Rage at Don: The war on Rumsfeld is really a bureaucratic turf battle

I think Director [of National Intelligence John] Negroponte has battles to fight within the bureaucracy, and particularly with the Department of Defense. DOD is refusing to recognize that the director of national intelligence is in charge of the intelligence community. -- Sen. Susan Collins

On Sept. 10, 2001, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld held a town hall meeting at the Pentagon and identified what he saw as the gravest threat to national security: the Pentagon's own bureaucracy. "With brutal consistency, it stifles free thought and crushes new ideas. It disrupts the defense of the United States and places the lives of men and women in uniform at risk," he said. He may have underestimated both the size and tenacity of this foe.

In the opening pages of their new book about the Iraq war, "Cobra II," Michael R. Gordon and Gen. Bernard E. Trainor quote the Sept. 10 speech to frame the battle that has raged inside the Pentagon for five years. As the nation has weathered the most deadly terrorist attack on its soil in history, fought a global war on terror and liberated two countries, there has been a battle inside the Pentagon over the size, organization and weaponry of the U.S. military. And that battle has only intensified as the bureaucracy that Mr. Rumsfeld chastised for being stuck in a Cold War mindset has picked up allies in Congress, the military and in some quarters of the administration. It is this coalition that is now pushing for Mr. Rumsfeld to be fired.

But it's not just the defense secretary's head the former generals, anonymous leakers and senators are after. This is a classic Washington turf and policy war. In the balance is the nation's ability to fight the war on terror and confront other threats around the globe. One of the more significant theaters of this war has been waged in the intelligence community. Two years ago at the behest of the 9/11 Commission, Congress created the director of national intelligence to sit atop the CIA, FBI and other intelligence gathering agencies. In theory the DNI would improve the nation's ability to collect, analyze and disseminate information about national security threats. In this process Congress was cheered on by the Bush administration's normal critics in the media.

Initially the Bush administration resisted creating the new post, but as the 2004 presidential election approached Mr. Bush came out in support of it. A few members of Congress, however, put the breaks on for a few weeks.

They included Rep. Duncan Hunter, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, and Rep. John Kline of Minnesota, a relatively new arrival on Capitol Hill, who as a former Marine helicopter pilot had seen the need for good intelligence firsthand while carrying the "nuclear football" for President Reagan and while serving in Somalia in the 1990s. Before the legislation creating the new layer of bureaucracy was sent to the president to be signed into law shortly after the election, these few holdouts in the House won a critical battle for the military. They ensured that the Pentagon would not lose its ability to gather and analyze intelligence independently to support soldiers in harms way.

That victory, however, always depended on vigorous civilian control over a Pentagon that would rather not make enemies on Capitol Hill. That leadership starts with the defense secretary and also requires support from a president who understands that it's vital for the Pentagon to control its own intelligence assets. Sen. Collins, who led the fight in Congress against Reps. Hunter and Kline, has never accepted the powerful but limited role for the DNI. Instead she has continued to insist that Mr. Negroponte push to expand his mandate and gain total dominance over the intelligence community.

This has come even as the New York Times and Washington Post have printed articles recently pointing out that the DNI has turned out to be -- surprise, surprise -- ineffective at creating more-accurate intelligence or even in turning out competing analysis that then filters up to policy makers. If anything, the creation of the DNI has made it less likely that members of Congress will receive anything but a consensus view from the intelligence community.

A recent House Intelligence Committee report puts its finger on the problem by saying the DNI is in danger of becoming "less an intended 'orchestration mechanism,' and more another layer of large, unintended and unnecessary bureaucracy." The committee is threatening to cut Mr. Negroponte's funding unless he comes up with a plan for reforming the intelligence community. But short of abolishing his own position, it's hard to see how that is possible.

It is in this context that we can view the criticism of Mr. Rumsfeld intensifying over the past year. The underlying theme from the handful of retired generals who have spoken out against the defense secretary to the critics on Capitol Hill and elsewhere is that Mr. Rumsfeld has been too forceful a leader at the Pentagon. Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, wants to go so far as to hold a symbolic "no-confidence vote" on the defense secretary. "Let the Senate go on the record," he told reporters last week.

Unable to persuade the president from invading Iraq or to stop him from pushing for a more flexible military with an expanded role around the world, it seems the critics are now trying to throw sand in the gears of the military machine in the hope that it will grind to a halt. It's hard to see how this serves the national interest.

Brendan Miniter is assistant editor of OpinionJournal.com.