[You may have noticed that more and more of the articles appearing in NucNews are about military, paramilitary, police, and officially sanctioned spies. These are included to show dangerous trends which might be stopped locally if people see the larger picture.]

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Not So False Alarm

Saturday, August 28, 1999; Page A17
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-08/28/002l-082899-idx.html

Defense Secretary William Cohen [op-ed, July 26], who believes we should prepare for a "grave new world" of chemical and biological weapons, may be aware of facts and circumstances Milton Leitenberg is not aware of ["False Alarm," Free for All, Aug. 14]. Leitenberg seems to argue that because there have been no large, successful biological terrorist attacks in the past, there can be none in the future.

A June 13 New York Times article, "Government Report Says 3 Nations Hide Stocks of Smallpox," reported that Iraq, North Korea and Russia are assessed to be harboring undeclared stocks of smallpox virus. North Korean and Iraqi soldiers have been vaccinated against smallpox, although the disease was declared eradicated almost 20 years ago.

In 1993, North Korea was assessed by the Russians as having a smallpox weapon program. This gained a general concurrence from the CIA in an open hearing, and also is supported by defector reports. If the North Korean regime implodes, control of the virus could break down. If the local population is exposed, the virus could spread quickly to China, Japan and around the world.

Russian or Iraqi germs might find their way to the United States. Osama bin Laden has stated that it is his duty to try to acquire weapons of mass destruction. We know that he has tried for chemical and nuclear ones. He has declared war on the United States and its citizens. He has been in contact with Saddam Hussein and Iraq. He has struck in the United States before, at the World Trade Center. The chief counterterrorism organization in the United States, the FBI, has suspended giving tours of its headquarters, in part because of concern that bin Laden's supporters could strike within the United States.

The United States is ill prepared to respond to biological terrorism. There is no cure for smallpox. If a smallpox case were identified, for example, everyone who had come in contact with that person would need to be vaccinated immediately, both to protect those exposed and to prevent the spread of the virus. There are currently 15.4 million doses of vaccine in the U.S. inventory, which sounds like a lot, but Yugoslavia needed more than 18 million doses in 10 days during its bout with smallpox in 1972 -- and that was in a population of 21 million who had already been vaccinated.

The U.S. stock of vaccine is old, and some samples have failed quality-control checks. The FDA does not authorize use of the vaccine stock we do have. The vaccine often provokes reactions that must be treated with Vaccinia Immune Globulin (VIG). The U.S. stock of VIG has turned pink. It may still be effective, but the FDA does not wish to take the chance that it's not. New supplies are being contracted but will continue to be limited.

A contract is in place to provide smallpox vaccine to the military. But that vaccine is not expected to be available until approximately 2005. The Department of Health and Human Services is seeking to contract for a larger civilian supply to be available some time after the military has been vaccinated.

In 1993, the Defense Science Board stated its concern about a biological attack on the United States: "If such an attack should occur, the military establishment will be blamed for a failure in national defense, regardless of the purported mandate -- and above all, we would blame ourselves." Perhaps that is why Secretary Cohen has made increasing preparedness against weapons of mass destruction his "signature issue," as Leitenberg states. Secretary Cohen's concerns should not be dismissed, but rather should be a spur to increase preparedness.

-- David Siegrist
The writer is a research fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies.

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Military Computers Vulnerable

By The Associated Press, August 28, 1999
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/w/AP-Pentagon-Computer-Security.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Auditors who investigated the Defense Department's information networks found security vulnerabilities in computer systems controlling critical operations that range from weapons design to soldiers' payrolls.

The General Accounting Office, following up on cyber security recommendations it has made since 1996, warned Friday that ``weaknesses in DOD information security continue to provide both hackers and hundreds of thousands of authorized users the opportunity to modify, steal, inappropriately disclose and destroy sensitive DOD data.''

The recommendation from the GAO -- Congress' investigative arm -- that DOD put together a comprehensive, departmentwide information security program is not new; the report noted that the Pentagon has already made limited progress on some computer security fronts.

Pentagon spokeswoman Susan Hansen said the GAO's report was welcomed as a way of helping to raise awareness of the problem and that it was ``right in line with the types of things that we are ready to do.''

The Defense Department, perhaps the largest user of such information systems in the world, spends roughly $1 billion a year on computer system security, and has requested more money from Congress.

``To put the kinds of corrections in will require consistent efforts, and those cost,'' Hansen said. The office of Defense Secretary William Cohen and other DOD operations within the Pentagon itself recently set up additional firewalls and password protection for information systems, she noted.

The GAO said that while some corrective efforts have been undertaken in response to its earlier recommendations, progress has been ``inconsistent across the various DOD components,'' including controls over who can physically or electronically gain access to sensitive computer systems.

``Users were granted access to computer resources that exceeded what they required to carry out their job responsibilities,'' the report said.

Hansen said the Defense-wide Information Assurance Program, a security effort aimed at consolidating such control protection efforts across the DOD, is on schedule.

The GAO report said it was too early to assess the success of this program, and recommended that the program define how it will work with other security initiatives already in place.

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Sneak-Attack Detectives Prepare to Prowl
Guard Units Train to Fight Biochemical Weapons

By Bradley Graham Washington Post Staff Writer Saturday, August 28, 1999; Page A03
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-08/28/074l-082899-idx.html

FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo.-Outfitted in full-body protective suits with air tanks, three members of the Missouri National Guard grope methodically through a mock terrorist lair looking for lethal chemicals amid scattered canisters and overturned jars.

The scene, during an exercise here last week, is set up to resemble an apartment in Washington's Anacostia neighborhood that has just been raided by the FBI on a tip that terrorists were planning a chemical or biological attack on the nation's capital. The Guardsmen, members of a new force being trained and equipped for combating unconventional weapons, have less than an hour--the time it will take for their oxygen to run out--to scour the premises and identify hazardous materials.

They move too slowly and fail to spot some dangerous items in the apartment's makeshift laboratory before withdrawing. A second team ventures in. Military specialists coaching from the sidelines attribute the first group's shortcomings to inexperience but commend the reservists for not blowing themselves up.

As concern grows that a rogue state or terrorist group might someday unleash biological or chemical agents in a U.S. city, the Pentagon is investing tens of millions of dollars to convert part of the Guard into an emergency response force. Equipped with sophisticated gear for analyzing mysterious substances, the first 10 units, each with 22 members, are scheduled to go into operation by January.

But are they really necessary? The FBI already has a hazardous materials unit ready to rush to the scene of an attack. So do the active-duty Army and Marine Corps. Many local police, fire and health agencies also are preparing for the threat of biochemical attack.

A recent report by the General Accounting Office argued that the Guard units--known as RAID teams, for Rapid Assessment and Initial Detection--are redundant and their mission poorly defined. The congressional watchdog agency also challenged the ability of the RAID units to respond quickly and effectively to an attack. It urged Congress to reassess the program and restrict funding for additional teams.

Congress so far has ignored the advice. At the urging of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which wanted to fund 17 more RAID teams, Senate and House conferees last month authorized 12 more in fiscal 2000.

Starting with $20 million appropriated last year for the first 10 teams, Congress has quickly expanded the program. It added $19 million last autumn for more equipment, plus $13 million to establish RAID "light" teams in states lacking full-fledged contingents. The latest defense authorization bill would provide an additional $64 million.

Congressional funding for the RAID initiative fits with the strong backing that lawmakers have historically afforded the Guard, which has members in almost every district. In fact, some critics regard the RAID teams largely as an effort to find a new mission for the Guard and help it avoid deeper budget cuts in the post-Cold War era.

"It's basically become an attempt to find something the Guard can do, from what we can tell," said Ann Borseth, a defense analyst who worked on the GAO report.

Senior Pentagon officials reject such criticism, vigorously defending the Guard units as essential elements in a developing national plan to provide a many-layered response--from local to federal levels--against attacks involving chemical, biological or radiological agents.

Under a separate multimillion-dollar program, local police, fire and health departments in 120 cities also are being trained to deal with what the Pentagon calls weapons of mass destruction. But defense officials say attacks of this kind, with their broad potential for casualties, would likely overwhelm local units.

The Guard teams are intended to give state governors a small expert force to help detect and identify whatever biological or chemical element may be released and coordinate the involvement of other federal troops. Their members include many former active-duty military specialists in chemical warfare. And unlike most of the Guard, which serves part-time, these units require a full-time commitment and will be on 24-hour alert.

Still, one of the chief concerns for critics is the time it will take a RAID team to reach the scene of an attack. In a chemical incident, the first hour or two is critical. But the Guard teams, which have no military aircraft dedicated to them, cannot guarantee a response time of less than four hours.

"All local, state and federal officials we met with expressed concern that this time frame would get the team there too late to be useful," the GAO report said.

In the event of a biological attack, the role of the Guard teams is even more questionable, critics say. Because germ agents such as anthrax or smallpox can be released inconspicuously, there is little likelihood of knowing an attack has occurred until hours or even days later, when sick people start showing up at hospitals or doctors' offices.

"I'm quite puzzled about what exactly the RAID teams would do in the event of a biological attack," said Donald Henderson, a professor of epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University and head of the Center for Civilian Biodefense Studies. "The job of detecting a germ agent will rest with physicians and hospital emergency room personnel, coupled with state and local health department people and their laboratories. What we really need are more epidemiologists."

The interaction of RAID teams with local authorities also is problematic. Many police, fire and health departments already have experience working with each other, as a result of coping with industrial spills and natural disasters. They have little practice dealing with the Guard.

"The problem is, it's going to be hard to integrate them into our normal emergency operating procedures," said Gary Briese, executive director of the International Association of Fire Chiefs. "We respond to emergencies daily, and if most of the time we never see the RAID teams--if they only expect to show up for one in a thousand responses--then coordinating with them isn't likely to go smoothly."

Plans call for the RAID units to start training regularly with city emergency response teams, and defense officials express confidence that the Guard squads will be able to contribute a new thing or two.

"You'd be surprised at how little capability exists in some of the larger cities of our country," said a military official supervising the Pentagon effort. "Our people have been through 700 to 1,200 hours of training each, including courses taught by about 20 different agencies, among them the National Fire Academy, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy. There isn't a response unit in the country that comes close to that."

At the Army base here, RAID teams from around the country spent several weeks this summer practicing responses to some of the attacks they consider possible. There was the national fur convention scenario, in which animal rights activists let loose balloons loaded with botulism germs. And the gay rights parade scenario, which also involved balloon weapons, this time filled with the nerve agent ricin in powder form.

A scenario set in downtown Boston envisioned an exploding trash can releasing GF gas, a powerful nerve agent. Another story line began outside Salt Lake City's Delta Center, with a terrorist trying to pump a deadly liquid into a fire hydrant. And still another exercise imagined a Seattle office building, where a rash of illnesses among office workers led to the discovery of a terrorist group preparing a radiological dispersion device using cobalt-60.

To detect the lethal substances they might come up against, the RAID teams were given $70,000 mass spectrometers, which show a characteristic pattern of lines for various molecules. The devices require expertise to read, and Guard members were just learning to handle them.

"Interpreting the plot lines is challenging," said Army 1st Lt. Thomas Benton, a New York Guard member. "Analysts typically have had PhDs and a lot of high-level chemistry."

During one practice session, recalled Army Maj. Robert Domenici, the New York team leader, "It took us several minutes to realize that what we were monitoring was gasoline."

But for the most part, military and industry specialists observing the exercises expressed satisfaction with the Guard units.

"The training has been pretty intense, but we're getting there," said Army Staff Sgt. Tim Riley, whose job as a "modeler" for the Missouri Guard is to estimate the danger zone around a chemical or biological attack. "For the time we've been allotted and everything, we're probably ahead of the power curve."

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GAO: Military Aid in Davidian Siege Proper
'93 Support to FBI, ATF Cost $1 Million

By Edward Walsh, Richard Leiby Washington Post Staff Writers Saturday, August 28, 1999; Page A06
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-08/28/079l-082899-idx.html

Military assistance during the 51-day siege of the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Tex., in 1993 cost almost $1 million, and the military acted properly in providing it, the General Accounting Office has concluded in a report that it submitted to Congress.

The support included helicopters and other aircraft, tanks and other combat vehicles, a wide variety of equipment and training of the federal agents who were conducting the siege, the report said.

The GAO, an investigative arm of Congress, did not explore whether military personnel played any role in the April 19, 1993, assault on the compound. Military documents show that three members of Delta Force watched the tank and tear gas assault, which ended when the compound burst into flames, killing 76 people.

Any direct military involvement in a civilian law enforcement operation would have required a presidential waiver of the law barring such activity. But military officials insist that the military personnel on the scene were only observers.

Under federal law, the military can assist civilian law enforcement agencies in certain circumstances, including operations targeted on suspected drug activity. In seeking military help for their initial, unsuccessful attempt to arrest Branch Davidian leader David Koresh, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) said it suspected that the cult's compound was also the site of a clandestine methamphetamine laboratory. It was on that basis that two requests for help were approved by the Texas National Guard and Operation Alliance, a clearinghouse that represents counterdrug interests of federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.

A report on the 1995 House hearings on the Waco incident said ATF officials deceived the military to obtain assistance "under the guise of a counternarcotics operation." The report questioned the credibility of drug allegations against Koresh, terming them "very stale by legal standards," and said the sect's previous leader, not Koresh, was suspected of methamphetamine manufacturing.

"ATF agents misrepresented to Defense Department officials that the Branch Davidians were involved in illegal drug manufacturing," the congressional report said. "As a result of this deception, the ATF was able to obtain some training from [military] forces which would not have otherwise provided it."

The GAO reached an opposite conclusion. It said the law sets no standard for deciding what types of counterdrug activity qualify for military support and that military officials "have considerable discretion" in making such decisions.

"We found no basis to conclude that the officials involved abused that discretion," the GAO report said. "We also found no indication that ATF officials misrepresented the information provided to the military in order to obtain the support. Therefore, we conclude that the military's decision to approve the counterdrug support was reasonable and authorized under the relevant statutes."

Once the 51-day standoff began, according to the report, it was no longer necessary to have a connection to counterdrug activities because that "qualified as military assistance to civilian authorities."

Most of the military assistance costs--totaling $982,400--were incurred by the Texas National Guard and active Army units, the GAO report said. The FBI and the ATF have reimbursed the military for $747,300, most of which was paid by the FBI.

The GAO also provided a detailed accounting of how the money was spent, including $98,264 in undercharges and $539 in overcharges by the military. It said, for example, that the Army did not bill civilian agencies for the loss of two night vision goggles, at a cost of $9,168. It said the Texas National Guard overcharged civilian agencies $41 for vehicle parts.

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Military provided advice at Waco

8/26/99- Updated 07:29 PM ET
http://usatoday.com/news/washdc/ncsthu02.htm

WASHINGTON (AP) - During the Waco standoff, the military provided assistance ranging from helicopters and tanks to experts on hostage rescue, Pentagon officials and congressional investigators said Thursday.

But officials insisted the military did not play an ''operational'' role in any of the activities leading up to the fiery destruction of the Branch Davidian compound in 1993.

Three Army special operations officers were present on the day the compound burned, but they did not give advice to the FBI on how to proceed, nor was advice requested from them, said a senior military official.

Neither did the three observers have anything to do with the FBI's newly disclosed use of incendiary devices on that day, said the official, who spoke only on condition of anonymity.

The issue of the military's role was given fresh attention with disclosure of the use of the military-style incendiary devices and a statement by the chairman of the Texas Department of Public Safety, James B. Francis.

Francis told The Dallas Morning News that federal officials need to explain why members of the Army's Delta Force anti-terrorism squad were at the scene on the final day.

Federal law prohibits the military from becoming actively involved in domestic law enforcement matters unless directed to do so by the president.

Pentagon officials would not comment on the record on the matter or divulge specific information regarding the Delta Force.

However, the senior official said that Defense Department early on in the 51-day standoff was asked to provide two special operations officers with expertise in hostage rescue to review an FBI contingency plan.

They did review the plan, the official said.

The military also loaned radios and other communications equipment - and technicians to maintain them - and made various other equipment available, including tanks, tents and helicopters, the official said.

Meanwhile, the General Accounting Office, an investigatory arm of Congress, issued a report on Thursday on military assistance provided during the standoff.

The report said that the military provided ''a wide variety of assistance,'' both to the FBI and to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. It put the total cost of the assistance at $1 million, including support from state National Guard units.

Primarily, the report focused on assistance to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, noting that military personnel were called to the scene after the agency ''cited possible drug-related activity at the compound.''

In its report to the House Government Oversight Committee, the GAO concluded that the agency's ''requests for assistance from military counterdrug programs met the requirements of the relevant statutes for authorizing such support.''

The senior Pentagon official said no consideration was given to requesting a presidential waiver of the law that prohibits military involvement in domestic law enforcement because it wasn't deemed necessary or applicable.

The official said he did not know whether the military supplied the FBI with the incendiary devices that were used, but he said he doubted it.

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Reno Angry At FBI Misinformation Over Waco

Updated 1:18 AM ET August 27, 1999, By John Poirier
http://webcrawler-news.excite.com/news/r/990827/01/news-crime-davidians

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno said Thursday she was angry at not being told until recently that six years ago the FBI used tear gas canisters capable of sparking a fire at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas.

But even though the Federal Bureau of Investigation admitted using the tear gas devices after denying it for six years, Reno said the government did not cause the fire that destroyed the compound and killed 80 people including the leader of the Branch Davidian religious sect, David Koresh.

"I am very, very upset," Reno said of the new information. "I don't think it's very good for my credibility. That's the reason I'm going to pursue it until I get to the truth."

Several congressional Republicans said an investigation should be reopened into the government's handling of the Waco standoff, which ended on April 19, 1993, with a rapid series of fiery explosions at the main wooden structure where the religious sect was holed up.

Reno said her anger and frustration stemmed from assurances she received that incendiary devices would not be used.

"Prior to April 19 (1993), I received assurances that the gas and its means of use were not pyrotechnic," Reno told her weekly news conference. "Since then, I have consistently been told that no pyrotechnic devices were used."

Repeating FBI assertions made earlier this week, Reno said, "At this time, all available indications are that the devices were not directed at the main wooden compound, were discharged several hours before the fire started and were not the cause of the fire."

Threatening to reopen hearings, Rep. Dan Burton, the Indiana Republican who chairs the House of Representatives Committee on Government Reform, said in a statement, "This new information requires a thorough investigation of whether the Justice Department has misled the American people, and the Congress, about what happened at Waco."

Rep. Bob Barr, a Georgia Republican, said, "If federal officials have been lying about these elements of the siege, their testimony on other matters should also be examined."

Reno, the nation's top law enforcement officer, said, "I'll be happy to cooperate in every way that I can."

The FBI admission Wednesday night that "pyrotechnic devices" may have been used in the siege, marked an about-face after six years of unqualified denials to Congress and the public that no such flammable devices were used in the siege.

A Justice Department official close to Reno, said she was unhappy when she was informed the 51-day stand-off between the religious sect and the U.S. government was back in the news.

"I can't believe this!" the official said, repeating Reno's words when she was told of the Dallas Morning News report this week quoting a former top FBI official as saying two military ordnance M651 CS tear-gas grenades were fired at the "pit," an underground structure that led to tunnels opening into the compound.

At Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, White House spokesman Joe Lockhart said President Clinton "stands with the attorney general in her determination to get all the facts in this case and to make them available to Congress and the public as soon as possible."

In San Antonio, the woman who headed a federal jury that convicted eight surviving Davidians in 1994 for crimes related to the siege said they should now get new trials.

"The question never was settled in our minds during the trial as to exactly who started that fire," Sarah Bain told local radio station WOAI. "Most of us had some doubts that the Branch Davidians were responsible for mass suicide."

Eight members of the sect were sentenced to jail terms of up to 40 years for weapons offenses and aiding and abetting the manslaughter of federal agents.

Reno said she and FBI Director Louis Freeh had ordered a fresh investigation Wednesday into Waco after the FBI admission. "I will not stop until I get to the bottom of this," she said.

FBI spokesman Tron Brekke said an agency inspector, who is yet to be named, will lead an investigation team of 40 agents -- all of whom will be least of supervisory rank.

He added the probe -- which also will look into why Reno or Freeh may have been misinformed -- will take "weeks rather than months."

Mike Caddell, a lawyer representing the survivors and relatives of the dead in a wrongful-death lawsuit against the government, said Reno's admission came after six years of stonewalling and gameplaying.

"We're not suggesting that anybody intended to kill the Davidians. What we're suggesting is that this was a silly, stupid, crazy plan that almost certainly was going to result in the loss of life," he told CNN.

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Glendening Vows to Push 'Smart Guns'

By Manuel Perez-Rivas Washington Post Staff Writer Saturday, August 28, 1999; Page B01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-08/28/052l-082899-idx.html

Gov. Parris N. Glendening vowed yesterday to use the full strength of his office to win passage of a law requiring that all guns sold in Maryland feature technology that would allow only their owners to fire them.

The governor's comments came as he met with the 21-member task force he appointed to recommend how the state should mandate the sale of so-called "smart guns," weapons equipped with such high-tech components as fingerprint sensors. Glendening (D) said he wants legislation approved during the next General Assembly session that would put Maryland at the forefront of an issue gaining national attention.

"I am very, very serious about this issue," he said. Glendening first proposed mandating smart--or "childproof"--guns during his reelection campaign two years ago. The issue was dropped last year, but the governor is promising to make it a priority during the coming year.

Smart gun proposals have been introduced in several state legislatures in recent months, most notably in New Jersey, where one bill passed a Senate committee before stalling. A congressional bill introduced by U.S. Rep. William J. Pascrell Jr. (D-N.J.) would provide $100 million over four years in grants for research and development of smart guns and then require gun manufacturers to produce them if the technology is deemed feasible by the National Institute of Justice.

The debate about smart guns centers on the question of whether the technology is sufficiently developed or can be developed. Although some gun makers, most notably Colt's Manufacturing Co., are developing guns with high-tech safety features, there is opposition within the industry and from the National Rifle Association to any legislative mandates. Even Colt's, which carries a smart guns update on its Web site, is opposed to mandating use of such weapons.

"You can't mandate technology. You can mandate the study of technology, and you can promote its development," said Jeffrey K. Reh, general counsel of Beretta U.S.A. Corp., which is headquartered in Prince George's County. The company's position on smart guns is that the technology is "undeveloped and unproven" and that its use could increase the number of gun-related fatalities. Reh also criticized Glendening for not appointing a representative from a gun manufacturing company to the task force.

Yet Glendening and other supporters of a smart guns law said the technology is available and can be made reliable. The governor compared the issue to the efforts that led up to federal mandates requiring air bags in cars and child-proof caps on medicine bottles.

"It can be done. It absolutely can be done," he said. "It's just like air bags. The car manufacturers insisted it couldn't be done. The law was passed and air bags have saved lives."

"That technology, I know for a fact, is available," said Col. David B. Mitchell, the superintendent of the Maryland State Police and the task force chairman. "The question is cost. The question is when can we reasonably expect to see it come forward."

Stephen P. Teret, the director of the Center for Gun Policy and Research at Johns Hopkins University and a member of Glendening's task force, said he believes smart guns that use high-technology features such as fingerprint sensors or sensors that are activated by a separate device, such as a ring worn by the owner, could be ready in about a year.

Teret said the recent spate of high-profile mass shootings have increased public support for requiring such high-tech safety features. In addition, some of the recent lawsuits against gun manufacturers have cited the lack of smart gun features in their products. And, he said, proposals similar to the one being considered in Maryland have been gaining ground.

"All of this makes what I think is a very compelling argument for the gun manufacturers," he said.

Yet some staunch opponents of gun control said that Glendening's proposal is an underhanded way to ban the sale of guns altogether.

"The technology does not exist. Show me one," said Bob McMurray, of Silver Spring, who is the chairman of Marylanders Against the Gun Ban, a decade-old umbrella group representing gun owners. "He knows that if he introduces a bill to ban handguns outright he won't win. So he's trying to do it this way."

Glendening asked the task force to study the technology available and to meet with community groups, legislators and gun makers to discuss the issue. He asked the group to try to find common ground with the gun industry, but said they should move ahead anyway if that was impossible.

"If we cannot [find common ground], we will use the full strength of the office to try to protect our children," he said, cautioning task force members to brace themselves for a tough fight.

"Recognize that this will be a death struggle in many ways, but it's one that we've fought before and won before, and there are people alive because of this," he said, citing 1996 legislation limiting handgun purchases in the state to one a month.

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George Tenet's CIA Record

By Patrick G. Eddington Friday, August 27, 1999; Page A29
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-08/27/017l-082799-idx.html

David Ignatius's benign view of George Tenet's tenure as director of central intelligence ["New Guy at the CIA," op-ed, Aug. 22] is out of sync with Tenet's actual record. Although not officially sworn in until July 1997, Tenet served as acting DCI upon John Deutch's departure in late 1996. What has Tenet's record been during this time?

It began with the denial -- in January 1997, before Congress -- that the CIA had withheld any relevant information from the public regarding possible chemical exposures among American Gulf War veterans. Four months later, Tenet dispatched an underling, Robert Walpole, to Capitol Hill to recant. The agency had, since 1986, conclusive evidence that chemical weapons were routinely stored at the Khamisiyah weapons depot -- the same depot that was destroyed by American combat engineers in March 1991. A year later, Tenet's Inspector General office issued a report indicating that the agency had identified more than 1.5 million documents with potential relevance to the maladies affecting ailing Desert Storm veterans, but that the material would not be reviewed for release to the veterans or the public -- again demolishing Tenet's claims of the agency's "openness" on the Gulf War illness issue.

Tenet's commitment to greater public accountability on the CIA's current and previous actions is also questionable. An August 1997 report by the State Department's Advisory Committee on Historical and Diplomatic Documentation charged the agency with "stone walling" on the declassification of records dealing with nearly a dozen CIA covert actions during the Cold War. Tenet, breaking pledges made by his two immediate predecessors, cited "budgetary and resource constraints" as the reasons for the continued classification of the material a questionable assertion at best.

Tenet's tenure has brought increased employee-related litigation. Earlier this year, Washington-area litigator Roy Kneger filed a federal class action suit on behalf of agency employees who were impeded in their attempts to seek legal representation. Krieger told The Post in January that his request to examine materials relevant to a grievance made by one of his agency clients had been denied.

Many of the grievances deal with questionable polygraph tactics used by CIA Security, an overreaction stemming from the Aldrich Ames case. Considered by many to be little more reliable than a Ouija board and generally inadmissible in court cases, the polygraph is still viewed by the CIA as a talisman. Tenet's failure to seriously examine its drawbacks in the wake of the Ames case has clearly contributed to excesses by CIA Security, precipitating Krieger's class action suit.

The agency's analytical record under Tenet has been dismal, recalling the worst days of the highly politicized intelligence assessments of the Reagan and Bush years. Early in 1998, the CIA's Office of Transnational Issues, unhappy with a balanced and accurate report prepared by University of Hawaii professor Gary Fuller on the relative ethnic stability of China, pressured university officials to fire him. Fuller -- who refused to toe the agency line that China was heading the way of the former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia -- fought back, regaining his job but not his position as chairman of the university's geography department. Politicization of intelligence estimates continues to flourish under Tenet's leadership.

The CIA -- shorn of its satellite imagery analysis capability by Tenet's predecessor, John Deutch -- failed to detect India's preparations for renewed nuclear testing in May 1998. The same lack of satellite photo analysis undoubtedly played a role in the mistaken targeting of the Al Shifa pharmaceutical plant in the Sudan a year ago. Subsequent imagery of the plant, released by the Pentagon, showed no evidence of the kinds of special security measures normally associated with chemical weapons production facilities.

Relying on the Pentagon's National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) alone for photographic analysis -- particular on key strategic questions -- has proved to be the disaster critics predicted three years ago when NIMA was established. Tenet has made no move to restore the CIA's organic satellite imagery analysis capabilities, choosing instead to rely on NIMA, whose maps and imagery support also proved wanting in the Chinese Embassy bombing incident earlier this year.

Tenet's record to date is, at best, mixed. If, as Ignatius suggests, Tenet has truly embraced the philosophy of former director Richard Helms -- fined $2,000 in 1978 for perjuring himself before Congress five years earlier regarding the agency's role in subverting the Chilean government -- we all have reason for grave concern.