Why are retired military people taking over the US intelligence

[texpatriot2004]

agencies? On the way home tonight I was listening to NPR on the radio. There was a report about how many retired military people are being put into top intelligence positions in the US as of late? What is that about? Are they trying to manifest "group think"?

I don't remember the names and positions of all of the ones that they mentioned but there were many...too many for it to be a coincidence.

Anyone else here it?

[texpatriot2004]

1. There were, um, I don't know like more than 5, less than 10 nm

[rodeodance]

2. some show talked about it about a month ago also.

[Solo_in_MD]

3. Its been that way for decades

[H2O Man]

5. I think so.

Most of the US intelligence operations are military to begin with.

[jazzjunkysue]

4. Because George has run out of cronies who are still trying to build a career

and going down with this ship isn't really good for one's career....

[Gman]

6. You will drive yourself nuts trying to make sense out of anything they do

In general, just assume the most evil and sinister of motives and you're probably right.

[PoiBoy]

7. The U.S. intelligence agencies are being privatized...

this segment from Democracy Now! sure opened my eyes...

you can read the transcript or listen to the interview here:
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/12/151224

<snip>
AMY GOODMAN: So, talk about Mike McConnell and Booz Allen.

TIM SHORROCK: Well, it was interesting that Juan mentioned that he is into -- talks about integration of intelligence services, because that’s exactly what Booz Allen does. Booz Allen is one of about, you know, ten large corporations that play a very major role in American intelligence. Every time you hear about intelligence watching North Korea or tapping al-Qaeda phones, something like that, you can bet that corporations like these are very heavily involved. And Booz Allen is one of the largest of these contractors. I estimate that about 50% of our $45 billion intelligence budget goes to private sector contractors like Booz Allen. And Booz Allen Hamilton plays a very integral role in intelligence. It has a very close relationship, as you mentioned, with the National Security Agency. They advise them on their systems integration and things like this. They help bring intelligence together with other intelligence agencies. And I think this particular appointment is sort of an acknowledgment of how much -- of the role that contractors play, but it's also very dangerous to have somebody from the private sector who’s basically been a Yes man to the intelligence agencies all this -- you know, for the last ten years. If you’re a contractor, you do what the government says. So, I mean, where is our oversight? We basically don’t have any oversight of intelligence. And I think this is a very bad direction to be going in.
<end>


<snip>
AMY GOODMAN: Tim Shorrock, you write about the fact that Booz Allen is likely involved with the warrantless wiretapping of American citizens.

TIM SHORROCK: Right. Well, basically any large corporation that’s contracting with the National Security Agency has been involved in this. We talked earlier about Trailblazer. They were one of the subcontractors on this. SAIC ran the whole thing. But Booz Allen was a chief advisor to another program, which was the NSA’s internal communications. This was a program called Groundbreaker. And all of these programs are analyzing, you know, the phone calls that they intercept, the government communications from abroad they intercept. And when they’re intercepting phone calls between US citizens and people abroad, the corporations are involved. They have people there working not only as just technical advisors, but also doing analysis. And so, if the NSA is listening in on our phone calls, you can bet that Booz Allen is participating in that.
<end>


<snip>
JUAN GONZALEZ: And what are the expectations, in terms of what McConnell will do in the position differently?

TIM SHORROCK: I don't think he’ll be very much different. You know, what I’ve heard from people -- and most of my sources are people inside the industry, inside the corporations -- and they basically tell me he's a Yes man. He’s somebody who’s -- they got him in because basically they want him to push their own programs.

But I think it's very important for your listeners to know and to understand that when talking about the intelligence office, 85% of the intelligence budget is controlled by the Pentagon. So we’re talking about a military program here. Everything -- the NSA is under the Pentagon. The National Geospacial-Intelligence Agency, which does mapping and imagery, they’re under the Pentagon. The National Reconnaissance Office, which launches satellites, they’re under the Pentagon. And when the budget -- when the Intelligence Reform Act passed, you might remember, there was a big fight. You know, the 9/11 Commission wanted to have these national agencies put under the DNI and taken out of the Pentagon, but there was a fight led by people in Congress, who basically represented the contractors, who didn't want to be taken out of the Pentagon.
<end>


so then... the 110th Congress looked.. listened... and then approved McConnell for the appointment...!!!


Mike McConnell was sworn in as the nation's second Director of National Intelligence on February 13, 2007

http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:k1j8X2d1AjAJ:atlanticmedia.files.cms-plus.com/DNI_McConnell.pdf+Vice+Admiral+Mike+McConnell&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=22&gl=us


the Democracy Now! article mentions James Woolsey, George Tenent and Joan Dempsey all joining the contractors... these people and other former military join the contractors and then get themselves appointed into Directorships in this Administration to remove oversight and privatize our country's most valuable assets.


:wtf:

[texpatriot2004]

8. Thanks for the link. I hadn't seen that. They would like to

"privatize" everything.