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OPINION:
The stakes for our nation could not be higher as former Rep. John Ratcliffe of Texas becomes the 25th director of the CIA.
The country faces myriad complex threats, including wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, weapons proliferation, transnational terrorism, and an axis of hostile dictatorships in Russia, China, North Korea and Iran. One could make the case that obtaining good intelligence on the threats confronting us is more challenging and important than ever before.
Expressing appreciation for the courageous and dedicated CIA officers who do the critical work that helps our leaders make informed decisions, Mr. Ratcliffe emphasized after his swearing-in that “it is a privilege of a lifetime to lead the men and women of the CIA, an agency so vital to America’s national security and one with a culture of unwavering commitment to mission.”
Mr. Ratcliffe rightly focused on the CIA officers, whose work is crucial to mission success.
Former CIA Director David Petraeus, with whom I had the honor of serving at CIA headquarters and in Iraq, emphasized that a leader “must provide a vision — clear and achievable ‘big ideas,’ combined in a strategic concept — and communicate those ideas through the entire organization.”
With that guidance in mind, Mr. Ratcliffe would be well advised to consider three leadership precepts.
First, the CIA’s fundamental duty must be to protect the agency’s clandestine sources. Former Director John Brennan, who was never comfortable dealing with the messy business of human intelligence gathering, once told NPR, “We don’t steal secrets. We uncover, we discover, we reveal, we obtain, we solicit — all of that.”
But the CIA does steal secrets. That’s why the sources who are spying on our behalf, if they are caught, face the most dire consequences, including, in some cases, execution.
Mr. Ratcliffe must ensure that the CIA is equipped with the right personnel, bureaucratic structure and budget to recruit and handle these prized sources safely and securely. He is reportedly taking the positive step of reviewing whether Mr. Brennan’s reorganization of the CIA should be reversed because of its negative impact on the agency’s primary mission.
Second, having served as director of national intelligence in Mr. Trump’s first term, Mr. Ratcliffe has firsthand experience with the CIA’s deep commitment to intellectual honesty. That’s why the biblical quotation from John 8:32 is etched in stone at the CIA’s Langley headquarters: “And Ye Shall Know the Truth and the Truth Shall Make You Free.”
I served multiple overseas tours in war zones and environments with high counterintelligence threats, where rank melted away to an informal exchange of information. Everyone’s input mattered, and that input often meant the difference between life and death when planning a high-threat meeting with a terrorist source.
CIA officers are conditioned to tell the director what he needs to know — especially when it is not what he wants to hear. The best CIA directors actively sought out different viewpoints while being willing to challenge their assumptions. And they never hesitated to bring the CIA’s analytical judgments to the White House, even when they knew they could expect a negative reaction from the president and his senior national security advisers.
Delivering the truth, no matter how unsavory, is the greatest sign of respect for the office of the president.
Third, leadership is about taking care of those in your charge. That means ensuring CIA officers have everything they need to stay as safe as possible, especially when operating in harm’s way.
A bellwether challenge for Mr. Ratcliffe will be getting to the bottom of the Havana syndrome mystery, which was detected as early as 2016 when U.S. officials serving at the embassy in Cuba fell ill with vertigo, headaches, fatigue and hearing loss. With the Soviet-era KGB and now Russia’s intelligence services having extensive experience using microwave technology against foreign officials, the Kremlin might be the most likely culprit. Still, the CIA needs to produce conclusive evidence about what happened.
Mr. Ratcliffe is right to single out China as the United States’ top global adversary and to underscore the importance of increasing the scope and intensity of CIA operations against the ruling Chinese Communist Party. But the Biden administration never formally assigned blame for the Havana syndrome cases reported by U.S. diplomatic and security officials, which occurred in Russia, South Asia, China, Europe and even Washington. That’s a glaring intelligence failure that must be rectified.
During a 2011 visit to Afghanistan, a U.S. soldier asked Secretary of Defense Robert Gates what “kept him up at night.” The soldier probably expected Mr. Gates to talk about terrorism or Iran’s nuclear program, but Mr. Gates responded that his concern for the troops was always at the forefront of his mind.
That is a role model for leadership that is worth emulating.
• Daniel N. Hoffman is a retired clandestine services officer and former chief of station with the Central Intelligence Agency. His combined 30 years of government service included high-level overseas and domestic positions at the CIA. He has been a Fox News contributor since May 2018. He can be reached at danielhoffman@yahoo.com.
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