Wednesday, March 14, 2018

President Trump Nominates Career CIA Officer to Be CIA Director And First Woman To Head CIA


Guy Taylor at the Washington Times offers a piece on Gina Haspel, an outstanding choice to be the new CIA director. 

President Trump’s latest personnel shake-up comes with a historic first: Gina Haspel is in line to be the first woman to head the CIA.

But the low-key, highly decorated CIA veteran, whose rise through the agency’s vaunted Clandestine Service put her at the center of some the most controversial U.S. intelligence missions of the past half-century, could face a tough confirmation battle.

Human rights groups expressed outrage Tuesday over the pick of Ms. Haspel to replace Mike Pompeo. They said her involvement in one the agency’s darkest periods — the waterboarding and rendition programs in the years after the 9/11 attacks — make her an unsuitable candidate to head the agency.

However, several former high-level U.S. intelligence professionals, as well as many lawmakers, heaped praise on Ms. Haspel, saying she represents an unprecedented choice from within the CIA’s ranks and that her rise to the top is an inspiration for America’s career intelligence officials.

“It means a lot to the workforce that one of our own was able to reach the highest ranks of the agency and be promoted to be director,” former CIA Clandestine Service Officer Daniel Hoffman said in an interview. “It’s an incredible statement about how somebody can achieve great things from within. It matters a lot.”

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:


Note: You can also read the earlier CIA announcement that named Gina Haspel as deputy CIA director via the below link:

2 comments:

  1. Haspel's connections with what the Dems and others consider "torture" and water-boarding might mean a dead-end and a big thumbs-down for her confirmation. However, realists (rather than demagogues) should understand that espionage is a dirty business, one in which very few of us are ready, willing, and able to engage. Without spies during the Cold War and its aftermath, we would all be speaking a different language in the former U.S.

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  2. RT,

    I agree.

    Plus at the time of her actions we were very concerned about another 9/11-type attack. Time was critical.

    Plus the fact that the program was ordered and approved by President Bush and signed off as legal (at the time) by the Justice Department.

    Gina Haspel is a pro. With all of our threats, we need her at the helm of the CIA.

    Paul

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