Prospect of General at CIA Fuels Misgivings

President Bush’s apparent choice to run the CIA ran into surprising opposition Sunday as congressional leaders expressed concern about his military background, with one top Republican describing him as “the wrong person, [in] the wrong place, at the wrong time.”

The White House is believed to be poised to announce as early as today the nomination of Air Force Gen. Michael V. Hayden to be CIA director. Hayden would succeed Porter J. Goss, who resigned under pressure on Friday.

It was unclear how Sunday’s burst of concern might affect the timing or substance of that announcement, or whether it reflected concerns that had been previously aired with the administration behind closed doors.

But several influential members of Congress, including Republicans on the House and Senate intelligence committees, said they were concerned about a high-ranking military officer running the CIA while the agency is engaged in a rancorous turf war with its intelligence counterparts at the Pentagon.

Hayden, currently the top deputy to national intelligence director John D. Negroponte, would not be the first career military officer to head the CIA. The most recent was Navy Adm. Stansfield Turner, named to the post by President Carter.

But critics contend that naming the general to head the CIA would be a further demoralizing blow for the agency, which has been trying to recover from intelligence failures related to the Sept. 11 attacks and the search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

“Putting a general in charge is going to send the wrong signal through the agency here in Washington, but also to our agents in the field around the world,” Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said on “Fox News Sunday.”

“I’ve got a lot of respect for Mike Hayden.... He’s got a distinguished career,” Hoekstra said. But despite that admiration, he continued, “bottom line, I do believe he’s the wrong person, [in] the wrong place, at the wrong time. We should not have a military person leading a civilian agency at this time.”

The Pentagon has sought to aggressively expand its intelligence capabilities and operations under Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, both in the United States and abroad, and it controls about 80% of the estimated $40-billion annual intelligence budget.

The CIA has resisted Rumsfeld’s efforts, arguing that the military is not as interested in the sort of long-term intelligence-gathering used in policymaking that has historically driven the intelligence agency.

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told “Fox News Sunday” that the CIA should be concerned that it was “about to be, quite frankly, just gobbled up by the Defense Department.”

Hayden’s confirmation as CIA director would put a military officer in charge of every major U.S. spy agency. Members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence -- the panel that will hold confirmation hearings on Bush’s nominee to succeed Goss -- also voiced concerns Sunday about a Hayden nomination and the growing role of the military in the ranks of U.S. intelligence agencies.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said on ABC’s “This Week” that Hayden “might think about resigning his commission” if he is nominated, adding that she was concerned about the military controlling “most of the major aspects of intelligence.”

But a Republican member of the panel, Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, said on the same TV program that he was not sure if Hayden’s departure from the military would allay concerns about “military personnel running the CIA.”

“I think the fact that he is part of the military today would be the major problem,” Chambliss said. “Now, just resigning [his] commission and moving on -- putting on a striped suit, a pinstriped suit, versus an Air Force uniform -- I don’t think makes much difference.”

The intelligence committee’s chairman, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), also acknowledged “real concern about somebody from the military heading up the CIA.”

One solution, Roberts said on CNN’s “Late Edition,” would be for Hayden to bring in deputies with “a strong civilian background.... That would help the situation with the CIA.”

While praising Hayden and his experience, Roberts said he would withhold judgment on whoever the nominee is until after Senate hearings. “I’m not in a position to say that I am for Gen. Hayden and will vote for him,” Roberts said.

Hayden has spent most of his military career in intelligence work. Before joining the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, created in late 2004 to coordinate the activities of all 16 U.S. spy agencies, he headed the National Security Agency, which collects and analyzes intelligence gleaned by intercepting electronic signals.

That experience has been a particular source of controversy. Since Hayden’s name arose late last week in connection with the CIA vacancy, critics have cited his relative inexperience in the development and cultivation of human intelligence sources -- an area seen as one of the CIA’s major shortcomings and a contributing factor in failing to detect the Sept. 11 plot.

Hayden also was an architect of an administration plan to monitor, without obtaining court orders, telephone conversations and Internet traffic of suspected terrorists communicating with people in the United States after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Since the warrantless surveillance program was exposed in media reports late last year, he has been the administration’s chief defender of the program. Critics have questioned its legality and say the administration has done an inadequate job of explaining it to the public and Congress.

Republicans and Democrats said they hoped that if Hayden were nominated, his confirmation hearings would offer an opportunity to learn more about that program.

“Congress has relatively limited leverage on the White House on exercising our constitutional authority,” Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, told “Fox News Sunday.” “We could use [the confirmation hearings] for leverage to find out” more about the NSA wiretaps.

Even though the Judiciary Committee would not consider the nomination, Specter said he would have “some very pointed questions” if Hayden gets the nod.

Goss, a former congressman from Florida and Hoekstra’s predecessor as chairman of the House intelligence panel, resigned Friday after a turbulent 19 months at the CIA.

Despite 10 years as a CIA operative early in his career, Goss was widely seen as having lost the support of the agency rank and file. He also alienated people through his management style, which included putting members of his congressional staff in key agency positions.

Goss also is believed to have clashed with Negroponte, who was appointed last year to oversee the nation’s intelligence agencies and who has wanted to narrow the mission of the CIA.

Some critics say that if Hayden -- Negroponte’s top deputy -- is nominated to head the agency, he would seek to further that goal.

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Gen. Michael V. Hayden

Born: March 17, 1945; raised in Pittsburgh.

Education: Graduated in 1967 from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh with a bachelor’s degree in history; commissioned a 2nd lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force through Duquesne’s ROTC program; received a master’s degree in modern American history from Duquesne in 1969; additional education at the Defense Intelligence School, the Armed Forces Staff College and the Air War College.

Experience: Has spent most of his military career in intelligence work, starting with his first post as an analyst and briefer at the Strategic Air Command (1970-72).

Notable assignments include director for defense policy and arms control, National Security Council (1989-91); commander of the Air Intelligence Agency and director of the Joint Command and Control Warfare Center (1996-97); deputy chief of staff, United Nations Command and U.S. Forces Korea (1997-99); and director of the National Security Agency (1999-2005).

Named principal deputy director of national intelligence and promoted to four-star general in April 2005.

Military awards include the Defense Distinguished Service Medal (third-highest peacetime award), the Defense Superior Service Medal with oak leaf cluster, the Legion of Merit and the Bronze Star.

Family: Wife, Jeanine Carrier, married 1987; three children: Margaret, Michael, Liam.

Other: Speaks Bulgarian; avid Pittsburgh Steeler fan.

Sources: Who’s Who in America, Air Force Assn., ABC’s “This Week”