MARK MANSFIELD ON CIA AND THE MEDIA

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• Publication Date: February 2, 2015

In Their Own Words
INTELLIGENCE OFFICERS REMEMBER
February 2015
Mark Mansfield on CIA and the Media
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GOOD NEWS IS NEWS:
MARK MANSFIELD ON CIA AND THE MEDIA
February 2015
1 cc kr-rr
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STUDY OF INTELLIGENCE
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Mission
Knowledge
Capture
Distribution
Recent
(U) The core mission of the Center for the Study of Intelligence (CSI) is to enhance
the operational, analytical, and administrative effectiveness of the CIA and the Intelli-
gence Community by creating knowledge and understanding of the lessons of the past,
by assessing current practices, and by preparing intelligence officers and their orga-
nizations for future challenges. As the home of CIA's History Staff, Lessons Learned
program, Oral History program, and Emerging Trends program, CSI initiates studies
of issues, programs, operations, business practices, and events to identify practices that
can be shared and applied to future activities.
(UHFOU0) To support its work, CSI publishes Studies in Intelligence, books, mono-
graphs, documentary films, and web-based content addressing historical, operational,
doctrinal, and theoretical aspects of the intelligence profession. It also administers the
CIA Museum and maintains the Agency's Historical Intelligence Collection. The center
is also the executive agent for managing the Intelligence Community's Lesson Learned
and Strategic Studies Programs.
(U//FOU0) CSI promotes the retention and sharing of corporate knowledge and
the preservation of CINs institutional memory. The Oral History Program, often in
connection with CIA's Career Transition Program, collects, documents and preserves
the experience and tacit knowledge of Agency and Intelligence Community officers
through recorded interviews and written recollections. Those wishing to volunteer to
contribute to CSI knowledge-capture efforts or to ask questions about the effort may
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(u) Recent CSI "In Their Own Words" monourauhs include.
Contact (U) Readers may direct questions about this study to the CSI production staff via
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The director of CSI may be reached on
In Their 0 ords 'vary 2015)
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Preface
CIA public affairs specialist Mark Mansfield,
who served 31 years until his retirement in July
2013, died on 21 January 2015. Early in his career,
he served in the Foreign Broadcast Information
Service and the Directorate of Intelligence. Mans-
field was, however, best known for his service as a
public affairs officer, working in one such capacity
or another for every director from William Casey
to Leon Panetta. His last assignment was as a CIA
officer in residence at Miami University in Florida.
When he wasn't teaching, Mansfield was writ-
ing and doing research with the aim of furthering
knowledge and understanding of the intelligence
profession throughout the Intelligence Community
(IC) and academia. For the CSI-produced journal
Studies in Intelligence, Mansfield interviewed former
Director of CIA (DCIA) Michael Hayden and pub-
lished an important review of Spinning Intelligence,
a collection of essays about the interrelationship
of intelligence and journalism. In it, Mansfield
demonstrated his sensitivity to the sometimes
conflicting, sometimes overlapping, goals of the two
professions.
Following the announcement of Mansfield's death,
a number of newspaper articles appeared�some
written by intelligence professionals with whom he
served, including former DCIA Hayden, who in his
Washington Times remembrance of 29 January ob-
served that Mansfield's "passing is being mourned
as much by the Fourth Estate as it is by the National
Clandestine Service:'
"Therein lies a lesson:' Hayden continued. "There
are unarguable structural tensions between an
enterprise, espionage, that relies on secrecy for
its success and another, journalism, that succeeds
only by ferreting out the unknown. Despite that,
eir 0 ci, (February 015)
Mark never saw this as a battle between the forces
of light and the forces of darkness:' Hayden added
that Mansfield "was a happy warrior...but, happy
or not, he was indeed a warrior... [who] was fierce
in defending the agency when he felt it was being
unfairly attacked."
In a time when CIA and IC professionals are
thinking so fondly of his achievements and rare set
of skills, CSI has decided to publish the following
work, which Mansfield prepared in late 2013 as part
of the CIA Career Transition Program's "knowledge
capture" effort, in which retiring officers extend
their transition periods to record, orally or in writ-
ing, career experiences and perspectives that might
be valuable for historical or operational reasons.
One product of the program is CSI's "In Their Own
Words" series, first-person accounts of the experi-
ences of Agency officers.
The following, virtually unedited, manuscript will
demonstrate that Mansfield had given to intelli-
gence officers and our profession the kind of love,
affection, and respect that his family is now re-
ceiving from the many who worked with him over
those 31 years. Though Mansfield could not know
his essay would serve this purpose, in a sense it
can be seen as a fond farewell to a beloved profes-
sion. Beyond that, and in keeping with the knowl-
edge-capture effort, it also makes an important
contribution to the understanding of the kinds of
issues public affairs specialists and leaders of intel-
ligence organizations will inevitably face in dealing
with the Fourth Estate.
�Peter Usowski
Director, Center for the Study of Intelligence
Central Intelligence Agency
2 February 2015
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Contents
GOOD NEWS IS NEWS:
MARK MANSFIELD ON CIA AND THE MEDIA 1
A Little History 3
Heroes 5
Bob Barron 5
Tony Mendez 6
Jeanne Vertefeuille 7
John Guilsher 8
Eloise Page 10
The Kasi Arrest 10
Defying Stereotypes 12
Cases in point 12
Informed Commentary 13
Vindication 16
The "Dark Alliance" Series 16
17
Brian Kelley 19
Leaning Forward 20
Jose Rodriguez
� � �
In Their Ow ds (Fe u ry 015)
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All portions of this document are UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY.
GOOD NEWS IS NEWS:
MARK MANSFIELD ON CIA AND THE MEDIA
"You [CIA officers] are often the first ones to get the blame
when things go wrong, and you're always the last ones to get
the credit when things go right. So when things do go right�and
they do more often than the world will ever know�we ought to
celebrate your success. . . That's why I came here."
These were the words of President Barack Obama,
who made his third visit to CIA Headquarters on 20
May 2011, less than three weeks after the successful
raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan, that led to the death
of Usama Bin Ladin.
The news coverage of the CIM role in the raid
was, arguably, the most positive in the Agency's
more than 60 years of existence. Among the lau-
datory media reports on the president's Langley
visit was a Washington Post web article headlined,
"Obama Praises CIA Workers' Role in Bin Laden
Killing" and a Wall Street Journal story headlined,
"Obama to CIA: 'I Put My Bet on You."
Regarding that wager, of sorts, numerous news
organizations reported President Obama's subse-
quent comment: "Now the whole world realizes
that that faith in you was justified." The Bin Ladin
operation, he said (and the Post reported), was "one
of the greatest intelligence successes in American
history." He added that intelligence professionals
would "study and be inspired by" this achievement
for "generations to come
Concluding his remarks that day by reminding the
workforce that they "won't get ticker-tape parades,"
eir Own (F:.ebruary 015)
The president added, "I hope you understand how
important [your work] is, how grateful I am, and
that you have the thanks of a grateful nation."
President Obama had expressed this sentiment
before, both publicly and privately, including when
he visited the Agency for the first time in April
2009. In a comment that wasn't replayed extensively
in the press, he said, "When you succeed, as you so
often do, that success usually has to stay secret. So
you don't get credit when things go good, but you
sure get some blame when things don't:'
"Amen," an employee shouted.
"I got an 'amen' corner out there the president
replied, provoking laughter and applause.
There have been many instances over the years
when the CIA has been criticized publicly, and jus-
tifiably, for its performance, including involvement
in the Iran-contra affair in the 1980s, the flawed esti-
mate regarding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq,
counterintelligence failures and major espionage
cases, and the lack of actionable intelligence that
conceivably could have prevented the 9/11 attacks.
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There also have been withering criticisms of the
Agency for the terrorist detention and interrogation
program, particularly the use of enhanced interroga-
tion techniques that have been branded by some as
torture. And questions continue to be raised about
the appropriateness of the Intelligence Community's
technical collection programs aimed at thwarting
terrorist attacks. Much of the reporting in these
stories�which frequently appear on the front pages
of newspapers or at the top of newscasts�has been
shallow, misguided, exaggerated, or flat out wrong.
Far too often, the press tends to focus on what are
labeled intelligence failures and what is wrong with
CIA, equating neg-
ativity and contro-
versy with news-
worthiness. Former
CIA Director Mi-
chael Hayden, for
whom I served as
director of public
affairs from mid-
2006 to early 2009,
has described it as an "impulse to drag anything CIA
does to the darkest corner of the room," making it
very difficult for the Agency to do its vital work.
An unnamed retired case officer was quoted in a
2009 Daily Beast article as saying, "We've gone from
chasing the bad guys to being portrayed as the bad
guys ourselves." (Actually, that had been the case for
decades, with movies, TV sitcoms, and spy novels
often depicting CIA "agents" as crazed assassins or
buffoons.)
In a January 2010 op-ed piece after the suicide
bombing in Khowst, Afghanistan, that killed seven
CIA employees the previous December, former
case officer Art Keller wrote, "Although the CIA's
work is instrumental to keeping America safe...
it has evolved into the perennial whipping boy of
US popular culture and mass media. Even when
we celebrate another al-Wida or Taliban operative
killed or captured, so often thanks to the CIA, those
successes are taken for granted.
2
During my CIA career�most of it in the Office
of Public Affairs�I have seen many things go
right, and it is a tribute to the outstanding people
throughout the Agency who have served with
such distinction, courage, devotion, and integrity.
"Meanwhile, when something goes wrong at the
Agency, the public response is never, 'Maybe we
should cut them a little slack: Instead, the tone of
coverage is a relentless, shrill harping: 'How has
the agency screwed up this time, and when will the
newest round of investigations to "fix" the Agency
begin?"
Less than 18 months after the attack in Khowst,
the Agency received the unprecedented public rec-
ognition�and credit�for its role in taking down
Bin Ladin. It was, as the president said, a result of
perseverance, relentless focus, and determination
over many years. And it spoke volumes about the
quality of the
people who work
at CIA.
During my CIA
career�most of
it in the Office of
Public Affairs�I
have seen many
things go right, and
it is a tribute to the outstanding people throughout
the Agency who have served with such distinction,
courage, devotion, and integrity. Moreover, they
have served with passion and compassion.
Since the print and broadcast media tend to focus
on "bad news"�including real and perceived intel-
ligence failures�it is easy to lose sight of the many
positive, uplifting stories that have been written
or aired about the Agency and its people over the
years. The successful Bin Ladin raid is probably
the first one that comes to mind for the well over
60 percent of the workforce that joined the Agency
after 9/11, but there have been many other suc-
cesses, and they merit discussion here. In addition,
there have been many examples of thoughtful
media commentary on intelligence issues, partic-
ularly when the Agency was the subject of severe
criticism. And there have been several instances
in which the CIA or Agency officers have been
vindicated after the mainstream media rushed to
judgment.
In Their Own VVords (February 2015)
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A Little History
Since its inception in the fall of 1947, CIA has had
a capability to deal with the press. But for the first
30 years of the Agency's existence, that capability
was decidedly low-key. It was basically a one-man
show, and occasionally a director of central intel-
ligence (DCI) would also engage the press on a
specific issue�usually for damage control reasons.
A formal public affairs office was not created at the
Agency until 1977, when Admiral Stansfield Turner,
President Carter's selection as DCI, brought Her-
bert Hetu, a career Navy public affairs officer, over
to the Agency.a
Hetu, a savvy
public affairs pro,
arrived at CIA
with ideas that
many Agency
veterans viewed
as heretical,
including allowing a network camera crew to film
in the CIA Operations Center for the first time ever.
Truth be told, the prevailing view throughout the
Agency, and particularly in the clandestine service,
was that the best way to deal with the press was not
to deal with them and the best comment was a "no
comment." Indeed, Hetu, who passed away in 2003,
believed that some CIA officers "looked upon him
as something approaching a traitor:' according to
Ronald Kessler's book, Inside the CIA.
Hetu did not claim to know a lot about the intelli-
gence business, wrote Kessler, but "he simply had a
gut feeling that the CIA could be doing a better job
in the press area:'
a. According to the author of a forthcoming history of CIA's
media relations efforts, CIA has had a designated press rela-
tions officer, and sometimes two, since May 1951, though the
person's title was usually "assistant to the director." Before the
formation of a formal office to handle press relations in 1977,
individual DCIs, from Hoyt Vandenberg through William Colby,
dealt directly on dozens of occasions with individual reporters
and their bosses to control damage, promote positive stories,
swap gossip, and collect information. More often than not, the
CIA press officer was not involved.� Center for
the Study of Intelligence.
eir Own (F:.ebruary 015)
Webster. . . believed one of his most important
responsibilities was to help restore public trust
and confidence in the Agency in the wake of Iran-
contra.
There is a misperception that former Director
William Casey (1981-87) totally dismantled the
public affairs apparatus after he was chosen by
President Reagan to succeed Turner in 1981. It
is true that he did some restructuring and scaled
some things back a bit, and he appointed a career
clandestine service officer, George Lauder, to be the
director of public affairs.
But CIA spokespersons dealt with the press regu-
larly during the Casey era. The Agency frequently
gave unclassified background briefings to reporters,
particularly those
heading to, or
returning from,
assignments over-
seas as correspon-
dents. Moreover,
Casey gave public
speeches and, on
occasion, conversed with reporters he respected.
Communicating with the public wasn't his top
priority or his strongest attribute, for sure, but he
understood the need to do it.
Judge William Webster (1987-91), who had been
FBI director and was nominated by President Rea-
gan to become DCI in 1987, was the first director
with whom I worked fairly closely, as one of his
speechwriters from 1987 to 1989 and then as an
Agency spokesman.
Webster, who brought with him William Baker
from the Bureau to head up public affairs at CIA,
believed one of his most important responsibilities
was to help restore public trust and confidence in
the Agency in the wake of Iran-contra. In an inter-
view, Webster told author Kessler that besides the
president, he saw the press and Congress as his two
most important constituencies. "As Webster would
state, it was all part of keeping the Agency account-
able and remembering that it was there to serve the
American people Kessler wrote.
3
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And Baker,
Kessler wrote,
worked to establish
credibility with
a skeptical clan-
destine service.
CC
There is a lot you
do that we can talk
about:' Baker told operations officers. "The image
that many Americans have of you, particularly after
Iran-contra, is not very positive. There are ways we
can work on that and improve public opinion and
still be credible:'
According to Kessler, Baker was at CIA to help
"market" the Agency, and to let the public know that
it does do good things. Baker, who was well respect-
ed by reporters and had earned the respect of Agen-
cy insiders, returned to the FBI in 1989 to become
assistant director for criminal investigations. After
retiring from the Bureau, he joined the Motion Pic-
ture Association of America (MPAA), and eventual-
ly became the MPAs president and chief operating
officer before stepping down in 2000.
During his confirmation hearings in 1991,
DCI-designate Robert Gates expressed his desire
to continue Webster's policies of making more
material about CIA available to the general public
and promoting openness "to the extent possible."
Shortly after taking office, he asked Director of Pub-
lic Affairs Joseph DeTrani (who also had served in
the clandestine service), to appoint a task force on
greater openness. The task force had a tight dead-
line, reporting back to Gates in a month.
�
4
Among the task force's more than 20
recommendations was the suggestion to pitch
more stories to the news media that highlighted
the contributions of individual CIA employees.
�
The press had
a field day when
they learned that
the openness task
force report was
originally classified
"secret:' but, as
comical as it might
have appeared, there were reasons: it was a deliber-
ative document and, more important, it contained
the names of journalists who agreed to sit down
with the task force and offer their views on how the
Agency could be more open. They had been prom-
ised confidentiality. The report was declassified in
1992 (with the names of the journalists redacted).
Among the task force's more than 20 recommen-
dations was the suggestion to pitch more stories
to the news media that highlighted the contribu-
tions of individual CIA employees. The goal was to
"personalize" and "humanize" the Agency�to let
Americans know that CIA officers were ordinary
people doing extraordinary things on their behalf
and to tell these stories without revealing state
secrets, of course.
This recommendation, and others approved by
Gates, resulted in numerous stories over the years
that have given the American public a better appre-
ciation for intelligence and a better understanding
of the people who make intelligence work happen.
So in the section that follows, I will recount a few of
these stories with the hope they will be inspiring to
future generations of CIA officers.
+
In Their Own Words Fe 'vary 2015)
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Heroes
Bob Barron
On 16 December 2009, Charlie Gibson's last night
as the anchor of ABC's World News Tonight, he
singled out two people he met during a more than
40-year career in journalism, calling them "extraor-
dinary heroes"
The first was Bob Barron, a former CIA disguise
specialist who, after retiring from the Agency 1993,
started a second career, using his extraordinary
skills to help burn
victims or others who
had been disfigured
in accidents or by
illnesses.
During a 2002 inter-
view on ABC's Prime-
time, Gibson asked
Barron, "In simple
terms, you build them
new faces?"
"I build them new
faces:' Barron replied.
"Ears... .hands. I can
rebuild hands"
The idea of going from designing disguises
to designing prosthetic devices occurred
to him . . . while attending a biomedical
sculptors' conference. . . . He was there
to find out if the private sector had
any new materials to offer for disguise
creation. . . . Instead, he discovered what
he wanted to do after he retired from the
Agency.
In another interview, Barron said the idea of going
from designing disguises to designing prosthetic
devices occurred to him in 1983, while attending a
biomedical sculptors' conference in New York. He
was there to find out if the private sector had any
new materials to offer for disguise creation.
Instead, he discovered what he wanted to do after
he retired from the Agency. "I thought to myself,
'Bob, if you can change someone's identity, you
could certainly give back a disfigured person's iden-
tity by designing prosthetics"'
So a decade later, when he retired, Barron began
designing prosthetic ears, eyes, noses, and full-face
eir 0 ci, (February 015)
masks for burn patients, as well as people who had
birth defects or had suffered debilitating illness-
es. He was profiled in newspapers and magazines
across the country, and interviewed on Oprah,
Mon tel, The O'Reilly Factor, and documentaries for
the Discovery Channel and National Geographic.
I recently caught up with Barron, 71, who is still at
it, running Custom Prosthetic Designs Inc. out of a
small office in Ash-
burn, Virginia. While
many of his patients
are young children,
he recently made an
ear for a 93-year-old
cancer survivor. And
while he can't help ev-
ery patient who comes
his way because of the
nature and extent of
disfigurement, he says
he can and does help
95 percent of them.
"God gave me this
gift," Barron said, noting that he has designed pros-
thetic devices for over 1,000 patients since he began
his second career. "I don't make a fortune off of
someone's misfortune, but I get a great satisfaction
in changing that person's life and making that per-
son whole again. There is no better feeling. I mean,
who are we if we're not helping someone?"
In several interviews, he cited as one of his most
memorable cases helping a beautiful Pakistani
woman, Zahidi Parveen, who had been horrifically
mutilated by her husband in an unfounded, jealous
rage. After brutally beating her, the husband cut
off most of her ears and sliced off her nose with a
5
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straight razor, and then gouged out her eyes with a
metal rod. He left her for dead.
Although she survived the devastating injuries,
Zahidi was greatly distressed by her little children
screaming when they saw her disfigured face.
According to an article in a medical journal, Zahi-
di was flown from Pakistan to the United States in
2001 for treatment. Barron worked closely with two
surgeons who fabricated the eyes and the skeletal
foundation of the nose, and he then fabricated her
nose and ears. Though she was still blind, she re-
turned to Pakistan content that her children wanted
to hug her again.
Barron says each of his patients has their own story,
and many tell him they don't know how to begin to
thank him. "You already have," he tells them. "Just
look at that smile. Your smile is thanks enough:'
Tony Mendez
In 1997, to help commemorate CIA's 50th anni-
versary, an Agency steering committee selected 50
"Trailblazers," CIA officers from the Agency's incep-
tion to the present who had taken the organization
in important new directions and helped shape its
history.
Bill Harlow, who several months before had been
selected public affairs director by DCI George Tenet
after holding key communications posts in the
Navy and at the White House, thought it would be a
wonderful idea to tell some of their stories publicly
and let the American people know these men and
women who had done terrific things for America.
"Can we declassify some of these stories?" Harlow
asked. "You must be new here," was the response he
got from the recalcitrant bureaucracy.
Eventually, after seeking and receiving Tenet's
strong endorsement, Harlow was authorized to tell
the story of a "Trailblazer" named Antonio "Tony"
Mendez. Seventeen years earlier, Mendez, a disguise
specialist, had exfiltrated six US diplomats, posing
as a production crew for a phony sci-fi movie, out
of Iran during the hostage crisis.
Mendez, at the Agency's urging, did numerous
press interviews in connection with the CIA anni-
versary and in 2000 wrote Master of Disguise: My
Secret Life in the CIA.
But he became known to millions of Americans
when Argo, a movie based on the rescue, was
6
released in 2012 and in February 2013 received the
Academy Award for Best Picture.
Ben Affleck, who directed the movie and played
Mendez, has praised the CIA at every opportu-
nity in media interviews, noting that the Agency
allowed him to film several scenes at Headquarters.
(This was one of the latest of the Agency's efforts�
begun in earnest in the mid-1990s with the hiring
of a liaison with the entertainment industry�to
assist moviemakers interested in portraying the
Agency accurately.)a
Although Mendez, now 73, received the Intelli-
gence Star, "he never got [public] credit," Affleck said
in one press interview. "Nobody ever knew about it.
And one of the things I wanted to do with this movie
is hold him up and say, 'This is an American here
When Affleck appeared on The O'Reilly Factor,
the provocative Bill O'Reilly said facetiously, "This
is a valentine from Ben Affleck to the Intelligence
Community....the same people who waterboarded,
the same people who renditioned."
Without missing a beat, Affleck responded, "I have
been to the CIA.... These are extraordinary, honor-
able people at the CIA. Make no mistake about it"
Mendez, asked by ABC's George Stephanopoulos
what he would like audiences to glean from Argo,
a. For the CIA Chief Historian's reviews of the book and movie,
see David Robarge, "Operation Argo in Book and Film," Studies
in Intelligence 57, No. 1 (March 2013).
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said he hopes the takeaway is a movie in which CIA
officers are not portrayed as "deranged assassins:'
"The fact is we are human beings, and we have
families, and we go out to a job every day like most
people he said. "And we prevail."
Asked how well Affleck portrayed him, Mendez
deadpanned, "He was OK. He's not good looking
enough:'
Jeanne Vertefeuille
In a tribute to Jeanne Vertefeuille, who died in
December 2012 after a valiant battle with cancer,
journalist Rupert Cornwell wrote that when it
comes to espionage, life has a habit of imitating
art. He likened Vertefeuille, who knew as much
about the KGB as anyone in the building, to Connie
Sachs, the unsung researcher who helped catch a
Soviet mole in John le Carre's 1974 novel Tinker,
Tailor, Soldier, Spy.
Long after she
retired from the
Agency, Ver-
tefeuille could
be seen around
the building in
her trademark
turtlenecks and
tennis shoes,
still working
on counterintelligence issues as a contractor and
imparting wisdom to succeeding generations of
CIA officers.
She was, says her close friend and colleague
Sandy Grimes, "one of the most private people you
can ever, ever imagine:' And Vertefeuille would
"faint" if she knew The New York Times had writ-
ten an obituary on her, Grimes said in a poignant
Washington Post interview that appeared later and
chronicled their long friendship and professional
relationship.
Those articles, and others, highlighted Verte-
feuille's legacy�starting at the CIA as a typist in
1954, developing expertise on counterintelligence
and Soviet/East Bloc affairs, serving as a chief of
eir 0 ci, (February 015)
After Ames pled guilty and was sentenced to
life in prison, it was decided in /995 by Agency
management that Vertefeuille, Grimes, and other
members of the team could do select press
interviews.
station in Africa, and then leading a task force
whose tenacity led to the 1994 arrest of Aldrich
Ames. Ames' espionage for Soviet (and later Rus-
sian) intelligence over a nine-year period led to the
deaths of numerous CIA assets and compromised a
myriad of sensitive of Agency operations.
Grimes and Vertefeuille co-authored a book
published in 2012, shortly before Vertefeuille died,
entitled, Circle of
Treason: A CIA
Account of Trai-
tor Aldrich Ames
and the Men He
Betrayed.
In the preface,
they discussed
not only what
motivated them
to write the book but also what prompted them to
participate in numerous media interviews, be-
ginning in 1995, on the case. "All of our contacts
with the media stem from a project conceived by
the Agency to tell its side of the Ames story:' they
wrote. "After Ames was arrested in February 1994,
the FBI, as is customary for that organization,
launched a campaign to let the public know of their
success. In the Agency's view, the decisive CIA
contribution to this roll-up was getting lost:' (The
FBI didn't join the mole hunt until 1991, when the
Agency enlisted the Bureau's help.)
In a 1994 interview with CIA's What's News, Kent
Harrington, the Agency's director of public affairs
when Ames was arrested, said there were strict con-
straints on what the Agency could say publicly so
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that the prosecution could be pursued successfully.
"The director [R. James Woolsey] took this serious-
ly, senior officers in the Agency took this seriously,
and so did we in public affairs?'
Harrington, in an interview for a book that came
out in 2012 entitled The CIA in Hollywood, said the
Ames story was
"devastating"
to public per-
ceptions of the
Agency. He add-
ed that the case
was an "especially
significant blow"
because it coin-
cided with the growing public perception that CIA
was no longer needed in a post-Cold War world.
After Ames pled guilty and was sentenced to
life in prison, it was decided in 1995 by Agency
management that Vertefeuille, Grimes, and other
members of the team could do select press inter-
views on: CIA operations against the Soviet target;
the damage caused by Ames' espionage; and the
investigative efforts that led to his identification as a
Soviet mole.
"Initially this project made us quite uneasy
because we are of the old school and had been
indoctrinated that one was to avoid the media at all
costs:' they wrote. "Later we became more comfort-
able with the idea?'
In Circle of Treason, Vertefeuille wrote that in a
debriefing after Ames' arrest, Ames said that when
"At first I wanted to jump across the table and
strangle him [Ames]," she wrote. "But then I started
laughing. It really was funny, because he was the
one in shackles, not me."
KGB officials asked him in 1985 for the name of a
CIA officer whom they might plausibly frame for
the assets who were being rolled up (and it became
clear there was a mole), he gave them her name.
"At first I wanted to jump across the table and
strangle him:' she wrote. "But then I started laugh-
ing. It really was
funny, because
he was the one in
shackles, not me."
As devastating
as the Ames case
was, the fact of
the matter is that
he was caught
and justice was done. After the damage assessment
was completed, then DCI John Deutch (1995-96)
said the assessment, in all of its detail, "does noth-
ing to shake my conviction that we need a clandes-
tine service?'
"Of all the intelligence disciplines, human in-
telligence is, indeed, the most subject to human
frailty, but it also brings human intuition, ingenuity,
and courage into play against the enemies of our
country:' Deutch said in a statement issued publicly.
"Often there is no other way to penetrate a terror-
ist cell or a chemical weapons factory or the inner
circle of a tyrant. At critical times human intelli-
gence has allowed our leaders to deal with the plans
and intentions�rather than the weapons�of our
enemies?'
John Guilsher
According to a "Washington Whispers" piece in
US News and World Report, receiving a "Trailblaz-
er" award at CIA is akin to "getting into the Spook
Hall of Fame?'
A posthumous recipient of the award in the fall of
2009 was John Guilsher, a legendary CIA case officer
who had died the previous year. According to a
8
Washington Post obituary by Matt Schudel, Guilsher's
exploits in Moscow were "among the most remark-
able episodes in the history of the Cold War?'
Five times from January 1977 to February 1998,
the obituary stated, a Soviet engineer named Adolf
Tolkachev had tried to make contact with the CIA,
offering information on Soviet aircraft and weap-
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ons systems. Initially, the Agency thought he was a
dangle and didn't respond to his entreaties, which
included pounding on the chief of station's car.
Tolkachev made one more desperate effort, writ-
ing in an 11-page letter that if he were spurned this
time, he would give up.
At that point, the
station chief as-
signed Guilsher to
make contact with
him. Guilsher and
his wife, Catherine,
had been posted in
Moscow for only a
few months and were "living in the fishbowl that
was life for a [case officer] during the Cold \Ake
according to a lengthy "Lives to Remember" piece
by Michael Ruane that appeared in The Post in
January 2009. Their apartment was bugged with
microphones and cameras, they were under almost
constant surveillance, and even their dog had been
drugged so the KGB could search the apartment.
The first telephone contact with Tolkachev was
made in March 1978, when Guilsher called him
from a public telephone during the intermission of
a ballet performance at the Bolshoi Theater. Guilsh-
er's wife played an indispensable role, distracting a
female KGB "minder" so he could vanish and place
the call. Within minutes, having accomplished the
mission, he was back in his seat.
Indicative of the incredibly difficult operating
environment, Guilsher's and Tolkachev's first face-
to-face meeting did not occur until New Year's Day,
1979.
The engineer proved to be one of the CINs most
valuable assets inside the Soviet Union. Guilsh-
er handled the relationship with great skill and
extraordinary tradecraft. Described as smart, cool,
dependable, and good on the street, Guilsher also
happened to be a master of disguise, The Post re-
ported.
eir Own (F:.ebruary 015)
The engineer proved to be one of the CIA's
most valuable assets inside the Soviet Union.
Guilsher handled the relationship with great
skill and extraordinary tradecraft.
In an unclassified account in Studies in Intelligence
of Guilsher's activities in Moscow, former CIA
operations officer Barry Royden wrote that Guilsher
might drive to the US Embassy for a dinner engage-
ment and then leave through a back door and climb
into another car. "While still in the car:' Royden
wrote, Guilsher "changed out of his western clothes
and made himself
look as much as
possible like a typ-
ical, working-class
Russian by putting
on a Russian hat
and working-class
clothes, taking a
heavy dose of garlic, and splashing some vodka on
himself." He then would ride subways and buses to
his secret meetings�returning to the embassy and
exiting the front door in a suit and tie.a
Guilsher and Tolkachev met more than a doz-
en times before the case officer left Moscow for
another assignment in mid-1980. The Post quoted
Royden's assertion in his official account that the
information Tolkachev provided on Soviet weapons
"could have meant the difference between victory
and defeat, should a military confrontation with the
USSR have occurred."
This remarkable story did not have a happy ending
for Tolkachev. Although he continued to meet with
CIA case officers until early 1985, he was identified
to Soviet authorities by disgruntled CIA officer Ed-
ward Lee Howard and was executed by the Soviets
in 1986.
Like Vertefeuille, Guilsher continued to work at
CIA as a contractor long after he retired, consulting
on Russian affairs and inspiring young officers. At
the 2009 Trailblazer ceremony for Guilsher, which
was attended by his widow and children, then CIA
Director Leon Panetta (2009-2011) said Guilsher
was "a rare combination of careful planner and
audacious operator."
a. See Barry Royden, "An Exceptional Espionage Operation
Tolkachev, A Worthy Successor to Penkovsky," Studies in Intelli-
gence 47 No. 3 (September 2003). (The article is unclassified.)
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Eloise Page
Eloise Page, a case officer and the Agency's first
female supergrade, was at one point in her career
selected by CIA officials to head a new division on
technology, to be called the "Scientific Operations
Branch," according to an account of her life in The
Los Angeles Times.
According to
James Pavitt, the
former depu-
ty director for
operations who
spoke at her
funeral service in
Georgetown in
2002, Page declined, saying, "I'll be damned if I'll
be the chief SOB" So, The Times reported, Agency
officials changed the name, and Page "broke yet
another barrier in the CIA's glass ceiling:'
She was, Pavitt said, the "perfect southern lady
whose proper exterior allowed her to serve her
country in the not always nice world of espionage:'
Even after retiring from the Agency in 1987, Page
provided counterterrorism training to analysts and
operations officers at the Defense Intelligence
College.
Page, who like Mendez was one of the original 50
"Trailblazers," started her career as Major General
William "Wild Bill" Donovan's secretary in the OSS
and went on to become the CIA's first female chief
of station in 1978. It was in Greece, three years after
terrorists had assassinated Richard Welch, the chief
of station there.
"It was a rough
assignment," The
Times reported.
"She thrived:'
The assignment
in Athens height-
ened her interest
in counterterrorism, and she became a top expert
on the issue. Even after retiring from the Agency
in 1987, she provided counterterrorism training
to analysts and operations officers at the Defense
Intelligence College.
When Page died at the age of 82, Director George
Tenet said, "From her earliest days of service with
OSS, she was a source of inspiration to others. She
will be forever:'
The Kasi Arrest
For several years, head of the
DCI's CounterTerrorist Center, kept Aimal Kasi's
"Wanted" poster on his office door.
"It was a reminder we would not stop looking for
him," said
On 17 June 1997, then Acting DCI Tenet and FBI
Deputy Director William Esposito announced the
arrest of Kasi, who four and a half years earlier had
murdered two CIA employees and wounded three
others in a morning rush hour attack outside CIA
Headquarters.
In a horrific shooting spree that stunned the
American public and was front-page news through-
10
out the nation, Kasi stepped out of his vehicle with
an AK-47 and shot the employees point-blank in
their cars as they waited at a red light to make a left
turn from Route 123 onto the Headquarters com-
pound.
Those of us headed to work at Headquarters that
morning, and countless others, will never forget
that day.
President Bill Clinton, who visited CIA in Janu-
ary 1994, noted in his remarks that stars had been
carved into the memorial wall for Dr. Lansing
Bennett and Frank Darling, the two Agency officers
slain in the attack. "I want to say again personally
how much I admire the service that they gave, the
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sorrow and anger we all felt and continue to feel
about this outrageous act:' he told the workforce�
and the nation.
Clinton added, "These [memorial] stars remind us
that the battle lines of freedom need not be thou-
sands of miles away, but can be right here in the
midst of our communities with our families and
friends:'
The tragic events
of 25 January 2003
produced heroic
actions, includ-
ing those of CIA
analyst
who was
in the lead car at
the stoplight when Kasi began his shooting spree.
Despite being shot twice in the shoulder, he sped to
the main gate in an effort to warn security person-
nel of the attack, before _passing out. According
to then DCI Woolsey quick action helped
prevent further bloodshed and hastened the arrival
of first responders to the scene. In November 1993,
he was awarded the Intelligence Star.
When Kasi was finally apprehended in Pakistan�
after a long and often frustrating hunt�FBI Deputy
Director Esposito said the success of the investiga-
tion was primarily due to the dedication of the men
and women of the CIA and FBI.
When Kasi was finally apprehended in
Pakistan. . . FBI Deputy Director Esposito said
the success of the investigation was primarily due
to the dedication of the men and women of the
CIA and FBI.
In remarks that were reported widely, Tenet said,
"We have always kept the faith and never wavered
in our commitment to find the individual charged
with this attack:'
"Today marks a clear triumph of good over evil:'
CIA marked Kasi's capture with an emotional,
standing-room only event in the "Bubble" that
day, featuring remarks by Tenet and other jubi-
lant Agency officials. Tenet asked staffers to play a
recording of Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA"
eir 0 ci, (February 015)
as the crowd filed out of the auditorium. "Wanted"
posters of Kasi with the word "Captured" stamped
on them in red bold letters could be seen through-
out the building.
The arrest also marked a turning point in relations
between the CIA and FBI, which had deteriorated
in the wake of the Ames case, according to Kessler
in another book,
The CIA at War.
He said some at
CIA had chafed at
post-Ames reforms
giving the FBI an
increased role in
counterintelligence
activities at the
Agency.
"Now, the FBI had arrested a man who had killed
two CIA employees:' Kessler wrote. In the Bubble,
the FBI agents who captured Kasi in Pakistan got
hugs and a standing ovation. (b)(3)
(b)(6)
Tenet and Esposito said in a joint written state-
ment that Kasi's apprehension "demonstrates that
terrorists have no refuge among civilized nations
and that we will mount a relentless pursuit to find
US fugitives and bring them to justice no matter
where they may hide:'
At the end of the statement, Esposito thanked the
families of the victims "for their patience and faith"
in the investigators and the investigation. "You nev-
er lost hope and we never gave up," he said.
Kasi was found guilty of capital murder in No-
vember 1997 and sentenced to death. He was exe-
cuted by lethal injection at Greensville Correctional
Center in Jarratt, Virginia, in November 2002.a
a. The story of the hunt for and capture of Kasi is told in
CSI, story
Staff: 2012) (Classified S//NF). A classified documentary film
with the same title is available in video-on-demand, dated 18
March 2013.
(b)(3)
(b)(6)
(b)(3)
(b)(6)
11
(b)(3)
(b)(6)
(b)(3)
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Defying Stereotypes
As was the case with the Route 123 shootings,
there were some heartbreaking stories over the
years that "humanized" the Agency. These stories
not only shed some light on courageous Agency of-
ficers who died in the line of duty, but they also in-
spired many Americans and reminded them of the
sacrifices and risks involved in intelligence work.
There also were news pieces which showed that
CIA employees, and their spouses, did much more
than skulk around, communicate covertly, and
operate in back alleys. Defying stereotypes and
countering misperceptions, CIA officers enjoyed
their families, contributed to their communities,
kept their perspective, and didn't take themselves
too seriously. And, on occasion, they could be as
creative and resourceful in their kitchens as on the
streets of a foreign capital.
Cases in point
The publication of a 1997 cookbook, Spies, Black
Ties, and Mango Pies, which included recipes
amassed by Stephanie Glakas-Tenet and other
members of the CIA's Family Advisory Board at the
time. The "spook cookbook," which was published
privately and sold out at more than 60,000 copies,
complemented each recipe with a funny (or har-
rowing) anecdote concerning the dish or some slice
of Agency life.
The cookbook received national publicity and was
so popular that a sequel, More Spies, Black Ties, and
Mango Pies, was published in 2009 with more than
200 recipes. The Washington Post reported that the
latest edition contained "entertaining yarns:' includ-
ing "scrounging for potatoes while being tailed" or
"what to do if the flambe sets a top [dinner] guest's
napkin on fire:"
Then there were the dozens of stories on James
Sanborn's 1990 encrypted sculpture "Kryptos"
(meaning hidden in Greek), including a live shot on
The Today Show. For years, reporters were intrigued
by efforts to break the code on the three-part piece,
the bulk of which was in the northwest corner of the
New Headquarters Building courtyard.
And it's hard to forget the groundbreaking, so to
speak, robotic solar powered lawnmowers that were
purchased and used by the Agency back in 1996
12
(very few had been sold in the United States at the
time). A Washington Post story noted that they were
acquired as part of CIA's "Innovation Activities
Program:' and the robotic devices could conceiv-
ably save the expense of lugging heavy lawn-mow-
ing equipment around and having security guards
supervise contracted groundskeepers.
Those of us in public affairs sometimes found it
puzzling, and amusing, that the media wanted to
focus on sculptures or then state-of-the-art garden-
ing devices, even though we knew they provided
great visuals for the broadcast media. But if it kept
the press from fixating on the latest Agency miscue
or transgression (actual or imagined), we weren't
going to complain.
There have been many other fun stories�even
ones that piqued the interest of newspaper readers
who first turn to the sports pages. One of my all-
time favorites was a November 2008 piece by Wash-
ington Post columnist Mike Wise, profiling one of
the Pittsburgh Steelers' most loyal fans, General
Michael Hayden.
The Steelers were in town for a game that Monday
evening, and the piece chronicled Hayden's affinity
for the team, noting that he had served as an equip-
ment manager in the early 1960s. Hayden wasn't
paid a salary, but each Christmas he would receive
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a check from the Rooney family, who owned the
Steelers, and that helped pay for his second semes-
ters at Duquesne University.
Similarly, I'll always remember the "local boy
makes good" stories that ran in the New York City
tabloids when Tenet, who as a teenager had worked
as a busboy in a Little Neck, Queens, diner along
with his twin brother Bill, was nominated by Clin-
ton to be DCI.
People enjoy reading feature stories like that
because they can relate to them. Stories like that can
and do change perceptions.
Less than a year ago, I read a story in The Mi-
ami Herald concerning CIA that certainly defied
stereotypes. It previewed an event that never would
have taken place when I started my Agency career
in 1982. The CIA would be holding its very first
recruiting and networking session for lesbian, gay,
bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) men and women
Informed Commentary
in South Beach. It's well known that CIA has had an
active LGBT organization since 1996, but the fact
that the Agency was cosponsoring a public event
with the Miami-Dade Gay & Lesbian Chamber of
Commerce got my attention. It proved that we have
come a long way, and made me even prouder of the
Agency.
In The Herald piece, Steve Adkins, the Miami
Chamber's president, said CIA had proposed the
event. "They want to make sure we know their
stories and, in addition, make people aware that
they're an open and inclusive employer," he said.
"Who knew?"a
About 50 potential applicants from the Miami
area attended the event.
a. On this subject, see also "From
the OSS to Today: The Evolving Status of LGBT Employees at
CIA," Studies in Intelligence 58, No. 1 (March 2014) (The article
is classified S//NE).
During the nearly two decades I served as an
Agency spokesman, I would sometimes character-
ize dealing with reporters as "the sport of the long
season:' If public affairs officers were to scream
every time an unflattering or unfair story were
written, they would lose their voices in short order.
And during the
course of one
flap or another,
if employees
were to comb the
"Media High-
lights" searching
for a positive
story, they would soon be pulling their hair out.
I had the opportunity to deal with many fine,
principled journalists in my career�people who
worked hard to get a story right and strived for
balance. They also performed a great public service
eir 0 ci, (February 015)
also knew a few reporters and editors who put
a premium on getting a story first rather than
necessarily getting it right, and who rarely let
national security concerns get in the way of a scoop.
and, in some cases, put their lives on the line to do
their jobs.
I also knew a few reporters and editors who put a
premium on getting a story first rather than neces-
sarily getting it right, and who rarely let national se-
curity concerns
get in the way of
a scoop.
In an interview
with me that ap-
peared in Studies
in Intelligence in
2010, former Di-
rector Hayden said he thought The New York Times'
decision in December 2005 to publish a story on
the terrorist surveillance program after holding it
for more than a year�was "irresponsible:' He also
thought The Times' June 2006 story on the SWIFT
program [for accessing international financial data]
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was irresponsible. I think Hayden is right, because
both stories impaired our ability as a nation to
counter terrorism.
It was during the hubbub surrounding the pub-
lication of the SWIFT story that Washington Post
columnist David Ignatius made an astute observa-
tion, mentioning that as a reporter and editor, he
had been "wrestling with different versions of the
national security conundrum" for nearly 30 years.
"We journalists usually try to argue that we have
carefully weighed the pros and cons and believe
that the public benefit of disclosure outweighs any
potential harm," he wrote. "The problem is that we
aren't fully qualified to make those judgments?'
Ignatius, in my view, has been and continues to
be the most thoughtful and well informed com-
mentator on CIA and intelligence matters. He also
happens to be one of the most gifted and prolific
spy novelists of his generation (he has written eight,
including Agents of Innocence and Body of Lies.)
While some bloggers claim he is soft on the
Agency, a careful look at his body of work over the
years suggests the opposite. In a 2004 column, for
instance, he wrote that the Agency could certainly
improve its performance, noting that it was "too
risk averse, too prone to groupthink, too mired in
mediocrity?'
He then added, "But the cure for these problems is
hardly to send in a team of ideologues from Capitol
Hill and drive out the Agency's most experienced
intelligence officers?'
Commenting in August 2009 on the CIA's "foray"
into the use of enhanced interrogation techniques,
Ignatius wrote, "CIA officers aren't idiots. They
knew they were heading into deep water�legally
and morally�when they signed up for the [ter-
rorist] interrogation program. That's part of the
Agency's ethos�doing the hard jobs that other
departments prudently avoid.
He continued, "Looking back, it's easy to say the
CIA officers should have refused the assignments
they suspected would come back to haunt them.
14
But questioning presidential orders really isn't their
job, especially when those orders are backed by
Justice Department legal opinions?'
In the midst of a 2009 furor over Congress not
being briefed until that time about a CIA program,
never fully operational, aimed at taking al-Qdida
terrorists off the street, Ignatius opined, "As other
countries watch the United States lacerate its intelli-
gence service�for activities already investigated or
never undertaken�perhaps they admire America's
commitment to democracy and the rule of law.
More likely, I fear, they conclude that we are just
plain nuts?'
Indeed, no one would accuse him of waffling on
the issue of what should, and shouldn't, merit con-
gressional notification. Soon after former Director
David Petraeus' affair became public in November
2012, as well as revelations concerning e-mails be-
tween a Tampa socialite and General John Allen (for
which Allen was ultimately exonerated), Ignatius
wrote, "Amazingly, many members of Congress
talk as if the real outrage here was that they weren't
informed earlier about the investigations of Petraeus
and Allen. 'We should have been told: said Dianne
Feinstein, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Com-
mittee, last Sunday. To which an observer might
respond vernacularly: Give me a break?'
Congress appropriates funds and has a legitimate
role in overseeing how it is spent, Ignatius wrote,
"but the idea that these scandals demonstrate the
need for greater congressional involvement in sen-
sitive investigations is preposterous?'
Writing recently about Edward Snowden's disclo-
sures of NSA programs aimed at thwarting terror-
ism, Ignatius said, "Intelligence collection relies on
the human fact that even smart [terrorists] do stu-
pid things; they forget how powerful and pervasive
the US systems are. That's why these surveillance
programs remain valuable?'
The leaks about NSA programs also were elo-
quently addressed by New York Times columnist
Thomas Friedman, who wrote, "I do wonder if
some of those who unequivocally defend this
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disclosure are behaving as if 9/11 never happened�
that the only thing we have to fear is government
intrusion in our lives, not the intrusion of those
who gather in secret cells in Yemen, Afghanistan
and Pakistan and plot how to topple our tallest
buildings or bring down US airliners with bombs
planted inside underwear, tennis shoes, or comput-
er printers?'
Friedman, one of the most insightful commenta-
tors around, added, "Yes, I worry about potential
government abuse of privacy from a program de-
signed to prevent another 9/11�abuse that, so far,
does not appear to have happened. But I worry even
more about another 9/11."
Not surprisingly, some of the most insightful
commentary on intelligence comes from former
CIA officers, because they speak from experience.
In a October 2012 Daily Beast column headlined,
"Stop the Libya Blame Game," former CIA analyst
Bruce Riedel wrote, "Policy and intelligence officials
routinely have to brief the public, the media, and
Congress on fast-breaking events about which they
typically have incomplete and often inaccurate early
accounts. Believe me, I've been there. Trying to dis-
cern who carried out a terrorist attack is especially
difficult?'
Former CIA officer Paul Pillar wrote in a Foreign
Policy column entitled "Don't Blame the Spies," after
US intelligence was criticized following the Arab
uprisings in 2011: "The public too often assumes
that the Intelligence Community is some sort of
eirO
uary 015)
Department of Avoiding Surprises and consequent-
ly blames it for every unexpected event?'
"How could anyone, for example, have expected
that a Tunisian street-cart vendor's self-immolation
would set the region ablaze?" he wrote. "It is utterly
impossible for the White House, intelligence ser-
vices, or anyone else to predict the timing of future
unrest.
He continued, "The events in question are not
the result of someone's secret plan, discoverable
through assiduous and skillful intelligence work."
Those who either criticize or endorse US foreign
policy decisions need to keep in mind what is
knowable and what is not, said Pillar. Much about
events unfolding in the Middle East is still unknow-
able, largely because it is unplanned, he wrote.
Pillar also put events in perspective�for the gen-
eral public and for CINs workforce�after Petraeus
resigned in November 2012. In a Foreign Policy
piece that made its way into the "Media Highlights,"
Pillar wrote that the CIA "will shake off this latest
turbulence and go about performing its mission?'
Scandals and controversies are, for the vast major-
ity of employees, "outside noise that has little or no
impact on their jobs:' he wrote.
"The latest scandal briefly provides a topic for wa-
ter-cooler conversation. And then people go back to
work."
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Vindication
A bad story about CIA�or any other organization or event, for that matter�gets
demonstrably worse when it has "legs," meaning that it captivates the media's
attention for weeks, months, or even longer.
The "Dark Alliance" Series
The Agency's public affairs office grappled with
quite a few stories with "legs" during my career.
One of the most harmful and corrosive was the
San Jose Mercury News' "Dark Alliance" three-part
series in August 1996. The series, authored by Gary
Webb, suggested that CIA supported efforts by the
Nicaraguan contras to bring cocaine into the Unit-
ed States to finance their operations, leading to a
crack cocaine epidemic in south central Los Ange-
les and inner cities across the nation.
The explosive allegations were fueled by the then
new Internet, guaranteeing a huge audience even
though the largest, most influential newspapers did
not pay a lot of attention to the story initially.
Despite strong Agency denials of the key allega-
tions, "Dark Alliance" created a furor, prompting
investigations by Congress, the Justice Department,
and the CIA's Office of the Inspector General (IG).
Within weeks, though, the mainstream media
began poking holes in the story, first in a Septem-
ber 1996 article by Tucker Carlson in The Weekly
Standard and then lengthy October pieces by The
Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, and The
New York Times.
Carlson's piece said "after a year of research, Webb
came up with no evidence to support his claim,"
while The Post "found that the available information
does not support the conclusion that the CIA-
backed contras�or Nicaraguans�played a major
16
role in the emergence of crack as a narcotic in wide-
spread use across the United States!'
While the tide was beginning to turn, there still
was great anger and consternation�particularly in
some predominantly African-American communi-
ties�about Webb's charges. Deutch, who was DCI
at the time, was so troubled by the allegations�and
their implications�that he accepted an invitation
from Rep. Juanita Millender-McDonald to appear
at a town hall meeting in the Watts neighborhood
of south Los Angeles in November 1996. Some of us
in public affairs didn't think it was a very good idea
to accept the invitation, but Deutch was determined
to do it.
In what The Los Angeles Times described as "a dra-
matic break with tradition for America's most secre-
tive government agency," Deutch told a "skeptical
and irate" audience of more than 800 local residents
that there would be a complete investigation into
the CIA-crack cocaine controversy.
According to CNN, which covered the event along
with other broadcast media, Deutch "had a hard
time keeping order and getting his points across!'
He was shouted down several times as he tried to
encourage anyone with evidence of a crack con-
spiracy to report it to the LAPD, the CIA IG, or
Congress.
"It is an appalling charge," Deutch said. "It goes to
the heart of this country. It cannot go unanswered,
In Their Own ords (February 2O1 5)
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that the CIA, an agency of U.S. government found-
ed to protect Americans, helped introduce drugs
and poison into our children and helped kill their
future. No one who heads a government agency can
let such an allegation stand."
By early 1997,
Jerry Ceppos, the
San Jose Mercury
News' executive
editor who up
until then had
strongly defended "Dark Alliance," changed his
tune. In March, he told Webb that a team of report-
ers and editors from the newspaper found serious
flaws in his reporting, and that the paper would
shortly publish a letter to readers acknowledging
the shortcomings.
On 11 May 1997, Ceppos published the front-page
column in the newspaper, saying the series "fell
short of my standards:' He criticized the stories
because they "strongly implied CIA knowledge" of
contra connections to US drug dealers who were
manufacturing crack cocaine. "We did not have
proof that top CIA officials knew of the relation-
ship," Ceppos said.
Ceppos concluded, "I believe we fell short at every
stage of our process�in the writing, editing, and
production of our work.... We have learned from
the experience and even are changing the way we
handle major investigations:'
Having lost confidence in Webb, Ceppos reas-
signed him from The Mercury News' Sacramento
bureau to a very small bureau in Cupertino, Cali-
fornia, far from his family. Webb eventually re-
signed.
"It is an appalling charge," Deutch said. "It goes to
the heart of this country. It cannot go unanswered."
In January
1998, as CIA's
IG neared
completion of a
17-month inves-
tigation that de-
bunked the central findings in the series, DCI Tenet
issued a public statement which received consid-
erable press play. "I must admit that my colleagues
and I are very concerned that the allegations made
have left an indelible impression in many Ameri-
cans' minds that the CIA was somehow responsible
for the scourge of drugs in our inner cities," he said.
"Unfortunately," he continued, "no investigation�
no matter how exhaustive�will completely erase
that false impression or undo the damage that has
been done.... That is one of the most unfortunate
aspects of all of this:'
Webb's life ended tragically in December 2004; the
Sacramento County Coroner's Office determined
the cause of death to be self-inflicted gunshot
wounds to the head. His ex-wife said he had been
distraught for some time over his inability to get a
job at another major newspaper, according to The
Sacramento Bee.
Jose Rodriguez
In a 31-year Agency career�virtually all of it
under cover�Jose Rodriguez made some life-and-
death decisions and dealt with more than his share
of thorny situations. But nothing compared with
what he faced in December 2007, when news broke
that he had in November 2005 ordered the destruc-
tion of CIA videotapes of terrorist interrogations.
In his 2012 book Hard Measures, which was written
with Bill Harlow, Rodriguez gave his side of the story.
eir 0 ci, (February 015)
The former head of the CounterTerrorist Center
and National Clandestine Service talked about why
enhanced interrogation techniques were employed
on hardened terrorists, the intelligence gleaned from
the program, why he ordered the videotapes' de-
struction, the firestorm that resulted when it became
public, and the impact it had on his life.
In Hard Measures, Rodriguez laid out his reason-
ing for giving the tape destruction order in 2005:
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He wanted to protect the identities of CIA officers
involved in the interrogations, and he had grown
weary of bureaucratic hand-wringing.
He made the decision, though, at great personal
cost. In the first 24 hours after the story appeared in
the national press, the late Senator Edward Ken-
nedy declared, "We haven't seen anything like this
since the 18-and-1/2-minute gap in the tapes of Pres-
ident Richard Nixon. What would cause the CIA to
take this action?" he asked on the Senate floor. "The
answer is obvious�cover up:'
Within weeks, the attorney general announced a
full-blown criminal investigation into the tapes' de-
struction, and John Durham was appointed special
prosecutor.
The media commentary about the matter was
uniformly condemnatory. "I never saw a single
[editorial] that was in any way supportive of the
action I had ordered:' Rodriguez wrote. "Of course,
the editorial writers had precious little information
on which to base their views, but it seemed infor-
mation was not a requirement before rushing to
judgment."
Suddenly, he found himself retired, under crimi-
nal investigation, and, except for his family, "feeling
pretty much alone."
"Don't get me wrong:' he wrote. "I got a lot of calls
of support from friends and former colleagues, but
I likened it to a funeral. Lots of people show up for
the service and express their sympathies, but then
they go home or back to work and get on with their
lives. Only the next of kin are left to deal with their
sense of enormous loss:'
Potential employers, he said, became "vague, dis-
tant, or noncommittal:'
On 9 November 2010�five years to the day after
the videotapes were destroyed and nearly three
years after the special prosecutor's investigation
18
began�the Department of Justice issued a succinct
public statement saying, "Mr. Durham has conclud-
ed that he will not pursue criminal charges for the
destruction of the interrogation videotapes:'
Upon hearing the good news, Rodriguez wrote
that a large part of him wanted simply to forget the
ordeal, given all the time, effort, and angst spent on
it. But after he told his wife Patti that the cloud had
been lifted, "we both began to cry tears of relief:'
Coinciding with publication of Hard Measures,
which sold briskly, Rodriguez did interviews on
CBS 60 Minutes, Fox's Hannity, and a host of other
news programs.
Nationally syndicated radio host Rush Limbaugh
reflected the views of many when he proclaimed, "I
know people who know this man. He is a patriot, a
hero, a great guy...I love Jose Rodriguez:'
In his book, Rodriguez said he will "forever be
thankful" to Hayden for supporting him during
the tapes investigation. "My decision to destroy the
tapes was made before he became [CIA] direc-
tor, and he could have punted," he said. Instead,
[Hayden] not only supported my actions, he be-
came a lonely but articulate and vocal defender of
the Agency's interrogation programs:'
After years of investigation and scrutiny, Rodri-
guez, who now works in the private sector and
occasionally comments on counterterrorism issues,
believes his actions were vindicated. "I have no
regrets:' he wrote. "I would do it all again, because
it was the right thing to do�vindicated or not. I
know our actions helped save American lives�and
I can live with that:'
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Brian Kelley
In a March 2011 interview with The Fairfax Times,
former CIA counterintelligence officer Brian Kelley
was described as "the wrong man" in the wrong
place at the wrong time.
Kelley, a long-time CIA counterintelligence officer
whose groundbreaking work in 1989 led to the dis-
covery of suspected spy Felix Bloch, was the Agency
officer suspected by the FBI of being the spy who
turned out to be FBI special agent Robert Hanssen.
The FBI's Hans-
sen�who had
been spying for
the Russians, off
and on, for more
than 20 years�
was arrested
near his Vienna,
Virginia, home in February 2001 and is serving a
life sentence.
While the media did not
Kelley was under suspicio
were convinced he was
Kelley died in November 2011 at the age of 68�
only months after The Times interview�but he had
lived not only to see himself totally vindicated, but
to resume his CIA career and retire in 2006 and
then continue to work as a consultant and teacher.
While the media did not report at the time that
Kelley was under suspicion, numerous FBI agents
were convinced he was the mole, Kelley said.
For several years, the FBI invested a "staggering"
amount of technical and human resources to try to
obtain evidence to corroborate its suspicions, Kelley
wrote in a Studies in Intelligence review of Breach,
the 2007 movie about Hanssen's espionage. Kelley
was placed under 24-hour surveillance, his home
and work spaces were searched, and computers and
telephones in both his home and office were put
under technical surveillance. Moreover, the Bureau
eir 0 (February 015)
report at the time that
n, numerous FBI agents
the mole, Kelley said.
launched a false-flag recruitment operation against
him (he promptly reported the unsolicited contact).a
Kelley said he and his family "lived with the real
horror that I would be arrested and charged with a
capital crime about which I was innocent."
"My children, my sisters, along with many friends,
were told repeatedly that, with 99.9 percent certain-
ty, I was a traitor who was living a double life and
that I caused the death of several Russians who had
secretly worked
for CIA and the
FBI," he said.
Ultimately,
Hanssen was
fingered, and the
FBI proceeded to
build the case against him.
After he was cleared, Kelley was interviewed for
several books and also discussed his story on 60
Minutes and other news programs. He also told his
story in a long, classified, and frank oral history
interview that was published in two parts in Studies
in Intelligence issues of March and June 2012. In the
first part, Kelley spoke of his career in counterin-
telligence; in the second he spoke of the ordeal he
experienced living under the FBI's microscope.
And while Kelley faulted senior officials at the
FBI for bungling the case, he also singled out and
praised the Bureau agents who "stood up and
repeatedly told the supervising agents that I was
innocent."
"They were real heroes to me and my family:' he
said.
In a 2010 magazine profile, Kelley said anoth-
er hero was former CIA Deputy Director Steve
a. Brian Kelley, The Movie Breach: A Personal Perspective,"
Studies in Intelligence 52, No. 1 (March 2008).
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Kappes, who, at an Agency ceremony in 2007
attended by over 250 people, took to the podium,
apologized to Kelley and his family, and presented
him with the Distinguished Career Intelligence
Medal. The room, said Kelley, erupted in applause.
Leaning Forward
"For my family and my friends who suffered great-
ly as a result of what the FBI did, Steve's remarks
were very cathartic:' he said. "It helped put an end
to a very painful time in all of our lives. So many
innocent people suffered, and it was only after Steve
and the others spoke that the real healing process
started....Steve is a revered figure for my family."
Television journalist Ted Koppel once referred
to the public affairs office at CIA as "the ultimate
oxymoron," and rarely a day passed when I didn't
have a good laugh about the incongruity of doing
outreach for an espionage organization. That said,
it's a necessary and important function, both for the
institution and for our democracy.
During the years he headed the CIA, General
Hayden frequently said he believed the Agency had
a "social contract" with the American people�that
nothing was more critical than earning the public's
trust and confidence.
In a statement to the workforce shortly after he
took office, he said, "I want the American people
to understand the contributions that CIA makes to
national security and the Agency's critical role in
keeping Americans safe. Moreover, I want them to
understand that you are dedicated public servants
who act with integrity and reflect the core values of
our nation."
Increasing public understanding of the Agency's
contributions�and the quality and character of its
workforce�will always require effort, commitment,
and even more transparency. It is a challenge we
must meet and embrace.
While it is critical for our government to protect
legitimate secrets, I believe that unwarranted and
excessive secrecy undermines the Agency. When
the pendulum swings to the "tell them nothing
about everything" side, it breeds mistrust and only
increases the likelihood and toxicity of the next
�
20
leaked story. It also largely cedes public discourse to
self-styled "experts" who either have an agenda or
don't know what they are talking about.
So I fall squarely into the "tell them what you can"
camp. Toward that end, CIA's public website and the
Internet have been enormously beneficial. Speeches
by senior officials, news releases, and even some
statements to the workforce are posted in their en-
tirety, reaching a wide audience and no longer just
being subject to reportorial interpretation. All sorts
of unclassified documents and publications are
quickly and routinely made available to the general
public.
Technology is a facilitator, but CIA's most precious
resource has been, and always will be, its people.
People who are not afraid to take risks. People who
make tough and gutsy decisions. People who invent
and deploy gadgets and disguises. People who go,
willingly, to faraway places and put their lives on
the line. Patriotic Americans who, day in and day
out, do extraordinary things and make the world a
better place.
During my career, I have had the privilege to serve
with all of the heroes I've written about here, and
many more. Continuing to tell their stories, to the
extent we can, is very much in CINs interest and
will help build further public support for it. In my
experience, a forthcoming approach with the media
and the public�while at the same time protecting
sources and methods assiduously�benefits the
Agency over the long run and enhances its credibil-
ity. And it certainly serves the public interest.
+ +
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