(2 of 2)
Turner has also brought on needless complications by offering two different explanations for the trimming. He first argued that it was merely an effort to reduce the enlarged ranks caused by the war in Southeast Asia. But officers retort Schlesinger's reductions had done that. Next Turner contended that the U.S.'s technological capability for gathering intelligence had improved so much that far fewer field agents were needed.
The CIA has become proficient with observation satellites, interception of foreign radar and microwave communications, and other secret esoterica, but the notion that technology can extensively replace manpower in intelligence work is hotly disputed. Contends James Angleton, former chief of counterintelligence at the agency: "Technical intelligence devoid of human intelligence is dangerous. Lacking vital on-site inspection, you must have the capability to penetrate the enemy's deception plans." Agents also argue that U.S. satellites can now be knocked out by Soviet "hunter-killer" satellites and thus could be rendered useless in a crisis. One former high-level insider warns: "We would be blinded. We would have no adequate staff on the ground to do intelligence or counterintelligence."
Despite all the complaints, the cutbacks will continue, and the CIA's covert branch will grow leaner, if not tougher. Perhaps the ultimate worry is one raised by a U.S. counterintelligence expert: "If the situation were reversed, and I learned that the Soviet KGB was firing more than 800 people, I would expect our Moscow station chief to recruit somebody—or be fired himself."
Carrying complaints to the point of disloyalty may be hard to imagine, but the CIA got a firm reminder that not all its ex-agents play by the old-boy-network rules. Last week Random House published Decent Interval, a 592-page book by Frank Snepp, 36, an eight-year CIA veteran who had been a senior analyst in Viet Nam and was one of the last Americans to leave Saigon as it was falling to the Communists in 1975. Snepp charges that the CIA and the State Department inexcusably botched the evacuation. He claims that the U.S. not only abandoned about 60,000 Vietnamese who had served American agencies, including, in some cases, the CIA, but also failed to destroy secret intelligence documents identifying many CIA informers who were left behind.
Snepp quit the agency in 1976. The CIA charges that he has both violated his secrecy agreement and gone back on a promise to Turner that he would submit his manuscript for clearance. Snepp apparently has broken no law—only his word.