WASHINGTON — The increasing collaboration between U.S. special forces units and CIA paramilitary teams is "fraught with danger" because of fundamental differences in the two groups' missions and legal authorities, according to a report published by the U.S. Army War College.
The study points to potential problems with America's growing reliance on CIA and military teams operating together in covert settings. Among them are concerns that members of the armed forces involved in such missions could find themselves considered "unlawful combatants" and deprived of Geneva Convention protections if caught in foreign lands.
The report also raises questions about whether Congress is adequately set up to conduct oversight.
And it suggested that the super-secret nature of the missions, coupled with murky chains of command, could lead to breakdowns in communication with main force units and raise the risk of friendly-fire incidents.
"Close cooperation and intermingling between the CIA and [special operations forces] is fraught with danger given their respective cultures, operational modes, sources of information, and oversight structures," said the study, which was written last year but surfaced publicly Friday when it was discovered on a Defense Department website.
Although the CIA's paramilitary operators are almost all former members of the armed forces, they often work under significantly different ground rules. The CIA operatives, who do not wear uniforms or insignia, normally are used in situations in which the government wants to be able to deny any connection to them. The Pentagon's special forces units, by contrast, normally go into action in uniform, and function -- and expect to be treated -- as regular military personnel.
Those distinctions could lead to legal as well as operational complications, the study said.
It was written by Army Col. Kathryn Stone, a senior attorney in the military who studied at the War College last year. Stone serves as the staff judge advocate -- the top military legal counsel -- at U.S. Southern Command in Miami. Southern Command is responsible for military operations in Latin America, including the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Reached at her home in Miami on Friday, Stone said she favored increased collaboration between the CIA and the military but wrote the report to call attention to some of the potential pitfalls of that relationship.
