Pentagon Seeking Leeway Overseas
Operations Could Bypass Envoys
from: The Washington Post Thursday, February 24, 2005
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A48522-2005Feb23?
language=printer
By Ann Scott Tyson and Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writers
The Pentagon is promoting a global counterterrorism plan that would
allow Special Operations forces to enter a foreign country to conduct
military operations without explicit concurrence from the U.S.
ambassador there, administration officials familiar with the plan
said.
The plan would weaken the long-standing "chief of mission" authority
under which the U.S. ambassador, as the president's top representative
in a foreign country, decides whether to grant entry to U.S.
government personnel based on political and diplomatic considerations.
The Special Operations missions envisioned in the plan would largely
be secret, known to only a handful of officials from the foreign
country, if any.
The change is included in a highly classified "execute order" -- part
of a broad strategy developed since Sept. 11, 2001, to give the U.S.
Special Operations Command new flexibility to track down and destroy
terrorist networks worldwide, the officials said.
"This is a military order on a global scale, something that hasn't
existed since World War II," said a counterterrorism official with
lengthy experience in special operations. He and other officials
spoke on the condition of anonymity because the proposal is
classified.
The Pentagon sees the greater leeway as vital to enabling commando
forces to launch operations quickly and stealthily against terrorist
groups without often time-consuming interagency debate, said
administration officials familiar with the plan. In the Pentagon
view, the campaign against terrorism is a war and requires similar
freedom to prosecute as in Iraq, where the military chain of command
coordinates closely with the U.S. Embassy but is not subject to
traditional chief-of-mission authority.
The State Department and the CIA have fought the proposal, saying it
would be dangerous to dilute the authority of the U.S. ambassador and
CIA station chief to oversee U.S. military and intelligence activities
in other countries.
Over the past two years, the State Department has repeatedly blocked
Pentagon efforts to send Special Operations forces into countries
surreptitiously and without ambassadors' formal approval, current and
former administration officials said.
The State Department assigned counterterrorism coordinator J. Cofer
Black, who also led the CIA's counterterrorism operations after Sept.
11, as its point person to try to thwart the Pentagon's initiative.
"I gave Cofer specific instructions to dismount, kill the horses and
fight on foot -- this is not going to happen," said Richard L.
Armitage, describing how as deputy secretary of state -- a job he
held until earlier this month -- he and others stopped six or seven
Pentagon attempts to weaken chief-of-mission authority.
In one instance, U.S. commanders tried to dispatch Special Forces
soldiers into Pakistan without gaining ambassadorial approval but
were rebuffed by the State Department, said two sources familiar with
the event. The soldiers eventually entered Pakistan with proper
clearance but were ordered out again by the ambassador for what was
described as reckless behavior. "We had SF [Special Forces] guys in
civilian clothes running around a hotel with grenades in their
pockets," said one source involved in the incident, who opposes the
Pentagon plan.
Other officials cited another case to illustrate their concern. In
the past year, they said, a group of Delta Force soldiers left a bar
at night in a Latin American country and shot an alleged assailant
but did not inform the U.S. Embassy for several days.
In Pentagon policy circles, questions about chief-of-mission
authority are viewed as part of a broad reassessment of how to
organize the U.S. government optimally to fight terrorism. In this
view, alternative models of U.S. military, diplomatic and
intelligence authority -- possibly tailored to specific countries
and situations -- should be considered.
Pentagon officials familiar with the issue declined to speak on the
record out of concern that issues of bureaucratic warfare would
overshadow a serious policy question.
Debate over the issue reignited last month, as Armitage and
then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell departed and Condoleezza
Rice prepared to replace him, said an administration official
familiar with the matter. When the Pentagon refused to change
language in the execute order, that put the issue before Rice.
In the past week, however, she has made it clear that she intends to
protect the existing chief-of-mission authority. "Rice is resolute in
holding to chief-of-mission authority over operations the way it
exists now, for a very rational reason -- you need someone who can
coordinate," said a senior State Department official.
Some officials have viewed the debate as an early test of how Rice
will defend State Department views on a range of matters in
bureaucratic infighting with the Pentagon.
The State Department's concerns are twofold, officials said:
Conducting military operations would be perilous without the broad
purview and oversight of the U.S. ambassador, and it would set a
precedent that other U.S. agencies could follow.
"The chief-of-mission authority is a pillar of presidential authority
overseas," said the administration official familiar with the issue.
"When you start eroding that, it can have repercussions that
are . . . risky. Particularly, military action is one of the most
important decisions a president makes . . . and that is the sort of
action that should be taken with deliberation."
U.S. ambassadors have full responsibility for supervising all U.S.
government employees in that country, and when granting country
clearances they are supposed to consider various factors, including
ramifications for overall bilateral relations. For example, one
reason the U.S. military never conducted aggressive operations
against al Qaeda in Pakistan was a fear that such actions would
incite the local population to overthrow the fragile, nuclear-capable
government of President Pervez Musharraf.
The rift between the Pentagon and State Department over
chief-of-mission authority parallels broader concerns about the
push to empower the Special Operations Command in the war on
terrorism. The CIA, for example, has concerns that new
intelligence-gathering initiatives by the military could weaken
CIA station chiefs and complicate U.S. espionage abroad.
Without close coordination with the CIA, former senior intelligence
officials said, the military could target someone whom the CIA is
secretly surveilling and disrupt a flow of valuable intelligence.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A48522-2005Feb23?
language=printer
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