[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 6]
[Senate]
[Pages 7423-7446]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           EXECUTIVE SESSION

                                 ______
                                 

      NOMINATION OF JOHN D. NEGROPONTE TO BE DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL 
                              INTELLIGENCE

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
proceed to executive session for the consideration of calendar No. 69, 
which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read the nomination of John D. Negroponte, of 
New York, to be Director of National Intelligence.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will be 4 
hours of debate equally divided between the two leaders or their 
designees, and the Democratic time will be equally divided between the 
Senator from West Virginia, Mr. Rockefeller, and the Senator from 
Oregon, Mr. Wyden.
  The Senator from Kansas.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I thank you.
  Mr. President, as chairman of the Senate Select Committee on 
Intelligence, I rise today in strong support of the nomination of 
Ambassador John D. Negroponte to serve as our Nation's first Director 
of National Intelligence.
  The committee held Ambassador Negroponte's confirmation hearing on 
Tuesday, April 12, and voted favorably to report his nomination to the 
full Senate on Thursday, April 14.
  Now, the speed with which the committee acted upon this nomination 
and the nomination of LTG, soon to be four-star general, Michael 
Hayden, to be the Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence, 
really underscores the importance the committee, and I

[[Page 7424]]

believe the Senate, places on continuing and ensuring reform of our 
Nation's intelligence community and, as a result, our national 
security.
  While our intelligence community has a great number of successes--let 
me emphasize that--of which intelligence professionals should be 
justifiably proud--and the problem here is that when we have successes 
in the intelligence community, many times either the community or those 
of us who serve on the committee or those who are familiar with those 
successes cannot say anything about them because it is classified--but 
the intelligence failures associated with the attacks of 9/11 and the 
intelligence community's flawed assessments of Iraq's WMD programs 
underscored the need for fundamental change across the intelligence 
community.
  In my years on the Senate Intelligence Committee, I have met many of 
these hard-working men and women of the intelligence community who work 
day in and day out with one goal in mind; that is, to keep this Nation 
secure and our people safe.
  They are held back, however, by a flawed system that does not permit 
them to work as a community to do their best work. So we need to honor 
their commitment and their sacrifices by giving them an intelligence 
community worthy of their efforts and capable of meeting their 
aspirations and our expectations of them.
  So responding to that demonstrated need for reform, Congress really 
created the position of Director of National Intelligence with the 
intent of giving one person the responsibility and authority to provide 
the leadership that the Nation's intelligence apparatus has desperately 
needed and to exercise command and control across all the elements of 
the intelligence community.
  In short, through legislation, we created the DNI, the Director of 
National Intelligence, to provide the intelligence community with a 
clear chain of command and the accountability that comes with that.
  To facilitate that chain of command, and to foster accountability, 
the National Security Intelligence Reform Act of 2004 gave the DNI 
significant management authorities and tools, including expanded budget 
authority, acquisition, personnel, and tasking authorities.
  These authorities, however, are limited in significant ways, and the 
legislation leaves certain ambiguities about the DNI's authorities.
  As a result, there are questions about the DNI's ability to bring 
about the kind of change and true reform necessary to address the 
failures highlighted by the 9/11 attacks and the assessments of Iraq's 
WMD programs.
  So the task of resolving these ambiguities and questions will fall to 
the first Director of National Intelligence. As the WMD Commission 
pointed out in its recent report, the DNI will have to be adept at 
managing more through resource allocation than through command.
  Moreover, the first DNI will define the power and scope of future 
Directors of National Intelligence and will determine, in large 
measure, the success of our efforts to truly reform the intelligence 
community.
  Bringing about that reform is not going to be easy. Numerous 
commissions--many commissions--have identified the same failings as 
those that resulted in the legislation that created the DNI. Yet 
previous reform efforts have proven largely fruitless.
  So immune to reform is the intelligence community that the WMD 
Commission described it as a ``closed world'' with ``an almost perfect 
record of resisting external recommendations.''
  Allow me to relay one example to demonstrate this point.
  Over 3 years have passed since the September 11 attacks, and the 
elements of the community have not made the progress that we want in 
sharing intelligence data amongst the community. The distinguished vice 
chairman and I call that ``information access.''
  Elements within the intelligence community, unfortunately, continue 
to act--some elements--as though they own the intelligence data they 
collect rather than treating that data as belonging to the U.S. 
Government.
  As a result of the community's failure to repudiate outdated 
restrictions on information access, and its refusal to revisit legal 
interpretations and policy decisions that predate the threats now 
confronting the United States, impediments to information access are 
reemerging--reemerging, even today--in the very programs designed to 
address the problem.
  Clearly, then, the Nation's first Director of National Intelligence 
will face tremendous challenges and will require unwavering support 
from both Congress and the White House.
  I am pleased President Bush has made it very clear that the DNI will 
have strong authority in his administration. We in Congress must do our 
part, and we begin with the nomination of Ambassador Negroponte.
  The President has made an excellent choice in choosing the Ambassador 
to serve as the first DNI. He has dedicated more than 40 years of 
service to our country. Over the course of his public service career, 
the Senate has confirmed him seven times, including five times for 
ambassadorial positions in Honduras, Mexico, the Philippines, the 
United Nations and, of course, most recently in Iraq. Ambassador 
Negroponte has also held a number of key positions within the executive 
branch, including serving as Deputy National Security Advisor.
  In short, his career has been dedicated to intelligence and national 
security matters, and he has a great deal of experience to offer as the 
new Director of National Intelligence. He is well suited for this 
position. I look forward to working with him.
  In my discussions with Ambassador Negroponte, I have made it clear 
that Congress and the American people expect him to make a difference 
in the intelligence community. I must say, on behalf of the Senate 
Select Committee on Intelligence and on behalf of my vice chairman and 
myself, we have promised to conduct aggressive, preemptive oversight in 
regard to helping the DNI answer the challenges he will face with 
regard to the capabilities we have or do not have with regard to the 
intelligence community.
  We expect him to break down those barriers to information access I 
alluded to earlier. We expect him to improve the human intelligence 
capabilities we need. And ultimately, we expect him to provide 
leadership and accountability. In response to these questions, during 
his confirmation hearing, the Ambassador simply responded ``I will'' 
with conviction.
  Clearly Ambassador Negroponte will face significant challenges. He is 
going to carry heavy burdens. I am convinced, however, he has the 
character, the expertise, and the leadership skills required to 
successfully meet these challenges and to shoulder these 
responsibilities.
  I urge my colleagues to support this nomination, and I reserve the 
remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I join with the chairman of the 
Intelligence Committee in what he has said. Today the Senate is 
considering the nomination of Ambassador John Negroponte to become the 
Nation's first Director of National Intelligence. Personally, I 
strongly support this nomination, and I will discuss the reasons why in 
a moment.
  First, however, as the chairman did, I am going to take a few minutes 
to describe how critical this new position is to our country and its 
future, the magnitude of the challenges Ambassador Negroponte will 
face.
  In 1947, Congress created the Central Intelligence Agency and the 
Director of Central Intelligence. The Cold War was upon us and the 
Nation needed intelligence about our new adversary. The structure we 
put in place at that time to keep tabs on the Soviet Union grew and 
took on additional missions over the next 40 years. But the 
intelligence community stayed primarily focused on that one target of 
the Soviet Union.
  Then in 1990, the Soviet Union dissolved. The world changed 
dramatically, but our intelligence organizations for the most part did 
not. As a

[[Page 7425]]

consequence, we have for the past 15 years made do with an intelligence 
system designed to penetrate and collect information about a single 
static adversary. There was no one in charge to force change from 
within, and before September 11 of 2001, there was little impetus for 
change from without.
  The National Security Act of 1947, the genesis of all of this, 
designated the DCI to serve as the head of the Central Intelligence 
Agency, also the principal adviser to the President on intelligence 
matters, and the head of the U.S. intelligence community--all three of 
those assignments.
  The Director of Central Intelligence ran the CIA, advised the 
President, but, frankly, never exercised the third responsibility, 
which is probably the most important other than advising the President, 
and that is managing the intelligence community itself.
  Even after the events, tragic though they might have been, of 9/11, 
it took 3 years, two major investigations of those events, and the 
stunning intelligence failures prior to the Iraq war to break through 
the entrenched interests and to achieve reform that created the 
position of director of something called national intelligence, all of 
it.
  The difficulty involved in the birth of this new office serves as a 
warning for the challenges that the Ambassador, if confirmed, as I hope 
he will be, will face. Bureaucracies are amazingly slow to change. That 
doesn't say anything bad about the people. That is the way the world 
works, whether it is corporate, private, or whatever. The bureaucracies 
are tenacious in defending their turf. Some of the stories are 
remarkable within the 15 intelligence agencies the Ambassador will have 
to oversee. Reform of the intelligence community will involve stepping 
on the turf of some of the most powerful bureaucracies in Washington. 
And first and foremost among those is the Department of Defense.
  Eighty percent of our intelligence spending is in the DOD budget. The 
incoming Director of National Intelligence will have to quickly 
establish a close working relationship with the Secretary of Defense, 
but it must be a relationship of equals, and Ambassador Negroponte must 
be willing to exercise the authority given him by the legislation and 
the President when he and the Secretary differ. In effect, the Director 
of National Intelligence supersedes the head of the Department of 
Defense.
  Ambassador Negroponte also will encounter and need to manage the CIA, 
an organization accustomed to operating with tremendous autonomy, a 
world unto itself. Some of these agencies, such as the National 
Security Agency--they are called NSA--get acronyms, ``no such 
agency''--that is part of the way their world operates. That is not to 
denigrate them, their public service, their public commitment, their 
willingness to offer up their lives for their country. But bureaucracy 
of a huge magnitude it surely is.
  Then there is the FBI, an agency which is dominated by its law 
enforcement history and struggling to make itself into a full partner 
in the intelligence community. Some question whether that can be done; 
my mind is still open to it. They are trying. Most people say it is 
working at the top but not in the middle, because if you are a lawyer, 
you have a yellow pad, you go arrest somebody for breaking the law. If 
you are an intelligence officer, you find somebody you are suspicious 
of, and you don't arrest that person. You surveil that person, you 
trail that person, maybe for weeks, months, to find out where that 
person takes you and what intelligence we can learn from that.
  But these are powerful organizations with very proud histories. They 
are populated by dedicated and talented public servants who have 
contributed to our security for decades. But our needs are now 
different. All of these agencies now must change the way they do 
business.
  Ambassador Negroponte takes charge at a time when the intelligence 
community is reeling from criticism for the lapses prior to 9/11 and 
the significant failures related to prewar intelligence on Iraq.
  The chairman and I worry about that because it affects morale. One 
doesn't want to affect morale. But on the other hand, intelligence 
agencies have to reflect the current needs of this country and act 
accordingly.
  The loose amalgam of 15 intelligence agencies needs a leader who can 
change not simply the boxes on an organizational chart but the way we 
do intelligence. The different agencies traditionally have collected 
intelligence from their sources, analyzed it, put it into their 
databases, and then shared it as they deemed appropriate. The chairman 
and I are very fond--both of us--of saying the word ``share'' is now 
outmoded. There is a need-to-know basis from time to time. But if you 
share something, that means you own it and that you make the decision 
you will share it with somebody. We prefer the modern word for 
intelligence which is going to have to be ``access,'' that anybody in 
that business has access to that intelligence automatically by 
definition unless there is a particular need-to-know restriction.
  The Director of National Intelligence has to create a new culture 
where the process of producing intelligence is coordinated across 
agencies from the beginning. The collection strategies for various 
targets need to be unified, and the intelligence collected needs to be 
available to everyone with the proper clearance and the need to know 
that information.
  That is the concept of jointness in operation that the Presiding 
Officer knows well because he is on the Armed Services Committee, as is 
my colleague, the chairman of the Intelligence Committee. Jointness is 
a concept the military has used and made work very effectively. It goes 
back to the Goldwater-Nichols Act almost 20 years ago, and it is 
something the Intelligence Committee is going to have to learn how to 
do. Making fundamental changes is absolutely essential in order to make 
sure our intelligence is timely, objective, and independent of 
political consideration.
  The credibility of the intelligence community--and, by extension, the 
credibility of the United States--has suffered when key intelligence 
reports such as the prewar intelligence report on Iraq failed the test 
of being timely, objective, and independent as required by law. It is 
not something they just ought to be doing; it is required by the 1947 
National Security Act.
  Making major changes in the way the community operates and produces 
intelligence will be the first step for Ambassador Negroponte. He also 
must instill a sense of accountability. On this many of us feel 
strongly. The joint inquiry conducted by the Senate and the House 
Intelligence Committees into the events of 9/11 called for 
accountability for the mistakes made prior to the attack where 
thousands lost their lives. The WMD commission, which finished its 
work, also highlighted this issue.
  But despite these findings and despite what one would think the 
country would assume and expect, no one has been held accountable for 
the numerous failures to share critical intelligence and act on 
intelligence warnings in the year and a half prior to the 9/11 attacks. 
Likewise there has been a lack of accountability over the failings in 
the collection, analysis, and use of intelligence prior to the Iraq war 
itself.
  Accountability means people get fired or people get demoted or people 
get scolded or, concurrently, people are patted on the back, rewarded, 
encouraged, motivated further, held up before their colleagues as 
exemplary because they have done something particularly well.
  So the Ambassador is not only going to have to deal with problems 
from the past, but he will have to face immediately the growing scandal 
surrounding the collection of intelligence through the detention, 
interrogation, and rendition of suspected terrorists and insurgents. We 
have been subjected to an almost daily deluge of accusations of abuse 
stemming from these operations.
  The intelligence we gain through these interrogations is, frankly, 
too important to allow shortcomings in this program to continue, and 
the Director of National Intelligence will be

[[Page 7426]]

the official responsible for ensuring we have a comprehensive, 
consistent, legal, and operational policy on the detention and 
interrogation of prisoners because there is enormous flux in that whole 
area right now. The lack of clarity in these areas has led to confusion 
and likely contributed to the abuse we have witnessed.
  Dealing with the many challenges is a tall order. But if anybody can 
succeed in the position of DNI, Director of National Intelligence, an 
entirely new position in the U.S. Government, one of the three or four 
toughest jobs in Washington, that person is Ambassador Negroponte. He 
has a 40-year career of public service, as has been indicated, in some 
of most difficult and critical posts in the Foreign Service: Vietnam, 
the Paris peace talks, South and Central America, the U.N., and most 
recently in Baghdad.
  He has been doing this for 40 years. One of the things I have 
appreciated particularly about him is that he is not a military person, 
not a political person, not an intelligence person. He is a diplomat. 
He is somebody who, through his entire career, has engaged in 
understanding the nuances of the cultures we have to deal with in the 
intelligence world and what follows intelligence across the world. But 
he also knows a great deal about intelligence and the military 
operations and the political aspects of life simply because you cannot 
be an ambassador and avoid those things.
  He is a diplomat, a manager, a negotiator, which is crucial to 
bringing these agencies together and to go back and forth with the 
President and the Congress. He has extensive knowledge of the workings 
of the Government. That is a very prosaic statement, until one takes it 
at face value. Most people don't. They have extensive knowledge about 
certain parts of Government. He covers the ballfield. He has the 
temperament, standing, and self-confidence, frankly, to deal with the 
Washington bureaucracy. He has a great deal of confidence in himself, 
and he ought to--he has the backing of somebody called the President of 
the United States of America.
  The Intelligence Reform Act provides the Director of National 
Intelligence with considerable authority. But in Washington, DC, the 
support of the President is invaluable in exercising authority. To put 
it another way, a person loses their stature pretty quickly if the 
President is not backing that person in high-profile decisions, 
particularly in those instances when decisions meet resistance from the 
heads of other departments and other agencies which have full call on 
the President and his attention. The President's support will be 
absolutely critical to Ambassador Negroponte's success--and succeed he 
must, Mr. President.
  The United States faces a period of enormous uncertainty and threat. 
The problems of international terrorism will be with us for many 
decades, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction poses a 
danger at this minute for the entire world and will for decades to 
come.
  These are difficult targets for the intelligence community, but these 
are the things that threaten our security every moment. These are the 
issues the intelligence community must master. They are our front line 
of defense. The warfighter has not yet engaged properly until the 
intelligence has been collected and disseminated and policy is made 
from that. Ambassador Negroponte must lead all of us into a new era on 
intelligence. I think he is very well suited for the task, and I look 
forward to his swift confirmation.
  In closing, I also hope the Senate moves very quickly to confirm the 
President's nominee to be Principal Deputy Director of National 
Intelligence, and that is LTG Michael Hayden. This is a tandem made in 
Heaven. General Hayden understands the military, the lifelong service 
of it. He understands intelligence. He is Director of the National 
Security Agency. He has a profound, intuitive, knowledge-based 
understanding of what is under the rocks and what is plainly in sight, 
what is plainly good or wrong about the intelligence profession. He has 
led the National Security Agency for the last 6 years. It is an 
interesting fact that in the National Security Agency, under their 
roof, is the largest collection of mathematicians in this world. That 
may be known or not; I suspect it is. But these people do incredibly 
important things. He has led them now, having been reappointed three 
times. Together, Ambassador Negroponte and General Hayden make a 
powerful team. I am very pleased to support them both.
  I thank the Chair and yield the floor.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Will the vice chairman yield?
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Of course.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator for a very 
comprehensive statement. I thank him for what I think is a very 
accurate statement, more especially with the history he has outlined of 
the intelligence community; more especially with the contributions of 
the men and women within the intelligence community who have successes 
that obviously you cannot talk about, but the obvious need for reform 
because of what we have gone through; especially for the Senator's 
comment in relationship to the new DNI in relation to the Department of 
Defense. That was right on target.
  There has been a great deal of comment, as the vice chairman knows, 
that 80 percent of the funding of the intelligence budget goes to the 
military, and in terms of being the majority user of intelligence 
nobody would quarrel with that. I don't know of any Member of Congress 
who would say otherwise. I think we have made great progress between 
the intelligence and the military and the real-time analysis or real-
time intelligence to the warfighter, even though our challenges in 
parts of the world are very great. But I point out--and I think the 
vice chairman agrees--that the principal user of intelligence--not 
majority but principal user of intelligence--is not the military, as 
important as they are; it is the President of the United States and the 
National Security Council and the Congress of the United States to 
determine policy.
  I thank the Senator for bringing that out and I thank him for a very 
fine statement and also for being a fine vice chairman. We aggressively 
tried to provide insight and advice to the new DNI.
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. If my friend will yield, I further say that the 
President made an enormous contribution, which was sort of generally 
overlooked--not by those of us who work in this field of intelligence--
when he made it very clear and made an executive decision that 80 
percent of the budget that goes to the military, minus a few very 
specific tactical areas, and necessarily so, would be under the 
Director of National Intelligence. That was the President declaring 
that whoever is in that position will control the funding. 
Complications can arise, but the President has been clear about who is 
going to run this operation, and that is very important.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I could ask for unanimous consent to lock 
in the order, but I think I can just make a suggestion with the few 
Senators we have here. I am sure more will come. Senator Bond has a 
time conflict and would like to be recognized for 10 minutes. Senator 
Feinstein has been waiting, as has Senator Wyden. And then Senator 
Collins will come to the floor very quickly, one of the coauthors of 
the Intelligence Reform Act. If we can have an understanding that that 
would be the order, I think that would be appropriate.
  Also, I ask unanimous consent that the time consumed by any quorum 
calls be charged equally to both sides.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I am more than happy to yield 10 minutes 
to a valued member of the committee, the Senator from Missouri, Mr. 
Bond.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri is recognized.
  Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I thank Chairman Roberts. As we all know, 
this February, President Bush nominated Ambassador John Negroponte to 
serve as the Nation's first Director of National Intelligence. I rise 
today in strong support of his confirmation for this demanding 
position. I agree with the chairman and vice chairman; I can think of 
few people as well suited by

[[Page 7427]]

experience, intelligence, and dedication to tackle this assignment. I 
heard the remarks of the vice chairman, and I wish to associate myself 
with those very fine remarks--particularly his remarks about General 
Hayden who is nominated to be the Principal Deputy. We are not talking 
about his nomination today, but I associate myself with the high 
commendation that has been made of this gentleman, who also deserves 
prompt confirmation, so that we can get about the critically important 
work of providing intelligence. Ambassador Negroponte's wealth of 
experience and outstanding track record should be well known to all of 
us. A proven leader and manager in our national security establishment, 
he served five tours as chief of mission in U.S. Embassies. He has 
worked closely not only with frontline intelligence officers but 
himself served as Deputy National Security Adviser. He has solid 
experience working with the U.S. military, as well as representatives 
of Cabinet departments. Most telling, his recent experience as U.S. 
Ambassador to Iraq and the United Nations provide him with a unique 
view into the spectrum of national security challenges we now face and 
how best to construct an intelligence apparatus to meet those 
challenges. He understands that while collecting, analyzing, and 
disseminating good intelligence are not only requirements of a sound 
foreign policy and a secure homeland, they are key elements. Most 
important, these are processes in dire need of repair. The Ambassador 
is the right choice at the right time to take on these challenges.
  As we continue our war on terror against those who would do us harm, 
our intelligence community must also work to stem the proliferation and 
prevent the use of weapons of mass destruction, maintain a watchful eye 
on global competitors and adversaries, be alert to emerging threats, 
and provide guidance to policymakers on how best to positively 
influence global change. Most importantly, they must be able to provide 
policymakers with timely, accurate, and authoritative intelligence to 
manage, instead of reacting to looming threats. In short, the 
Ambassador has his work cut out for him.
  He will have to invigorate human intelligence capabilities. Our spies 
and agents must not only collect better intelligence, they must work to 
penetrate the governments of rogue states, terrorist and insurgent 
organizations, and closed societies where some of the most devious 
plots to attack America and its people and interests, as well as our 
allies, are hatched. We know we have fallen short in our human 
intelligence--or HUMINT--capabilities leading up to the conflicts in 
Afghanistan and Iraq. We are going to have to correct that and we look 
for the DNI's leadership to do that.
  As DNI, the Ambassador will have to work diligently to ensure that 
signals intelligence and other technical collection means are 
continuously updated, expanded, and modified to not only provide 
strategic intelligence but also actionable information for our war 
fighters--something in which I am personally most interested.
  Our intelligence community is home to some of the world's finest 
minds which have averted disaster and provided the highest quality 
information to consumers from the President down to the privates on the 
front line. However, inferential analysis and ``group think'' are 
practices against which the DNI must guard. The DNI must ensure that 
rigorously competitive analysis models and improved analytics 
tradecraft be implemented.
  The problem of inaccurate information sharing amongst agencies has 
been a recurring theme during the review of the Senate Select Committee 
on Intelligence of our recent intelligence failures leading to 9/11 and 
U.S. assessments of Iraq WMD programs. We have seen, unfortunately, 
even since 9/11, far too recent incidents where agencies working on 
common problems did not share that information and those sources. In 
this day, that is totally unacceptable. The DNI will not only face the 
challenge of ensuring that information is passed up and down the chain 
of command, but that colleagues working for different agencies within 
the intelligence community can and do regularly share and exchange 
information and ideas.
  The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, under the wise, 
compassionate guidance of Chairman Roberts, has espoused the idea of 
not merely information sharing but of information access. It is a 
difficult task. Sensitive information must be protected from 
disclosure, and too often protecting it from disclosure means not 
sharing it with people who are working on the same project. 
Nonetheless, the Ambassador has assured me that an analyst with a need 
to know will have access to the information, regardless of who collects 
it and who is working on it.
  In the end, no matter what means is used to collect intelligence, it 
is the fine, brave, and dedicated men and women of the intelligence 
community who will make it work on any given day on the ground. It will 
be not only a responsibility but a duty of the DNI to ensure that these 
men and women receive the proper education and training to discharge 
their duties. While substantive expertise and technical prowess are 
essential, leadership and management training, along with mentorship 
programs are key elements that will ensure that we attract, as well as 
retain, the talented, motivated, and dedicated personnel we need.
  The men and women of the intelligence community are our first 
tripwire to help stave off disaster. They can advise us on prudent 
courses of action to advance our national security interests. They 
willingly take great risks and make great sacrifices daily. 
Accordingly, it is the solemn obligation of the DNI to ensure their 
ranks continue to be filled with competent visionaries, managers, and 
innovators who are willing to lead and care for them.
  Over the years, this body has seen and even drafted recommendations 
to establish a DNI and/or a more accountable and powerful chief of our 
intelligence community. While the establishment of a DNI is historic, 
it was not established to the degree of budgetary and other powers that 
I, along with several of my colleagues, would have liked and thought 
would be very necessary. So the Ambassador will face challenges as he 
asserts his authority over the 15 intelligence agencies he will 
supervise. I hope he will use the implied powers of this position and 
the positive enforcement and support of the President to make sure the 
work that needs to be done is done and the DNI will have the power 
that, unfortunately, he was not given in the legislation but we believe 
he must exercise.
  Reflecting on the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, and the WMD 
Commission, as well as many pre-9/11 studies, and the work that has 
gone on in the Select Committee on Intelligence, I fully endorse and 
call on my colleagues to support Ambassador Negroponte as he 
establishes these powers to make sure our homeland is protected and our 
policymakers and warfighters on the ground are well informed.
  Having met with Ambassador Negroponte at length and being well aware 
of his qualifications, I am confident he will not only meet these high 
standards but will set a fine precedent for all succeeding DNIs to 
follow.
  I ask my colleagues to act quickly to confirm Ambassador Negroponte 
to lead our intelligence community so he may begin in earnest to make 
the difficult changes we believe are sorely needed.
  I thank the Chair, I thank the managers of this nomination, and I 
urge prompt confirmation.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, as a member of the Intelligence 
Committee, I wish to make a few comments both about Ambassador John 
Negroponte and also LTG Michael Hayden. He is soon to be General 
Hayden, I understand.
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Will the Senator allow me to yield to her such time 
as she may desire?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I certainly will. I thank the Senator from West 
Virginia.
  I know General Hayden will be a four-star general very shortly. I 
think that is very good news. So we will have the first Director and 
Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence.

[[Page 7428]]

  I believe these are both excellent nominees. They will provide strong 
new overall management and leadership to the intelligence community as 
it finally adapts to post-Cold War realities.
  Ambassador Negroponte has served with distinction, both in Washington 
and around the globe. He served as United States Ambassador to four 
nations and to the United Nations. As Deputy National Security Adviser, 
Ambassador Negroponte was intimately involved in the formation and use 
of intelligence. He is well suited to overseeing the collection of 
vital intelligence needed for the United States to protect itself. 
Ambassador Negroponte comes to this new position without strong ties or 
bias to any specific intelligence agency. That is an enormous strength, 
and I believe he will be an honest broker and manager for the 
community. He has pledged that he will be a neutral and apolitical 
provider of intelligence to Government policymakers.
  Although General Hayden's nomination is not before us at this time, I 
wish to say I hold him in the highest regard. He is a skilled manager 
and an expert in the workings of our Nation's intelligence apparatus. 
General Hayden led a remarkable turnaround of an enormously complex and 
technical agency, the National Security Agency. He was first made 
Director of the NSA under President Clinton and has had his tour 
extended three times by President Bush. That is a true testament to his 
leadership. He has proven his ability to establish a skilled and 
dedicated workforce. In short, General Hayden is a strong choice to be 
the day-to-day manager of the intelligence community.
  Both men have the strength, the vision, and the determination that is 
necessary to be successful in their new positions.
  As my colleagues know, I introduced legislation to create a DNI in 
the 107th Congress and again in the 108th Congress. So I was pleased to 
see that with the support of the 9/11 Commission and the chairs and 
ranking members of the Intelligence and Governmental Affairs 
Committees, this position was finally established.
  As Director and Deputy Director of National Intelligence, these 
appointees face daunting challenges. The 15 intelligence agencies are a 
community in name only. The fiefdoms and turf battles--the stovepipes--
between agencies may have lessened since September 11, but they 
continue to hinder our intelligence operations.
  Our technical means for collecting intelligence must be adapted to 
this new nonstate terrorist world and its challenges. The acquisition 
and development of new intelligence systems need better management.
  The demands for better human intelligence are well documented by 
reports, including the Congressional Joint Inquiry, our Intelligence 
Committee's Iraq study, the 9/11 Commission, and the President's own 
WMD Commission. Each of these reports spells out, in stark terms, the 
organizational, the leadership, and the capability challenges that 
await Director Negroponte and General Hayden.
  The U.S. intelligence estimates of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction 
were, as the WMD Commission stated, ``dead wrong'' before the war. 
There was a lack of solid intelligence, made worse by fundamental and 
inexcusable lapses in tradecraft and judgment. The systematic failings 
will take sustained leadership and vigorous oversight to correct.
  Our intelligence capabilities in other crucial areas--Iran and North 
Korea among them--are still inadequate and unacceptable. As the war and 
postwar operations in Iraq show dramatically and tragically, we cannot 
govern effectively and cannot make informed decisions without timely 
and accurate intelligence. We cannot afford to fail again. The stakes 
are very large, indeed.
  Thankfully, the recent Commission and Senate reports have also made 
important recommendations. Both Ambassador Negroponte and General 
Hayden have expressed willingness to make important changes. They will 
take steps to integrate and bolster intelligence collection and to end 
``group think'' and untested assumptions. They will use red teams and 
alternative analysis when intelligence conflicts. This was a 
substantial lacking that led to the wrong judgments made in the Iraq 
National Intelligence Estimate that so many of us relied upon to make 
our judgment on how to vote to authorize the President with use of 
force in Iraq.
  The Director also has the authority to put in place a management team 
and implement changes, including new mission managers and new centers, 
to focus attention on the most pressing problems.
  I believe strongly it is going to take a strong and authoritative 
Director of National Intelligence to put our intelligence community 
back on the right track. Equally important, it will take forthright and 
impeccably objective leaders to restore the credibility both to the 
American people and to the world that was destroyed by the assessments 
of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.
  The legislation that created the DNI last year, the Intelligence 
Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act, spells out the framework for a 
strong DNI, but it did not fill in the details. The authorities and 
responsibilities that should have been made clear in law, I believe, 
will have to be instead established in practice. I have discussed 
privately and through the confirmation hearing process with Ambassador 
Negroponte the need for him to assert authority by taking bold action 
to lead and manage the intelligence community, and I will support him 
in doing so.
  I have confidence the new Director shares this vision and will take 
the necessary steps immediately after taking office. General Hayden, 
with his experience in fighting these battles as Director of NSA, will 
be a key adviser and ally in fulfilling this charge.
  The men and women who work for the 15 intelligence agencies are 
skilled and dedicated, but they need innovative, new tools and ways of 
doing business to meet our future strategic intelligence needs. I am 
confident that Director Negroponte and Deputy Director Hayden will work 
to provide these needs.
  I thank the President for forwarding such skilled, nonpartisan 
nominees, and I wholeheartedly support their confirmation.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I am delighted to yield 10 minutes to the 
distinguished chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental 
Affairs Committee whose unflagging, untiring, persevering efforts, 
along with her coauthor, Senator Lieberman, led to passage of the 
Intelligence Reform Act that has returned us to this whole process 
where we have Ambassador Negroponte and General Hayden, an outstanding 
team, not only to reform but to lead the intelligence community.
  I thank the Senator for her leadership and her efforts. She 
persevered, and she was successful.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, first, I thank the distinguished chairman 
of the Senate Intelligence Committee and his extraordinary ranking 
member for all their work to improve the quality of the intelligence 
upon which our policymakers, our men and women who are on the front 
lines, and all of us rely.
  Last July, the Senate leaders assigned the Homeland Security and 
Governmental Affairs Committee the task of developing legislation to 
implement the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. The committee I 
am privileged to chair devoted more than 5 months to this important and 
complex issue that is so crucial to the safety and well-being of the 
American people. We successfully accomplished our assignment with the 
enactment of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 
2004, which the President signed into law in December.
  During the committee's inquiry into how to fix the flaws in our 
Nation's intelligence capability that permitted so many dots to go 
unconnected for so

[[Page 7429]]

long, one remedy emerged as being among the very highest priorities. 
Our intelligence community--15 disparate agencies and entities, each 
with its own expertise and experience--clearly needed one leader. The 
role of this leader has often been described as that of a CEO in 
business, a person with the ultimate authority over the operation and 
with the ultimate accountability for results. An even more succinct 
description was offered by former Secretary of State Powell at one of 
our committee's many hearings. He said what the intelligence community 
really needed was an empowered quarterback.
  The new law creates the Director of National Intelligence as that 
empowered quarterback, with significant authority to manage the 
intelligence community and to transform it into, to use President 
Bush's term, a single unified enterprise.
  I believe John Negroponte is the right person, the right leader to be 
that CEO, that empowered quarterback.
  Ambassador Negroponte is an accomplished diplomat, which is a vital 
credential in the international war against terrorism. Having served 
very recently as our Ambassador in Iraq, he knows firsthand how 
important the intelligence provided is. He has been an intelligence 
consumer. Throughout his distinguished and varied career in service to 
our country, he has demonstrated strong, decisive leadership skills. 
These skills will be invaluable in exercising the Director of National 
Intelligence authorities and in carrying out the intelligence community 
transformation called for in our legislation.
  The Ambassador's extensive experience in national security and 
foreign relations is a solid foundation for the weighty 
responsibilities he will have in this critical position. As the first 
DNI, Ambassador Negroponte will not only serve a critical role 
immediately, he will also establish the relationships and set the 
precedent for future DNIs. Thus, when I met with the Ambassador, I 
encouraged him to aggressively use the authorities we worked so hard to 
secure in the intelligence reform bill. One of those key authorities 
concerns the DNI's responsibility for determining the budget for the 
national intelligence program. He also will have significant authority 
to execute that budget and to transfer funds, if needed, to meet 
emerging threats and the greatest priorities.
  Today, at a hearing before the Armed Services Committee on the 
nomination of General Hayden to be the No. 2 person to the DNI, I 
raised the issue with General Hayden about the need to aggressively 
exercise that budget authority. The law is very clear on this point, 
but already we have seen some signs from the Defense Department of a 
potential challenge to the new DNI in exercising that authority.
  I think it should be very clear, through the legislative history and 
in our conversations today, that the DNI has a direct relationship to 
the heads of the National Security Agency and the other intelligence 
agencies that are housed within the Pentagon but serve not only the 
Department of Defense but all intelligence consumers. I was pleased to 
hear General Hayden's understanding of the extent of that authority.
  Ambassador Negroponte will be the first intelligence CEO to set the 
community's budget, to establish community-wide intelligence gathering 
and analytical priorities, and to employ financial, technological, and 
human resources where and when they are most needed, or, as Secretary 
Powell might have put it, he will be calling the plays. This is an 
unprecedented challenge and unprecedented authority, and I am convinced 
John Negroponte will meet this challenge in an exemplary manner. I am 
convinced he understands the need to exercise that authority to the 
full extent of the law.
  Ambassador Negroponte will provide our intelligence community with 
accomplished, experienced, dedicated, and needed leadership. I 
wholeheartedly urge my colleagues to approve this important nomination 
without any delay. Again, I commend the chairman and the ranking member 
for bringing this nominee so quickly to the Senate floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Martinez). The Senator from Oregon.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, it is not easy for a member of the Senate 
Select Committee on Intelligence to oppose Ambassador Negroponte's 
nomination on the floor of this Senate. I am well aware that many do 
not share the concerns, and the views I will express this afternoon 
have not been arrived at casually.
  The Ambassador is the consummate diplomat, a dedicated public 
servant, a well-liked person who is popular with Members of the Senate 
of both political parties. He has been confirmed by the Senate for a 
variety of posts. I have voted twice for those confirmations, but I am 
not convinced that Ambassador Negroponte is the right man for this job. 
I have reached this judgment based on my strong belief that a 
prerequisite for this position should be a willingness to be direct and 
forthcoming with policymakers even when the truth is difficult. 
Unfortunately, directness was nowhere in sight in the Ambassador's 
responses at his confirmation hearing last week.
  At that hearing, the Ambassador was not even as direct and 
forthcoming in discussing controversial matters as he has been in the 
past. For example, at the hearing I discussed with the Ambassador his 
service in Honduras. I made it clear at the outset that I understand it 
makes no sense to relitigate a war that took place in Central America 
more than 20 years ago. In spite of the lengthy news accounts printed 
that morning, the morning of his confirmation hearing, providing new 
information documenting the Ambassador's continued backing of the 
Contras after the House had voted to halt U.S. support, I chose not to 
focus on those issues. I raised the Honduras issue last week and return 
to it this afternoon because I believe the record of the Ambassador's 
service there is particularly telling in terms of his judgment and his 
willingness to confront difficult facts, which I believe are two key 
requirements for the Director of National Intelligence.
  For example, I find it especially troubling that the Ambassador's 
perception of the human rights situation in Honduras differs so 
dramatically from that expressed by the Central Intelligence Agency, 
the InterAmerican Court, the Honduras Human Rights Commission, and 
others. The Central Intelligence Agency released a report entitled 
``Selected Issues Relating to CIA Activities in Honduras in the 1980s'' 
which found:

       Honduran military committed hundreds of human rights abuses 
     since 1980, many of which were politically motivated and 
     officially sanctioned.

  The CIA report linked the Honduran military personnel to death squad 
activities.
  Mr. Negroponte, on the other hand, said in a September 12, 1982, 
letter that was printed in the New York Times Magazine that:

       Honduras's increasingly professional armed forces are 
     dedicated to defending the sovereignty and territorial 
     integrity of the country, and they are publicly committed to 
     civilian constitutional rule.

  The InterAmerican Court for Human Rights heard cases concerning human 
rights abuses in Honduras. In 1989, the Court found:

       A practice of disappearances carried out or tolerated by 
     Honduran officials existed between 1981 and 1984; and
       The Government of Honduras failed to guarantee the human 
     rights affected by that practice.

  In an October 23, 1982, letter printed in the Economist, Ambassador 
Negro-
ponte wrote:

       Honduras's increasingly professional armed forces are fully 
     supportive of this country's constitutional system.

  The Honduran Human Rights Commissioner released a report on forced 
disappearances that occurred in Honduras during Ambassador Negroponte's 
tenure. The report states:

       [t]here existed within the Armed Forces a deliberate policy 
     of kidnapping and forcibly disappearing persons.

  Yet the introductory passage of the 1983 State Department Country 
Report issued while Mr. Negroponte was Ambassador stated:


[[Page 7430]]

       The Honduran military, which ruled the country for almost 
     20 years before 1982, supports the present civilian 
     government and is publicly committed to national and local 
     elections, which are scheduled in 1985, as well as the 
     observance of human rights.

  The fact is, when you read what the Ambassador has said about 
Honduras, and what the CIA and others have said about the same time 
period, it is as if John Negroponte was an ambassador to a different 
country.
  Given these sharp differences, I asked the Ambassador last week to 
reconcile this very large gap between what he saw and what others 
reported. I expected an answer that would have at least acknowledged 
these very substantial differences and indicated that in hindsight the 
Ambassador would have been more outspoken about human rights practices.
  Instead, the Ambassador tried to dismiss the issue altogether by 
simply saying the differences were not so great, something I thought 
was pretty hard to fathom, given the accounts I had provided to him.
  The fact is, in trying to brush off this issue of Honduras, the 
Ambassador actually showed less candor last week than he has in the 
past. For instance, at his 2003 hearing before the Foreign Relations 
Committee when he was being considered for Ambassador to the United 
Nations, Mr. Negroponte stated the following about Honduran human 
rights abuses:

       Maybe it was a mixed picture, Senator. I am more than 
     willing to acknowledge that.

  At the same hearing he said:

       Could I have been more vocal? Well, you know, in 
     retrospect, perhaps I could have been.

  So you have to ask, as I have done, Why would the Ambassador be less 
direct last week than he had been previously? Certainly there was no 
national security reason for him to duck questions about events that 
are decades old. Perhaps the newspaper articles that morning made him 
fear Congress would get into issues he might find uncomfortable. That 
is certainly understandable, but it is absolutely unacceptable for a 
nominee tapped to head our Nation's intelligence community at a time 
when directness and forthrightness is more important than ever before. 
Throughout his confirmation hearing, on issue after issue, the 
Ambassador ducked and avoided giving anything resembling a 
straightforward answer.
  I asked the Ambassador whether he foresaw his office involving itself 
in decisions relating to the implementation of the PATRIOT Act's 
surveillance powers, and in particular whether his office might weigh 
in on whether the Federal Bureau of Investigation should seek a FISC 
warrant.
  His answer?

       Senator, I am not entirely certain what my authorities 
     would be under FISC.

  I asked the Ambassador whether he would be willing to take a fresh 
look at the United States rendition policy, possibly the most 
controversial weapon being used in fighting terrorism today. Rendition 
involves sending a suspected terrorist from one country to another 
without court proceedings. Republican and Democratic administrations 
have used renditions in the past, but their use has increased 
significantly since 
9/11, and the policy has certainly changed. Previously, most suspects 
were rendered to the United States. Now it works the opposite way. More 
and more often the United States is rendering suspects to foreign 
countries. News reports indicate that suspects are frequently being 
rendered to countries known to torture suspected terrorists, such as 
Syria, Egypt, Uzbekistan, and Saudi Arabia. While the United States 
gets assurances from foreign governments they will not use torture, 
U.S. officials have little control over the situation once a suspect is 
in the hands of the foreign country.
  Rendition is the practice used to address a very difficult dilemma. 
America may lack the evidence to bring a suspected terrorist into 
court; there is some proof of wrongdoing, but not enough for a court of 
law. If the suspect is not an American citizen, it is possible to send 
them elsewhere to be dealt with, but that can be a dicey prospect. 
Renditions get suspects off the streets, something which makes 
Americans safer. But the tactic has raised serious concerns for many of 
our citizens and for many people in other countries as well. I have 
heard those concerns, but I also recognize that renditions can serve a 
legitimate and valuable purpose. It is a question of how this policy is 
carried out. Our country needs to have a frank and candid and direct 
discussion about this policy of rendition. But, before that can happen, 
there needs to be some answers to some tough questions:
  Have any suspects been rendered based on faulty intelligence and, if 
so, what amount of intelligence should be necessary before a rendition 
takes place?
  Are there certain countries to which the United States should not 
render suspects?
  Are the assurances the United States gets in the rendition area 
sufficient with regard to the use of torture?
  Does the United States need to retain more control of suspects it 
renders, especially to countries that have weak human rights records?
  How good is the intelligence the United States is getting from 
rendered suspects?
  What is the effect of a rendition policy on America's diplomatic 
relations with other countries?
  These are some of the important questions that need to be answered. 
So in an effort to examine Ambassador Negroponte's openness and to try 
to determine his judgment in a difficult area such as this, I asked the 
Ambassador whether he would be willing to take a fresh look at our 
rendition policy; not a point-by-point description of what he would do, 
but simply would he be willing to take a fresh look, a new inspection 
of this country's approach in rendition.
  The Los Angeles Times summed up the Ambassador's response to my 
question about rendition with four words. They said: ``Negroponte 
avoided the question.''
  The Ambassador, I would point out, ducked other important questions 
asked by members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. For 
example, our colleague from Michigan, Senator Levin, asked the 
Ambassador to explain what action he would take if the Ambassador 
concluded policymakers were making public statements that differed from 
the classified intelligence. There was no direct answer to that 
important question asked by Senator Levin.
  Senator Feinstein sought detailed information on how, with regard to 
countries such as Iran and North Korea, the Ambassador intended to 
assure the United States developed much needed credible intelligence. 
Ambassador Negroponte responded:

       Well, Senator, the law prescribes a number of approaches to 
     this.

  Then I asked the Ambassador about the issue of overclassification of 
material in the area of national security. This is an issue that has 
concerned many in the Senate, of both political parties. I have been 
interested in this matter for some time.
  I was, frankly, flabbergasted when
9/11 Commissioner Tom Kean, who did such a superb job in his work, with 
Lee Hamilton, former Member of the other body--Tom Kean said 75 percent 
of everything he saw when he chaired the
9/11 Commission that was classified should not have been classified. 
This is what Tom Kean said in the extraordinarily important inquiry he 
conducted.
  The Central Intelligence Agency initially blacked out over 50 percent 
of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Report on Iraq's WMD 
programs and links to terrorist groups.
  I will tell colleagues I thought Chairman Roberts and Senator 
Rockefeller did a superb job in guiding our committee to a unanimous 
judgment with respect to Iraq and that important report. But if the CIA 
had had its way, page after page after page would have been blacked 
out.
  The National Archives Information Security Office reported 14.2 
million classification actions in 2003, twice the number recorded 10 
years earlier. The agencies are becoming more creative in terms of how 
they overclassify. In addition to the traditional ``limited official

[[Page 7431]]

use,'' ``secret'' and ``top secret,'' some agencies now have 
``sensitive security information,'' ``sensitive Homeland Security 
information,'' ``sensitive but unclassified'' and ``for official use 
only'' classifications, as well.
  Secrecy has become so pervasive it makes you wonder whether facts are 
being classified for legitimate reasons or to protect the individuals 
and agencies involved.
  As I mentioned, this has been a bipartisan concern. I am particularly 
grateful for the work Senator Lott has been willing to do with me. We 
took some modest steps in the intelligence reform bill to open this 
process and try to bring some balance back into the area of 
classification. But given this history, given the huge explosion in 
terms of overclassification of Government documents, I was interested 
in what the Ambassador had to say with respect to this.
  When I first asked, he said:

       Senator, I don't know about classification or 
     overclassification.

  But then he went on to make the mind-boggling claim that ``Certainly 
the trend in my lifetime has been to reduce levels of classification 
wherever possible. And I've seen that happen before my own eyes.''
  Troubling as that answer was and the nonanswers that I received to 
the other important questions I asked with respect to the PATRIOT Act 
and relating to rendition and other topics, as troubling as what I was 
told and wasn't told, is it is not only what the Director of National 
Intelligence will know that is so important but what he is willing to 
say that is vital.
  In spite of the Ambassador's responses to these questions, I have no 
question in my mind of Ambassador Negroponte's ability to master the 
facts. What I am not confident of is his steadfast commitment to 
speaking those facts to ears that do not want to hear them. And history 
tells us the consequences of an inability or an unwillingness to speak 
truth to power can be disastrous.
  This country saw what happened in the Bay of Pigs, an unsuccessful 
attempt by United States-backed Cuban exiles to overthrow the 
Government of the Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. It is a classic example 
of what can happen when America's intelligence community is unwilling 
or unable to be candid. In his review of the Bay of Pigs invasion 
release to the public in 1998, CIA Inspector General Lyman Kirkpatrick 
identified numerous failures. These include:

       [The f]ailure to subject the president, especially in its 
     latter frenzied stages, to a cold and objective appraisal by 
     the best operating talent available, particularly by those 
     not involved in the operation, such as the Chief of 
     Operations and the chiefs of the Senior Staffs;
       [The f]ailure to advise the president, at an appropriate 
     time, that success has become dubious and to recommend the 
     operation be, therefore, canceled and that the problem of 
     unseating Castro be restudied;
       The failure to maintain the covert nature of the project--
     ``[f]or more than three months before the invasion the 
     American press was reporting, often with some accuracy, on 
     the recruiting and training of Cubans. Such massive 
     preparations could only be laid to the U.S. The agency's name 
     was freely linked with these activities. Plausible denial was 
     a pathetic illusion.''

  This is what the inspector general said. This is not what a partisan 
said. Yet the CIA unrealistically plowed ahead, unwilling or unable to 
face the reality of the situation that the operation was doomed to 
fail, and as a result the CIA was humiliated, many died, our prestige 
was damaged.
  Throughout the entire time our country was in Vietnam the 
intelligence community also failed to be forthright and was plagued by 
overoptimism. One example was particularly worth noting.
  In 1963, the Board of National Estimate's draft Nation Intelligence 
Estimate concluded that ``The struggle in South Vietnam at best will be 
protracted and costly [because] very great weaknesses remain and will 
be difficult to surmount.''
  Unhappy with the pessimistic conclusion, the Director of Central 
Intelligence John McCone rejected the draft and instructed the board to 
seek the views of senior policymakers in revising the Nation's 
Intelligence Estimate.
  So the final version of the 1963 stated:

       We believe that Communist progress has been blunted and 
     that the situation is improving . . .

  As those who put together the Pentagon papers later observed:

       The intelligence and reporting problems occurring during 
     this period cannot be explained away . . . In retrospect [the 
     estimators] were not only wrong, but more importantly, they 
     were influential. As a result, a generation paid the price 
     for the unwillingness or the inability of the intelligence 
     community's inability to be forthright.

  Now our country deals with those consequences.
  Many in the Senate will remember George Tenet told the President of 
the United States that the weapons of mass destruction case against 
Iraq was a ``slam dunk.'' Now America knows what George Tenet knew and 
what he was unwilling or unable to tell the President of the United 
States, that it wasn't a slam dunk at all.
  The Niger yellowcake, the high-strength aluminum, the mobile weapons 
lab, the aerial vehicles, the intelligence provided by Curveball and 
the Iraqi National Congress witnesses, all of this intelligence was 
questionable and was being questioned by at least some members of the 
intelligence community.
  However, George Tenet was not direct. He was not forthcoming. He told 
the President of the United States what the President wanted to hear. 
Whether he was unwilling or unable to be straight with the President, I 
cannot possibly determine. What I do know is that as a member of the 
Select Committee on Intelligence I want to do everything I can. I know 
every Member of the Senate wants to make sure these mistakes are not 
repeated. The stakes are simply too high.
  The Intelligence Reorganization Act gave the Director of National 
Intelligence a whole lot of responsibility but very little enforcement 
power. As the Director works to make 15 intelligence agencies pull 
together, his credibility will be his currency. Critical to his success 
will be the understanding of all concerned that this person is going to 
be direct, that the person will be forthcoming, that the person will 
make sure that no matter who the truth hurts, no matter what 
policymakers think, they are going to get the facts.
  Here is what I think the country needs. The United States needs a 
Director of National Intelligence who is going to speak truth to power, 
somebody who has, in Hamilton's words, the ``gumption'' to tell the 
President and other senior policymakers what they don't want to hear.
  The United States needs a Director of National Intelligence who has 
the knowledge and the experience to step in and begin fixing the 
problems facing the intelligence sector immediately.
  The United States needs a Director of National Intelligence who will 
break down existing walls inhibiting analysts throughout the 
intelligence community and, when appropriate, officials and citizens 
outside that realm from getting access to the information they need to 
keep Americans safe. The United States needs a Director of National 
Intelligence willing to, when necessary, go head to head with the 
agencies under his control, especially the Department of Defense. If 
the Director lets them push him around, he is doomed.
  The United States needs a Director of National Intelligence to take 
control over the intelligence budget. Before Congress created the 
position, the intelligence community lacked a leader willing to make 
tough budget priority and tradeoff decisions. Each agency asked for 
funds. It was, in effect, a matter of passing the request along. This 
has to stop. There are not limitless resources. A strategic view, not a 
parochial lens, ought to be guiding budget decisions.
  The United States needs a Director of National Intelligence to shape 
the intelligence agencies he oversees into a true community because, at 
this point, the phrase ``intelligence community'' is pretty much a 
misnomer. While coordination and cooperation have improved, the 
individual intelligence agencies persist in maintaining their

[[Page 7432]]

own culture and collection practices. As the military services have 
learned to fight jointly, our intelligence collection agencies need to 
learn how to act together to gather critical information our 
policymakers and warfighters need to protect our country.
  The United States needs a Director of National Intelligence who 
recognizes he cannot do this alone. This position is new and its 
authority, while substantial, is unclear. His fights with the 
administration over matters of significant national policy need not, 
and should not, always be kept quiet. If the Director of National 
Intelligence is to succeed, he will need to look to allies in the 
executive branch and here in the Congress to help.
  While Ambassador Negroponte is surely a skilled diplomat and has many 
allies in the Senate, Senators of both parties I admire greatly, I am 
not confident the administration's nominee will meet these 
expectations.
  For that reason, I will be voting no on the nomination of Ambassador 
John Negroponte to be Director of National Intelligence.
  Mr. President, I want to wrap up with one additional point. I am 
pleased to be in strong support of General Hayden, who will, when the 
nominee is confirmed, be the deputy. I thought General Hayden's 
directness and openness at his confirmation hearing was particularly 
welcome.
  For example, I asked him, on the matter of privacy rights, which is 
pretty important, given his past background at the NSA, how he would 
handle that issue. I think there was a sense it is possible to fight 
terrorism ferociously while still protecting civil liberties. General 
Hayden, in contrast to what we heard at the earlier confirmation 
hearing, was refreshingly direct in his responses, where he talked 
about pushing right up to the line--I believe those were his exact 
words--but being sensitive to civil liberties.
  So I am pleased to be able to say, on the floor of the Senate, I am 
looking forward to the support General Hayden will be receiving from 
the Senate shortly. I expect Ambassador Negro-
ponte and General Hayden to be approved. My door will be open to both 
of them. As a member of the Intelligence Committee, it is my hope that 
both of these individuals will not hesitate to ask me and ask 
colleagues for help. The safety of our country depends on the 
performance of these two individuals in this key post.
  Mr. President, with that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, how much time remains on this side of 
the aisle?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia has 32 minutes.
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume, which will be less than that.
  Mr. President, I am going to use this opportunity to speak on an 
unrelated issue, not entirely but somewhat, but one that is of critical 
importance to the intelligence community and the American people.
  Last week, I filed an amendment to the emergency supplemental 
appropriations bill. Unfortunately, I was not able to bring the 
amendment before the Senate because it was not germane under 
postcloture rules. This amendment is important enough, however, that I 
will take just a few minutes to explain it.
  My amendment was, and is, simple and straightforward. It expresses 
the sense of the Senate. It is not directive. It expresses the sense of 
the Senate that the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence should 
conduct an investigation into matters related to the collection of 
intelligence through the detention, interrogation, and rendition of 
prisoners. That is its purpose.
  The amendment, as I indicated, does not direct the committee to 
undertake this much needed and long overdue congressional review. 
Rather, it is a statement by the Senate that the committee should carry 
out its oversight duties and carefully, thoroughly, and constructively 
evaluate the interrogation practices of the U.S. Intelligence 
Community.
  A year has passed since the appearance of photographs graphically 
portraying the abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison. Since 
then, we have seen a steady stream of accusations relating to the way 
U.S. military and intelligence agencies treat individuals in their 
custody. Allegations of mistreatment have surfaced wherever the United 
States holds prisoners overseas--across Iraq, in Afghanistan, and at 
Guantanamo Bay.
  Troubling new revelations have become almost a daily occurrence--
literally a daily occurrence--with a disturbing number of these 
incidents resulting in prisoner deaths.
  At least 26 prisoners have died in American custody. The disturbing 
charge has been leveled against the United States that we are exporting 
torture through rendition practices that lack accountability.
  Who can honestly say these events and allegations are not serious 
enough to warrant an Intelligence Committee investigation?
  The collection of intelligence through interrogation and rendition is 
an extremely important part of our counterterrorism effort and one of 
our most important intelligence tools.
  But this tool, as with all others, must be applied within the bounds 
of our laws and our own moral framework. It must be subject to the same 
scrutiny and congressional oversight as every other aspect of 
intelligence collection. This, unfortunately, has not been the case.
  Despite the critical importance of interrogation-derived intelligence 
and the growing controversy surrounding detention, interrogation, and 
rendition practices and policies, the Congress has largely ignored the 
issue, holding few hearings that have provided only limited insight.
  More disturbingly, in this Senator's judgment, the Senate 
Intelligence Committee--the committee charged with overseeing 
intelligence programs, and the only committee with the jurisdiction to 
investigate all aspects of this issue--is, in this Senator's judgment, 
sitting on the sidelines and effectively abdicating its oversight 
responsibility to media investigative reporters who go at it very 
aggressively and on a daily basis.
  As the Intelligence Committee's vice chairman, I have been pushing, 
for the past 3 months, for an investigation into the legal and 
operational questions at the heart of the detention and interrogation 
controversy.
  My requests, and those of other committee members, have been 
rebuffed, based upon the argument that we have been fully informed on 
the particulars of our detention and interrogation program, and the 
Intelligence Committee need only monitor these operations.
  The point has also been made that the Intelligence Committee should 
not undertake an investigation into these issues because the CIA 
Inspector General is conducting his own investigation. I reject this 
notion that the Senate should cede to the executive branch its 
oversight responsibilities. Carrying out oversight is why the Senate 
Intelligence Committee exists.
  Effective congressional oversight is not achieved passively waiting 
for and accepting the parameters of internal executive branch reviews. 
We are separate in our responsibilities, executive and legislative. 
While it is true that the CIA inspector general is investigating 
specific allegations of abuse involving intelligence personnel, those 
specific cases represent a small portion of what the Intelligence 
Committee should be examining. Many fundamental legal and operational 
issues are outside the inspector general's very limited focus and 
deserve the Intelligence Committee's immediate attention.
  We have a duty to not simply monitor but to actively inquire about 
the conduct of congressionally funded activities--that is our job--
especially activities such as prisoner interrogation that can have life 
or death implications. Down the road, if we don't set these rules 
straight, that can come back to haunt our soldiers and their safety.
  Up to this point, the Intelligence Committee oversight that I am 
speaking of has been, in the judgment of this

[[Page 7433]]

Senator, abdicated to the press over the past year. Here is a sampling, 
which I will go through quickly, of headlines from articles that have 
been published in recent weeks: ``Interrogator Says U.S. Approved 
Handling of Detainee Who Died''; ``White House Has Tightly Restricted 
Oversight of CIA Detentions''; ``FBI Report Questions Guantanamo 
Tactics''; ``Questions Are Left by C.I.A. Chief on the Use of 
Torture''; ``CIA's Assurances on Transferred Subjects Doubted--
Prisoners Say Countries Break No-Torture Pledges''; ``Europeans 
Investigate CIA Role in Abductions''; ``Army Details Scale of Abuse of 
Prisoners in an Afghan Jail''; ``Prisoners at Abu Ghraib Said to 
Include Children''; ``Army, CIA Agreed on `Ghost' Prisoners''; ``Lack 
of Oversight Led to the Abuse of Detainees, Investigator Says''; ``Ex-
CIA Lawyer Calls for Law on Rendition''; ``CIA Avoids Scrutiny of 
Detainee Treatment''; ``Files Show New Abuse Cases in Afghan and Iraqi 
Prisons''; ``CIA Is Seeking New Role on Detainees''; ``FBI Agents 
Allege Abuse of Detainees at Guantanamo Bay''; ``CIA Was Wary of U.S. 
Interrogation Methods in Iraq.''
  I think the Presiding Officer gets the drift.
  I ask my colleagues to consider the finding made by General Fay in 
his recent report on the abuses at Abu Ghraib. General Fay found that 
CIA practices ``led to a loss of accountability, abuse . . . and the 
unhealthy mystique that further poisoned the atmosphere at Abu 
Ghraib.''
  General Fay was unable to fully investigate the CIA's role at Abu 
Ghraib and other prisons. The Senate Intelligence Committee, however, 
is not unable to do that. That is our job.
  These and other reports highlight the need for the sort of strong 
congressional oversight that in my judgment is now absent. There are 
many legal and operational questions that we should be investigating to 
ensure that this vitally important intelligence collection program is 
not continually hampered by vague and confusing legal and operational 
directives.
  For example, on March 18, 2005, the Central Intelligence Agency 
issued a statement that:

       CIA policies on interrogation have always followed legal 
     guidance from the Department of Justice.

  That may be so, but was that legal guidance supportable? A lengthy 
legal opinion of the Department of Justice on interrogation practices, 
which had been issued in secret in August 2002, was quickly repudiated 
by the White House when it became public in June of 2004 and was 
superseded by a public Justice Department legal opinion in December of 
2004. As that episode indicates, secret law is an invitation to great 
error.
  The Intelligence Committee, which includes members of the Senate 
Judiciary Committee, must conduct a complete examination of the legal 
guidance that CIA and Defense Department interrogators have been given. 
What supporting roles do the CIA and FBI play in the interrogation of 
suspects at military-run institutions? And how are their activities 
coordinated, if they are?
  It has been publicly reported that the CIA requested that a number of 
prisoners held in Iraq not be registered and be kept from international 
inspection--so-called ghost detainees--and that FBI officials lodged 
strenuous complaints about the mistreatment of prisoners held at 
Guantanamo Bay. I cannot emphasize how strongly those FBI objections 
were. These reports and others strongly suggest that different agencies 
are operating by different sets of interrogation and detention rules, 
which is a recipe for disaster.
  The Congress should evaluate the general policy guidelines for which 
it is appropriate to render a detainee to another country, and what 
intelligence is gained from such practice.
  More specifically, we must examine the validity of assurances that 
the United States is given when detainees are rendered to other 
countries that they will not be tortured. The Congress should 
undertake, with the intelligence community, case studies of 
interrogations, including the methods used and, importantly, the 
reliability of the information obtained. As with other intelligence 
tools, we should consider on the basis of facts, rather than surmise, 
what works, what does not work, to obtain reliable information that 
actually contributes to our national security. The Congress should 
examine plans for the long-term detention or prosecution of persons 
detained or rendered for interrogation purposes.
  Should the United States, for example, hold detainees without trial 
for years or decades to come? Is it acceptable to do that for the 
reason that the detainees' acknowledgment of their actions came during 
interrogations that would neither meet the standards of a U.S. court or 
U.S. military commission?
  The reality may be that if Congress continues to default in its 
oversight and legislative responsibilities, that the courts, in fact, 
themselves will end up filling that vacuum. The threat of terrorism is 
going to be with us for many years, if not decades. The intelligence we 
gain through interrogations will be crucial in protecting Americans 
themselves against future attacks. If we are to optimize those 
counterterrorism efforts, we need to have a plan, not an ad hoc policy, 
for how to deal with people in our custody.
  America is not a nation that uses or condones torture. We are party 
to international agreements that prohibit these acts, and we demand 
humane treatment for our citizens when they are arrested abroad and for 
our soldiers when they are captured on the battlefield. We must uphold 
the same high standards for individuals in our custody or we will 
rightly be branded as hypocrites, and we will put our soldiers and our 
citizens in danger. I cannot emphasize that enough.
  Next year will mark the 30th anniversary of the Senate Intelligence 
Committee. The committee was created in the crucible of an extensive 
bipartisan investigation in 1975, led by Senators Frank Church and John 
Tower, into allegations of abuse by U.S. intelligence agencies. One 
conclusion, as described by Howard Baker--somebody I admire 
enormously--was that the congressional oversight system had provided 
``infrequent and ineffectual review'' and that ``many of the abuses 
revealed might have been prevented had Congress been doing its job.''
  Accordingly, the resolution establishing the Intelligence Committee 
charged it to ``provide vigilant legislative oversight over the 
intelligence activities of the United States to assure that such 
activities are in conformity with the Constitution and the laws of the 
United States.''
  It is time for the Senate Intelligence Committee to carry out the 
vigilant legislative oversight that is our duty and which a number are 
calling for us to do. We should launch a comprehensive and constructive 
investigation into the detention, interrogation, and rendition 
practices of the intelligence community because it is long overdue.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the 
Congressional Record several editorials that have appeared around the 
country calling for congressional action. They include editorials from 
many newspapers, including the Washington Times and newspapers from 
Tennessee, Oregon, Florida, Maryland, New York, and California.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

             [From the St. Petersburg Times, Feb. 17, 2005]

                          Investigate the CIA

       The extensive use of ``extraordinary rendition,'' by which 
     the CIA moves terrorist suspects to undisclosed prisons 
     around the world for interrogation, has to be the agency's 
     worst kept secret. News reports abound of potentially dozens 
     of al-Qaida suspects held overseas by the CIA, incommunicado 
     and without charge or turned over to the security services of 
     other nations known for their abusive treatment of prisoners, 
     such as Egypt and Syria.
       Congress has been inexcusably reluctant to investigate 
     these actions. The Republican leadership apparently has been 
     happy to let the CIA dirty its hands with extralegal 
     strategies in the nation's efforts to fight terrorism. But 
     thanks to some pushing by Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV, D-
     W.Va., the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence 
     Committee, Congress may begin to open its

[[Page 7434]]

     eyes. Rockefeller has asked the committee to open a formal 
     investigation into the CIA's use of detention, interrogation 
     and rendition. Rockefeller told the New York Times that he 
     felt the committee would be ``derelict if we did not carry 
     out our oversight responsibilities.''
       Until now, Congress has done little more than shrug as more 
     evidence has emerged of U.S. intelligence services engaging 
     in brutal interrogations. During the Senate confirmation 
     proceedings of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, it became 
     clear that the CIA had solicited the Justice Department 
     memorandum giving legal cover to those who use aggressive 
     techniques against prisoners. The CIA wanted to protect its 
     agents from criminal liability. And the administration's view 
     remains that the CIA is not bound by the president's 2002 
     directive that prisoners in American custody be treated 
     humanely. Late last year, when some in Congress sought to 
     impose new limits on abusive interrogation tactics by the 
     CIA, the White House intervened and the those limits were 
     dropped.
       Congress has willingly collaborated in this charade that 
     America is maintaining its moral authority in the world even 
     as it adopts the tactics of human rights abusers. But as 
     former Secretary of State Colin Powell and retired military 
     leaders have repeatedly warned, when America approves of the 
     use of torture it puts its own soldiers in danger of facing 
     the same brutality.
       Rockefeller's call for an investigation seems to have some 
     momentum. Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., the Intelligence 
     Committee's chairman, is open to the suggestion. This is 
     Congress' duty. The committee should demand a full accounting 
     of every detainee under the direct or indirect control of the 
     CIA, and it should demand to know precisely what techniques 
     have been used to elicit information. This has been allowed 
     to go on far too long.
                                  ____


               [From the Sunday Oregonian, Mar. 6, 2005]

                 The Torture Business Lands In Portland

                          (By David Sarasohn)

       It could make you wonder if congressmen are interested in 
     economic development.
       Rep Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., is actually asking Congress to 
     investigate a hometown company. Moreover, the company is in a 
     booming business, which will be profiled on ``60 Minutes'' 
     tonight.
       In fact, this worldwide business is so big, nobody even 
     knows how big it is--or how big it could get.
       You'd think we'd want a piece of it.
       But at the end of February, Blumenauer wrote leaders of the 
     International Relations Committee, ``I am simply appalled by 
     continued revelations in the media regarding the torture of 
     detainees in American custody, whether by CIA officials, 
     military personnel, or after being transferred to foreign 
     governments.
       ``The extensive reports of physical and mental abuse at 
     American detention facilities around the world, the evidence 
     of detainees being turned over to other countries to be 
     interrogated and tortured, and continued efforts by the Bush 
     administration to restrict legal and constitutional 
     protections from detainees form a compelling case that these 
     are not isolated incidents but administration policy.''
       Moreover, Blumenauer wrote, ``I am additionally troubled by 
     the use of a Gulfstream V jet registered to a shadowy--and 
     possibly illegal--dummy front company, Bayard Foreign 
     Marketing LLC, in my hometown of Portland, Oregon. Press 
     reports have found no public record of the company's alleged 
     owner, nor have calls to their office been successful at 
     locating him. The evidence certainly points to a violation of 
     Oregon law in order to hide the true nature and breadth of 
     this extraordinary rendition program.''
       Picky, picky, picky.
       Here we have a Portland company involved in what is clearly 
     a growth industry--the United States shipping prisoners 
     secretly around the world to be tortured by countries that 
     lack the U.S. Constitution or scruples--and people insist on 
     looking at it as a human rights violation instead of an 
     economic development opportunity.
       In November, the Sunday Times of London reported a flight 
     log for the Gulfstream showing more than 300 flights to 
     countries such as Libya and Uzbekistan--countries that not 
     only offer an expansive view of interrogation, but are 
     normally difficult to get to from Portland. It's not clear if 
     passage on the plane is ever round-trip.
       At the time, the plane was owned by Premier Executive 
     Transport Services of Dedham, Mass., which the Boston Globe 
     found had the same non-existent corporate structure as Bayard 
     Foreign Marketing. ``Sightings of the plane,'' said the 
     Globe, ``. . . have been published in newspapers across the 
     globe and on the Internet.''
       Tonight, ``60 Minutes'' profiles another plane in the same 
     business, a Boeing 737 that has made 600 flights since 9/11, 
     including 10 to Uzbekistan--where the British ambassador at 
     one point complained to his superiors and to U.S. authorities 
     about how the prisoners were being tortured, techniques 
     involving rape, suffocation and immersing limbs in boiling 
     liquid.
       As one of the CIA agents who set up the program explains to 
     the show's reporter, ``It's finding someone else to do your 
     dirty work.''
       Except that nobody around the world seems to be fooled. 
     When Blumenauer went to East Asia to inspect tsunami damage, 
     people everywhere--China, Thailand, Indonesia--wanted to talk 
     about what happened to those in U.S. custody. ``It just 
     happened repeatedly,'' he said Friday.
       Last week, when the State Department issued its annual 
     report on human rights, countries from China to Turkey 
     responded that the United States had no standing to comment 
     on the issue. Noting the irony of the United States 
     condemning countries where it was shipping its prisoners, 
     William F. Schulz of Amnesty International suggested, ``The 
     State Department's carefully compiled record of countries' 
     abuses may perversely have been transformed into a Yellow 
     Pages for the outsourcing of torture.''
       Congress, thinks Blumenauer, might at least want to ask 
     some questions.
       ``There is so much of what is happening that is not 
     accountable,'' he says. ``To suggest that there are thousands 
     of people caught up with this is no exaggeration.''
       And Blumenauer is now even more interested, since he's 
     found the program is almost a constituent.
       Torture, it seems, now has a Portland address.
                                  ____


                 [From the Times Union, Mar. 10, 2005]

                          Torture on the Wing

       Most Americans would cringe at any suggestion that there 
     are parallels between the human rights abuses in Argentina 
     during the 1970s, and Central Intelligence Agency 
     interrogations of suspected terrorists today. But the 
     similarities are there, and that should shame the Bush 
     administration and Congress. An investigation is more than 
     warranted.
       During the years when a military junta ruled Argentina, 
     suspected political opponents ``disappeared.'' They were 
     imprisoned by government forces and tortured. Many were 
     murdered, but some were returned to the streets to tell their 
     stories.
       No one has suggested that the CIA interrogators have 
     systematically murdered captives, to be sure. Nor is there 
     any way to know if American citizens have been seized. But 
     the very secrecy of these operations, and the lack of 
     accountability, raise the possibility that such abuses can 
     occur.
       What is known is distressing enough. Recent news accounts 
     have detailed how CIA agents or mercenaries--it's hard to 
     tell because the captors are masked--have been abducting 
     suspected terrorists, putting them aboard planes and flying 
     them to countries like Syria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and 
     Afghanistan, where they are interrogated and tortured.
       The abductions aren't a new development, either. Indeed, 
     former President Clinton once advocated kidnapping Osama bin 
     Laden and turning him over to Saudi Arabia, where he would 
     face ``streamlined'' justice. But according to a New York 
     Times article printed in this newspaper Sunday, the 
     abductions have been stepped up markedly in response to the 
     terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. There is no requirement 
     that the CIA get prior approval from the Justice Department 
     or the White House to seize a suspect. And by sending 
     captives to foreign countries, there is no obligation to 
     afford the captives any rights under American law, including 
     the prohibition against torture.
       Defenders of these operations claim that they are justified 
     because they have produced information that has saved 
     American lives by thwarting possible terrorist attacks. 
     Others argue that in a time of war, extreme measures are 
     often necessary. Given the urgency of breaking up terrorist 
     plots, they argue, there is little time to observe a long 
     legal process. Moreover, the suspects are most likely 
     foreigners or illegal immigrants, not citizens who are being 
     deprived of their right to due process.
       The consequences of such abductions can't be so easily 
     dismissed, however. Without a system of checks and balances, 
     there is no way to know whether there was good reason to 
     detain someone. That point was driven home during an 
     interview with one detainee, who told the television news 
     program ``60 Minutes'' last Sunday of being abducted while on 
     vacation in Macedonia, shackled, put on a plane and flown to 
     the Middle East for interrogation. He was later released on 
     his own in Albania after, he claims, his captors acknowledged 
     they had confused his name with that of a terror suspect.
       Then there's the matter of placing Americans living abroad 
     at risk of being abducted by terrorist organizations who hope 
     to use their hostages to bargain for their comrades' release.
       Finaily, and hardly least, there is the damage to America's 
     image and values. At the least, Congress should demand some 
     system of accountability to prevent abuses. More than that, 
     it should investigate the claims that these operations have 
     indeed provided life-saving intelligence, or if they have 
     merely tarnished the image of a nation committed to the rule 
     of law.

[[Page 7435]]

     
                                  ____
                  [From the Fresno Bee, Mar. 14, 2005]

 Glass Houses Human Rights Report Has One Glaring Omission--the United 
                                 States

       As required by Congress, the State Department has issued 
     its annual report on human rights progress, or the lack of 
     it, in countries around the world.
       Among those faulted are a number of U.S. allies, including 
     the provisional government in Iraq that is partly a U.S. 
     creature. As always, only one country was missing: the United 
     States.
       That's not entirely self-serving. This country doesn't rate 
     itself because, as a State Department official put it, ``it 
     wouldn't have any credibility.'' Besides, he said, there's no 
     shortage of critics, including U.S.-based human rights 
     groups.
       But this year's report comes at an especially awkward time. 
     There is continuing evidence of abuses in U.S.-run prisons in 
     Afghanistan, Iraq and at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba--the same kind 
     of abuses for which State's report rightfully faults other 
     governments. But there has not been the full, impartial probe 
     that's needed to give a fuller picture of what happened and 
     who, at whatever level, is responsible.
       As long as the United States fails to fully investigate, 
     report and correct its own lapses, it allows abusive regimes 
     abroad to deflect criticism by asking: Who is the United 
     States to judge?
       Indeed, Russia and China did just that following 
     publication of the State Department report.
       It's a fair question, and part of the response should be a 
     thorough attempt to go beyond the focus on abuses by low-
     level military and intelligence personnel. Too much is 
     already known to accept the facile explanation that the 
     accumulating scandal reflects only isolated ``rogue'' 
     behavior.
       And while there have been several investigations, and more 
     continue, all have been conducted by or for the Pentagon, 
     which is unlikely to point the finger of blame upward. 
     Whatever the full truth may be about where ultimate 
     culpability lies, an air of cover-up hovers over the process.
       On Capitol Hill, Sen. Pat Roberts, the Republican chairman 
     of the Senate Intelligence Committee, has rejected a proposal 
     by the Democratic vice chairman, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, to 
     launch a broad probe into the role of U.S. intelligence 
     agencies in the detention, interrogation and ``rendition''--
     transferring to the custody of foreign governments--of terror 
     suspects. This standoff suggests a partisan approach to a 
     vital national security matter.
       What's at stake in the investigation of prisoner abuses is 
     the credibility of this country, which is likelier to be 
     restored through an independent, nonpartisan investigation 
     that lays out whatever facts it finds.
       Perhaps there is no ``smoking gun'' to be found at the top. 
     But for as long as the process remains an essentially in-
     house exercise, those annual State Department human rights 
     reports will continue to raise the question: Who is the 
     United States to judge?
                                  ____


                [From the Baltimore Sun, Jan. 31, 2005]

      American Scar; Permitting Torture Brands Us in the Worst Way

                         (By George Hunsinger)

       When the Senate confirms Alberto R. Gonzales as U.S. 
     attorney general, the vote will be the beginning, not the 
     end, of public debate about our government's policy on 
     torture.
       The Abu Ghraib scandal is only the most visible sign that 
     this policy is inconsistent. Officially, our government 
     opposes torture and advocates a universal standard for human 
     rights. Yet, at the same time, it has allowed ingenious new 
     interrogation methods to be developed that clearly violate 
     these standards. They include stress positions, sleep 
     deprivation, sexual humiliation and desecration of religious 
     objects. These practices, which should never be used, are no 
     less traumatic than the infliction of excruciating pain.
       For religious people, torture is especially deplorable 
     because it sins against God and against humanity created in 
     God's image. It degrades everyone involved--planners, 
     perpetrators and victims.
       More than 225 Christian, Jewish, Muslim and Sikh religious 
     leaders signed an open letter to Mr. Gonzales. They objected 
     to his role in developing a narrow definition of torture and 
     to his equally troubling assertion that some people are not 
     subject to the protections of international law. They 
     registered deep concern about our government's moral 
     foundations, urging support--in practice, not just in words--
     for fundamental human rights.
       Four steps must now be taken to clarify that our government 
     has truly abolished torture.
       First, Congress must remove the false partition placed 
     between the military and intelligence services governing 
     extreme interrogation techniques tantamount to torture. The 
     Senate was right to pass, nearly unanimously, new 
     restrictions for the Pentagon, CIA and other intelligence 
     services. But congressional leaders in both houses later 
     buckled under White House pressure and scrapped the language 
     governing intelligence services.
       Whether the military or intelligence services are 
     conducting practices tantamount to torture is of absolutely 
     no significance. Trying to differentiate between the two 
     perhaps eases the conscience of decision-makers, but it is a 
     distinction without a difference. It fails to insulate us 
     from the absolute evil that is torture.
       Second, Congress must outlaw ``extraordinary rendition,'' a 
     euphemism for torture by proxy. It means that detainees are 
     secretly transferred to countries where torture is practiced 
     as a means of interrogation. Although made public only 
     through shocking cases, such as those of Maher Arar, who was 
     deported to Syria by the United States, and Mamdouh Habib, an 
     Australian citizen who was sent to Egypt before being held at 
     Guantanamo, it has become a mainstay counterterrorism tool.
       Does it really need to be said that ``disappearing'' people 
     without any kind of due process is contrary to everything 
     America stands for, not to mention our laws and treaties? The 
     reasons for a detainee's arrest and his guilt or innocence 
     are irrelevant. No sound moral argument can be made that 
     enabling torture through rendition is permissible.
       Third, Mr. Bush should make a clear statement that torture 
     is wrong in any form and under any circumstances. He should 
     state beyond a shadow of doubt that America will not be 
     complicit in its commission. Leadership from the president 
     would go a long way toward resolving the torture crisis.
       Finally, America needs a special prosecutor. Our reputation 
     has been so badly damaged by Guantanamo, Bagram and Abu 
     Ghraib that no other remedy will do. The existing 
     investigations are not enough because they have not been 
     truly independent. Organizations such as the American Bar 
     Association, Amnesty International and the highly respected 
     International Commission of Jurists in Geneva have all 
     insisted that an independent investigation is imperative.
       Nothing less is at stake in the torture crisis than the 
     soul of our nation. What does it profit us if we proclaim 
     high moral values but fail to reject torture? What does it 
     signify if torture is condemned in word but allowed in deed? 
     A nation that rewards those who permitted and promoted 
     torture is approaching spiritual death.
       George Hunsinger is McCord professor of theology at 
     Princeton Theological Seminary and coordinator of Church 
     Folks for a Better America.
                                  ____


           [From Chattanooga Times Free Press, Feb. 8, 2005]

                        Stories From the Inside

       ``During the whole time we were at Guantanamo,'' said 
     Shafiq Rasul, ``we were at a high level of fear. When we 
     first got there the level was sky-high. At the beginning we 
     were terrified that we might be killed at any minute. The 
     guards would say to us, `We could kill you at any time.' They 
     would say, `The world doesn't know you're here. Nobody knows 
     you're here. All they know is that you're missing, and we 
     could kill you and no one would know.'''
       The horror stories from the scandalous interrogation camp 
     that the United States is operating at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, 
     are coming to light with increased frequency. At some point 
     the whole shameful tale of this exercise in extreme human 
     degradation will be told. For the time being we have to piece 
     together what we can from a variety of accounts that have 
     escaped the government's obsessively reinforced barriers of 
     secrecy.
       We know that people were kept in cells that in some cases 
     were the equivalent of animal cages, and that some detainees, 
     disoriented and despairing, have been shackled like slaves 
     and left to soil themselves with their own urine and feces. 
     Detainees are frequently kicked, punched, beaten and sexually 
     humiliated. Extremely long periods of psychologically 
     damaging isolation are routine.
       This is all being done in the name of fighting terror. But 
     the best evidence seems to show that many of the people 
     rounded up and dumped without formal charges into Guantanamo 
     had nothing to do with terror. They just happened to be 
     unfortunate enough to get caught in one of Uncle Sam's 
     depressingly indiscriminate sweeps. Which is what happened to 
     Shafiq Rasul, who was released from Guantanamo about a year 
     ago. His story is instructive, and has not been told widely 
     enough.
       Rasul was one of three young men, all friends, from the 
     British town of Tipton who were among thousands of people 
     seized in Afghanistan in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001. 
     They had been there, he said, to distribute food and medical 
     supplies to impoverished Afghans.
       The three were interviewed soon after their release by 
     Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional 
     Rights, which has been in the forefront of efforts to secure 
     legal representation for Guantanamo detainees.
       Under extreme duress at Guantanamo, including hundreds of 
     hours of interrogation and long periods of isolation, the 
     three men confessed to having been in a terrorist training 
     camp in Afghanistan. They also said they were among a number 
     of men who could be seen in a videotape of Osama bin Laden. 
     The tape had been made in August 2000.

[[Page 7436]]

       For the better part of two years, Rasul and his friends, 
     Asif Iqbal and Rhuhel Ahmed, had denied involvement in any 
     terror activity whatsoever. But Rasul said they eventually 
     succumbed to long months of physical and psychological abuse. 
     Rasul had been held in isolation for several weeks (his 
     second sustained period of isolation) when an interrogator 
     showed him the video of bin Laden. He said she told him: 
     ``I've put detainees here in isolation for 12 months and 
     eventually they've broken. You might as well admit it now.''
       ``I could not bear another day of isolation, let alone the 
     prospect of another year,'' said Rasul. He confessed.
       The three men, all British citizens, were saved by British 
     intelligence officials, who proved that they had been in 
     England when the video was shot, and during the time they 
     were supposed to have been in Qaida training camps. All three 
     were returned to England, where they were released from 
     custody.
       Rasul has said many times that he and his friends were 
     freed only because their alibis were corroborated. But they 
     continue to worry about the many other Guantanamo detainees 
     who may be innocent but have no way of proving it.
       The Bush administration has turned Guantanamo into a place 
     that is devoid of due process and the rule of law. It's a 
     place where human beings can be imprisoned for life without 
     being charged or tried, without ever seeing a lawyer, and 
     without having their cases reviewed by a court. Congress and 
     the courts should be uprooting this evil practice, but 
     freedom and justice in the United States are on a post-9/ll 
     downhill slide.
       So we are stuck for the time being with the disgrace of 
     Guantanamo, which will forever be a stain on the history of 
     the United States, like the internment of the Japanese in 
     World War II.

  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas is recognized.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I regret that I am compelled to speak on 
this subject. The topic of the day is the confirmation of Ambassador 
John Negroponte to be the new National Director of Intelligence, but it 
appears as if that topic has now changed, and I have no alternative but 
to respond in that basically the purpose and the responsibilities of 
the Intelligence Committee have been challenged by the vice chairman.
  I understand that the vice chairman feels strongly about this issue. 
We have discussed this at length--not as much as I had hoped and that 
we had intended to--to seek common ground, but he feels so strongly 
that he offered an amendment to the supplemental appropriations bill, 
which he has discussed.
  I feel equally as strong, so much so that I filed a second-degree 
amendment in response. My second-degree amendment is in stark contrast 
to the amendment offered by my colleague and my friend. My amendment 
actually expresses support for our Armed Forces and intelligence 
officers, rather than calling into question their actions, while they 
are on the front lines in the war on terror. The amendment underscored 
the Intelligence Committee's continuing aggressive oversight of all 
aspects of the war on terror, including terrorist detention and 
interrogation.
  The Rockefeller amendment is a sense of the Senate, as he indicated, 
calling for the Intelligence Committee to launch yet another formal 
investigation of the men and women who are prosecuting the war against 
the terrorists. The proposed Rockefeller investigation, as I read the 
parameters originally proposed and then refined, I think would be 
virtually boundless in its exploration of any matter even tangentially 
related to the use of rendition, detention, and interrogation of 
terrorists.
  I want my colleagues to know that these are the very tools that are 
being used by our brave men and women in the military and intelligence 
agencies to combat a continuing terrorist threat against every American 
and our interests. They are also critical in our efforts in Iraq and 
Afghanistan, and they are saving lives as I speak.
  I oppose the efforts of Senator Rockefeller to launch yet another 
wide-ranging investigation because I believe, despite what he 
believes--and reasonable men can certainly disagree--that it is 
currently unnecessary. I believe it would be impractical and damaging 
to the ongoing operations and morale of the people who are doing the 
job.
  We are not sitting on the sidelines. We are not being passive, we are 
not rebuffing, we are not defaulting, and we sure as heck are not going 
to let the media drive the agenda within the Intelligence Committee 
with regard to classified information and our national security. The 
Senate Intelligence Committee, in the conduct of its normal but 
aggressive oversight responsibilities, is examining the broad issues of 
the effectiveness of interrogation operations, the humane treatment of 
detainees, the role of intelligence in tribunals and combatant status 
review boards, and, yes, rendition operations.
  In conducting this oversight, just this past month committee staff--
both minority and majority--once again visited the detention facility 
at Guantanamo Bay for onsite inspections, briefings, and discussions. 
The committee is continuing its oversight through visits, interviews of 
relevant individuals and personnel, through requests of documents, 
reviews of prior investigations, and briefings from intelligence 
community element, using basically the same methodology we used during 
the WMD review and investigation.
  In other words, we are doing our job. I believe we are fulfilling our 
oversight responsibilities. And there are still ongoing investigations, 
including the Navy inspector general's investigation into FBI 
allegations of abuse at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and the comprehensive 
efforts of the CIA inspector general of which we are fully informed to 
the degree that we have never been informed before.
  Further, I believe the Rockefeller proposal is unnecessary because 
this issue has been thoroughly investigated over the past 3 years. We 
have investigated and investigated and investigated. In fact, we have 
investigated the investigations.
  Let me give you an idea of how many times our own people have been 
investigated: in January 2002, the Custer report; January 2003, the DOD 
general counsel and DOD working group, with relation to the 
interrogation of detainees held in the global war on terrorism; 
September 2003, the Miller report; November 2003, the Ryder report; May 
2004, the Navy inspector general review; June 2004, the Taguba report 
in regard to the tragedy that happened in Abu Ghraib; June 2004, the 
Jacoby report; July 2004, the Mikolashek report; August 2004, the Jones 
and Fay investigation; mid-August 2004, the Schlesinger Commission; 
August 2004, the Formica report; December 2004, the Army Reserve 
Command inspector general's assessment of military intelligence and 
military police training; March 2005, last month, the Church report.
  This issue has been--and will continue to be--thoroughly investigated 
by inspectors general and criminal investigators from the DOD, all of 
the uniformed services, the CIA, and the Justice Department. It is hard 
to keep track, but I count at least 15 comprehensive national level 
investigations and well over 300 investigations of specific allegations 
of abuse. Between these investigations and our regular and aggressive 
oversight--I will emphasize, our regular, aggressive oversight--I am 
comfortable as chairman that the Intelligence Committee is meeting its 
responsibilities.
  I want my colleagues to also think about something else. Last year, 
just as we have talked about, we enacted the most comprehensive 
reorganization of the intelligence community since its creation over 50 
years ago. We created the position of the Director of National 
Intelligence and gave him new authorities and enormous 
responsibilities, further encumbered by our very high expectations. We 
have all spoken to that during this confirmation process.
  If the Intelligence Committee embarks on an unnecessary and boundless 
what some would even call a fishing expedition that is surely to be 
tainted by politics, suggested by any leak that has appeared in the 
press, it will be the first thing that greets the new DNI when he takes 
office. As Ambassador Negroponte begins the difficult process of fixing 
what we and numerous commissions have said need fixing, he would be met 
with endless requests for documents, interviews, and hearings. So 
Ambassador Negroponte and General Hayden need to hit the ground

[[Page 7437]]

running, and that would be exceedingly hard to do if they land right in 
the middle of an unnecessary congressional investigation.
  I believe that would be a very serious mistake and contrary to the 
intent of Congress.
  Finally, I oppose Senator Rockefeller's investigation because it will 
hinder ongoing intelligence collection, and I believe it would damage 
morale.
  My colleagues should know there is a consensus in the intelligence 
community that terrorist interrogations are the single best source of 
actionable intelligence against the ongoing plans and plots of our 
enemy. Terrorist interrogations today are saving lives in Iraq--
American lives, Iraqi lives, Afghan lives--and are subverting plots 
against our own homeland.
  The information gleaned from interrogating terrorists is doing 
exactly what I said in terms of the priority that we have and our 
responsibilities on the Intelligence Committee in reference to our 
national security. The majority of usable and actionable intelligence 
against al-Qaida comes from the terrorist interrogations and 
debriefings. We must preserve this irreplaceable source of information. 
Do it right, yes, but we must preserve it.
  There is no doubt that this is a delicate intelligence oversight 
issue. The oversight of detention and interrogation does command a 
large portion of the Intelligence Committee staff and time and effort. 
We must continue to treat interrogation as a delicate oversight issue 
or we risk losing it.
  I am concerned an unnecessary informal investigation would accomplish 
little beyond what we already do in the course of our normal and, yes, 
aggressive oversight efforts. As I have said on other occasions, it 
will likely cause risk aversion, the very thing we are trying to avoid.
  The constant and repetitive investigations of our frontline personnel 
will have a chilling effect, a no-confidence vote, really, on the 
collection of intelligence through interrogations.
  The Senate and the Intelligence Committee should be publicly 
supportive of our men and women of our Armed Forces and intelligence 
agencies because the overwhelming majority of these people are doing 
their best to protect us all. Where there have been allegations, they 
are reported and they are being investigated. And after they are 
investigated, they are turned over to the Justice Department, if 
warranted, and people are being charged.
  Frankly, I am fast losing patience with what appears to me to be 
almost a pathological obsession with calling into question the actions 
of the men and women who are on the front line in the war on terror. 
Some of these very courageous individuals wear uniforms and some do 
not. They leave their spouses and children at home, after assuring them 
that everything will be all right, with the understanding that it may 
not be all right, and sometimes it is not all right. They travel to the 
other side of the world in the service of their country with a 
reasonable expectation that their country supports them. At times they 
make mistakes, and sometimes they make serious mistakes for which they 
must account, and rightfully so, and we are doing that.
  But as we sit here in the relative safety and comfort of the Capitol 
complex, I cannot help but think that some of us have lost our 
perspective. We will and must do our duty as elected officials. As I 
have indicated, we will continue aggressive oversight on this issue, 
and we will reach out to our friends across the aisle to incorporate 
their concerns. But, Mr. President, I say to my friends, we are at war. 
Therefore, our first and foremost duty is to support our troops and 
intelligence officers at home and abroad. I, for one, will not advocate 
using the constitutional authorities vested in this great institution 
as a blunt instrument on the very people we depend on to keep us safe 
every day.
  I am on their side. And make no mistake, if we sanction another 
needless investigation, it will be a very public vote of no confidence 
in our men and women on the front lines in the war on terror. I, for 
one, have not lost confidence in our people.
  The Senator from West Virginia referred to the almost daily 
revelations regarding the alleged abuses. It is very clear to me what 
is happening. Facts already known to us and to investigators are now 
finding their way into the press through Freedom of Information Act 
requests and, quite frankly, leaks. In Washington, a leak is not a leak 
until somebody gets wet. I can tell you, on the Intelligence Committee, 
we are right about up to here, and the same thing is true in many other 
agencies.
  I do not think I am being conspiratorial when I suggest this is a 
deliberate effort to give the public the impression that this is an 
ongoing and growing problem. It is not. I do not believe it is. 
Mistakes have been made by our military and our intelligence agencies, 
and the Justice Department has responded properly with investigations 
of abuse and misconduct. We will oversee that. We are being told that, 
and we are being kept fully informed. I will always meet our oversight 
duties using facts not press reports.
  I urge my colleagues to consider this, as we have two options to 
take. Again, I offer the open door of suggestions just as we did with 
the WMD inquiry to incorporate concerns of the minority on the 
committee with responsibilities as I see them as chairman of the 
Intelligence Committee and do our due diligence.
  I reserve the remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining under the 
agreement that was entered into earlier?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Alexander). The Senator has 29 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I yield 5 minutes to the Senator from West 
Virginia.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I thank my colleague. Needless to 
say, all of us on the Intelligence Committee do all of this for the 
protection of the American people and protection of the American 
troops. That goes without saying.
  I have to say that all of the investigations to which my friend and 
distinguished chairman of the Intelligence Committee referred in his 
remarks were all about the military. None of them were authorized to 
get into or had access to information about the Central Intelligence 
Agency and its role. We do not investigate the military in particular; 
the Armed Services Committee does. We investigate the Central 
Intelligence Agency and any other intelligence efforts with respect to 
detention, interrogation, and rendition.
  So there are lots of studies that have been done, but there are 
precious few, if any, that have been done with respect to the 
intelligence community.
  I have put forward this amendment because I think it must be done. I 
do not consider it irrational. I do not consider it against our troops. 
I think I made the point it is in part to protect our troops because we 
are going to be facing these kinds of situations for years and years to 
come.
  I look forward to and I have some confidence that the chairman and 
myself and members of the committee can come to an agreement on how we 
approach this in a way which works, gives us the information we need, 
and we can proceed forward to protect our soldiers.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I will speak very briefly on this matter 
because I would like to support Senator Rockefeller's call for an 
inquiry into this area, particularly as it relates to rendition.
  Let me begin by saying that I strongly agree with my friend and 
chairman, the distinguished Senator from Kansas, with respect to how 
important a time this is with our people in harm's way. Chairman 
Roberts is absolutely right that the fight against terrorists certainly 
is not a nice business. We understand that.
  I want to take a minute and support Senator Rockefeller in the hopes 
we

[[Page 7438]]

can work this out and do it in a bipartisan way along the route we took 
with respect to Iraq, where we got a unanimous agreement in our 
committee and showed a difficult area could be tackled in a bipartisan 
way.
  The reason I support Senator Rockefeller and want this matter 
addressed is I think this inquiry could especially provide another 
useful tool in our fight against al-Qaida. I say that because the 
longer the war against al-Qaida and its associates goes on, the more we 
realize what a sophisticated enemy we are facing.
  Bin Laden and his followers understand the modern media, both here 
and abroad. They know that allegations of torture and mistreatment 
undercut our efforts amongst our allies and influences world opinion 
against the United States. It seems to me we cannot allow ourselves to 
be defamed by deceitful and murderous madmen who have learned how to 
manipulate public perception.
  What Senator Rockefeller is talking about would provide us, through 
an inquiry, the opportunity to discredit information collected from al-
Qaida and other terrorists in custody. Torture is not an effective way 
of getting valuable, credible intelligence. A suspect in extreme pain 
or psychological stress will lie about anything and everything 
necessary to stop what that suspect is enduring, and if the possibility 
of torture is removed, those analyzing the information will have 
greater faith in the reporting.
  If, however, an investigation proves that torture was used by anyone, 
we will have an additional reason to question the information and 
better ability to determine the truth from fabrication. So I come to 
the floor today to say I support Senator Rockefeller in terms of his 
request. I think Senator Roberts, the chairman of our committee, makes 
a very valid point about the sensitivity of this time, our people being 
in harm's way, terrorists will stop at nothing, and I think what 
Senator Rockefeller is talking about could provide an additional tool, 
an additional opportunity, to strengthen the fight against al-Qaida by 
publicly correcting their lies and to give us an opportunity to expose 
the al-Qaida spin machine.
  I have spoken at some length on the floor this afternoon, but I want 
to make clear that I hope the distinguished chairman and the ranking 
member can work this out. I support Senator Rockefeller.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. KOHL. Mr. President. I rise today in support of the nomination of 
Ambassador John D. Negroponte to serve as our first Director of 
National Intelligence, a position whose importance to our national 
security cannot be stressed enough.
  After 9/11 and the failure of the intelligence community to predict 
the absence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, study after study 
has told us that our intelligence system is broken, and desperately in 
need of repair. We began the process of fixing our intelligence 
community in December, when we passed the Intelligence Reform Act of 
2004. Arguably the most important part of that legislation was the 
creation of a new position--the Director of National Intelligence--with 
appropriate budgetary and personnel authority to effectively coordinate 
the fifteen different intelligence agencies. Eliminating gaps and 
ensuring that our intelligence agencies are working together is vital 
to winning the war against al Qaeda, as well as to our long-term 
national security.
  That having been said, the mere creation of this position was not a 
silver bullet. Many challenges lie ahead for the new DNI. Transforming 
our intelligence agencies--getting them to work together and share 
information--will not be easy. According to the Robb-Silverman 
Commission, turf battles are again emerging between the Central 
Intelligence Agency, CIA, Federal Bureau of Investigation, FBI, and 
Department of Defense, DOD. These turf battles contributed to past 
intelligence failures, and if we are going to truly reform the 
intelligence community, we need to put an end to this. The key to a 
well-functioning intelligence community is to resolve these disputes in 
the best interest of the country, and not one agency or another. 
Independence and strong leadership are essential to the DNI's success.
  Good intelligence is vital to our ability to protect against the 
threats we face today, as well as the threats we will face in the 
future. That cannot happen without better management, a DNI to 
coordinate all of our intelligence efforts--to make sure everyone 
involved remembers that we are all on the same team, working toward the 
same goal. It is critical that he succeed in making meaningful changes 
to our intelligence community. These are high hurdles, but I believe 
Ambassador Negroponte is up to the job.
  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I want to discuss the nomination of John 
Negroponte to be the first Director of National Intelligence. This is a 
new position created by Congress as a key element of intelligence 
reform after the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, and after the 
many failures we saw concerning intelligence on Iraq and weapons of 
mass destruction.
  I want to discuss one particular aspect of the problems we had with 
the intelligence community, and how I hope Ambassador Negroponte will 
improve upon that situation.
  In the course of conducting oversight of the executive branch, 
Congress requires information and documents produced by the executive 
branch, including from the intelligence community. This is especially 
true in cases where Congress, or members of Congress, are conducting 
oversight for which they are responsible.
  Unfortunately, it has been disturbingly difficult to obtain 
information and documents from this administration on a number of 
serious issues and from a number of agencies, including from the 
intelligence community, as well as from the Defense and Justice 
Departments.
  The only conclusion I can draw from my experience in seeking 
information and documents from this administration as part of my 
oversight responsibilities is that too often they have not cooperated 
fully or appropriately.
  Let me turn to some specific examples. Each year, the Armed Services 
Committee holds a hearing with the senior leaders of the intelligence 
community on worldwide threats. After the hearings, members write 
questions for the record, and the answers are made part of the official 
hearing record.
  Last year, on March 9, 2004, the Armed Services Committee held its 
annual worldwide threat hearing with the Director of Central 
Intelligence or DCI, George Tenet, and the Director of the Defense 
Intelligence Agency, Admiral Lowell Jacoby. But the CIA did not answer 
all the questions for the record until one year later, after I brought 
this delay to the attention of the new DCI, Porter Goss.
  In June 2003, as the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, 
I initiated a minority staff inquiry into the pre-war intelligence on 
Iraq, and the use of that intelligence by the administration. In order 
to conduct this inquiry, it was necessary to request many documents 
from the intelligence community, as well as from the Defense 
Department.
  Although the intelligence community provided some documents, they 
stonewalled other requests. For example, on April 9, 2004, I wrote to 
Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, requesting the 
declassification of three sets of briefing charts produced by the 
Office of Under Secretary of Defense Douglas Feith concerning the Iraq-
al Qaeda relationship. The charts contained intelligence that only the 
intelligence community could declassify.
  I knew that one slide, which had been declassified previously at my 
request, was highly critical of the intelligence community's assessment 
of the Iraq-al Qaeda issue, and that it had been shown to Defense 
Secretary Rumsfeld and later to the staffs of the Office of the Vice 
President and the National Security Council, but that it had not been 
shown to DCI Tenet when he was briefed.
  On July 6th, I received a letter from Stanley Moskowitz, the Director 
of Congressional Affairs at the CIA. His letter said that in response 
to my April 9 request, the ``declassification review

[[Page 7439]]

of the charts is underway and we hope to have an answer to you shortly. 
We apologize for the delay.''
  However, although his staff told my staff that they were working on 
the request, and later that they had completed the review, the 
documents were not forthcoming, nor was an explanation for the delay. I 
finally received the documents earlier this month, after the current 
Director of Central Intelligence, Porter Goss, provided them.
  In another example, on April 29, 2004, I requested the 
declassification of specific portions of three finished intelligence 
reports from the CIA concerning the relationship between Iraq and al 
Qaeda. I requested that they respond by May 10th, but they did not 
reply for 2 months.
  In that same July 6th letter from Stanley Moskowitz, it said that, in 
response to my April 29 request, ``the declassification review is 
underway and we hope to have an answer to you shortly.''
  However, the CIA did not provide an answer ``shortly.'' It did not 
provide any answer until after Director Tenet had left the CIA, and I 
had brought the situation to the attention of the new management team. 
The declassified materials were finally provided on April 6, 2005, 
nearly a year after the request.
  I have had similar problems with obtaining documents from the 
Department of Defense. I made a request for documents on November 25, 
2003, and I am still awaiting documents from that request.
  In that case, the Defense Department said it was withholding some of 
the documents to determine whether they were covered by executive 
privilege. It did so until late March, when it finally provided some of 
the documents, 16 months after my original request. I would note that 
it is unclear what possible executive privilege concern could exist for 
these documents, some of which were unclassified talking points to be 
used by Pentagon officials.
  In the same case, the Defense Department originally told me they were 
withholding some documents containing intelligence information that was 
``Originator Controlled,'' also known as ORCON. The Department promised 
me that they would provide any documents cleared for release by the 
CIA. But instead of doing so, they simply swept all the CIA-cleared 
documents into their executive privilege review.
  The new leadership of the CIA and the Intelligence Community, Porter 
Goss, is adopting a more responsive and responsible attitude toward 
congressional requests for information and documents than did his 
predecessor.
  After I brought these delays to his attention at a hearing in March, 
he said he would look into the matter and ensure that the information 
was provided. And he did what he promised. On April 6th, he wrote me a 
letter as a follow-up to providing me the materials that had been 
delayed so long.
  I would like to quote from the last paragraph of his letter:

       You should have received answers to these requests months 
     ago. There is no excuse for such delays. I have conveyed to 
     my staff that this is not how the Agency will treat requests.

  That is the right approach to take. After all the frustrating delays 
and stonewalling, it is a welcome breath of fresh air. And I hope the 
window stays open for the whole Intelligence Community.
  This brings me back to the nomination of Ambassador Negroponte to be 
the new leader of the Intelligence Community. At his nomination hearing 
before the Intelligence Committee, I asked him about this problem of 
stonewalling, ignoring, or delaying on requests for information and 
documents. I asked him if he would ensure that the intelligence 
community provides timely and responsive answers to such requests, and 
he basically said he would look into the situation.
  Frankly, I was hoping he would have a more robust and positive 
answer, and that he would commit to taking steps, if confirmed, to 
ensure that the intelligence community is fully responsive in a timely 
manner to congressional requests for information and documents.
  However, I am hopeful that when Ambassador Negroponte does look into 
the matter, he will be more responsive, in light of the law we just 
passed. He has a responsibility to the Nation, to the Congress, and to 
the people--not just to the President.
  I have some of the correspondence outlining the problems I have 
described, and I would ask unanimous consent that they be printed in 
the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                      U.S. Senate,


                                  Committee on Armed Services,

                                    Washington, DC, April 9, 2004.
     Hon. George Tenet,
     Director of Central Intelligence,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Mr. Director: I am writing to request information and 
     action relative to a series of three briefings presented by 
     the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy 
     (OUSDP), Douglas Feith, to several audiences, entitled 
     ``Assessing the Relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda.'' I 
     believe you received a copy of these briefings as attachments 
     to a letter written by Under Secretary Feith to me on March 
     25, 2004, a copy of which he sent to you.
       According to Secretary Feith, the first briefing was 
     presented to the Secretary of Defense in August, 2002. The 
     second briefing was presented to you in August, 2002. The 
     third briefing was presented to staff of the National 
     Security Council (NSC) and the Office of the Vice President 
     (OVP) in September, 2002.
       I am requesting the following:
       1. As these briefings contain intelligence information, I 
     request that you declassify the briefings, to the greatest 
     possible extent. One page used in two of the briefings (to 
     the Secretary of Defense and to the NSC/OVP staffs) has 
     already been declassified at my request.
       2. Did the CIA see and clear these briefings before they 
     were presented to the Secretary of Defense and to NSC and OVP 
     staffs? If so, when? Did CIA request changes to the 
     briefings? Given that they contain intelligence information 
     controlled by the originating agencies, would such clearance 
     requests be the normal course of action?
       3. Please explain when you and when the CIA first learned 
     of the existence of the OUSDP briefs; when you and the CIA 
     first learned that this briefing was going to be (or had 
     been) provided to the Secretary of Defense and to NSC and OVP 
     staffs; and when the CIA first learned that a different 
     version of the briefing was going to be (or had been) 
     presented to NSC and OVP staffs than had been presented to 
     the CIA.
       4. Please provide the CIA's views on two aspects of these 
     briefings: first, the substantive findings and conclusions 
     (both implied and explicit) of the briefings; and second, the 
     reliability of each intelligence item or report cited in the 
     briefings.
       5. Please provide your views on the appropriateness of two 
     activities: first, the presentation by non-Intelligence 
     Community personnel to senior policymakers or administration 
     officials of any formal intelligence analysis that is not 
     cleared by the Intelligence Community or made known to it; 
     and second, the provision of comments and edits by entities 
     outside of the Intelligence Community on the contents of 
     Intelligence Community products, whether draft or final.
       I appreciate your assistance in this request, and I look 
     forward to your response by April 23, 2004.
           Sincerely,
                                                       Carl Levin,
      Ranking Member.
                                  ____

                                                      U.S. Senate,


                                  Committee on Armed Services,

                                   Washington, DC, April 29, 2004.
     Hon. George Tenet,
     Director of Central Intelligence, Central Intelligence 
         Agency, Washington, DC.
       Dear Director Tenet: I request that you declassify the 
     following information:
       (1) From the June 21, 2002 Counter-Terrorism Center 
     document relating to Iraq's relationship to al Qaeda (CTC 
     2002-40078CH): In the Key Findings section, p. i, third 
     bullet under the first paragraph; p. iii, second bullet; p. v 
     in its entirety (the Scope Note); In the main body of the 
     report, p. 6, the second section on the page (first and 
     second columns, one paragraph and two sub-bullets).
       (2) From the October 2, 2002 National Intelligence Estimate 
     on Iraq and weapons of mass destruction (WMD) (NIE 2002-
     16HC): p. 68, the first non-bulleted full paragraph and the 
     two subsequent sub-bullets.
       (3) From the January 29, 2003 Counter-Terrorism Center 
     document relating to Iraq and terrorism (CTC 2003-40004HJX): 
     beginning on p. 16, the section that begins with the last 
     paragraph on the page, all of page 17, and the first two 
     bullets on page 19; p. 27, second column: the section heading 
     and first full paragraph under the heading; and the second-
     to-last full paragraph.
       I would expect that expeditious declassification should be 
     possible, given that you have already declassified 
     significant portions

[[Page 7440]]

     of the October 2002 NIE, including all the key judgments, all 
     the text concerning uranium, and the alternative views of the 
     State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research.
       Please have a member of your staff call Richard Fieldhouse 
     of the Committee staff at 202-224-0750 with any questions or 
     requests for clarification.
       I appreciate your assistance with this request and look 
     forward to your response by May 10, 2004.
           Sincerely,
                                                       Carl Levin,
     Ranking Member.
                                  ____

                                           The Director of Central


                                                 Intelligence,

                                    Washington, DC, April 6, 2005.
     Hon. Carl Levin,
     Committee on Armed Services, U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Levin: I have confirmed that responses to the 
     long outstanding requests you brought to my attention during 
     the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) Global 
     Intelligence Challenges hearing have now been provided to the 
     Committee. As you made me aware, these requests were from 
     last year's Worldwide Threat hearing, as well as from 
     correspondence dating back to last April. As promised, I 
     instructed Agency personnel to promptly complete their review 
     and provide appropriate and meaningful answers.
       You should have received answers to these requests months 
     ago. There is no excuse for such delays. I have conveyed to 
     my staff that this is not how the Agency will treat requests.
           Sincerely,
     Porter J. Goss.
                                  ____



                                  Central Intelligence Agency,

                                     Washington, DC, July 6, 2004.
     Hon. Carl Levin,
     Ranking Democratic Member, Committee on Armed Services, U.S. 
         Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Levin: I am responding on behalf of the 
     Director of Central Intelligence to your letter of 9 April 
     2004 requesting information and action relative to a series 
     of briefings presented by the Office of the Under Secretary 
     of Defense for Policy, Douglas Feith, to several audiences, 
     entitled ``Assessing the Relationship between Iraq and al 
     Queda.'' Specifically, you asked five questions. The 
     responses to your questions are provided below.
       1. As these briefings contain intelligence information, I 
     request that you declassify the briefings, to the greatest 
     possible extent. One page used in two of the briefings (to 
     the Secretary of Defense and to the NSC/OVP staffs) has 
     already been declassified at my request.
       Answer: The declassification review of the charts is 
     underway and we hope to have an answer to you shortly. We 
     apologize for the delay.
       2. Did the CIA see and clear these briefings before they 
     were presented to the Secretary of Defense and to the NSC and 
     OVP staffs? If so, when? Did CIA request changes to the 
     briefings? Given that they contain intelligence information 
     controlled by the originating agencies, would such clearance 
     requests be the normal course of action?
       Answer: CIA did not see or clear these briefings before 
     they were given to the Secretary of Defense, NSC or OVP. The 
     intelligence information used in these briefings was from 
     products previously disseminated to IC and Executive Branch 
     elements, to include DoD and the White House. There was no 
     need for further clearance in presenting the intelligence 
     information to the Secretary of Defense, NSC or OVP as the 
     originator control clearance had been resolved at the time of 
     initial dissemination.
       3. Please explain when you and when CIA first learned of 
     the existence of the OUSDP briefs; when you and the CIA first 
     learned that this briefing was. going to be (or had ,been) 
     provided to the Secretary of Defense and to NSC and OVP 
     staffs; and when CIA first learned that a different version 
     of the briefing was going to be (or had been) presented to 
     NSC and OVP staffs than had been presented to the CIA.
       Answer: We first learned of the brief in mid-August 2002 
     when it was presented to the DCI. We believe it was at that 
     point that we learned that it had been presented to senior 
     levels in the Pentagon. We did not learn that it had been 
     presented to the NSC and OVP or that there were different 
     versions until earlier this year.
       4. Please provide the CIA's views on two aspects of these 
     briefings: first, the substantive findings and conclusions 
     (both implied and explicit) of the briefings; and second, the 
     reliability of each intelligence item or report cited in the 
     briefings.
       Answer: The CIA's January 2003 paper, Iraqi Support for 
     Terrorism, represents the CIA views on the issues covered in 
     the DoD slides. This paper has been provided to the 
     Committee.
       5. Please provide your views on the appropriateness of two 
     activities: first, the presentation by non-Intelligence 
     Community personnel to senior policymakers or administration 
     officials of any formal intelligence analysis that is not 
     cleared by the Intelligence Community or made known to it; 
     and second, the provision of comments and edits by entities 
     outside of the Intelligence Community on the contents of the 
     Intelligence Community products, whether draft or final.
       Answer: The DCI responded to a similar question from you at 
     the 9 March 2004 hearing. He said, ``My experience is that 
     people come in and may present those kinds of briefings on 
     their views of intelligence, but I have to tell you, Senator, 
     I'm the President's chief intelligence officer; I have the 
     definitive view about these subjects. From my perspective it 
     is my view that prevails.''
       Lastly, in response to your 29 April 2004 letter requesting 
     the declassification of information contained in two 
     Counterter-
     rorism Center publications and the October 2002 National 
     Intelligence Estimate, the declassification review is 
     underway and we hope to have an answer to you shortly.
       Sincerely,
                                             Stanley M. Moskowitz,
                                Director of Congressional Affairs.

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I would like to express my support for 
John Negroponte to be the first Director of National Intelligence, DNI. 
I have the utmost respect for Ambassador Negroponte and confidence that 
he will excel in this position.
  It is apparent that there is a need to improve our Nation's 
intelligence capabilities. The passage of the Intelligence Reform and 
Terrorism Prevention Act, by creating the position of Director of 
National Intelligence, is an important step in achieving this goal. 
Creating centralized leadership in the intelligence community will 
provide better management of capabilities and pro-
duce common standards and practices across the foreign and domestic 
intelligence divide. The position of DNI will better allow the 
intelligence community to set priorities and move resources where they 
are most needed. The position of DNI is going to be difficult and 
demanding. I believe Ambassador Negroponte's experience and character 
make him an excellent choice to take on this vast responsibility.
  From 1960 to 1997 Ambassador Ne-
groponte was a member of the Career Foreign Service, serving at eight 
different posts in Asia, Europe, and Latin America. He has been 
Ambassador to Honduras, Mexico, and the Philippines. Ambassador 
Negroponte also served as Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans and 
International Environmental and Scientific Affairs and as Deputy 
Assistant to the President for National Security affairs.
  More recently, Mr. Negroponte distinguished himself as ambassador to 
the United Nations, during the difficult time immediately after the 
terrorist attacks of September 11. Furthermore Mr. Negroponte last year 
became the first American Ambassador to Iraq since the fall of Saddam 
Hussein. In this role he played an important role in moving the nation 
of Iraq towards a democratic and stable future.
  Ambassador Negroponte has a long and distinguished career during his 
more than 40 years of service to this country. During that time he 
faced many challenges and difficult situations. I have the highest 
expectations that he will take on the assignment as Director of 
National Intelligence with the same dedication he has shown in the 
past. Under his leadership, I believe America will have the 
intelligence capability it so urgently needs to fight and win the 
continuing global war on terror.
  Ms. SNOWE. Mr. President, I rise today in support of John Negroponte 
to be confirmed as the Director of National Intelligence. These are 
historic and perilous times as we continue to face enemies intent upon 
attacking us and the values and freedoms upon which our Nation was 
founded.
  Because we still know very little about our Nation's most dangerous 
adversaries, the new Director of National Intelligence will be 
responsible for ensuring that this Nation's intelligence community has 
the collection and analytic expertise required to confront our greatest 
challenges no matter from which quarter they appear. While many are 
concerned about the emergence of China as a peer competitor in the 
Northern Pacific, we obviously still face the scourge of international 
terrorism, international criminal organizations and other transnational 
threats. And, of course, there remains the perplexing problem of 
gathering intelligence against closed societies such

[[Page 7441]]

as Iran and North Korea so called ``hard'' targets.
  Ambassador Negroponte has both the distinct privilege and solemn 
obligations that come with being the first Director of National 
Intelligence. How he leads, how he manages the community, how he shapes 
his role, the relationships he creates with the various agencies and 
their leaders will not only determine how effective he is in reforming 
our intelligence community but very likely how each of his successors 
will approach the oversight of our intelligence community as well. And 
the transformation he is charged with overseeing carries with it the 
future security of this Nation.
  Our intelligence community professionals are the best in the world 
and every day they toil tirelessly, often unrecognized, in the shadows 
to keep this country safe. I believe they are eagerly looking for 
strong leadership so they can move forward with the business of 
securing the country.
  It has been said that ``A leader takes people where they want to go. 
A great leader takes people where they don't necessarily want to go but 
ought to be.'' I believe that John Negroponte possesses the experience 
and leadership necessary to take this Nation's 15 intelligence agencies 
and the thousands of dedicated professionals in those agencies who toil 
to protect us all to where they ought to be.
  He has demonstrated a recognition of the need to refocus our 
intelligence community, so that disparate intelligence agencies are 
working together more cooperatively, so that information access is 
improved to enable all relevant agencies to provide necessary input, 
and so that the intelligence products provided to national policy 
makers are not only timely but reflect the best judgment of the 
entirety of the intelligence community.
  Ambassador Negroponte has taken on some of the toughest and most 
important jobs in our diplomatic service in his long and illustrious 
career as a Foreign Service Officer. He has been nominated for and 
confirmed as Chief of Mission in four embassies and as the President's 
representative to the United Nations. He has served in leadership 
positions within the Department of State and as a security advisor in 
the White House. John Negroponte has demonstrated the resolve and 
ability to take on tough management and policy positions and to perform 
admirably.
  In the past 3 years, there have been four major investigations that 
have concluded that the time has come for significant reform in the 
intelligence community. In December 2002, the primary recommendation of 
the Joint Inquiry into the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001 was 
that Congress should amend the National Security Act of 1947 to create 
a statutory Director of National Intelligence to be the President's 
principal advisor on intelligence with the full range of management, 
budgetary, and personnel responsibilities needed to make the entire 
U.S. Intelligence Community operate as a coherent whole.
  Last July, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence issued its 
Report on the U.S. Intelligence Community's Prewar Intelligence 
Assessments on Iraq that found that although the Director of Central 
Intelligence was supposed to act as head of both the CIA and the 
intelligence community, for the most part he acted only as the head of 
the CIA to the detriment of the intelligence product provided to 
National policymakers.
  Later that month, the 9/11 Commission issued their report on the 
terrorist attacks and also recommended that the current position of 
Director of Central Intelligence should be replaced by a National 
Intelligence Director with two main areas of responsibility: to oversee 
National intelligence centers and to manage the National intelligence 
program and oversee the agencies that contribute to it.
  Finally, earlier this month the President's Commission on the 
Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of 
Mass Destruction found the Intelligence Community is ``fragmented, 
loosely managed, and poorly coordinated; the 15 intelligence 
organizations are a `community' in name only and rarely act with a 
unity of purpose.'' They also concluded that the Director of National 
Intelligence will make our intelligence efforts better coordinated, 
more efficient, and more effective.
  Clearly, with this many investigations and Commissions arriving at 
the same conclusions time and again, for the sake and safety of the 
Nation we must begin the transformation of the fifteen agencies tasked 
with collecting and analyzing intelligence into a single, coordinated 
community with the agility to predict, respond to and overcome the 
threats our Nation will face. The confirmation of the first Director of 
National Intelligence is the first step in executing this extremely 
complex undertaking and time is of the essence. Indeed, I cannot recall 
a time when a nominee has come before the Senate with the entire 
community they have been nominated to lead in the midst of such 
sweeping transformation.
  And once again, I believe the President has made an excellent choice 
in John Negroponte to lead the intelligence community through such a 
transformation.
  I look forward to working with him in the coming years as we shape 
our intelligence community into a cohesive whole and as he defines the 
role of Director of National Intelligence. With a strong DNI and a 
focused intelligence team, our Nation will be safer. I urge my 
colleagues to join me in supporting the confirmation of John Negroponte 
the first Director of National Intelligence.
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, the successes of the intelligence community 
are never really known to the American public. But the spectacular 
failures of the last few years have been apparent to us all. Blue-
ribbon panels, presidential commissions, and common sense have all told 
us that the intelligence community needs reform. In recent months, with 
action by Congress and the administration, we've begun to see progress. 
With the vote on John Negroponte's nomination today, we will take an 
important step in giving life to the structural reforms we've debated 
for so many months.
  John Negroponte faces a daunting challenge as the country's first 
Director of National Intelligence. It will be his responsibility to 
make intelligence reform a reality, to break-down the barriers between 
intelligence agencies, and to restore the credibility of the American 
intelligence community. There once was a time where the word of the 
President of the United States was enough to reassure world leaders. 
After the intelligence failures of the last few years, that is no 
longer true.
  In his confirmation hearings, Mr. Negroponte identified ways to 
improve the intelligence process--formalizing lessons-learned exercises 
across the community; utilizing ``Team B'' analyses to avoid self-
reinforcing analysis premised on faulty assumptions; improving inter-
agency and community-wide cooperation; and removing barriers between 
foreign and domestic intelligence. He must also be able to work 
effectively with Secretary Rumsfeld and the Department of Defense--and 
its 80 percent of the intelligence budget--to really reform the 
community. Many of us in Congress will support his efforts, and I urge 
President Bush to be steadfast in this regard as well.
  But Mr. Negroponte's most immediate and urgent task will be to speak 
truth to power. When the intelligence does not support the policy goals 
or ambitions of the administration, Mr. Negroponte must never flinch, 
never waiver, never compromise one iota of his integrity or the 
integrity of the intelligence. He must also be willing to push analysts 
to challenge assumptions, consider alternatives, and follow the 
evidence wherever it may lead them. And when they do, he must back them 
with the full authority of his office.
  Today we face many threats, the dangerous legacy of the Cold War in 
vast nuclear arsenals, the spread of weapons of mass destruction, the 
spread of terrorism, lingering disputes in various regions of the 
world, and new forces, like globalization, all crying out for 
leadership by the United States. The

[[Page 7442]]

decisions policy makers make are influenced by many factors. But on 
issues of war and peace, on protecting this country, on determining our 
long-term national security needs and the direction of our foreign 
policy, there is no substitute for intelligence that is accurate, 
timely, and trusted.
  Mr. Negroponte will shape the role of Director of National 
Intelligence in fundamental ways. He will be judged on whether or not 
America is safer at the end of his tenure than when he starts. For the 
sake of us all, I hope he succeeds.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I strongly support the nomination of 
Ambassador John D. Negroponte to be the first Director of National 
Intelligence.
  This is not a moment without precedent in history. President 
Roosevelt faced a similar situation in 1941 when he had disparate 
intelligence and information gathering organizations within the 
government, but did not have a single person in charge. President 
Roosevelt convinced a reluctant Colonel William J., Wild Bill, Donovan 
to be the first ``Coordinator of Information,'' an organization that 
eventually became the Office of Strategic Services, OSS, and 
ultimately, the Central Intelligence Agency.
  I would like to read a quote from the book, ``Donovan of O.S.S.,'' by 
Corey Ford:

       The appointment of Colonel Donovan as director of COI was 
     formally announced by executive order on July 11, 1941, and 
     his duties were defined in Roosevelt's own words: `To collect 
     and analyze all information and data which may bear upon 
     national security, to correlate such information and data and 
     make the same available to the President and to such 
     departments and officials of the Government as may the 
     President may determine, and to carry out when request by the 
     President such supplementary activities as may facilitate the 
     securing of information important for national security not 
     now available to the Government.'
       The directive was purposely obscure in its wording, due to 
     the secret and potentially offensive nature of the agency's 
     functions; and the other intelligence organizations, jealous 
     of their prerogatives, took advantage of the vague 
     phraesology to set loose a flock of rumors that Donovan was 
     to be the Heinrich Himmler of an American Gestapo, the 
     Goebbels of a controlled press, a super-spy over Hoover's G-
     men and the Army and Navy, the head of a grand strategy board 
     which would dictate even to the General Staff. In vain, the 
     President reiterated that Donovan's work, `is not intended to 
     supersede or to duplicate or to involve any direction of or 
     interference with the activities of the General Staff, the 
     regular intelligence services, the Federal Bureau of 
     Investigation, or of other existing agencies.' The 
     bureaucratic war was on.
       It was a war all too familiar to Washington, the dog-eat-
     dog struggle among government departments to preserve their 
     own areas of power.

  Ambassador Negroponte and General Michael Hayden, USAir Force, his 
deputy, face a similar situation today, and I wish them well.
  Some have said the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act 
of 2004 uses similarly ``vague phraseology'' in describing the 
authorities and responsibilities of the new Director of National 
Intelligence. Some say that Roosevelt was intentionally vague to allow 
the strong personality of Wild Bill Donovan to make this new 
intelligence organization work.
  I think we have two very strong personalities in Ambassador 
Negroponte and General Hayden who are up to the task and will make this 
new Office of National Intelligence work. Their work will be even more 
effective as they forge strong alliances with their colleagues in other 
departments of Government.
  As Ambassador Negroponte begins this important effort, I know he is 
mindful on the balance that must be maintained between the needs of 
national policy makers, military commanders on distant battlefields, 
and local and national homeland security officials, who are all charged 
with the safety and security of the American homeland. The support 
these elements enjoy today has not always been the case. When General 
Norman Schwarzkopf testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee 
in June 1991 regarding lesson learned during the first Persian Gulf 
War, he told the committee that responsive national intelligence 
support has been unsatisfactory from his perspective as the theater 
commander in charge of combat operations. Clearly, much has changed 
since 1991, but we must all remain vigilant in ensuring that 
intelligence support for our men and women in uniform is maintained and 
enhanced.
  Ambassador Negroponte has a strong record of public service as the 
U.S. Ambassador to Honduras, Mexico, the Philippines, the United 
Nations, and most recently, Iraq. He has a great reputation as a 
problem solver who can be counted on for the epitome of candor and 
integrity.
  John Negroponte has served his Nation faithfully and well. His 
willingness to take on this daunting challenge is a testament to a man 
who understands service to Nation and has, once again, answered the 
call to serve. We are fortunate to have a citizen of such character to 
undertake this important and challenging task of bringing our 
Intelligence Community together as a coherent, well-coordinated entity.
  I strongly support confirmation of Ambassador John D. Negroponte to 
be the first Director of National Intelligence, and hope the spirit of 
Wild Bill Donovan guides and inspires his efforts.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, today I rise to give my enthusiastic vote 
of support for President Bush's nominee to be this Nation's first 
Director of National Intelligence. I have known Ambassador Negroponte 
for over 20 years, and his professional career as one of our Nation's 
best diplomats began 20 years earlier. And rarely have I voted in 
support of a Presidential nominee with greater confidence. I trust that 
my colleagues will lend their support unanimously to the President's 
selection for a position we are anxious to fill.
  As he assumes the position we created last year to unify the 
intelligence community's capabilities as they have never been unified 
before, I offer Ambassador Negroponte my complete support, with three 
points to consider.
  First, as I have told the nominee, this will be the most difficult 
job he will ever hold. And I say this to the man who has just returned 
from serving as our first ambassador to a liberated Iraq. During 
Ambassador Negroponte's nomination hearing two weeks ago, the 
distinguished chairman of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, who 
also has my greatest respect, while reviewing the job requirements for 
the new position of DNI, candidly asked the nominee: ``Why would you 
want this job?''
  The answer, for those who know him, is that Ambassador Negroponte has 
always responded to the call by his country to take on difficult 
challenges. And we in the Senate have supported him by confirming him, 
to date, seven times.
  Second, as I also told the nominee, and I have said to my colleagues: 
Osama bin Laden is not quaking in his hideaway because we have created 
the position of Director of National Intelligence. Let us be candid to 
ourselves about this. Too often in Washington, a bureaucratic response 
is mistaken for a solution. I hope we all recognize, after the years of 
discussing reform, that the legislation we passed last year initiates 
the beginning, not the end of reform.
  And this leads to my third point. Ambassador Negroponte's mission, 
once we confirm him, is to take the elements of the intelligence 
community and de-Balkanize them. His mission will be to create a whole 
that is greater than the sum of the intelligence community parts. He 
will do this by achieving what we call jointness between all parts of 
the community. When he does that--and this will have to do as much with 
creating new doctrine, and creating community culture that integrates 
this doctrine--then will our already impressive elements we have in our 
community be able to advance our security. Only then will we be 
creating the 21st century global intelligence capabilities that will 
make bin Laden's inevitable successors and wannabees sweat and run.
  In my conversations with Ambassador Negroponte about his new brief, I 
have shared some of my ideas with him, and I have found him to be 
welcoming of these and all ideas. He understands the problems we face, 
as he

[[Page 7443]]

has been a consumer of intelligence for most of his career, and he has 
spent his last tour in Iraq confronting the challenge of multiple armed 
groups dedicated to collaborating against us. I believe he knows what 
we need, and I know he is determined to take the impressive 
technological and human capacities already in place in our intelligence 
community and take it to the level necessary to give the American 
public a strategic intelligence capability we need and must have.
  I believe Ambassador Negroponte has always served this country 
honorably. As we confirm him today, which I trust we will, I offer him 
my support and, once again, gratitude for choosing to serve his country 
in one of the most challenging positions in our history.
  Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, one of my top priorities is the real 
reform of our Nation's intelligence. The Intelligence Reform Act of 
2004 was a first step toward transforming the U.S. intelligence 
community. Information sharing will be strengthened, while diverse 
opinion and independent analysis will be protected.
  The single most important provision in the act was the creation of a 
Director of National Intelligence, who would have authority, 
responsibility, and financial control over the entire intelligence 
community.
  The President has nominated an experienced diplomat to be Director of 
National Intelligence. Ambassador John D. Negroponte has worked hard 
for his country and has made personal sacrifices. When his country 
called, he has exposed himself to hardship and danger most notably in 
Vietnam and in Iraq.
  He has also had extensive exposure to U.S. intelligence products and 
operations. He had intelligence coordination responsibilities in 
Washington on the National Security Council. He recently had 
responsibility for leading the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad during a time 
when intelligence on the Iraqi insurgency had the highest priority.
  Yet I have serious concerns with certain aspects of Ambassador Negro-
ponte's record--particularly his actions while he was ambassador to 
Honduras. There is a serious discrepancy between his description of the 
Honduran government's human rights record during those years and that 
of the CIA Inspector General and nongovernmental organizations. He has 
yet to show complete candor in discussing U.S. activities there with 
the Congress.
  I believe that Ambassador Ne-
groponte could have been more outspoken in reporting from his vantage 
point at the United Nations in the winter of 2003--when our country was 
on the verge of war.
  Despite these concerns, I will vote for the confirmation of 
Ambassador Ne-
groponte. I am encouraged by his responses to my questions during 
hearings before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
  In a very important exchange, he provided assurances that he will 
``speak truth to power.'' In response to my questions, Ambassador 
Negroponte said he would make sure that reliability problems with 
sources are put before decisionmakers. He agreed to explore mechanisms 
like the State Department's Dissent Channel to encourage those who see 
yellow flashing lights to express their views to senior officials and 
to protect dissenters from political retaliation. And he said that he 
himself would be taking the ``unvarnished truth'' to the President. He 
also said that all organizations under his purview will obey the law 
and that there will be full accountability.
  These assurances are critical. My vote to confirm Ambassador 
Negroponte is based on them. As a member of the Senate Select 
Intelligence Committee, I will be watching closely to see that they are 
honored and will do what I can to contribute to Ambassador Negroponte's 
success as the first Director of National Intelligence.
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, it is my pleasure to support the nomination 
of Ambassador John Negroponte to the post of Director of National 
Intelligence.
  Mr. Negroponte is superbly qualified for this new and challenging 
position. I applaud the President on his choice of candidate. Last 
week, Mr. Negroponte was approved by the Senate Select Committee on 
Intelligence. I expect he will be confirmed with overwhelming, 
bipartisan support here on the Senate floor.
  Mr. Negroponte's career in public service spans four decades and 
three continents. He has served in Europe, Asia and Latin America. He 
speaks five languages fluently, and has won Senate confirmation for 7 
previous posts. He is widely regarded as one of our most distinguished 
and respected public officials.
  Among his many career highlights, Mr. Negroponte has served as 
Ambassador to Honduras, Ambassador to Mexico, Ambassador to the 
Philippines, and Ambassador to the United Nations. He has served under 
multiple presidents, Republican and Democrat.
  In 2004, President Bush nominated Mr. Negroponte to serve as our 
Ambassador to the newly liberated Iraq.
  As his background attests, Mr. Negroponte has tackled many difficult 
and sensitive missions. He has also earned a reputation as a skilled 
manager--skills he will surely need in the job ahead.
  As Director of National Intelligence, Mr. Negroponte will be 
responsible for overseeing the entire intelligence community. It will 
be Mr. Negroponte's job to keep America safe by bridging the gaps 
between our 15 intelligence agencies and improving information sharing 
between agencies.
  He will determine the annual budgets for all National intelligence 
agencies and offices, and direct how these funds are spent. The 
Director will also report directly to the President.
  It is a tough job and a tremendous responsibility. But I am confident 
that Mr. Negroponte will work hard to make the necessary reforms to 
help keep America safe.
  We learned on 9-11 that the enemy is deadly and determined. He 
doesn't wear a uniform or march under a recognized flag. He hides in 
the shadows where he plots his next attack.
  Dangerous weapons proliferation must be stopped. Terrorist 
organizations must be destroyed. And we must have an intelligence 
community that works together to confront these very real dangers so 
that we never suffer another 9-11 or worse.
  I look forward to Mr. Negroponte's swift confirmation. He has served 
our country with honor and distinction over many years. America is 
fortunate to have a public servant of his caliber working hard on our 
behalf.
  Mr. CORZINE. Mr. President, I rise today in support of the 
confirmation of John Negroponte to be our Nation's first Director of 
National Intelligence. This is a historic moment, and a critical step 
toward making our nation more secure. But it is also only the beginning 
of what will be a long and challenging effort to reform and improve our 
intelligence capabilities.
  It is worth recalling how we got here. The establishment of the 
Director of National Intelligence would not have happened had it not 
been for the patriotism and passion of some remarkable Americans. Let 
me begin with the families of the victims of 9/11 who managed to turn 
their grief into real, effective action. The Family Steering Committee 
and, in particular, four 9/11 widows from my State who called 
themselves the ``Jersey Girls,'' fought for real answers. They pushed 
for the creation of the 9/11 Commission, whose recommendations included 
the position for which Mr. Negroponte is being confirmed today. They 
also insisted that the administration cooperate fully with the 
Commission as it sought a full accounting of the terrorist attack. They 
did all this for one reason: they wanted America to be safer than it 
was on the day they lost their loved ones.
  We also owe an enormous debt to the 9/11 Commission, led by former 
New Jersey Governor Tom Kean and former Congressman Lee Hamilton. The 
Commission's hard work, persistence, intellectual honesty, and 
political neutrality brought about something truly incredible: a 
national consensus. The Commission's meticulous and thorough study of 
the events leading up to and including September 11 and its wise and 
succinct recommendations gave us

[[Page 7444]]

an understanding of the past and a path forward. And, by involving the 
American people in their deliberations, they helped generate public 
support for much needed reform.
  It is almost impossible to overstate the challenges ahead for the new 
Director of National Intelligence. The intelligence failures that led 
to the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, happened in part because 
of a lack of coordination among our intelligence agencies. It is the 
DNI's job to resolve this problem. Mr. Negroponte will need the 
President's support. He will also need Congress' support. He has mine.
  The DNI will also have to correct the intelligence failures that led 
to the war in Iraq. That includes ensuring that intelligence analyses 
are objective and that those analyses are used appropriately by policy 
makers. The DNI will need to speak truth to power, to tell policymakers 
the hard truth about what we know and what we don't know. Intelligence 
must guide policy, and not vice versa.
  Our intelligence serves many purposes, from informing foreign policy 
to supporting tactical military decisions. The new DNI will be 
responsible for guiding our priorities. But this position would not 
have been created had we not been attacked on our soil, on September 
11, 2001. The intelligence community has new consumers: the Department 
of Homeland Security, Federal, State and local government officials, 
law enforcement and our Nation's first responders. It is critical that 
these people have the information they need to protect us.
  Mr. Negroponte is highly qualified for this position and I am proud 
to support his confirmation. But he cannot do this alone. This and 
future administrations and the Congress must stay engaged in and remain 
committed to the hard work of intelligence reform.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to express my support for 
this historic nomination of Ambassador John Negroponte to be the first 
Director of National Intelligence named under the Intelligence Reform 
and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004--the most sweeping reform of the 
intelligence community in over 50 years. With this appointment, we will 
finally have a single official with the authority, responsibility, and 
accountability to lead a more unified and more integrated intelligence 
community capable of avoiding the unacceptable intelligence failures 
recounted in excruciating detail by the independent 9/11 Commission 
and, more recently, by the President's WMD Commission.
  I am confident Ambassador Negro-
ponte is up to this admittedly difficult task. With a career in public 
service spanning over four decades, Ambassador Negroponte has 
demonstrated the commitment and determination this post demands. His 
service in numerous Foreign Service posts across Asia, Europe, and 
Latin America--and most recently as the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq--has 
certainly provided him with the global perspective of our intelligence 
needs that the position requires. And, having served in senior 
positions here in Washington at the State Department and at the 
National Security Council, Ambassador Negroponte has developed the 
bureaucratic skills that the DNI must exercise in order to be 
effective.
  The most important factor in whether Ambassador Negroponte--indeed, 
whether the entire intelligence reform effort--succeeds, is the degree 
of support provided by President Bush and the White House in the early 
but formative stages of this process. The path toward reform is always 
a difficult one, particularly with the likely array of bureaucratic and 
institutional obstacles the DNI is likely to confront. As the WMD 
Commission candidly recognized, ``The Intelligence Community is a 
closed world, and many insiders admitted to us that it has an almost 
perfect record of resisting external recommendations.'' It should come 
as no surprise that the array of strong statutory authorities provided 
to the DNI under the legislation can, in and of itself, only accomplish 
so much; implementation will now be the crucial test, and the President 
must show the same level of commitment he demonstrated during the final 
push to pass the intelligence reform legislation in the last Congress.
  I am encouraged in this regard by the President's remarks in 
announcing the nomination of Ambassador Negroponte. President Bush 
said:

       In the war against terrorists who target innocent civilians 
     and continue to seek weapons of mass murder, intelligence is 
     our first line of defense. If we're going to stop the 
     terrorists before they strike, we must ensure that our 
     intelligence agencies work as a single, unified enterprise. 
     And that's why I supported, and Congress passed, reform 
     legislation creating the job of Director of National 
     Intelligence.
       As DNI, John will lead a unified intelligence community, 
     and will serve as the principle advisor to the President on 
     intelligence matters. He will have the authority to order the 
     collection of new intelligence, to ensure the sharing of 
     information among agencies, and to establish common standards 
     for the intelligence community's personnel. It will be John's 
     responsibility to determine the annual budgets for all 
     national intelligence agencies and offices and to direct how 
     these funds are spent. Vesting these authorities in a single 
     official who reports directly to me will make our 
     intelligence efforts better coordinated, more efficient, and 
     more effective.

  Unfortunately, we had no single official who effectively forged unity 
of effort across the intelligence community prior to September 11. We 
had no quarterback. Prior to this legislation, the Director of Central 
Intelligence (DCI) had three jobs: No. 1. principal intelligence 
advisor to the President; No. 2. head of the CIA; and No. 3. head of 
the intelligence community. As the 9/11 Commission concluded: ``No 
recent DCI has been able to do all three effectively. Usually what 
loses out is management of the intelligence community, a difficult task 
even in the best case because the DCI's current authorities are weak. 
With so much to do, the DCI often has not used even the authority he 
has.''
  The new Director of National Intelligence has two main 
responsibilities: to head the intelligence community and to serve as 
principal intelligence advisor to the President. As principal advisor 
to the President, the DNI is responsible--and accountable--for ensuring 
that the President is properly briefed on intelligence priorities and 
activities. The CIA Director will now report to the DNI, who is not 
responsible for managing the day to day activities of that agency while 
also heading the intelligence community. In fact, the legislation 
specifies that the Office of the DNI may not even be co-located with 
the CIA or any other element of the intelligence community after 
October 1, 2008.
  As head of the intelligence community, the DNI will have--and must 
effectively use--the wide range of strong budget, personnel, tasking, 
and other authorities detailed in the legislation to forge the unity of 
effort needed against the threats of this new century. I am pleased 
that Ambassador Negroponte, appearing before the Senate Select 
Committee on Intelligence, indicated he has heeded the advice from many 
quarters, including the President's WMD Commission, to push the 
envelope with respect to his new authorities.
  Perhaps the most significant of these authorities is the DNI's 
control over national intelligence funding, now known as the National 
Intelligence Program NIP. Money equals power in Washington, or to 
paraphrase one of the witnesses who testified before the Senate 
Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee as we drafted the 
intelligence reform legislation, former DCI James Woolsey: ``The Golden 
Rule in Washington is that he who has the gold, makes the rules.'' For 
instance, with respect to budget development, the bill authorizes the 
DNI to ``develop and determine'' the NIP budget--which means that the 
DNI is the decision-maker concerning the intelligence budget and does 
not share this authority with any department head.
  Once Congress passes the national intelligence budget, the DNI must 
``ensure the effective execution'' of the NIP appropriation across the 
entire intelligence community whether the funds are for the CIA, NSA, 
the Federal Bureau of Investigation, or any element of the intelligence 
community. The Director of the Office of Management and Budget must 
apportion those

[[Page 7445]]

funds at the ``exclusive direction'' of the DNI. The DNI is further 
authorized to ``direct'' the allotment and allocation of those 
appropriations, and department comptrollers must then carry out their 
responsibilities ``in an expeditious manner.'' In sum, the DNI controls 
how national intelligence funding is spent across the executive branch, 
regardless of the department in which any particular intelligence 
element resides.
  In order to marshal the necessary resources to address higher 
priority intelligence activities, the DNI has significantly enhanced 
authorities to transfer funds and personnel from one element of the 
intelligence community to another. And, in addition to these budget and 
transfer authorities, the legislation provides the DNI with many new 
and increased authorities by which to effectively manage the sprawling 
intelligence community and force greater integration and cooperation 
among intelligence agencies. The DNI has the power to develop personnel 
policies and programs, for example, to foster increased ``jointness'' 
across the intelligence community--like the Goldwater-Nichols Act 
accomplished in the military context. The DNI also has the authority to 
exercise greater decision-making with respect to acquisitions of major 
systems, such as satellites, to task intelligence collection and 
analysis, and to concur in the nominations or appointments of senior 
intelligence officials at the Departments of Defense, Homeland 
Security, Treasury, State, and Energy, the FBI, and elsewhere across 
the executive branch.
  More important than any individual authority, however, is the sum 
total. There is no longer any doubt as to who is in charge of, or who 
is accountable for, the performance of the United States intelligence 
community. It is the DNI. Until exercised in practice, however, these 
authorities are simply the words of a statute. And, unless exercised, 
they will atrophy. Timidity, weakness, even passivity are not an 
option. History will judge harshly a DNI who squanders this opportunity 
to spread meaningful and lasting reform across the intelligence 
community. And our national security depends upon it.
  I fully anticipate that Ambassador Negroponte will rise to the 
occasion. He must, and I believe he will, hit the ground running, 
boldly face the inevitable challenges and frustrations that lie ahead, 
and aggressively assert the authorities with which he has been 
provided. But the DNI will not be alone. With the full support of the 
President, the Joint Intelligence Community Council--composed of the 
Secretaries of State, Treasury, Defense, Energy, Homeland Security, and 
the Attorney General--will advise the DNI and make sure the DNI's 
programs, policies, and directives are executed within their respective 
departments in a timely manner. And, if confirmed, the President's 
nominee for Principal Deputy DNI, NSA Director Lieutenant General 
Michael Hayden, will be a most valuable asset in leading the reform 
effort.
  We have largely provided Ambassador Negroponte with the flexibility 
to establish the Office of the DNI as he sees fit in order to 
accomplish the goal of reform. In addition to his Principal Deputy, he 
may appoint as many as four other deputies with the duties, 
responsibilities, and authorities he deems appropriate. And, in 
addition to the National Counterterrorism Center, which is specifically 
mandated under the legislation, Ambassador Negro-
ponte is authorized to establish national intelligence centers, apart 
from any individual intelligence agency, to drive community-wide all-
source analysis and collection on key intelligence priorities. These 
national intelligence centers have significant potential to shift the 
center of gravity in the intelligence community from individual stove-
piped agencies toward a mission-oriented integrated intelligence 
network.
  In sum, we have provided Ambassador Negroponte with the tools to get 
the job done. Now, with the backing of the President, he must use those 
authorities to transform the intelligence community as envisioned by 
the 9/11 Commission, expected by Congress, and needed for the security 
of the American people. On September 11, 2001, it became painfully 
evident that the threats we face as a nation had evolved, and that our 
national security structure needed to evolve accordingly. Ambassador 
Negroponte will now have the opportunity to help our intelligence 
community meet these new security challenges. I wish him well.
  Mr. BUNNING. Mr. President, I speak today on the nomination of John 
Negroponte to be the first Director of National Intelligence. I want to 
express my full support for his confirmation.
  John Negroponte is without question one of the most qualified public 
servants to fill this position. Over the past four decades he has 
continually worked to advance American policy both domestically and 
abroad.
  He is a career diplomat and served in the United States Foreign 
Service from 1960 to 1997. Among his most notable posts are Vietnam, 
the Philippines, Honduras and Mexico.
  After the Foreign Service, Mr. Negroponte was appointed as the U.S. 
Ambassador to the United Nations from September 2001 until June 2004. 
After that, he was confirmed overwhelmingly by the Senate as the first 
U.S. Ambassador to the new democratic Iraq.
  Throughout his ambassadorship in Iraq, he received immense praise 
even from the harshest of critics for his removal of corruption in the 
reconstruction effort in Iraq. He later oversaw, what many deemed 
impossible--the first successful Iraqi democratic elections. As we have 
seen through his leadership in Iraq, democracy has quickly taken root 
in the country and I believe it will continue to grow.
  While the position of the Director of National Intelligence is new to 
our Government, I am confident that Mr. Negroponte will be successful 
in his endeavors to create a united intelligence entity. His experience 
and success in Iraq will serve him well in this new position.
  Intelligence reform is an issue that we know all too well. It has 
been widely addressed in a variety of government bodies since September 
11 and continues to be the topic of many debates. I commend President 
Bush in his efforts to directly confront this problem and to create a 
more unified and efficient intelligence apparatus.
  I am confident the Senate will overwhelming confirm Mr. Negroponte. I 
wish him well in his new position and with the daunting task of 
reforming our intelligence agencies. It is not an easy one. Despite 
this challenge, I believe he will make our intelligence efforts better 
coordinated, more efficient and more effective.
  Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I rise in support of Ambassador John Ne-
groponte's nomination to be the first Director of National 
Intelligence.
  I am pleased President Bush filled this critical position, and 
pleased that the Senate Intelligence Committee moved with such dispatch 
to move him through the process. The Director of National Intelligence 
will be one of the most difficult jobs in Washington. The director will 
have to integrate information from 15 Federal agencies involved in 
gathering anti-terrorism information.
  To break down the boundaries that fracture our intelligence 
community, Negroponte will have to draw on more than 40 years' 
experience in the Foreign Service. He served as U.S. ambassador to the 
United Nations from 2001 until last June, when he became the first U.S. 
ambassador to Iraq since the 1991 Gulf War. He served in the U.S. 
Embassy in Vietnam from 1964 to 1968 and has been ambassador to Mexico, 
the Philippines and Honduras.
  Mr. Negroponte is going to have to take advantage of his closeness 
with President Bush to overcome some of the institutional inertia 
within the intelligence community. However, Ne-
groponte cannot allow that closeness to be a double-edged sword. The 
DNI needs to be an independent voice. He needs to be able to withstand 
pressure from the President and report threats to American security as 
they are, not as others want them to be.
  I hope that Ambassador Negroponte will make it a priority to improve 
the flow of accurate, timely and actionable

[[Page 7446]]

intelligence to state and local security officials.
  Right now, local officials--our front line in the battle for homeland 
security--are getting intelligence from a dozen Federal terrorism watch 
lists. They get conflicting or incomplete data or information that has 
no impact on them. They don't have the resources and expertise to 
process intelligence, form a complete picture of the threats they face, 
and what steps they can take.
  We need to move away from a ``need-to-know'' intelligence culture to 
a ``need-to-share'' one. State and local emergency officials represent 
more than 800,000 sworn law enforment officers and 95 percent of 
America's counter-terrorism capability. They are on the front lines of 
the war on terror and they need better information in order to protect 
us.
  I recognize that will be difficult to do, and I also recognize that 
the solutions to this problem will require new thinking. But after 
serving with Colorado's police officers for 6 years as Attorney 
General, I also know that the current system of information and 
intelligence sharing is absolutely insufficient. We can do better--and 
we must do better.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I rise to express my support for the 
nominations of Ambassador John Negroponte and General Michael Hayden to 
be Director and Deputy Director of National Intelligence.
  The Senate's swift action on these two nominations is but the latest 
example of how the Senate's confirmation process should work, and, for 
the vast majority of President Bush's nominees, has worked.
  It is really a simple formula for success: the President puts forward 
good, qualified nominees and the committee of jurisdiction and the full 
Senate act expeditiously to approve the nomination.
  In nominating Ambassador John Negroponte and General Michael Hayden 
to be Director and Deputy Director of National Intelligence, the 
President has put forward people with long years of dedicated service 
to the country.
  Some have concerns about Ambassador Negroponte's previous service on 
Latin American issues, and these questions are certainly legitimate to 
explore.
  Ambassador Negroponte and General Hayden are men who have wide 
support across both parties, men who have proven track records as 
professional public servants.
  Together, these two men are good choices for the important new 
positions at the top of our intelligence community.
  With Ambassador Negroponte's recent experience in Iraq, long 
experience in diplomatic matters, and years of time as a ``customer'' 
of intelligence, I am hopeful he will focus on improving how 
intelligence is used.
  It is essential that he put in place the personnel and processes 
necessary to help the intelligence community avoid future colossal 
failures like Iraq, where in an effort to make the case for the use of 
force there, the President and the intelligence community repeatedly 
asserted that Saddam possessed weapons of mass destruction.
  As has become increasingly clear over time, Saddam did not possess 
stockpiles of these terrible weapons and a number of questions have 
been raised about whether the administration shaped or misused the 
available intelligence.
  Never again should a Secretary of State be sent in front of the 
United Nations to make the President's case for war based on evidence 
that was so terribly flawed.
  If Ambassador Negroponte can prevent such misuse of intelligence, and 
speak truth to power, he will be a successful Director.
  If Ambassador Negroponte is to succeed in developing the right 
intelligence and ensuring that it is used properly, he will have to 
dramatically transform our intelligence agencies.
  In the intelligence reform bill we passed last year, we demanded that 
someone take charge of improving the intelligence agencies' 
performance. In that bill, we gave him the tools and the mandate 
needed.
  Working with his Deputy Director, General Hayden, who has nearly 3 
decades of experience in transforming intelligence as a military 
officer, I expect Ambassador Negroponte to transform the intelligence 
community.
  The first step in this critical transformation must be to 
dramatically improve our intelligence collection capabilities, 
especially our human intelligence efforts, against the 21st century 
threats of terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass 
destruction.
  I hope these nominees will maximize their use of the strong, new 
authorities Congress provided them in last year's bill. Our Nation's 
security rests in large measure on their efforts. I wish them every 
success in their endeavors.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, if there is no other Member on our 
side who wishes to speak, I yield back the remainder of my time.
  Mr. WYDEN. I may be the only one with time remaining and I yield back 
the remainder of my time as well.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas.
  Mr. ROBERTS. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I yield back all time on the pending 
nomination, other than the 5 minutes that will be reserved for Senator 
Stevens; provided further that the vote on the confirmation of the 
nomination occur at 3:45 today. I further ask that at 3:30 today the 
Senate resume consideration of the emergency supplemental bill for the 
final 15 minutes of debate and that the votes scheduled on the two 
amendments and final passage occur immediately following the vote on 
the Negroponte nomination. I ask that all votes in the sequence after 
the first be limited to 10 minutes in length and that there be 2 
minutes for debate equally divided between the votes. Finally, I ask 
unanimous consent that following this consent, the Senate proceed to a 
period for morning business with Senators permitted to speak for up to 
10 minutes each.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
  Mr. SMITH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed 
to speak as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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