Rogue
Elephant Rising: The CIA as Kingslayer
By David Price
February 19, 2017 "Information
Clearing House"
- "Counterpunch"
-With
members of the CIA and NSA leaking materials on
Michael Flynn’s communications with Russian
officials, we are witnessing a slow boiling
domestic coup that will transform American
governance and the Executive Branch’s
relationships with intelligence agencies. It
remains to be seen whether these moves signal
broader attacks on the Presidency by agencies
long accustomed to taking out administrations
threatening the Agency’s perceived interests.
This
moment tells us more about the CIA revolting
against a particular administration than it does
about Trump’s people engaging in unusually
diabolical-illegal activities designed to
undermine an outgoing administration. We know
enough about Reagan’s pre-election dealings with
Iran to know that the CIA and NSA knew about
these transactions, yet these agencies were
content to remain silent; apparently glad to see
Carter ousted and welcoming a new era of
unparalleled “peace time” military and
intelligence spending. Similarly, American
intelligence agencies knew of Nixon’s efforts to
sabotage the Paris peace talks before the 1968
election, and the CIA did nothing to undermine a
new president who was going to give the agency
the war it wanted. The leaking of Flynn’s
information tells us little new about how
incoming administrations act, but it suggests
something new about US intelligence agencies
willingness to take out an administration not to
their liking.
To be
clear: I see nothing wrong with the leaks
themselves. I like intelligence leaks. I think
they are generally good for democracy and reveal
important truths about power. I am not worried
about leaks, I am worried about the CIA and
other intelligence agencies making a significant
power grab that is not being critically
considered. This is a move that no future
president will soon forget, and that will make
him or her think twice before crossing these
agencies.
The
left’s widely shared disdain for Donald Trump
makes the current rushing national wave of
schadenfreude understandable, yet there are few
on the left who appear worried about what this
domestic CIA coup portends for American
democracy. Because of the long history of
liberals’ attractions to using the CIA, perhaps
we should not be too surprised at this elation,
but we need to cautiously think beyond this
moment.
It is
no secret that many at the CIA hold disdain for
Flynn. His years at the Office of the Director
of National Intelligence and in command of the
Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) coincided with
efforts to move many of what had been CIA
operational activities and covert operations
away from CIA to DIA. With the CIA attacking the
Trump administration so soon after the election
with leaks of the Russian hacking report there
were clear public fissures appearing between the
Agency and the new Executive.
I
assume that there are lots of reasons why many
at the CIA and NSA wish to undermine the Trump
administration—I even assume I may share a few
of these reasons with them. While the agency is
comfortable with much of the corporate looting
that Trump appears ready to unleash, few in the
agency like the sort of instability that Trump
generates—and I suppose some within may take his
ongoing barbs and attacks on Agency incompetence
seriously.
As it
is to many of us on the left, it is obvious to
me that Trump is the most dangerous,
unqualified, and reckless US President I have
ever seen—much less imagined. And while it seems
as if he will soon enough seize some opportunity
to declare a national security disaster granting
himself new unlimited powers, I know no reason
to trust the CIA and other intelligence agencies
any more than we trust Trump.
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This
attack on the Executive Branch is like nothing
we’ve ever seen before. The most historically
interesting element of this moment is the rarity
of seeing the CIA operating, in real time, not
in its usual historical role as a covert arm of
the presidency (which Congressman Otis Pike
argued was its primary function), but as the
sort of rogue elephant that Senator Frank Church
and others long ago claimed it is. As members of
the Republic, no matter what momentary joy we
might feel watching this rogue elephant canter
towards our incompetent Commander and Chief, we
must not ignore the danger this beast presents
to one and all.
We
should welcome calls to investigate Trump,
Flynn, Bannon, Pence and others within the
administration, but we need to also investigate
and monitor the CIA for this latest in its long
history of attempted coups.
David Price a
professor of anthropology at Saint Martin’s
University in Lacey, Washington. He is the
author of Weaponizing
Anthropology: Social Science in Service of the
Militarized State published
by CounterPunch Books.
