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Retired CIA officer weighs in on tension between CIA and Trump

Politics December 14, 2016
Meghna Chakrabarti of Radio Boston interviewed Glenn Carle, who worked for the CIA for 23 years before retiring in 2007, about the ongoing clashes between President-elect Donald Trump and the intelligence community at large.
Photo via @nytimes
· 13 Dec 2016

<Thread> Interviewed a 23-year CIA veteran today. He had one of the most unflinching, critical assessments of PEOTUS/CIA story I've heard.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Highlights thread. First, background. Spoke with Glenn Carle. He worked at CIA for 23 years, from Reagan to George W. Bush.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Carle retired in 2007 from CIA's Clandestine Service as deputy national intelligence officer for transnational threats.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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He worked on four continents, and participated in the CIA/Bush admin's "enhanced interrogation" efforts in early 2000s. Later wrote a book

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· 13 Dec 2016
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highly critical of CIA and White House "War on Terror". He did things he's not proud of. Believes CIA failed in its core mission then.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Carle says the current rift between PEOTUS and intelligence community is even worse. Historic crisis. Believes immediate action must be

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· 13 Dec 2016
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taken, including declassifying the CIA Russia analysis, in a way that does not reveal methods or sources.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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His greater concern is that the lack of trust between PEOTUS Trump and CIA destroys the intelligence community's very reason for being:

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Carle agrees with frmr CIA acting director Morell that this is 'political equivalent of 9/11." Carle goes further.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Exactly how unusual is this moment? Carle says unprecedented. Others (Hayden) have said similar. Their point is that POTUS always has right

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· 13 Dec 2016
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to argue with IC assessments. It happens often. Carle says he's never seen a rejection of fact going back to Eisenhower administration.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Rejection of analysis in Carle's view amounts to PEOTUS rejection of entire purpose of intel community.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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He takes it as an affront to their professionalism and service to American national security.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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I pressed him on a couple of points. 1) This is a leaked analysis that needs confirmation/investigation. He agreed. 2) The CIA's own past.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Missteps. Including WMD/Iraq threat assessment. He said, "It is true that WMD we got wrong."

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Isn't this a legitimate source of continued doubt/skepticism among American public and PEOTUS? I also ask him about his own doubts he had

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· 13 Dec 2016
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about the Agency he had in the past. He wrote about them in 2011 in his book, "The Interrogator: An Education." Brief aside here...

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Carle was assigned to interrogate a person believed to be a high level Al Qaeda member. "Enhanced Interrogation." He becomes disilluioned

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· 13 Dec 2016
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with 'self-protective instincts' of intel community, and moral failing of Admin/IC to have embraced torture. His suspect turns out to be

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· 13 Dec 2016
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low level. An 'egregious' error, Carle says. CIA refuses to release captive b/c to do so would have shown "War on Terror" to be a

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· 13 Dec 2016
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'house of cards'. He's very critical of CIA in the book. See:

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· 13 Dec 2016
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So I asked him if, and why, he has faith in the agency now? He says because the book is also about American idealism:

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· 13 Dec 2016
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He believes CIA has tried to rectify past errors. Also, see Gen. Hayden interview - Hayden believes CIA is taking high risk w/ assessmt

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· 13 Dec 2016
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NPR link:

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Brings us back to Carle. I ask him about views from other high level IC people. Hayden says to bridge trust gap, CIA has to "get in

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· 13 Dec 2016
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"...president's head. We need to get our version of reality in front of the President. We have to work hard to make that happen." Hayden

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· 13 Dec 2016
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I spoke with Ret. Admiral James Stavridis ystdy. He believes that trust btw PEOTUS/IC can be built, given time. See:

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Does Carle believe the same thing? He says plainly, powerfully: No.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Carle believes he is in "no way representing a partisan faction of the national security establishment."

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· 13 Dec 2016
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Again, he retired in 2007, so not directly inside IC now. But did serve in CIA for 23 years from Reagan to GWB. He says this is a "crisis"

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· 13 Dec 2016
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from the agency level all the way down to individual officers. That's how worried he is right now.

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· 13 Dec 2016
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One view, one man. Audio of on air conversation here: <END THREAD>

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