Deep State

by Marc Ambinder

  The WikiLeaks public relations effort certainly failed in one respect: by its publishing such a massive number of cables simultaneously, a kind of “security through obscurity” effect took place, with no one state secret able to astound and resonate before being stepped on by yet another. Although the WikiLeaks strategy attempted to steer media coverage with carefully timed revelations—the Khalid El-Masri horror in Germany, the innocent Iraqis killed during Operation Baton Rouge in Samarra, Iraq, the presence of U.S. special operations forces on the ground in Pakistan and working alongside Pakistani fighters—the WikiLeaks organization demonstrated for a second time a poor mastery of the dynamic between the press and the public.22 (The first, of course, being the selectively edited “Collateral Murder.”) In both instances, WikiLeaks itself became the story.

  Still, with every passing day journalists and activists rifle through the ocean of secrets thrust into the public sphere by WikiLeaks, and it will take years before a full assessment can be made about the nature of U.S. diplomacy and the damage inflicted (or profits gained) by sunlight. But presently those with original classification authority in the U.S. government have been put on notice that embossing a document with “Secret” doesn’t diminish its ability to be printed.

  It’s worth noting in closing that contrary to the darkest suspicions of the activists at WikiLeaks, the United States did not prove as a rule to be duplicitous and hypocritical in its dealings. As evidenced by tens of thousands of cables, American diplomats have proven to be a trusted and ardent force for good in the world. Similarly, the United States as a nation is not universally looked upon as an imperial beast in need of slaying, but rather is often seen as a benign force that friends, nominal allies, and public enemies alike turn to for guidance, protection, and leadership. These nations sometimes ask the impossible (decapitating Iran) or the awkward (support in secret and denunciations in public), but they do look to the United States. By that standard, America does not cleave the international community into segments for conquest, but rather binds them together for mutual benefit. Perhaps the most shocking and unintended revelation of WikiLeaks is that the United States isn’t so bad at all.

  It’s worth reconsidering one other purported fact about WikiLeaks: though it may have been, in terms of volume, the largest leak in history, it was not the most damaging. Israel would say that nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu’s exposé of the country’s nuclear weapons complex at Dimona was catastrophic; Britain had to deal with disorienting revelations in the biography of former MI5 assistant director Peter Wilson in 1987 containing leaks that led to a full-scale revision of the country’s internal spying protocols.23

  Notes

  1. WikiLeaks, “Collateral Murder,” April 5, 2010, http://www.collateralmurder.com/.

  2. Bill Keller, “Dealing with Assange and the WikiLeaks Secrets,” New York Times, January 30, 2011, MM32.

  3. Tim Hsia, “Reaction on Military Blogs to the WikiLeaks Video,” New York Times, April 7, 2010, http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/07/reaction-on-military-blogs-to-the-wikileaks-video/.

  4. Ibid.

  5. Michael Hastings, “Julian Assange: The Rolling Stone Interview,” Rolling Stone, January 18, 2012, http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/julian-assange-the-rolling-stone-interview-20120118.

  6. “190946: Interior Secretary Provides Terms of A. Q. Khan’s Modified Detention,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=09ISLAMABAD280.

  7. “F-16 Security Notes: Request for Two Specific Changes That Will Benefit Coalition Operations,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=07ISLAMABAD2794.

  8. “VFM Chun Young-woo on Sino–North Korean Relations,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=10SEOUL272.

  9. “Google Update: PRC Role in Attacks and Response Strategy,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=10BEIJING207.

  10. “Al-Masri Case—Chancellery Aware of USG Concerns,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=07BERLIN242&version=1314919461.

  11. “Saudi King Abdullah and Senior Princes on Saudi Policy Toward Iraq,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=08RIYADH649.

  12. “General Petraeus with King Hamad: Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, NATO AWACS, Energy,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=09MANAMA642.

  13. “Yemen’s Counter Terrorism Unit Stretched Thin by War against Houthis,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=09SANAA2230.

  14. “Syrian Intelligence Chief Attends CT Dialogue with S/CT Benjamin,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=10DAMASCUS159.

  15. “Spain Details Its Strategy to Combat the Russian Mafia,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=10MADRID154.

  16. “Medvedev’s Address and Tandem Politics,” http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=08MOSCOW3343.

  17. “DOD News Briefing with Secretary Gates and Adm. Mullen from the Pentagon,” U.S. Department of Defense, Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs), News Transcript, November 30, 2010, http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/2010/11/dod113010.html.

  18. Scott Neuman, “Clinton: WikiLeaks ‘Tear at Fabric’ of Government,” NPR, November 29, 2010, http://www.npr.org/2010/11/29/131668950/white-house-aims-to-limit-wikileaks-damage.

  19. Thomas Jefferson, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 8 (Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), 92–93.

  20. David Newsom, The Public Dimension of Foreign Policy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1996), 33.

  21. “WikiSecrets: Julian Assange Interview Transcript,” Frontline, April 4, 2011, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/wikileaks/interviews/julian-assange.html.

  22. “Wikileaks U.S. Diplomatic Cables: Key Pakistan Issues,” BBC, December 1, 2010, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-11886512.

  23. Peter Wright, Spycatcher: The Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer (New York: Viking, 1987).

  CHAPTER 5

  Vital Information

  The election of General Dwight D. Eisenhower brought the spy community a president of the United States who understood intelligence in both theory and practice. One of Ike’s first orders of business was to provide encouragement to J. Edgar Hoover, who had eventually found acceptance but never comfort with Harry S. Truman. “Such was my respect for [Hoover] that I invited him to a meeting, my only purpose being to assure him that I wanted him in government as long as I might be there and that in the performance of his duties he would have the complete support of my office.”1

  Eisenhower thus unleashed Hoover and the FBI to pursue “security risks” in the federal government, a green light to hunt for communists on the payroll. The president further proved his devotion to Hoover by awarding the director the National Security Medal.

  Eisenhower also empowered the CIA by promoting General Walter Bedell Smith, whose leadership by 1953 had reshaped the Company into a leaner, more focused institution of intelligence analysis and covert operations. (Concluded former case officer Samuel Halpern, “If it hadn’t been for Bedell, I don’t think there would be a CIA today.”)2 Smith, who was Eisenhower’s most trusted, most capable associate during World War II, would become under secretary of state. The two men talked by phone “maybe several times a day.”3 Where everyone else in the administration referred to Eisenhower only as “Mr. President,” Smith had no problem picking up the phone and saying, “Goddamn it Ike, I think . . .”4 Though Allen Dulles, the new director of central intelligence, would work to limit Smith’s influence in the State Department, Smith would soon become the president’s closest adviser and chief overseer of covert operations.5 Until his retirement, he continued working behind the scenes to protect and nurture the agency he once brought back from the brink.

  With the Soviet bloc consolidating power in Eastern Europe, the CIA targeted every spot on the map where colonialism had flagged, from the Middle East to South America.6 The objective was to prevent communist infiltration of collapsed states. Furthermore, so long as it could operate in complet
e secrecy, the CIA was empowered to conduct operations in any nation whose geopolitical sympathies were antithetical to those of the United States.

  One of Eisenhower’s highest priorities (and lasting achievements) as president involved imagery intelligence (IMINT). During World War II, he developed a minor obsession with IMINT, ordering pilots to fly him above the combat zone.7 As president, he personally supervised the U-2 spy plane program, whereby a high-altitude reconnaissance plane equipped with the most sophisticated cameras of its time flew over Soviet soil, recording major infrastructure and tracking nuclear assets. The president signed off on every mission and closely studied each flight’s findings with Dulles and other CIA officials.8 He was no fool as to the risk such sorties entailed, however. “Well boys,” he said when first presented with plans for the U-2. “I believe the country needs this information, and I’m going to approve it. But I’ll tell you one thing. Some day one of these machines is going to get caught, and then we’ll have a storm.”9

  That day almost came in 1958 when Hanson Baldwin, the military affairs correspondent for the New York Times, learned of the U-2 missions while visiting Germany. When Baldwin returned to Washington, he met Robert Amory, the deputy director of central intelligence, for lunch. Baldwin was giving the deputy director a heads-up that the U-2 story would soon appear in the Times, to which Amory replied, “Jesus, Hanson, no!”10 Dulles would appeal successfully to Times publisher Arthur Hays Sulzberger to spike the story.11

  That day of reckoning feared by Eisenhower arrived on May 1, 1960, when a Soviet missile hit but didn’t destroy a U-2.12 The plane landed mostly intact, though the pilot’s fate was in doubt. (Survival was considered unlikely, and in any event the pilot was given a capsule of toxin to swallow in the event of capture.)13 The Eisenhower administration kept the loss a secret in hopes that the Soviets would do the same.

  Not long after, the U.S. ambassador was invited to an assembly of the Supreme Soviet, where he sat as a guest of honor. Premier Nikita Khrushchev presided over the 1,300-member Soviet legislature, conducting routine business before unexpectedly turning to darker matters:

  Lately, influential forces—imperialist and militarist circles, whose stronghold is the Pentagon—have become noticeably more active in the United States . . . . Comrade Deputies! On the instruction of the Soviet government, I must report to you on aggressive actions against the Soviet Union in the past few weeks . . . . The United States has been sending aircraft that have been crossing our state frontiers and intruding upon the airspace of the Soviet Union. We protested to the United States against several previous aggressive acts of this kind . . . . The aggressor knows what he is in for when he intrudes upon foreign territory . . . shoot the plane down! This assignment was fulfilled.14

  “The pilot of the American plane,” announced Premier Khruschev, “is alive and well.”15

  The diplomatic fallout was severe. The pilot, Gary Powers, spent nearly two years in a Soviet hard labor camp before being traded by the United States for a captured Soviet spy. Though the incident would prove embarrassing to the Eisenhower administration and devastating to international relations, it had the ironic effect of fast-tracking research and development of the U.S. Corona spy satellite, which would provide far more accurate image intelligence from the safety and security of space.16

  For the record, the U-2 spy plane was flown from a secret CIA facility in Peshawar, Pakistan.17

  When Eisenhower ordered the secret flights, he did so with the tacit approval of the public. The Soviet Union was a threat and had to be watched. His fear was not that the American people would learn of the missions and consider them criminal or immoral, but that the Soviets would learn of the missions and in some way retaliate. Still, whether a program is leaked, revealed post-conflict, or exposed by accident, sooner or later it’s going to get out. The entire enterprise, therefore, is an effort at failing gracefully, or delaying political or historical approval.

  Every president believes that the secret activities he orders or permits are both moral and in the interest of the nation. Sometimes he understands that the nation might not necessarily agree, and in such cases the hope is that the missions stay secret, lest they become a political concern as well as a security matter. Generally speaking, the worst effects of leaks (so far) have been the debates that result and the erosion of government trust by people who dislike having been kept in the dark.

  A hypothetical example: An oil company executive tells the president that petroleum prices will double in six months. The president spends the next six months quietly working with hostile governments in oil-rich countries to prevent economic disaster. Her rationale for keeping the information and the negotiations secret is obvious. But after six months elapse, if prices remain stable and word leaks that the president in some way capitulated to an unambiguously wretched regime, public faith in the government erodes. Similarly, if the economy collapses and word leaks that the president knew something, public faith in the government erodes. In both instances, democracy feels like an illusion and the Republic suffers.

  Another hypothetical: Immediately following a successful terrorist attack on the United States, authorities find and capture the mastermind. Intelligence suggests that another attack is imminent, but the terrorist isn’t talking.

  In that din of catastrophe, we should examine the limits of the faith we entrust to the government. Forty years after Eisenhower said, “I believe the country needs this information, and I’m going to approve it,” the country again needed vital information, and the president again approved it. Only this time it didn’t involve spy planes. It involved torture.

  When the insurgency began in Iraq, it caused panic at the Pentagon. The lack of tactical intelligence about enemy combatants was a significant problem for war planners. In early June 2003, U.S. commanders in Iraq launched Operation Peninsula Strike, the first of its efforts to sweep away the underbrush that allowed the Fedayeen Saddam to survive. The operation was not a success. On September 12, as violence against coalition forces spiked, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld sent a memo to Stephen Cambone, the under secretary of defense for intelligence. “I keep reading [intelligence community] intel,” he wrote. “It leaves one with the impression that we know a lot—who the people are, what they are doing, where they are going, when they are meeting, and the like. However, when one pushes on that information it is pretty clear that we don’t have actionable intelligence.” Furthermore, Rumsfeld didn’t “have good data on the people we have been capturing and interrogating” in either Iraq or Afghanistan. “I don’t feel I am getting information from the interrogations that should be enabling us as to answer the questions I’ve posed.”18

  It is not hard to see how, from this urgent need, a policy of enhanced interrogation techniques might develop, which in the frenzy of war might turn into torture. In 2004, according to a recently declassified memorandum written for Rumsfeld and three years after the start of the war, the U.S. Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) now “operated from a reactive rather than a proactive posture, and was not structured for the complex, extended-duration operations they currently conduct.” JSOC, it said, “lacked the ‘find’ and ‘fix’ and intelligence fusion capabilities essential” to the war on terrorism. Its intelligence capabilities, “particularly in human intelligence, were very limited.”19

  Such was the situation when Rumsfeld named then major general Stanley McChrystal as commanding general of JSOC. General McChrystal, the former commander of the 75th Ranger Regiment and a task force commander in Afghanistan, had just completed a Pentagon tour as vice director of operations on the Joint Staff. He had impressed Rumsfeld, who admired him for defending the Iraq War in pubic despite harboring private reservations.

  McChrystal had, with the help of Marshall Billingslea, the Pentagon civilian in charge of special operations, painstakingly drafted the execute order that allowed JSOC to pursue terrorists in a dozen countries outside Afghanistan and Iraq, subject to various ru
les imposed by the National Security Council. (JSOC could not set foot in Iran; it had to jump through hoops to chase terrorists in Pakistan; Somalia was an open zone.) McChrystal, compact, intense, and stone-faced, was known for his Ranger high-and-tight, his minimal tolerance for bureaucracy, and his talent as a constant innovator. (To wit: before he put on his first star, he had rewritten the U.S. Army hand-to-hand combat curriculum.) He is at once disarming and intimidating in person. He struck some subordinates as a monk, largely because he was an introvert, and the nickname JSOC personnel give to their boss—the Pope—became synonymous with McChrystal, more so than with any JSOC commander before or since. (The Pope moniker traces its lineage to Janet Reno, the attorney general under President Bill Clinton, who once complained that getting information out of JSOC was like trying to pry loose the Vatican’s secrets.)

  McChrystal slept in tents with his men. Once, General Doug Brown, the commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command, visited a JSOC team forward-deployed in a war zone, expecting that McChrystal’s office would befit a general officer’s billet. It turned out to be an austere eight-by-ten-foot prisonlike cell. It wasn’t for show that McChrystal accepted the designation of commander, Joint Special Operations Command Forward—he was always with his men. Indeed, under his command, JSOC’s headquarters back in Fayetteville, North Carolina, often had little to do. McChrystal brought everything with him. But as a decorated Ranger recalls of the period, “We were cowboys in 2003 and 2004 . . . we were accountable to no one.”