Clapper says he would aim to expand clout of intelligence chief

President Obama’s nominee to lead the nation’s sprawling intelligence apparatus promised Tuesday to strengthen the “perceived weakness” of the position amid concerns that the 16 intelligence agencies are duplicating effort and failing to coordinate.

Retired Air Force Gen. James R. Clapper told the Senate Intelligence Committee at his confirmation hearing that he would “push the envelope” as the nation’s fourth director of national intelligence, pursuing greater authority for a post that has been seen as too weak for its occupant to assert control.

“I would not agree to take this position on if I were going to be a titular figurehead or a hood ornament,” he said. “There needs to be a clear, defined, identifiable leader of the intelligence community.”

Clapper, currently chief of the Pentagon’s intelligence operations, has previously headed the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency. He would replace Navy Adm. Dennis C. Blair, who resigned in May at Obama’s request after he fell out with the White House and CIA Director Leon Panetta.

The position of director of national intelligence was created after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to foster centralized leadership of a U.S. intelligence operation that seemed to be working at cross purposes and failed to share information. It hasn’t quite worked as envisioned, said Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.).

“The true extent of the director’s authority and the exact nature of the job he is supposed to do are still a matter of debate,” she said.

Under the law, the director “is constrained from directing 15 of the 16” intelligence agencies, she said, and the 16th, the CIA, “has demonstrated the ability to thwart the DNI’s directives.”

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) warned Clapper that “there have been some apparently systemic failures” in intelligence oversight that need to be addressed.

Clapper, 69, promised to do so. Republicans on the committee praised him, suggesting that his confirmation was likely. Feinstein said she hoped for a vote within 10 days.

In his written testimony, Clapper noted that in 2006 he was forced out as head of the geospatial-intelligence agency, which oversees satellite surveillance, after clashing with then-Secretary of Defense Donald M. Rumsfeld.

“I am a ‘truth to power’ guy, and try always to be straight about anything I am asked,” Clapper said.

Clapper’s hearing came amid a Washington Post series arguing that the U.S. intelligence community had grown out of control since the Sept. 11 attacks, expanding into a burgeoning bureaucracy replete with duplication and relying hugely on private contractors to perform what used to be considered governmental functions.

Clapper disputed those conclusions and criticized the articles as veering into “sensationalism.”

Congress appropriates the intelligence community’s $75-billion budget with a variety of strings attached, he said.

“I think there’s some breathlessness and shrillness [in the Post series] that I don’t subscribe to,” he said at another point. “That’s not to say … that there aren’t things that can be improved.”

He defended the growth of intelligence contracting, comparing today’s defense industry to the “arsenal of democracy” that helped the U.S. and its allies win World War II.

“We have the largest, most capable intelligence enterprise on the planet,” Clapper said. “Intelligence … now drives everything, so it’s not surprising in my view that we have so many contractors.”

kdilanian@tribune.com