The Private Outsourcing of US Intelligence Services

mrbluze writes "It appears that more and more of the data collection sanctioned by the US government is passed through the hands of private enterprise, Salon reports. 'Because of the cloak of secrecy thrown over the intelligence budgets, there is no way for the American public, or even much of Congress, to know how those contractors are getting the money, what they are doing with it, or how effectively they are using it. The explosion in outsourcing has taken place against a backdrop of intelligence failures for which the Bush administration has been hammered by critics, from Saddam Hussein's fictional weapons of mass destruction to abusive interrogations that have involved employees of private contractors operating in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Aftergood and other experts also warn that the lack of transparency creates conditions ripe for corruption.'"

Comments

More than just the intelligence services

[HangingChad]

It's happening all through government. Military and GS people flipping over to contractors literally overnight. Same people doing the exact same job. Khaki on Friday, shirt and tie on Monday. Somehow they appear to have waived the conflict of interest clauses in military service that were supposed to keep that from happening.

I don't have that many contacts in the intelligence services but I wouldn't be surprised to find the same trend there. I'm betting a lot of the intelligence contracting were government people one day, private contractors the next.

Either way this is a bad trend. There are some things we want the government to do, even though you can argue it costs more and is less efficient. That's okay. Some services have considerations that need to go beyond the bottom line. Aside from that there appears to be little accountability in contract awards these days and many seem to have political overtones. High level positions going to people whose chief qualification seems to be that they graduated from Oral Roberts University.

If there's an encouraging sign it's that we're...finally...starting to see some outrage from those calling themselves conservatives. Better late than never I guess.

Re:Corruption

[king-manic]

You're right -- it's trollish, mainly because it's wrong. Go to fact check here for the actual truth. Cheney has received some deferred compensation and turned over a bunch of his stock options to charity. Apart from that, he has no continuing interest.

Which is still complete bullshit. At the end of his term Haliburton will be paying Mr. Cheney plenty for speaking engagements or as a advisory. He's done what he can to defuse the direct appearance of corruption but still makes numerous choices to benefit this one organization at the expense of US tax payers and US future interests. Why were so many no bid contracts awarded to a company he had an association with? Both the president and the vice were major parts of this company. Why is so much money flowing in that direction. You basically have 2 Amoral corporate agents posing as your head of state and alternate.

Congratulations on the rapidly declining dollar. A direct consequence of people like you who ignore the big picture and dwell on simple PR talking points and who feel overly invested in a political position that has not worked in your interest for a long time now. You international political and economic influence is waning and you continue to make decision in both government and corporately to expedite the fall of the American empire.