The arch neo-conservative wants the CIA to become “bolder and more innovative in covert action”
The U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence was established in the late 1970s as a watchdog designed to ensure greater transparency for CIA operations in the wake of the 1975-76 Church Committee hearings.
The Church Committee had alerted the public to CIA involvement in nefarious mind-control experiments, political assassinations, coups and all kinds of skullduggery throughout the 1950s and 1960s when the Agency was subjected to minimal congressional oversight.
Unfortunately, the promise of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence was scuttled during the 1980s when Joe Biden, Barry Goldwater and other senators friendly to the CIA used it to effectively shield the Agency from real congressional scrutiny by only selectively investigating its activities and covering up the most nefarious ones. They also pushed for new legislation designed to criminalize leaks and punish CIA whistleblowers.[1]
Since that time, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has done the opposite of what it was originally intended to do by further advancing CIA disinformation and trying to play up foreign threats in an attempt to secure yet higher funding for the CIA and related U.S. intelligence agencies.
The complete breakdown of any system of checks and balances and separation of powers is now epitomized by the appointment of Tom Cotton, a Republican senator from Arkansas, as chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
Cotton is an arch conservative who first gained public attention while serving in the U.S. Army in Iraq when he publicly advocated for the prosecution of three journalists under the Espionage Act after they had published an article detailing a classified government program monitoring terrorist financing.
In 2021, Salon reported that Cotton falsely claimed in campaign ads that he had earned a Bronze Star as a U.S. Army Ranger even though he did not serve in the Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment.
On January 15, Cotton provided opening remarks at the confirmation hearing of incoming CIA Director John Ratcliffe that exemplified his cowboy mentality.
Cotton stated that the nation needed a “strong, capable and aggressive CIA” and that the CIA needed to become “bolder and more innovative in covert action.”
Cotton went on to express dismay about the “loss of mission” resulting from an emphasis on “matters like the prospects for gay-rights legislation in Africa or climate change” and claimed that CIA analysts had “too often aligned with the Biden administration’s policy preferences.”
They did so by falsely claiming that the Afghan army was “strong and cohesive,” that Ukraine’s Army would “collapse within days of Russia’s invasion,” that Israel couldn’t “possibly destroy Hamas or Hezbollah,” and that “Iran’s air defenses are mighty and fearsome.”
The CIA has actually been politicized in the opposite way that Cotton claimed—it routinely advances faulty intelligence assessments in support of more, not less, aggressive military action.
As an example, the CIA’s analysis overestimated Ukrainian strength vis-à-vis Russia, predicting success in the summer 2023 counteroffensive that proved to be a disaster for Ukraine.[2]
The CIA also collaborated intimately with Israel in its ill-fated efforts to destroy Hamas and Hezbollah, which will never succeed because both organizations draw on the disaffection of the local population.
Cotton’s remarks about Iran ridiculously imply that Biden’s CIA dampened public support for war by failing to present Iran accurately as a paper tiger whose air defense could be easily destroyed and regime overthrown by the U.S. Again, the opposite holds true, as the CIA has for years been advancing disinformation about Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program that has helped fuel public support for regime-change operations and potential war.[3]
Cotton’s comments at the hearing generally reveal his hawkish views and desire to unshackle the CIA and revive its so-called glory days—when the CIA carried out repeated illegal acts chronicled in Philip Agee’s 1975 book, Inside the Company: A CIA Diary.
Ominously, Cotton fawned over former Attorney General John Ashcroft, a notorious proponent of the USA PATRIOT Act and torture, who was brought to the confirmation hearing to introduce Ratcliffe, a partner in Ashcroft’s law firm.
Predictably, Ratcliffe was himself treated deferentially by Cotton and his colleagues who failed to push back against the Sinophobic narrative that he advanced and his myopic world view in which an innocent America is threatened by supposedly rogue actors like the Chinese Communist Party, North Korea, Russia and Iran.[4]
Whether Democrat or Republican, all of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence members appear to hold a similar worldview to Ratcliffe. They in turn support massive military and intelligence agency budgets and aggressive confrontational policies directed at Russia and China that threaten the outbreak of World War III as well as an imperialistic foreign policy in the Middle East.
The only thing that remotely resembled a critical question at the hearing was Jon Ossoff (D-GA) questioning why Ratcliffe, as Director of National Intelligence (DNI), publicized certain information exonerating Trump of collusion with Russia in the 2016 election on the day of a presidential debate—thus favoring Trump and seemingly undercutting Ratcliffe’s commitment to ending the politicization of U.S. intelligence.
But Ossoff also, preposterously, raised concern about mythic Russian bomb threats and foreign election interference in the state of Georgia, which he hoped the CIA would better address.
Willfully blind to the horrific historical record, Cotton said in his remarks that the CIA had to “get back to its roots,” while noting that people “joined the CIA, after all, not a church choir or a therapy session on a college campus.” The latter comments were reminiscent of Henry Kissinger, who once said that “covert action was not to be confused with missionary work.”
Frank Church Is Probably Rolling in His Grave
Frank Church would surely be horrified that someone like Cotton has been appointed to chair the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that was set up as the CIA’s watchdog.
Other members of the committee also represent a betrayal of its stated purpose in “providing vigilant oversight” of the CIA’s activities.
Todd Young (R-IN), for example, is a member of the Board of Directors of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a CIA offshoot founded in the 1980s that specializes in mobilizing support for U.S. regime-change operations and advancing political propaganda.
Philip Agee wrote in the 1990s that “nowadays, instead of having the CIA going around behind the scenes and trying to manipulate the process by inserting money here and giving instructions secretly and so forth, they have now a sidekick, which is the National Endowment for Democracy, NED.”
Young’s status on the NED Board represents a blatant conflict of interest that should result in his immediate removal from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. The same is true of James Risch (R-ID), who has spoken at NED events in support of the NED.
Risch’s hardline neo-conservative views were evident at a joint NED-Senate Foreign Relations Committee event last year during which he claimed that, “when the U.S. retreats the rest of the world suffers,” referencing both Afghanistan—now under Taliban rule—and Taiwan, which Risch fears may soon be taken over by China.
Risch said further that Putin’s war on Ukraine was the “most blatant attack we’ve seen on democracy since the Cold War,” which is a lie since Ukraine’s president canceled elections and banned 12 opposition parties.
Risch’s outlook is, sadly, par for the course on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
On the Democratic side, there is Michael Bennet, who has a picture on his website of him shaking hands with Ukrainian dictator Volodymyr Zelensky.
The photo makes it unlikely that Bennet would order an investigation of the CIA’s role in the Ukraine conflict, where it has been involved in running death-squad operations from 12 bases that it set up after the U.S.-backed 2014 Maidan coup.
Another Democrat on the committee is Mark Kelly (D-AZ), a former Navy captain and astronaut who gave a speech at the 2024 Democratic National Convention (DNC) in which he mocked Donald Trump for his supposedly conciliatory attitude toward Russia and praised Kamala Harris for supporting NATO and Ukraine and for investigating alleged Russian election interference, which was actually been disproven years ago.
For years, Marco Rubio was a key figure on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence who used the committee as a platform to drum up exaggerated public fears about Russia, China and Iran that lent support to expanded military and intelligence agency budgets.
In the late 2010s, the committee under Rubio and Mark Warner’s leadership carried out a politicized investigation into Russia’s alleged attempts to influence U.S. elections, which contributed to the advancement of a Cold War environment in the U.S.
Reflecting its politicized nature, the investigation concluded erroneously that WikiLeaks “actively sought, and played, a key role in the Russian influence campaign and very likely knew it was assisting a Russian intelligence influence effort.”
This assessment is patently false and reflects the Senate Select Committee’s evolution into a body for advancing CIA disinformation rather than functioning as an oversight body—a trend that is surely to continue under Tom Cotton’s leadership.
Another Arkansan to Head House Intelligence Committee
Some pundits have expressed optimism over the appointmen of Cotton’s Arkansas colleague, Rick Crawford, as the new chairman of the House Intelligence Committee to replace Mike Turner (R-OH).
Crawford is a MAGA, America First Republican who voted last year against legislation providing billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine. His appointment is said to reflect a change in approach by the incoming Trump administration towards Ukraine.
The latter is most welcome if true, however, Crawford’s statement on his website does not inspire much confidence as he asserts: “now, more then ever, leaks and indiscretions by misguided intelligence staff can endanger Americans and hinder our ability to predict and prevent attacks.”
Just who these misguided intelligence staff are is unclear, though the comments display Crawford’s alignment with the CIA in supporting harsh legislation targeting leakers and whistleblowers and that he favors sustaining the pattern of secrecy by which the CIA can carry out illegal covert operations with impunity.
In his statement Crawford suggests a need to “re-focus our nation’s intelligence and counterintelligence community against our adversaries,” stating that “right now, terrorists, rogue regimes, and foreign state-actors are rapidly developing new ways to exploit and harm America’s national interests, and it’s our responsibility to ensure intelligence agencies remain three steps ahead of our enemies.”
These comments display the same kind of fairy-tale worldview as Cotton and others sitting on the intelligence committees in which rogue actors threaten an innocent America—a country that has more overseas military bases then the Roman and British empires at their peak.
The terrorists and rogue regimes Crawford has in mind are China, Iran, North Korea, and leftist regimes in Latin America hated by the MAGA right such as Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, which have immesurably improved living standards for their people through socialist economic policies and by asserting national control over their natural resources.
Like its Senate counterpart, the committee that Crawford now presides over has been deeply compromised in a betrayal of the purpose that it was set up for following the 1975/76 Church Committee hearings.
One outgoing member of the committee, Abigail Spanberger (D-VI), is an actual CIA agent who worked for the Agency in the Middle East.
Predictably, she went ballistic with the appointment of Tulsi Gabbard as the new Director of National Intelligence (DNI) because of Gabbard’s dovish views, claiming that Gabbard “traffics in conspiracy theories.”[5]
The latter is a term that was made pejorative by the CIA beginning in the 1960s in an attempt to smear critics of criminal operations it has been involved in like the JFK assassination.
Another member, Jason Crow, is a former Army Ranger and Ukraine, Taiwan and Israel hawk who supported legislation with Mike Waltz (R-FL)—who also sat on the House Intelligence committee before his appointment as Truump’s National Security adviser—to strengthen U.S.-Israeli intelligence sharing.
Crow has also worked tirelessly to secure more funding for the U.S. Space Command—developer of an elaborate space-based surveillance network—whose main base is located in his district in Colorado.[6]
Two additional recent members of the House Intelligence committee, Joaquin Castro (D-TX) and Elise Stefanik (R-NY)[7], the new U.S. ambassador to the UN, are members of the NED’s Board of Directors with Todd Young.
Frank Church indeed is rolling in his grave with the promise of the Church committee having long ago been betrayed.
At the sixth annual meeting of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers in 1981, Frank Carlucci, former CIA Deputy Director and Ronald Reagan’s Defense Secretary, bragged that “we’ve managed to pursue a very aggressive strategy on the Hill,” which Carlucci said had “paid dividends.” ↑
Biden’s Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines claimed that the planned Ukrainian counteroffensive in the summer of 2023 was “poised for success” as the Russians were “running out of ammunition,” though this proved to be false. ↑
See Gareth Porter’s book, Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare (Washington, D.C.: Just World Books, 2014). ↑
Ratcliffe is, like Cotton, a political reactionary from a conservative state—Texas. His views are articulated in a previous article I wrote for CovertAction Magazine on Trump’s national security nominations. ↑
Spanberger also claimed that Gabbard “cozies up to dictators like Bashar-al Assad and Vladimir Putin.” This is false; Gabbard in fact push for diplomacy with these leaders, which is not the same as “cozying up to them.” ↑
Waltz’ hawkish views are detailed in Jeremy Kuzmarov, “Marco Rubio An Abhorrent Choice For Secretary of State,” CovertAction Magazine, November 19, 2024. ↑
For more on Stefanik’s hawkish views, see Kuzmarov, “Marco Rubio An Abhorrent Choice For Secretary of State.” A lot of the members of the committee have military backgrounds. ↑
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About the Author
Jeremy Kuzmarov holds a Ph.D. in American history from Brandeis University and has taught at numerous colleges across the United States. He is regularly sought out as an expert on U.S. history and politics for radio and TV programs and co-hosts a radio show on New York Public Radio and on Progressive Radio News Network called “Left on Left.” He is Managing Editor of CovertAction Magazine and is the author of five books on U.S. foreign policy, including Obama’s Unending Wars (Clarity Press, 2019), The Russians Are Coming, Again, with John Marciano (Monthly Review Press, 2018), and Warmonger. How Clinton’s Malign Foreign Policy Launched the U.S. Trajectory From Bush II to Biden (Clarity Press, 2023). Besides these books, Kuzmarov has published hundreds of articles and contributed to numerous edited volumes, including one in the prestigious Oxford History of Counterinsurgency . He can be reached at jkuzmarov2@gmail.com and found on substack here.
