Word: panetta
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After months of disagreement between Panetta and Blair, Vice President Joe Biden and National Security Adviser James Jones ruled that the CIA would continue to have a direct line to the White House on covert operations and that the long-standing policy of CIA station chiefs being the top intelligence officers in all missions abroad would continue. Blair had sought greater responsibility over the covert ops and the right to anoint a non-CIA staffer as intel boss at certain foreign missions...
...agency's operations. "For some, this was an existential threat. If Blair was allowed to control covert ops, then how long before the whole of the CIA was absorbed into the DNI?" says a former operations official who retired from the agency last year. "Everyone was looking to Panetta to prevent that from happening." (See who's who on the CIA payroll...
...director, a veteran of Washington battles, is getting credit for beating back Blair, a retired Admiral. "Panetta showed he knows how to stamp on toes in this town," says the retired operations official. "[These] victories have reassured some of the doubters in Langley...
Doubts about Panetta's political skills had arisen in the summer, when President Obama decided to release secret memos about the CIA's controversial interrogation practices at Guantánamo Bay and other secret prisons - and when U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder ordered an investigation into potential wrongdoing by interrogators...
...turf battles with Blair have resulted in Panetta's being seen in a more positive light, and focused some criticism on Blair instead. "Denny's a good guy, but he should really focus on being the President's principal intelligence adviser, not on the operational stuff," says an Administration official. "Leon, of all people, certainly doesn't need to be micromanaged - and neither do the CIA folks in the field...