Members of Congress are sharply divided over how fast to proceed in drafting legislation to restructure the nation's intelligence services -- torn between political demands for speed and caution arising from the complexity of their task.
They also appear split over some of the major recommendations that the national commission charged with investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, made in its 567-page report last month, triggering the extraordinary mid-summer legislative effort. Those proposals -- especially ones that seek a far-reaching realignment of intelligence responsibilities -- could prompt a serious turf war among powerful Washington departments and agencies as well as congressional committees charged with overseeing them.
Over the last 30 years there have been eight unsuccessful efforts to reorganize intelligence operations -- including two recent ones from a presidential commission chaired by retired Lt. Gen. Brent Scowcroft, who is also chairman of President Bush's own Foreign Intelligence Board, and the joint House-Senate panel that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks.
Skeptics caution against unintended consequences that could impede rather than strengthen intelligence efforts. But the commission has been fierce in its lobbying for approval of all its recommendations, and its stature, reinforced by broad acclaim for its work and the support of Sept. 11 victims' families, has generated election-year pressure on Capitol Hill.
House and Senate leaders remain committed to producing legislation by the end of September, although they have been less clear about whether they will push for final passage before the Nov. 2 elections or later, perhaps in a post-election "lame duck" session.
Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), chairman of the Governmental Affairs Committee, which is charged with drafting the Senate version of the bill, has warned against both delay and excessive haste but said in an interview last week that she believes legislation can be passed before the elections. Armed Services Committee Chairman John W. Warner (R-Va.) said in a separate interview that he believes a bill could be drafted in time for final action before Congress adjourns in October. Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry and Democrats in both chambers are also pushing for speedy action.
But influential lawmakers from both parties, backed by current and former government officials, are warning against haste inspired by presidential election politics and by lawmakers' fears of being blamed for inaction, especially if terrorists strike before the elections.
"We must not allow false urgency dictated by the political calendar to overtake the need for serious reform" and "rush haphazardly through what may be the most complicated and significant government reorganization since World War II," Senate intelligence committee member Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) said in an op-ed column in The Washington Post last Tuesday.
Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) sounded a similar warning the next day to the Governmental Affairs Committee, saying, "We have to make sure we are driven more by 9/11 than by 11/2."
In the House, the dispute was framed in dramatic fashion last week when Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.), chairman of the House intelligence committee, urged caution, while Rep. Jane Harman (Calif.), the panel's ranking Democrat, accused the committee of moving too slowly.
House and Senate committees began holding hearings just days after the Sept. 11 commission issued its report, which called for prompt action on restructuring both intelligence operations within the executive branch and what it called "dysfunctional" oversight by Congress.
The report called for creation of a new post of national intelligence director within the president's office, with budgetary and hiring-and-firing authority over 15 agencies responsible for U.S. intelligence operations, including the CIA as well as several agencies in the Defense Department. The report also urged establishment of a national counterterrorism center, also in the president's office, to oversee anti-terrorist intelligence.
For Congress, it proposed a major strengthening of intelligence committees, with new powers to determine policy and funding, along with consolidation of homeland security responsibilities in permanent committees. These proposals would replace the hodgepodge of committees and subcommittees now responsible for these areas, which often results in delay and deadlock. But they could also trespass on the carefully guarded turf of powerful committees, such as Armed Services and Appropriations.
Bush endorsed these proposals, with significant reservations. He opposes putting the new director in the president's office and said the director should play a coordinating -- but not controlling -- role in apportioning funding for intelligence agencies.
