My name is karen. Thank you for joining us here at the center on National Security. We are delighted to be bringing you this afternoons conversation. With me today is awardwinning author, journalist, documentary maker. His new book is the spymasters how the cia director shaped the future and we are going to talk about this book today but first i want to say welcome and thank you for joining us. Its a pleasure to be here thanks for having me. So this is a wonderful read. When i started it i was like this is going to be too much information i wont be able to take it in but its fantastic. Its based on your own knowledge and research over 70 interviews and among those the directors of the cia except for the current ones and its not so much about the cia directors of their relationshitherelationship to te and the president would you agree with that . Thanks for the kind words about the book because what i try to do may be above all else is humanize these directors. I was lucky because as a cast of characters we never could have trumped up the quintessential director bob gates described as a james bond character with a cigarette in one hand and a martini in the other who could walk into the oval office and tell lbj that the domino theory was flawed and then Going Forward to bill colby. Then youve got bill casey and an amazing cast of characters all the way up to the first woman to run the cia but youre right the book focuses a lot on that relationship between the president and the cia director. Its almost impossible balancing act for a cia director because he or she on the one hand has to tell the person hard truths while also keeping the president s ear. That is a tough challenge even in the best of times and in the current times it is practically mission impossible. I dont know if you saw the comey film over the weekend but its one of the things that becomes clear how hard that particular relationship is generally and how much harder it was under trump so going down that line a little bit, who had the worst relationship . And i read the book so i think i know what youre going to say, and then who had the best. Jim woolsey would have to have the worst relationship. He is a fascinating character to me, brilliant guy. As we all know on a ideological spectrum, he was well over to the right bu the love to joke at the fact he was president of yale students for mccarthy and 68 and hosted not for the reasons mccarthy did but he thought it was winnable and we were not doing enough anyway. He becomes cia director about bill clinton and woolsey were like oil and water as one source put it to me. Clinton just didnt like him after the first briefing which went on and on evidently at some length. Woolsey left, bill clinton turned to one of the advisors and said i never want to see that man again and almost never did. He had literally one meeting with the president and at one point there was a freak accident on the south lawn of the white house, a small plane crashed and killed the pilot. Afterwards woolsey said to the press that was me trying to get an appointment with bill clinton. So it wasnt a very productive relationship. And he met his demise over the altar james scandal. He met that case in the most serious mold since kim filby probably in intelligence history. It happened on his watch and it frankly ended his tenure. And what about the best relationship . There would be a number of contenders for that probably. I would say bob gates and george w. Bush had a good relationship. Leon panetta and barack obama had a good relationship, john brennan and barack obama. Sort of a spoiler alert for those of you know i wrote another book called the gatekeepers about the white house chief of staff. Some of the attributes that make a great white house chief of staff also served cia directors and leon panetta was the gold standard. There were certainly other great chiefs and cia director but panetta was up there with the best and that is because it had a lohasa lot to do with the fact panetta when he became the director he was 70yearsold, hed been around the block, he served in congress and was comfortable in the corridors of power. He knew the white house and could walk into the oval office, close the door and tell barack obama what he didnt want to hear. That is essential in both jobs. And then to all the stations that panetta waited about half an hour and sent out another message to all the stations saying disregard the previous message. That this is not a fair fight. And to know exactly who had their back on this one. Not only barack obama but when Vice President joe biden who is the you on this one. And then to adjudicate this and then to say and then biden said yes and then knew he was a dead man walking. This isnt just about the cia director and the president with Foreign Policy and behind the scenes and with that foreignpolicy from decades. A number of those things and with the killing of bin laden but there was one incident that the audience doesnt know that much about and that is and then im so embarrassed. Dont be embarrassed because a lot of people dont know what and in fact the first half of the story i tell in the work has ever been recorded before. It is an absolutely believable story now last for decades. It was far and away the most wanted terrorist in the middle east by the cia and mossad all the way back to the worst stay in cia history which is the plumbing of the Beirut Embassy which killed so many cia officers and other americans at the time. Subsequently this was probably an operation and that was the beginning. It was a little time and from that day forward having israeli blood on his hand than anyone it was the operational genius. The operational chief because he is so elusive and that he read where disguises and to pioneer and those sophisticated ied that drove israelis out of lebanon and then to trigger the israeli withdrawal and in short the most wanted guy and the other two most wanted were general Qassem Soleimani and the iranian general named Qassem Soleimani whose name a ring a bell sense he was killed january of this year. In any event of the caa tried to track down medea and i told the story of an operation on bill clintons watch with cia director and actually they tracked him down to beirut and discovered he was discovering his mistress and word was at her and beat her as it turns out and then enlisted her to bundle him down to the dock and then to a battleship offshore. And the operation failed in before the cia tracked him down in damascus. So i told that story in hairraising detail how i joined cia massage operation , they finally got him tracked him as he was driving around damascus and his suv and decided they couldnt plant the bomb and always had his suv and to pull the prom and it was a technical marvel because replaced back door of the suv and to match the paint color exactly. They did all this and mossad pulled the trigger. And at one point, that one moment, while they were surveilling and waiting for a moment to strike, they looked, and looked again someone leaning on the car was guess who . General Qassem Soleimani and they thought we can take them both out. And permission was denied and the only legitimate target and Qassem Soleimani went off and is just an unbelievable story. And that whole initiation because because that has always been a fraught proposition at the cia. And for decades. And to go through confessions where the israelis. And bush signed off on the deal as long as nobody talked about it. In this chapter that i wrote in the book. When you exit your interviews with those cia directors what happened and comment. But in the end where tom brennan who gets frustrated with me asking repeatedly for commen comment. He finally looked at me and said he died quickly. Thats more than you got from the others. One thing i wanted to ask what are your thoughts the use of the generals to be head of the cia . And how we think about that and others have thought about that with general patraeus because there is a way that the is our distinct authorizations so what did you learn about that particular mixing of expertise . It is a mix of course the two directors and i that i get into it with our hayden and patraeus and each of them are capable and really interesting characters. Hayden tells the story of how when he arrives he runs the nsa prior to when he arrived at the cia and he went through the bubble to make his first address to the troops as it were. So as he was speaking he took questions and somebody said what would you like us to call you . And hayden who was eloquent and articulate, was thrown in did not know how to answer and finally he said whatever makes you comfortable. Call me whatever you want to call me. And in retrospect it was the most important thing that he said. What some lags as the cia some call it the fourstar general disease and that means military people sometimes arrive at the cia with a fairly welldeveloped sense of entitlement. Im use to having a staff of 50 people and to cater to his every whim. And this was a problem for patraeus when he arrived it was a culture shock. And then to be accustomed in a way of life and operating. As the cia culture. And when he met his untimely demise and then i asked him frame think about that and it is fascinating i have to say. And that could be a teaser for the next section of the book. So what did you learn about that process and to be the most fascinating scene in the book from the beginning all the way up to the current cia director. And ive had the privilege of getting to know the widow of the previously mentioned quintessential cia oldschool director and to full of terrific Untold Stories and that they were all asked to do things they should not have done. And i said like wet . And we got into it that house was a flawed character. And i love the stories he was holding his own on the dance floor with to stare at the 1975 state dinner for the shaw of iran. With the shah of iran. Sold his relationship with lbj is fascinating because he admired for his domestic achievements and words exasperated by the vietnam war but he wanted lbj to succeed and he leaned on him very hard is only lbj could do and with no Uncertain Terms he wanted intelligence showing domestic protesters against the vietnam war were being controlled by foreign communist powers. He protested and said thats not on the cia charter and he said im well aware of that. I want it. Holmes should have known better. And it was illegal domestic surveillance. And at the end of the day he came up with no evidence of any foreign control. So at the end of the day homes what is the most important time and when the clenched came during the watergate scandal and white house chief of staff called him into the white house and told him to shut down the fbi investigation into watergate. House was having none of it. So that is the earliest example of a cia director who had to deal with that pressure. But so many have had to and time and again president s will ask them to do stuff they should not be doing. But gates said usually you have to have a difficult problem. Let the diplomats handle it they say lets let the cia do it. Let the diplomats handle it they say lets let the cia do it. Is one former director told me you could never get rid of it or abolish it because and theres nobody to blame so the fact of the matter over the last five or six decades its because president s have asked them to do stuff they should not be doing. Did they get in trouble . Where they held accountable . Yes they were blamed time and again. The other classic language that in this town there are only policy success and intelligence failures. The cia was blamed for 9 11 and was called a failure of imagination but basically and said people would say how does it feel to have the worst intelligence failure since pearl harbor . The truth is to have a detailed chapter on this, july 2001 george tenet who is head of the al qaeda unit with a letter to the Bush White House he slammed his fist on the table and says we have to go to war now so essentially they blew the whistle and nobody heard it. This was less of an intelligence failure more of a policy failure to heed warnings. Fastforward to 2020 and now the catastrophic consequences of the president who ignored warnings in the president s daily brief throughout the month of january and 200,000 americans are dead. So with those stories and the abandonment of procedural norms. And with the Principal Committee meeting. And with the Trump Presidency and the cia. So on the war on the process this is the war on governing will never forget the outgoing chief of staff for obama so when the clock struck noon on jh he is waiting for winds previous to arrive and nobody showed up he waited an hour or more and then finally turned off the lights and left. To me thats enough of the presidency but its not the first time that norms have been abandoned. So lets go back to that because one of the things that i learned in the book and the part that was called the spymasters from july 2001. And then the number of persuasive of the ncaa. Now we had to do july 2001 and with the heads of the cia. Look National Security advisor and then you shake the tree when all those people at the table back. Number of people told me they think had Condoleezza Rice called the principals meeting they would have discovered that they were on us soil and had been for months because we all know its a failure to communicate between cia and fbi but that is the stuff that gets found out when you are process. Mrs. Is the first presidency trump is in the first presidency to fail to follow some of those norms. And in the case of the Bush White House they were living in a time warp and could not believe a bunch of guys with beards and caves were going to blow up the World Trade Center and said they thought they were euro nazis to stay up all night and blow stuff up during the da day. And as he tried to get that message it is one of those things we have enjoyed yet but to reflect on what you say so well with the war on government so the director time and time again almost always in a crisis situation. So i know how to ask this question but in what period of time do you think we have the best understanding of . We have a very close relationship with the wrong guy. The shah of iran. Thats one of my favorite chapters in the book and what happened on his watch as cia director and then the greatest intelligence failure of the new century. And then a huge fiasco but with those intelligence failures, the failure to see the shah of iran was as weak as he was late 1979 and on the verge of collaps collapse, was just a fiasco. And one of the reasons, quite frankly we had willfully blind ourselves is because Henry Kissinger in which he basically said if you will give us access to your listening post on the soviet union we are looking the other way and will not pay any attention to your political opponents. And then to rely on the shah secret police. I get into all of those in the book and that whole relationship between turner and jimmy carter is fascinating. But one of the caveats that i suppose is one of the great sources is just a plan guy because some of you may know him. Still very active and a persuasive voice on Foreign Affairs in the book on carter recently was terrific. But then to say our intelligence is terrible during the soul. And that we often just completely misunderstand this is a classic example of vietnam and just not understanding the society. Have to wonder if you have known the shots on the edge of collapse. And policymakers have done with that knowledge . What exactly could have done to change that Pivotal Moment in history . Was there any way to have arrived with the ayatollah . Im not sure the odds are all that gray would have been smart enough to figure out what to do. I love to his book on mutual book Richard Holbrooke about how badly we had misunderstood so many of the conflicts vietnam to iran to bosnia where the current situation. Obviously human beings are terribly forward and diplomats as well as. Suggesting is not much of a learning curve . I think the cia is much more capable today that was in 1979 and the was lots that went to the school as they did but white mail and deal for decades and diversity is a huge problem at the cia. I think historically over many decades have learned to understand other cultures that whack a see where is a part of that. And i think the cia has improved and many other ways. You have any questions to them in the chant and i will work on. Mm that was the dni and the director of National Intelligence the creation of post 9 11 reorganization the government is to enhance the intelligence and National Security priorities and abilities of the country. It meant the Intelligence Community community of the world and understand to function before. What you make of that or other directors make of that . A funny story because i was fortunate and very lucky with my book was launched, had a gym party on a party and i was asked this question and i proceeded to say after 9 11 that the Intelligence Community. And essentially with those muddled lines of authority. And then he started to leave his hand. And then to and the restructuring. And then plan and came in and now to have some of my gym copper with other Intelligence Services and they have a point. And i think that relationship works with jim clapper and brandon as cia director because they figured out how to make it work and clapper was the guy. And want to step on planet and chose. And to courtney the other agencies and to do his job as he saw fit. And then leon panetta where he said and then they showed up at langley and one that he meddled with but it is restructuring much more successfully now. And then to have the director of National Intelligence with a partisan hack and then really been serving the president to be on the spoke of intelligence to. We have a lot of questions and one is about torture and with the interrogation techniques, and how you see the cia reflection on that. Of time. It was only gone we should not have gone there. And will refer as those interrogation techniques and what the cia turmoils its not