Billions Spent By CIA On Counter-Terrorism Efforts Deemed A Colossal Failure

Some of you people think I'm crazy when I talk about the pervasiveness of the CIA funneling money into the hands of political insiders under the guise of legitimate intelligence gathering efforts for national security purposes. An LA Times' story by Ken Dilanian reveals how the CIA has spent billions of dollars on "non-official covers" known as NOCS who typically pose as business executives in what one senior official with the agency describes as being a "colossal flop." The official talked about a closed-door conference for NOCS a few years ago at which few had anything to say about their success in gathering useful intelligence information. "A colleague passed a caustic note to the senior officer," Dilanian wrote. "Lots of business. Little espionage."

The CIA spent at least $3 billion on the program, and the number of specially trained spies grew from dozens to hundreds. The entire clandestine service is believed to total about 5,000 people.

But because of inexperience, bureaucratic hurdles, lack of language skills and other problems, only a few of the deep-cover officers recruited useful intelligence sources, several former officers said.

So the CIA passes out large bucks to political insiders for make-work jobs, who in turn max out political contributions to the politicians who support their agenda of promoting endless spending on the military/industrial complex at the expense of our civil liberties. According to Dilanian's story, the CIA increased its use of NOCS following 9/11 spurred by Congress "to put its eyes and ears in gritty corners of the globe where Al Qaeda and other adversaries operate or recruit." The clandestine service employs at least 5,000 operatives according to Dilanian. Unlike real spies who work for the agency, NOCS have no diplomatic immunity if they are caught spying in another country and face the risk of imprisonment or worse. Except these people don't get caught spying because that's not why they're paid by the agency. Dilanian describes the training NOCs receive:

A growing number of recruits at the CIA training facility at Camp Peary, Va., known as the Farm — including the class of 2008, the largest in CIA history — was made up of NOCs, former officials said.

Unlike their classmates, they were barred from making cellphone calls or using the Internet in order to hide any ties to the CIA. Later, many would operate in their own names, holding real jobs for multinational companies around the globe.

One of the best examples of a possible NOC operating in Indiana is South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg. A few months ago, the South Bend Tribune reported on Mayor Buttigieg receiving orders that he was being called up for active duty next year as a Naval Intelligence Reserve Officer to be stationed in Afghanistan. The Tribune reported, "This will be the mayor's second visit to the war-torn country." "He previously traveled there as a civilian economic adviser with the global management consulting firm McKinsey & Company," the story continued. The reporter exhibited no curiosity about the mayor's links to the intelligence community despite that giant elephant in the room.

As I pointed out at the time, several principals of McKinsey & Co. are former CIA operatives. A New Yorker magazine article compared working for McKinsey as a present-day equivalent of working for the CIA in the 1950s. Buttigieg had also worked for the Cohen Group, an international consulting firm in Washington and the GE-owned NBC in Chicago, prior to entering Indiana politics. Indiana Democrats chose Buttigieg as its candidate for State Treasurer in 2010 despite the fact that the little-known 28 year-old had never run for any political office before. Believe me when I tell you that this agency is doing much more than gathering intelligence information abroad. It's going to great lengths to influence political elections at the national, state and local level in this country any way it can. How can we compete against all of the money being funneled by our own government into the candidates of its choosing through means that are difficult to track by classifying the expenditures as national security related? That should frighten any freedom-loving American. We've rapidly morphed into Nazi Germany all because of 9/11. Wake up, America!

UPDATE: While we're on the subject of intelligence gathering and national security, take note of the reporting of one of the few remaining investigative reporters in this country who isn't shilling for the government. Seymour Hersh reports that President Obama flat out lied to the American people about claims that U.S. intelligence proved that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad used Sarin gas on his own people. Hersh says the Obama administration cherry-picked intelligence information to make the case the administration wanted for going to war with Syria. Hersh also reveals that the administration buried intelligence that pointed towards the U.S.-backed rebels being behind the chemical attacks. Hersh was the only mainstream reporter to call out the Obama administration for reporting a complete fairy tale about the capture and killing of Osama bin Laden, who informed citizens know died many years ago shortly after the 9/11 attacks. Of course, Hersh's latest report is in a foreign publication. American mainstream publications no longer challenge the propaganda fed to them by officials inside the government.