Saturday, November 16, 2002; Page A01

Will these men maek criminals out of the innocent. Who will they haul off in the middle of the night?

President Bush's top national
security advisers have begun
discussing the creation of a new,
domestic intelligence agency that
would take over responsibility for
counterterrorism spying and analysis
from the FBI, according to U.S.
government officials and intelligence
experts.

The high-level debate reflects a
widespread concern that the FBI
has been unable to transform itself
from a law enforcement agency into
an intelligence-gathering unit able to
detect and thwart terrorist plans in
the United States. The FBI has
admitted it has not yet completed
the cultural sea change necessary to
turn its agents into spies, but the
creation of a new agency is firmly
opposed by FBI Director Robert S.
Mueller III, who has said he
believes the bureau can do the job.

On Veterans Day, top national
security officials gathered for two
hours to discuss the issue in a
meeting chaired by national security
adviser Condoleezza Rice. White
House Chief of Staff Andrew H.
Card Jr., Defense Secretary Donald
H. Rumsfeld, CIA Director George
J. Tenet, Attorney General John D.
Ashcroft, Mueller and six others
attended.

Homeland Security Director Tom
Ridge was recently dispatched to
London for a briefing on the fabled
MI5, an agency empowered to
collect and analyze intelligence
within Britain, leaving law
enforcement to the police. Similarly,
if another agency were created in
the United States, it would not
replace the FBI but would have the
primary role in gathering and
analyzing intelligence about
Americans and foreign nationals in
the United States.

Revelations of the debate come
amid heightened apprehension
within the U.S. intelligence
community over the possibility of
large-scale terrorist strikes against
the United States or Europe.

The FBI warned law enforcement
agencies Thursday night that Osama
bin Laden's terror network may be
plotting "spectacular" attacks inside the United States. Some intelligence
officials described the threats as even more ominous than those picked up in
the weeks prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. But the administration, citing a
lack of specific information about the time or place of any attack, did not
increase the national threat alert indicator from yellow or "elevated" -- a status
that means there is a "significant" risk of terror attacks.

The FBI warning said "al Qaeda may favor spectacular attacks that meet
several criteria: high symbolic value, mass casualties, severe damage to the
U.S. economy and maximum psychological trauma," adding that the highest
priority targets were historic landmarks, the nuclear sector, aviation and
petroleum.

The alert came after the release of a new audiotape believed to be made by
bin Laden threatening the United States and its allies.

At a news conference, Rice responded to criticism from some Senate
Democrats that the war on terror was flagging and from foreign officials that
the war on Iraq would distract the administration from its unfinished battle
with al Qaeda.

Rice said that President Bush "does not begin his day on Iraq; he begins his
day on the war on terrorism."

"This is the central focus of this administration," she added.

U.S. officials also revealed yesterday that they had recently captured a
high-level al Qaeda member. They declined to identify him but said he is
among the top dozen al Qaeda fugitives sought by the United States. It was
not clear yesterday where the al Qaeda leader was being held.

A Bush administration spokesman, who asked not to be named, said no
conclusions were reached about a domestic intelligence agency during the
Veterans Day meeting. He said an MI5-style agency was just one option
considered. The official, and other sources knowledgeable about the issue,
said the White House first wants to launch a new Department of Homeland
Security, which would include an intelligence analysis division.

Any major change such as this would come later, government sources said.
More meetings on the subject are planned.

Some members of Congress have said they favor creating a domestic security
agency and it is likely legislative proposals will be offered during the next
Congress. "We're either going to create a working, effective, substantial
domestic intelligence unit in the FBI or create a new agency," said Sen.
Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.), ranking member of the Senate Select Committee
on Intelligence. "The results are dismal to this point."

He said creating a whole new agency "would be a big-ticket item from
everyone's standpoint. We have to think this out carefully."

During the Veterans Day meeting, Mueller offered the same arguments about
the FBI's structure that he has made in testimony on Capitol Hill, sources said.
He has said the FBI is uniquely positioned to act as the United States' primary
domestic intelligence agency, and that reforms implemented since the Sept. 11
attacks have made counterterrorism the bureau's primary goal.

But others in the meeting were not as convinced, citing the FBI's progress to
date and the inherent difficulties of retraining FBI agents who are accustomed
to restrictions on domestic spying and prohibitions against gathering
information on people who are not suspected of committing crimes.

The bureau worked hard to snuff out similar proposals earlier this year when
the Homeland Security Department was first proposed.

But some former law enforcement officials such as George Terwilliger, a top
official in President George H.W. Bush's Justice Department, advocate
creating a domestic intelligence agency that would combine FBI counterterror
efforts with CIA and military operations. Keeping foreign and domestic
terrorism intelligence operations separate is an "outdated notion," he said.
"Somebody needs to have ownership of the problem on a government-wide
basis."

A number of outside intelligence experts and blue-ribbon panels recently have
recommended radical overhauls of the United States' domestic intelligence
structure.

In a preliminary report released this week, an advisory commission headed by
former Virginia governor James S. Gilmore endorsed a new counterterrorism
center made up of analysts now working for the CIA, FBI and other
agencies. The center "would be responsible for the fusion of intelligence, from
all sources, foreign and domestic, on potential attacks inside the United
States," the commission said.

Mueller met with Gilmore prior to the report's release to try to persuade him
not to recommend a separate intelligence agency, sources said.

In October, a separate bipartisan panel of high-technology experts and former
intelligence officials recommended that the proposed Homeland Security
Department take over collection and analysis of intelligence from the FBI. The
Markle Foundation Task Force on National Security in the Information Age
found that "the FBI has no effective process for providing intelligence on
terrorism to policymakers or others outside the law enforcement community."

The proposed Homeland Security Department, which was approved by the
House this week and is awaiting Senate approval, would include a new
analysis division that would receive and analyze terrorism-related reports from
the CIA, FBI, National Security Agency and other intelligence agencies. But
the new department would not collect intelligence data on its own and would
not have access to original information except in special circumstances,
administration officials have said.

I.C. Smith, a former FBI counterintelligence official, said there is no need to
create a new intelligence gathering agency outside the FBI, or to turn over
more duties to Homeland Security. Smith and many other current and former
FBI officials argue that the bureau was renowned for its intelligence-gathering
capabilities during the Cold War, though abuses led to restrictions on the
bureau's powers.

"The FBI worked counterintelligence for decades and did it very, very well
overall," Smith said. "It was able to bridge that gap between criminal
investigations and intelligence operations. . . . The problem is not the structure;
it's a failure of management to implement the resources they have."

Staff writer Susan Schmidt contributed to this report.

© 2002 The Washington Post Company

Copyright or Used by Permission, ©2006 ChewinTheFat.com

Top of Page