Mazzetti, Mark. "Intelligence Chief Is Shifted to Deputy State Dept. Post." New York Times, 4 Jan. 2007. [http://www.nytimes.com]
Mazzetti, Mark. "Intelligence Chief Is Shifted to Deputy State Dept. Post." New York Times, 4 Jan. 2007. [http://www.nytimes.com]
DNI John D. Negroponte's move to the State Department’s second-ranking position "is another blow to an intelligence community that has seen little continuity at the top since the departure of George J. Tenet in 2004." Officials said that the leading candidate for the DNI job is J. retired Vice Admiral Michael McConnell. The position of deputy director of national intelligence remains vacant.
[DNI/07]
Mazzetti, Mark. "Military Role in U.S. Embassies Creates Strains, Report Says." New York Times, 20 Dec. 2006. [http://www.nytimes.com]
A report by the Republican staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has found that "[t]he expansion of the Pentagon’s presence in American embassies is creating frictions and overlapping missions that could undermine efforts to combat Islamic radicalism.... As the Pentagon takes on new roles collecting intelligence, initiating information operations and conducting other 'self-assigned missions,' the report found that some embassies have effectively become command posts, with military personnel in those countries all but supplanting the role of ambassadors in conducting American foreign policy."
The staff report, "Embassies as Command Posts in the Anti-Terror Campaign," dated 15 December 2006, is available at: http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2006_rpt/embassies.html.
[MI/00s/06]
Mazzetti, Mark. "New Data and New Methods Lead to Revised View on Iran." New York Times, 5 Dec. 2007. [http://www.nytimes.com]
A National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) released on 3 December 2007 "concludes with 'high confidence' that Iran halted work on its nuclear weapons program in 2003." An NIE in 2005 had found that "Iran's leaders were working tirelessly to acquire a nuclear weapon." Current and former intelligence officials "said that the 2007 estimate was an attempt by spy agencies to examine the Iran problem in a new light, and that in the process they recast many of their principal judgments about Iran's weapons programs that might have relied on outdated information."
[Analysis/Est/Iran; GenPostCW/00s/07; OtherCountries/Iran]
Mazzetti, Mark. "Pentagon Is Expected to Close Intelligence Unit." New York Times, 2 Apr. 2008. [http://www.nytimes.com]
The Pentagon is expected to close the controversial Counterintelligence Field Activity office. According to government officials, the move "is part of a broad effort under Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates to review, overhaul and, in some cases, dismantle an intelligence architecture built by his predecessor, Donald H. Rumsfeld." The unit "came under fierce criticism in 2005 after it was disclosed" that its Talon database "included information about antiwar protests planned at churches, schools and Quaker meeting halls."
[MI/00s/08]
Mazzetti, Mark. "Pentagon Sees Move in Somalia as Blueprint." New York Times, 13 Jan. 2007. [http://www.nytimes.com]
"Military operations in Somalia" carried out by the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command, "and the use of the Ethiopian Army as a surrogate force to root out operatives for Al Qaeda in the country, are a blueprint that Pentagon strategists say they hope to use more frequently in counterterrorism missions around the globe."
[MI/SpecOps/00s]
Mazzetti, Mark. "Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Worsens Terror Threat." New York Times, 24 Sep. 2006. [http://www.nytimes.com]
In a classified National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), U.S. intelligence agencies provide a "stark assessment of terrorism trends," finding that "the American invasion and occupation of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks." The NIE "was overseen by David B. Low," NIO for transnational threats. It was commissioned in 2004 after Low joined the National Intelligence Council.
[Terrorism/00s/06]
Mazzetti, Mark. "A Storied Operative Returns to the C.I.A." New York Times, 30 May 2006. [http://www.nytimes.com]
Although the appointment has not been formally announced, former CIA clandestine service head Stephen R. Kappes is expected to be named the agency's deputy director. He "would become the first person since William E. Colby in 1973 to ascend to one of agency's top two positions from a career spent in the clandestine service."
[CIA/00s/06/Gen]
Return to Mau-Mb