WASHINGTON, Nov. 17 (UPI) -- A number of senior Pentagon officials are welcoming the ongoing staff shake-up at the CIA, the Washington Times reported Wednesday.
New agency director Porter Goss, a former Republican congressman and CIA officer, has seen three top officials -- deputy director John McLaughlin and two top clandestine officers -- abruptly resign in the past week.
Pentagon officials who asked not to be identified said Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was not always happy with the CIA's performance in the field, and accordingly, has worked to give U.S. Special Operations Command authority to collect its own intelligence on which commandos can act in hours or days to kill or capture terrorists.
Other Defense Department sources complained to the newspaper parts of the CIA's entrenched bureaucracy of analysts opposed the military's large role in a war against al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden.
"Let's just say that a lot of folks over there (at the CIA) were still committed to a pre-9/11 way of doing things," said a Pentagon adviser who has played a significant role in forming counter-terror policy.
