Acting Director Cites ‘Resilient’ Nature of CIA

Acting CIA Director Richard J. Kerr told retired agents Saturday that despite recent criticisms and allegations of wrongdoing the agency was resilient and would continue its work.

Kerr made the remarks to veterans of the CIA’s predecessor agency, the Office of Strategic Services, a day after the CIA’s former chief of covert operations was indicted on 10 counts of lying and obstructing justice.

Former covert operations chief Clair E. George was accused of blocking grand jury and congressional investigations into the Ronald Reagan Administration’s diversion of funds to Contra forces in Nicaragua from arms sales to Iran.

George was charged following testimony from another agent, Alan D. Fiers, who pleaded guilty to withholding Iran-Contra information from Congress.

Some members of Congress have suggested realigning U.S. intelligence agencies and cutting back their funds because of the collapse of the communist threat.

Kerr acknowledged that the CIA was “under a fair amount of fire,” but said that was not unique and the agency was “sound in its understanding of its objectives and its purposes.”

“I am struck more than anything else by how resilient this organization is and how willing it is to go on with its work,” he said.

His remarks were made in private, but a portion was released by the CIA’s public affairs office.

CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield said Kerr did not specifically mention George’s name or discuss in detail the federal indictment against George.

Kerr also did not discuss the upcoming Senate confirmation hearings for President Bush’s nomination of former CIA Deputy Director Robert M. Gates to be CIA director, Mansfield said.

Gates has said that he knew little of the Iran-Contra affair.

Kerr said: “The challenges ahead of us in a world of instability, in a world of real confusion and realignment, are much greater in many ways than the challenges that were facing us when we had a single, rather straightforward enemy to look at.”

He cited the need for information and analysis into weapons proliferation, regional instability, ethnic strife, narcotics and terrorism.

“It’s a much more complicated world, and intelligence has a very real role to play,” Kerr said.

Kerr added that intelligence was the key to the “fundamental policy process.”