Victory won’t end war on terror
Source: Omaha World-Herald, 5/3/2011
ASP board member former Senator Chuck Hagel is quoted.
By Joseph Morton
Gunning down Osama bin Laden in Pakistan notched a big victory in the American military’s war on terror, but it also represented a significant triumph for the U.S. intelligence community.
In the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the intelligence agencies were hammered for their inability to piece together the danger ahead of time. And they have been criticized in the years since for failing to find the mastermind behind the attacks.
Former Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., co-chairman of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board, said the American people can feel good now about the country’s investment in the intelligence agencies.
“A number of intelligence community people today are feeling justifiably proud and probably somewhat redeemed, at least in their own minds, that this thing worked,” Hagel said Monday. “We’re seeing an intelligence community of 15 independent agencies now working closer together than they ever have. … I know they’ve been frustrated. They’ve taken a lot of criticism, but in the end their hard work, their dedication, their focus paid off.”
