"Is the intelligence community 'out-of-control'?"
If those in charge do not know or profess not to know what is happening in their areas of responsibility, it is "out of control" by definition. Further, if it can be seen that unacceptable actions are taken which violate the fundamental purpose of an organisation, it can be said to be "out-of-control." By either of these criteria the intelligence community is "out-of-control."
Getting the opinions of six people at the top in one way or another can be meaningful but also presents pitfalls since there can be vested interests in maintaining image while hiding problems. Would anyone have said that the FBI was "out-of-control" in the 1960s and early 1970s with respect to abuses carried out under COINTELPRO? What about the CIA in Southeast Asia and elsewhere during the same period?
By the last half of the 1970s abuses due to "out-of-control" intelligence and law enforcement organisations were called to account by Senator Frank Church's committee in 1975 and 1976 with respect to the CIA and FBI (Watergate: cue Washington Post"). Admiral Bobby Inman, then DIRNSA, took NSA public to the horror of all concern for it truly had been "No Such Agency" for decades. Reforms, such as they were, didn't last long, did they? See Church Committee.
I believe that the disposition to carry out the activities for which these and other organisations were criticised and held to significant public account continued and found its outlet in contractors and dedicated intelligence organisations independent of government control but paid by government. True, there was much to be done which needed the best people who had to be paid for their services. At the same time this opened the door to those who had little or no qualifications to abuse the system.
Without control and accountability those who betrayed trust could do so and get away with it causing immense damage from the latest and most sophisticated espionage/surveillance technology ever known to human civilisation. While those who developed this technology were most likely above reproach, it was passed along for use by those who had less than honourable scruples. What they did with it was even worse and reflects the worst of COINTELPRO and CIA assassination abuses all wrapped into one activity.
I know this because I have been a surveillance target for 12 years since mid-August 1998 and subjected to this most sophisticated surveillance technology since February 2001. The latter was brought to the UK by a couple retired US Marines the senior of whom then started travelling elsewhere after the successful invasion of Afghanistan following 9/11 making his first stop a report Kabul.
Because of their disturbed personalities committed to sadistic torture abuse 24/7/365 I learned a great deal about what they were doing and the technology they had founded upon Tempest used against computer technology and the human being alike. They used V2K (Voice-to-Skull, i.e., electronic transmission of sound) for torture purposes that allowed me to hear much of what they were doing or trying to do wherever I was located day and night.
Since they joined a surveillance operation already in progress for 2.5 years, I already had a foundation of people whom I knew so there were no mysterious "they" in all of this. I then learned a great deal about these people and their activity which has gone on since before 9/11 for 9.5 years starting in February 2001. They spread the information all around about their marvellous surveillance technology which they allowed others to use. It became COINTELPRO all over again and goes on as of this writing.
Asking the experts to provide their opinion is a useful step but not a complete one. It's a necessary condition for assessment but not a sufficient one. All sources of information need to be considered most especially those many of us who have been on the receiving end of the abuse and denied any opportunity to get the real story out in any meaningful way. That, of course, is the purpose of this abuse.
I especially like General Michael Hayden's response for its evasiveness and support of the intelligence community. He is noted as being the CIA Director from 2006 to 2009, but he was also DIRNSA from 1999 to 2005 the longest serving DIRNSA ever. What little I knew about General Hayden was fascinating. I thought he was good and the kind of enlightened leader needed at the time since he remained so long in a job that rotated between the various military services. NSA was and is the focal point for military SIGINT coordinating all that activity among the various branches of the US military.
Given what I had learned by 2006, his move to the CIA as its director communicated to me what I had already concluded as existing in this world where HUMINT and SIGINT had merged in a single intelligence technology based upon Tempest which had been my direct experience as a target since February 2001.
In fact, I was so alarmed by its abuse given my former experience with the USAF Security Service (1961 to 1964) that I tried to send General Hayden an Email to advise him of what I considered a most serious breach of security. NSA is not open to receiving Emails from the outside world except for those looking for work. I thus sent this Email to personnel with the request that they forward it to DIRNSA, General Hayden.
"US National Security Breach: Email to DIRNSA" My 30th March 2002 Email to General Michael Hayden
Here's a situation which I recognised as being "out-of-control." I have sent a great deal of communication about this situation to bring it to light so that it could be ended. Even sending an Email to General Michael Hayden as best I could was not sufficient to bring any relief to what I knew as being terribly "out-of-control."
However, today Michael Hayden claims it is not "out-of-control" in the Washington Post. I beg to disagree. I believe that he, like many others, has a vested interest to serve and cannot or will not grapple with the monstrosity that has developed over the decades since the end WWII.
He spent ten years at the head of the NSA and the CIA without addressing the abuses which I had attempted to bring to his attention.
I believe that these abuses are widespread given the people involved and those who report as I do on the Internet. I believe that what we have today are intelligence community and law enforcement/security agencies who were "out-of-control" as they were in the 1960s and 1970s only more so since this is being carried out by contractors who are not responsible and are not accountable to anyone. General Michael Hayden has not taken any responsibility as far as I can see to bring accountability into his world of SIGINT and HUMINT. I believe that he could not do this because it was and is out of control.
Naturally, there is a massive cover up effort under way as there always is in these matters. The Washington Post needs to dig deeper and talk with a wider spectrum of people. As in Watergate they need to "follow the money trail." This will make Watergate look like a kindergarten picnic.
What really exists here is an alternative government not just alternative geography.
Those at the top haven't a clue about what is happening on the ground in the real world. There is a huge dichotomy between those trying to manage at the top and what is actually being done at ground level by those whom they are supposed to be managing. Those at the top create solutions and organisations to suite themselves based upon their belief about the way they think the world is matching what the want as a solution. The solution doesn't fit the problem. If fits their conception of the problem enabling them to do what they want.
As a result they create terrorism because they have not grasped the essence that terrorism is hatred against what they are and do to such a degree that a terrorist is willing to kill innocent people including women and children along with him/herself. As a result they are fighting something which they create further by fighting it as they do. Worst of all are those like Lt Harry Bird USMC Ret who are sent into areas that breed terrorists who do all the things which support such creation as well as carry out the job of the terrorist by destroying democracy and its institutions.
I sent Michael Hayden an Email about this problem over eight years ago. The proof that the US intelligence community is out of control rests with the fact that this Email produced no results when they were necessary. There is no point of contact. Those in significant positions are either ill served by those under them, or they do not know where else to go to solve a problem brought to their attention as I did regarding the out of control abuse from surveillance technology billed as an "experiment."
The vast array of intelligence agencies brought to the attention of the world by the Washington Post" confirms why the intelligence community is out of control and why those who want to abuse in the extreme do so with impunity for many years despite my explicit information to many in positions of significant authority Michael Hayden among them which fails to have any effect. They then have got to hide the truth while they cover up the reality of what is happening. This then creates more terrorists.
