Clinton Rejects Calls to Eliminate CIA

LANGLEY, Va. — President Clinton came out strongly in support of the embattled Central Intelligence Agency on Friday, rejecting calls by the CIA’s growing legion of critics for deep budget cuts if not outright elimination of the agency.

In a speech under a broiling noontime sun outside CIA headquarters here, Clinton told hundreds of CIA employees that cutting the intelligence budget simply because the Cold War is over would be akin to “canceling your health insurance when you’re feeling fine.”

Clinton’s visit was only his second to the agency since he became President and his first since John M. Deutch took over in May as director of an agency struggling to recover from the Aldrich H. Ames spy scandal and controversy over the CIA’s involvement in Guatemala.

The President seemed determined to use his speech to boost morale and counter the perception that he has little interest in intelligence matters. Clinton has been widely criticized for his failure to focus on the agency’s problems during the first two years of his term. His first CIA director, R. James Woolsey, resigned last December after it had become clear that he had lost credibility on Capitol Hill and seemed to have lost control of the agency itself, especially after the Ames debacle.

“A few have urged us to scrap the central intelligence service,” Clinton said. “I think these views are profoundly wrong. . . . Our nation is at peace, our economy is growing all right. All around the world, democracy and free markets are on the march. But none of these developments are inevitable or irreversible and every single study of human psychology or the human spirit, every single religious tract tells us that there will be troubles, wars and rumors of war until the end of time.”

Clinton also provided intriguing hints about recent intelligence successes, including those in the expanding arena of economic and industrial espionage, which is now a top priority for the U.S. intelligence community. He noted that the agency had, in recent months, “uncovered bribes that would have cheated American companies out of billions of dollars. . . . Your work has promoted American prosperity.”

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CIA officials said that Clinton was referring broadly to several recent agency operations which revealed that rival trading powers have been bribing officials in other countries to win large government contracts for their firms.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the CIA has been shifting resources away from traditional intelligence targets, such as Russia, to new priorities such as terrorism, narcotics and trade. The intelligence community is said to be providing new training for CIA case officers to develop economic intelligence, and Clinton Administration economic policy-makers are reported to be pleased with the CIA’s success at adapting to its new industrial and economic missions.

An internal debate about the proper role for the CIA in economic espionage has led officials to conclude that such counterintelligence activity is one area where the agency can and should play a role.

CIA officials believe that they should not conduct espionage directly against foreign firms on behalf of U.S. corporations and should limit their covert economic espionage to such areas as trade negotiations, protection of American firms against penetrations by foreign intelligence agents and uncovering bribes and corruption involving foreign businesses or officials that make it difficult for U.S. firms to compete in developing countries and elsewhere.

Upon his departure from the agency, Woolsey issued a statement explaining the CIA’s new role in economic intelligence: “We are not in the business of spying for private firms. But it does mean that we bring these corrupt foreign practices to the attention of the White House and the state and commerce departments, who then seek redress--often successfully.”

Clinton also spoke specifically about Ames, a CIA employee whose spying for the Soviet Union and later Russia led to the deaths of a number of American agents. The President sought to convince CIA employees that they should not allow the scandal to continue to dampen morale or create a climate of paranoia.

The President also warned that further budget cuts are inevitable for the intelligence community, and said the CIA will have to learn to be more selective in how it deploys its covert spies and its technology.