Spy Experience a Key Attribute for Rep. Goss

As members of Congress scavenged for information after the Capitol was evacuated Sept. 11, some wandered nearby parks, tuning in news bulletins on battery-powered radios.

Others gravitated to hastily assembled briefing rooms at the Capitol Police headquarters.

But a small group of lawmakers, showing perhaps the best instincts of all, assembled at the doorstep of Rep. Porter J. Goss, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

Throughout the morning, the Florida Republican emerged from military and intelligence briefings inside his Capitol Hill row house to dispense information and reassurance to nervous colleagues.

“Most of us were quite exercised, and there were F-16s flying overhead,” recalled Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.), among those who gathered at Goss’ door. “And there was Porter in the eye of the storm, calm, collected and relaxed.”

With the intelligence community facing some of the most intense scrutiny in its history, Goss figures to be at the center of the storm for some time.

As a former clandestine officer with the CIA, Goss is among a handful of lawmakers with hands-on experience in intelligence matters. From his committee seat, he is certain to play a major role in any overhaul of the nation’s spy community. And perhaps most important, many in Washington expect Goss to succeed George J. Tenet as head of the CIA.

Push for Spy Agencies a Key Part of Career

Of the new attention, Goss jokes that he is being “rediscovered” after spending much of his career in Washington pushing for a reinvigoration of spy agencies at a time when their budgets were shrinking and their relevance seemed diminished by the end of the Cold War.

Indeed, long before Sept. 11, Goss was sounding warnings that have become common refrains in Washington since the attacks: American intelligence had become too risk-averse; it was too reliant on technological prowess that served it well against the Soviets but is of little use against cave-dwelling terrorists; and, most of all, that the CIA had allowed its “human intelligence” capabilities--its roster of spies and informants--to shrink to dangerously deficient levels.

Now Democrats and Republicans alike are rushing to remedy those problems. And Goss, who complained that he could never get the attention of the Clinton White House, has emerged as President Bush’s closest Capitol Hill ally on intelligence matters.

That was never more clear than several weeks ago, when Goss and the ranking Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Richard C. Shelby of Alabama, sparred over whether Tenet should be forced out as CIA director. Shelby called for Tenet’s ouster. Goss said he should be allowed to stay. Days later, Bush showed up at CIA headquarters and threw his arm around Tenet in a public endorsement of the beleaguered director.

Tenet, a Clinton appointee, has offered no indication that he plans to step down. But Goss, who has announced he does not plan to run for reelection next year, is the only name in circulation as a possible successor. He acknowledges he would be interested in the position under the right circumstances.

“I wouldn’t want to do the job the way it’s structured today,” Goss said. Because of the ad hoc way the nation’s intelligence community evolved, he said, the CIA director has more accountability than authority. Much of the budget for the numerous intelligence agencies is controlled by the Defense Department, he said.

“The job I would really like to do is restructure the community,” Goss said.

Some think Goss might be a better CIA director than an intelligence panel chairman. In that post, he is widely respected for his knowledge of intelligence matters but is often accused of being too close to his former, and possible future, employer.

Critics note that, while many in Washington consider the terrorist attacks an intelligence failure, Goss has gone out of his way to avoid finding fault. Indeed, while many lawmakers are pushing for congressional hearings on the performance of intelligence agencies, Goss and his committee have proposed passing that politically charged task to an independent commission. Goss even fought on the House floor to make sure that the proposed panel would not have subpoena power and would focus exclusively on preparedness for future attacks, not past failures.

“This was not his finest hour,” said Steven Aftergood, an intelligence policy analyst at the Federation of American Scientists. “Clearly something went very wrong and clearly there is a need for an investigation. I don’t understand his resistance on this point.”

Goss says he simply wants to avoid a witch hunt.

“My concern is that we will have a hanging instead of a positive effort to plug up gaps,” Goss said. “This is a town where you decide to have a hanging and you argue about how high the tree is.”

Goss might never have left the CIA if his career hadn’t been cut short by illness. Goss entered the CIA in 1960 and served in its clandestine service for more than a decade before, at age 31, he became ill after being exposed to a toxic substance doctors could never identify.

The incident put him in the hospital for months, and he emerged in such a weakened state that the agency refused to reinstate him as an overseas officer.

“They wouldn’t give me the same job I had before, which is the only job I really wanted,” Goss said. “Sitting at a desk really isn’t second best.”

So he resigned and started a new life in Sanibel, Fla. Goss combined with other former CIA officers in a series of lucrative business ventures ranging from real estate deals to the founding of a weekly newspaper.

Soon he was drawn into local politics, serving on the Sanibel City Council and Lee County Commission.

In 1988, Goss ran for the House seat vacated by Connie Mack and won with 71% of the vote. He has been reelected six times by even wider margins in a district that is overwhelmingly Republican.

Goss, who is one of the wealthiest members of Congress with assets exceeding $18 million, says he has no formal plans beyond serving out his term.

If Goss does take the reins at the CIA, it would be at a time when the agency’s task is in many ways more daunting than the Cold War mission that defined the agency when Goss worked there in the 1960s.

“How do we get into the minds of people who want to do things like blow up the trade towers but haven’t committed a crime yet?” Goss said. “That’s the rub.”