Word: caseys
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Many lawmakers have long been afraid that the CIA backing of the contras would drag the U.S. into a war against Nicaragua, and Casey's briefings did not always reassure them. One Senator told TIME last week that the CIA director once went so far as to present a plan for a possible eventual partition of Nicaragua be tween a Sandinista regime in the west and a contra-ruled state in the east. Though the congressional committees cannot veto any CIA activities outright, they can, in Moynihan's words, "push and pull" the agency away from dubious schemes...
Until the mining episode, most legislators felt, Casey had been keeping the committees adequately informed. Nor is the CIA director solely to blame for the gaps that have since appeared in the legislators' knowledge. Several Senators on the Intelligence Committee confess they were remiss in not insisting on a briefing on CIA activities in Nicaragua early this year, and for failing to question Casey on references he made to the mining when he did meet with them twice in March. (The House Intelligence Committee was briefed on Jan. 31.) Still, Moynihan and others contend that Casey, at minimum...
...Senate Intelligence Committee has called a meeting for Thursday at which, Moynihan pledges, Casey will be asked "tough questions" about whatever operations the CIA may be conducting or planning in Nicaragua. One idea being floated by some Senate Intelligence Committee staffers is to require the CIA to certify weekly that it is not supporting any contra activities that have not been disclosed to Congress...
...restrictions would break a string of successes in expanding and revitalizing the CIA that Casey's bitterest critics admit has been highly impressive. During the 1970s, revulsion over some of the agency's early operations prompted cuts of 40% in the agency's budget and 50% in its staff. At the end of the Carter Administration, policymakers were receiving intelligence estimates at the lethargic rate of one a month...
...Casey came to the agency with top credentials. He learned intelligence by directing operations in Nazi-occupied Europe for the wartime Office of Strategic Services. During the Nixon and Ford Administrations, he served in a variety of economic posts. In his first three years as CIA director, he wangled budget increases of 20% or more out of Congress each year. (The agency's figures are secret, but a reliable estimate of its expenditures is $1.5 billion for the current fiscal year.) That has made possible a substantial increase in the number of CIA employees, to a current total...