OPPOSITION TO ROBERT GATES AS CIA DIRECTOR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-01448R000401810001-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 22, 2012
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: September 3, 1991
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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RADIO
7V REPORTS
-7'11 A lar~ Avenue, #2 . 50 i , h5f-4C
evy :se. MD 208' 5
DayBreak
September 3, 1991 8:00 A.M. Washington, D.C.
Opposition to Robert Gates as CIA Director
REID COLLINS: There's been a surprising development in
the nomination of Robert Gates to be the new Director of the
Central Intelligence Agency. Sources say that a number of
current and former CIA employees have told Senate investigators
they don't think Gates is the right man to head the spy agency.
CNN Special Assignment correspondent Steven Emerson has
obtained exclusive on-camera interviews with two former CIA
staffers who are publicly opposing Gates' nomination. And here
is his report.
PRESIDENT BUSH [5/14/91]: Well, I'm pleased to nominate
Robert Gates to be the Director of Central Intelligence.
STEVEN EMERSON: Since last May the Senate Intelligence
Committee has been investigating Robert Gates' background, in
preparation for his confirmation hearings scheduled later this
month. For most of the summer the investigation focused on Mr.
Gates' role in the Iran-Contra affair and whether he had made
misleading statements to Congress in previous testimony. But CNN
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has learned that within the past six weeks new opposition to Mr.
Gates has emerged from analysts and agents within the CIA itself.
In an unprecedented break in the rank and file of the CIA, more
than one dozen former and current employees of the CIA have
criticized the nomination of Robert Gates, according to Senate
Intelligence Committee officials. Significantly, most have based
their objections not on the Iran-Contra affair, but rather on Mr.
Gates' performance as a top official in the CIA from 1982 through
1989.
In exclusive on-camera interviews with CNN, two former
intelligence analysts have broken the traditional code of silence
in publicly opposing the nomination of Robert Gates.
JOHN GENTRY: I believe that the Agency has fundamental
problems of management and of politicization of analysis, and I
believe that Robert Gates was a major contributor to the problems
that continue in the Agency's Directorate of Intelligence to this
day.
EMERSON: John Gentry spent almost 12 years as an
economist with the CIA until he resigned late last year over what
he claimed was an institutionalized lack of integrity at the CIA.
GENTRY: I and a number of others perceived these
problems to have occurred immediately after the appointment of
Robert Gates as the Deputy Director for Intelligence in 1982.
DR. STEPHEN EMERSON: Having known the man and worked
for him, I just do not feel that Robert Gates is the man to lead
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the U.S. intelligence community into the 21st Century. My
personal opinions, I think, are also mirrored by people at the
Agency in the Directorate of Intelligence.
EMERSON: Dr. Stephen A. Emerson, who is not related to
me, was a CIA foreign policy analyst for eight years before he
was terminated in July after a dispute with Agency management.
Dr. Emerson and Gentry both charge that under Mr. Gates' tenure
analysts' reports were edited to delete information that the
White House and. State Department did not want to hear. However,
a veteran CIA official says that Agency analysts have always
complained when managers change their reports.
GEORGE CARVER: I'm sure that I made a number of my
colleagues unhappy, just as Bob Gates probably made a number of
his. But taking that unhappiness to a view that "He didn't
accept my position; therefore he's wrong and probably evil"
strikes me as a rather childish response.
EMERSON: Still, analysts point to specific cases where
they claim their reports were changed for political reasons.
Example: CIA middle managers ordered analysts to
withhold information that one Southeast Asian ally of the United
States had engaged in activities detrimental to U.S. interests.
Analysts further charge that intelligence reports about
the Soviet Union were slanted to reflect the prevailing political
winds.
Still, it is important to point out that no one has
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brought any evidence whatsoever that suggests that Robert Gates
ordered any of these changes personally.
GENTRY: He created, he fostered, he mandated a series
of organizational and procedural changes that prostituted the
analysis of the Agency. And this, over time, entered the DI, the
Director of Intelligence, culture as a directive to make people
happy, as opposed to providing objective, sound, factually
accurate intelligence to the United States Government.
DR. EMERSON: During the editing process, yes, certain
phrases or words were marked out with comments: "This will not
please the folks downtown. Revise the tone."
EMERSON: When you heard the phrase "This will not
please the folks downtown," what did you understand that to mean?
DR. EMERSON: Well, it was pretty clear-cut: that
someone downtown, usually in State or at the White House, didn't
want to hear this. It was bad news or went against some type of
policy option that they were thinking about.
I think Robert Gates had a lot to do with that.
EMERSON: In off-camera interviews with CNN, other
Agency employees have also charged that Robert Gates politicized
intelligence analysis at the CIA.
CARVER: That runs against everything that I've known
about Bob Gates. He certainly did nothing of the sort when he
worked for inc.
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EMERSON: Former CIA official George Carver has known
Robert Gates since 1973.
CARVER: For a professional officer intervening in the
sort of confirmation process, trying to sandbag the elected
President's nominee, to my mind, I regard that as unseemly unless
there is really some absolutely overriding reason. And I don't
find any such reason in connection with the nomination of Bob
Gates.
EMERSON: Carver and others caution that the number of
former and current CIA employees actively opposing the nomination
of Robert Gates is actually very small. Nevertheless, the Senate
Intelligence Committee is surprised that normally closed-mouthed
CIA analysts have spoken out against the nomination at all.
Steven Emerson, CNN Special Assignment.
COLLINS: CNN asked the CIA to respond to the story, and
a spokesman said the Agency defends the accuracy of its analyti-
cal reports. He stated further that the Agency feels that Robert
Gates, and we're quoting now, is an experienced, brilliant
intelligence officer who would bring a lot to the Agency.
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