John O. Brennan: belief

Transcript context

…But any bureaucracy has some autonomy, right? They do, and I think some of it takes on — as you’re pointing out — the temperament of the commander-in-chief, the chief executive. But all CIA covert action programs, for example, have to be authorized in very explicit writing by a president of the United States. The more aggressive a president might be on the foreign front, and the more that he or she would want the CIA to be involved, the CIA will be involved. But I do think that the CIA needs to stick with its traditional mission, which is to acquire clandestinely acquired intelligence that matters to US national security, whether it be human sources or technical collection. It needs to carry out the counterintelligence activities to protect our secrets from foreign interference or intrusion. It needs to engage with foreign liaison services so that we’re able to benefit from their capabilities and information gathering. It needs to conduct all source analysis so that we gain the benefit of the insights that we get from liaison, from clandestinely acquired sources, and so on. The more the CIA is pushed into the paramilitary, the more military-like activities, I think the more trouble the CIA will get into. What changes would you make to congressional oversight of the intelligence community?…

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