Exit of C.I.A. Chief Viewed as Move to Recast Agency
By MARK MAZZETTI
Published: May 7, 2006
WASHINGTON, May 6 — The choice of Gen. Michael V. Hayden of the Air Force as the new director of the Central Intelligence Agency is only a first step in a planned overhaul to permanently change the mission and functions of the legendary spy agency, intelligence officials said Saturday.
Porter J. Goss, who was forced to resign Friday, was seen as an obstacle to an effort by John D. Negroponte, the director of national intelligence, to focus the agency on its core mission of fighting terrorism and stealing secrets abroad. General Hayden, who will be nominated to the post on Monday, is currently Mr. Negroponte's deputy, and he is regarded as an enthusiastic champion of the agency's adoption of that narrower role.
A senior intelligence official said that General Hayden, in a recent presentation to the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, had sharply criticized Mr. Goss for resisting the transformation. Mr. Goss was seen as trying to protect the C.I.A.'s longtime role as the government's premier center for intelligence analysis, but under General Hayden, much of that function would probably move elsewhere.
"There will be a serious change to the structure of the agency," one intelligence official said. That person and others from intelligence agencies and the Bush administration were granted anonymity for this article because they are not allowed to speak publicly about intelligence matters.
Even as it turns its focus to intelligence collection, through the spying operations overseas that are run by the C.I.A.'s new national clandestine service, the C.I.A. faces a challenge from the Defense Department, which is expanding its own spying operations abroad....
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/07/washington/07goss.html?hp&ex=1147060800&en=9753e8d7ab86d2c8&ei=5094&partner=homepage
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