Historical note: this article was put together about the time that Congress decimated the CIA's HUMINT programs -- spies on the ground learning stuff. (In fact the article concludes that the entire agency is not necessary)
Most -- not all, but most -- agency-watchers view the congressional hack-job in the 1970s to be the reason for many problems later on. The CIA had done a lot of bad things. A lot of politicians got a lot of mileage on TV defending the little guy from the evil CIA, and it was very difficult to have a reasonable conversation about what they should be doing. It was all "Witch! Witch! Hang the witch!"
I'm not an expert and can't give an informed opinion. I can note from an organizational standpoint that either killing it or continuing to let it run HUMINT programs is rational, stripping it of all its power and then blaming it later for failures due to what you did to it? That's whacked. Yet if I remember correctly, some of the same politicians that lobbied to take spies out of the CIA (or kill it completely) lambasted it later for not having enough spies.
You can argue that they had a much more "nuanced" position than I am presenting, or you can argue that the CIA was an easy punching bag -- a big old political Piñata that you kick and votes fall out. Don't know.
Most -- not all, but most -- agency-watchers view the congressional hack-job in the 1970s to be the reason for many problems later on. The CIA had done a lot of bad things. A lot of politicians got a lot of mileage on TV defending the little guy from the evil CIA, and it was very difficult to have a reasonable conversation about what they should be doing. It was all "Witch! Witch! Hang the witch!"
I'm not an expert and can't give an informed opinion. I can note from an organizational standpoint that either killing it or continuing to let it run HUMINT programs is rational, stripping it of all its power and then blaming it later for failures due to what you did to it? That's whacked. Yet if I remember correctly, some of the same politicians that lobbied to take spies out of the CIA (or kill it completely) lambasted it later for not having enough spies.
You can argue that they had a much more "nuanced" position than I am presenting, or you can argue that the CIA was an easy punching bag -- a big old political Piñata that you kick and votes fall out. Don't know.