Clapper has confronted many of the thorny problems that surged during the Bush administration's handling of the "war on terror."
Clapper called for more transparency from the beginning of his tenure, saying one of his projects would be to lift some veils of secrecy in the murky world of intelligence. "Particularly now," he said in 2007, "it is incumbent on the intelligence community to make available as much information as we possibly can so that the public knows what we're up against."
The retired lieutenant general also embraced stricter oversight on treatment of terrorist detainees. A directive was issued in fall 2008 to require Pentagon monitoring of all interrogations, including those conducted by non-military agencies. Previously, under Bush Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, the CIA and foreign officials could question Pentagon prisoners without official observation.
Iraq and Afghanistan
Despite attempts to soften the Defense Department's image, Clapper was nonetheless a strong supporter of Bush's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, applauding the tactics used to fight al-Qaeda in 2007 testimony to the House Armed Services Committee and Senate Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. "Because of the President's commitment to our homeland security, we have more and better intelligence, military and law enforcement resources, and the capability to confront an enemy who is weaker now than it would have been absent our aggressive effort to confront and defeat them," he said.
Yet old-fashioned diplomacy and sensitivity are also in Clapper's repertoire, as he highlighted issues like the importance of respecting an ally like Pakistan's sovereignty or the need for more diversity in the intelligence field, calling for recruits with linguistic skills and deeper cultural understanding.
He also paired with Defense Secretary Gates in 2008 to help diminish the stigma attached to those who seek mental-health care to deal with post-traumatic stress, signing a memo that announced changes in the questionnaire used for government security clearances. "Seeking professional care for those mental health issues should not be perceived to jeopardize an individual's security clearance," the memo said.
Killing bin Laden
Under Clapper's watch as DNI, the world's most-wanted terrorist, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. special forces after years of painstaking intelligence work. That work involved months of covert surveillance of the suspicious compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan where bin Laden turned out to be living with some members of his family, although the terrorist leader was never positively identified before the U.S. raid occurred.
On May 1, 2011, President Obama ordered the risky operation on the compound that U.S. intelligence officials had been monitoring for months. Inside the compound, they found and killed bin-Laden, the mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and the target of a massive and frustrating 10-year manhunt.
bin Laden's body was removed from the compound, idenfitied positively through DNA evidence, and buried after administering Islamic rites and rituals, at sea.
"I think we can all agree this is a good day for America. Our country has kept its commitment to see that justice is done. The world is safer. It is a better place because of the death of Osama bin Laden," Obama said.
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