Extensions of Remarks E905 HON. PETER WELCH
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May 13, 2011 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — Extensions of Remarks E905 INTELLIGENCE AUTHORIZATION It is also a system in which contractors are works. They help craft war plans. They gath- ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2011 playing an ever more important role. The er information on local factions in war Post estimates that out of 854,000 people with zones. They are the historians, the archi- SPEECH OF top-secret clearances, 265,000 are contractors. tects, the recruiters in the nation’s most se- There is no better example of the govern- cretive agencies. They staff watch centers HON. PETER WELCH ment’s dependency on them than at the CIA, across the Washington area. They are among OF VERMONT the one place in government that exists to the most trusted advisers to the four-star do things overseas that no other U.S. agency generals leading the nation’s wars. IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES is allowed to do. So great is the government’s appetite for Thursday, May 12, 2011 Private contractors working for the CIA private contractors with top-secret clear- have recruited spies in Iraq, paid bribes for ances that there are now more than 300 com- The House in Committee of the Whole information in Afghanistan and protected panies, often nicknamed ‘‘body shops,’’ that House on the State of the Union had under CIA directors visiting world capitals. Con- specialize in finding candidates, often for a consideration the bill (H.R. 754) to authorize tractors have helped snatch a suspected ex- fee that approaches $50,000 a person, accord- appropriations for fiscal year 2011 for intel- tremist off the streets of Italy, interrogated ing to those in the business. ligence and intelligence-related activities of detainees once held at secret prisons abroad Making it more difficult to replace con- the United States Government, the Commu- and watched over defectors holed up in the tractors with federal employees: The govern- nity Management Account, and the Central Washington suburbs. At Langley head- ment doesn’t know how many are on the fed- Intelligence Agency Retirement and Dis- quarters, they analyze terrorist networks. At eral payroll. Gates said he wants to reduce ability System, and for other purposes: the agency’s training facility in Virginia, the number of defense contractors by about Mr. WELCH. Mr. Chair, today I want to high- they are helping mold a new generation of 13 percent, to pre-9/11 levels, but he’s having light a critical issue facing the Intelligence American spies. a hard time even getting a basic head count. Community: increasing reliance on contrac- Through the federal budget process, the ‘‘This is a terrible confession,’’ he said. ‘‘I tors. George W. Bush administration and Congress can’t get a number on how many contractors A 2010 Washington Post story reported that made it much easier for the CIA and other work for the Office of the Secretary of De- agencies involved in counterterrorism to fense,’’ referring to the department’s civilian 30 percent of the workforce in our intelligence hire more contractors than civil servants. leadership. agencies is contractors. Furthermore, the Post They did this to limit the size of the perma- The Post’s estimate of 265,000 contractors estimated that out of 854,000 people with top- nent workforce, to hire employees more doing top-secret work was vetted by several secret clearances, 265,000 are contractors. I quickly than the sluggish federal process al- high-ranking intelligence officials who ap- encourage my colleagues to read this eye lows and because they thought—wrongly, it proved of The Post’s methodology. The news- opening article. turned out—that contractors would be less paper’s Top Secret America database in- These startling facts cause me great con- expensive. cludes 1.931 companies that perform work at cern—we’ve learned the hard way time and Nine years later, well into the Obama ad- the top-secret level. More than a quarter of ministration, the idea that contractors cost them—533—came into being after 2001, and time again what happens when we fail to mon- less has been repudiated, and the administra- others that already existed have expanded itor the work of federal contractors. The fed- tion has made some progress toward its goal greatly. Most are thriving even as the rest of eral government has the responsibility to of reducing the number of hired hands by 7 the United States struggles with bank- maintain its commitment to monitoring their percent over two years. Still, close to 30 per- ruptcies, unemployment and foreclosures. use—with special attention made to the evolv- cent of the workforce in the intelligence The privatization of national security ing nature of their work and the associated na- agencies is contractors. work has been made possible by a nine-year tional security risks inherent to outsourcing ‘‘For too long, we’ve depended on contrac- ‘‘gusher’’ of money, as Gates recently de- tors to do the operational work that ought scribed national security spending since the these tasks. I look forward to working with the to be done’’ by CIA employees, Panetta said. 9/11 attacks. Select Committee on Intelligence to achieve But replacing them ‘‘doesn’t happen over- With so much money to spend, managers this goal. night. When you’ve been dependent on con- do not always worry about whether they are [From the Washington Post, July 20, 2010] tractors for so long, you have to build that spending it effectively. NATIONAL SECURITY, INC. expertise over time.’’ A second concern of ‘‘Someone says, ‘Let’s do another study,’ Panetta’s: contracting with corporations, and because no one shares information, ev- (By Dana Priest and William M. Arkin) whose responsibility ‘‘is to their share- eryone does their own study,’’ said Elena In June, a stone carver from Manassas holders, and that does present an inherent Mastors, who headed a team studying the al- chiseled another perfect star into a marble conflict.’’ Qaeda leadership for the Defense Depart- wall at CIA headquarters, one of 22 for agen- Or as Gates, who has been in and out of ment. ‘‘It’s about how many studies you can cy workers killed in the global war initiated government his entire life, puts it: ‘‘You orchestrate, how many people you can fly all by the 2001 terrorist attacks. want somebody who’s really in it for a career over the place. Everybody’s just on a spend- The intent of the memorial is to publicly because they’re passionate about it and be- ing spree. We don’t need all these people honor the courage of those who died in the cause they care about the country and not doing all this stuff.’’ line of duty, but it also conceals a deeper just because of the money.’’ Most of these contractors do work that is story about government in the post-9/11 era: Contractors can offer more money—often fundamental to an agency’s core mission. As Eight of the 22 were not CIA officers at all. twice as much—to experienced federal em- a result, the government has become depend- They were private contractors. ployees than the government is allowed to ent on them in a way few could have fore- To ensure that the country’s most sen- pay them. And because competition among seen: wartime temps who have become a per- sitive duties are carried out only by people firms for people with security clearances is manent cadre. loyal above all to the nation’s interest, fed- so great, corporations offer such perks as Just last week, typing ‘‘top secret’’ into eral rules say contractors may not perform BMWs and $15,000 signing bonuses, as the search engine of a major jobs Web site what are called ‘‘inherently government Raytheon did in June for software developers showed 1,951 unfilled positions in the Wash- functions.’’ But they do, all the time and in with top-level clearances. ington area, and 19,759 nationwide: ‘‘Target every intelligence and counterterrorism The idea that the government would save analyst,’’ Reston. ‘‘Critical infrastructure agency, according to a two-year investiga- money on a contract workforce ‘‘is a false specialist,’’ Washington, D.C. ‘‘Joint expedi- tion by The Washington Post. economy,’’ said Mark M. Lowenthal, a tionary team member,’’ Arlington. What started as a temporary fix in re- former senior CIA official and now president ‘‘We could not perform our mission with- sponse to the terrorist attacks has turned of his own intelligence training academy. out them. They serve as our ‘reserves,’ pro- into a dependency that calls into question As companies raid federal agencies of tal- viding flexibility and expertise we can’t ac- whether the federal workforce includes too ent, the government has been left with the quire,’’ said Ronald Sanders, who was chief many people obligated to shareholders rath- youngest intelligence staffs ever while more of human capital for the Office of the Direc- er than the public interest—and whether the experienced employees move into the private tor of National Intelligence before retiring government is still in control of its most sector. This is true at the CIA, where em- in February. ‘‘Once they are on board, we sensitive activities. In interviews last week, ployees from 114 firms account for roughly a treat them as if they’re a part of the total both Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and third of the workforce, or about 10,000 posi- force.’’ CIA Director Leon Panetta said they agreed tions. Many of them are temporary hires, The Post’s investigation is based on gov- with such concerns.