Handbook of intelligence studies / edited by

JOHN PRADOS
Directives from Bush administration secretary of defense Donald H. Rumsfeld have sought to
widen that role even further. For example, the fiscal 2005 Intelligence Appropriation Act
contained authorization for special forces to spend money to hire local groups for covert
operations in the same fashion as the CIA, taking away another of Langley’s few areas of
exclusivity. These roles and missions remain in contention between Rumsfeld and John
Negroponte, the Director of National Intelligence, who exercises theoretical control over all
US intelligence operations, but at this writing Rumsfeld seems to have the upper hand.
In contrast to the CIA the military special forces do offer a full spectrum of capability. They
are also available in unprecedented numbers: at 26,000 today, Army Special Forces are more
than twice as numerous as at their Vietnam war peak, and form only one element of an allservice
force that currently totals 44,000 men and women. 9 The Defense Department’s most
recent posture review nevertheless mandates a further increase of 15 percent in these forces
along with new technology and additional spending. The Rumsfeld operational scheme would
allow these forces to work covertly in espionage missions as well as to undertake a wider array
of counterterror activities.
Though the special forces have substantial capability they have never carried out a full-scale
secret war. Laos and Afghanistan (both wars there) were CIA enterprises in which detached
military officers served (the first case), or Special Forces detachments worked in tandem with
the agency (in the second Afghan war) with shared operational control. In Bosnia and the
occupation of Iraq the special forces have worked as elite strike teams, and in Afghanistan’s
occupation in that role as well as in Vietnam-style pacification missions. 10 There are training
missions underway as well in Colombia, Africa, and the Philippines. The court is out on how
USSOC might perform in a full scale paramilitary operation.
Beyond the strike team role, special operations forces and CIA covert operators have
exhibited a marked predilection for stand-off operations. These have featured use of the
Predator unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) armed with precision guided missiles. First introduced
as a surveillance system over Bosnia in the 1990s, a version of this UAV armed with the
Hellfire missile was developed by the CIA and the Air Force in 2000–01. 11 The first armed
Predator mission took place on October 7, 2001. It has since been used in its combat role, as far
as is known at this writing, in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Yemen. At present the Air Force is
creating a dedicated UAV special operations squadron. Stand-off operations obviously reduce
the vulnerability of US personnel but they have important rigidities, not being in actual
physical proximity to targets, not being recallable, not being deniable (and thus not truly covert)
since only the United States possesses this capability, and eroding the distinction between
covert and conventional military operations. In at least one case so far a Predator strike has
triggered large anti-US demonstrations in the target country.
In summary, the international environment is presently increasingly hostile to continued
covert operations. For different reasons the CIA and military special operations forces have
covert capabilities that are limited and in some respects mismatched to operational needs, while
stand-off strike systems, presently being touted as a panacea, have their own rigidities. These are
cautionary elements when considering the future of covert operations.
Classic conundrums of covert action
The covert operations most often cited as successes are the political action in Italy (1948), the
CIA coups in Iran (1953) and Guatemala (1954), and the paramilitary action in Afghanistan
(1979–1989). In terms of number, these amount to only a tiny fraction of the inventory of
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