The National Security Agency, the spy service that eavesdrops on communications to collect intelligence, announced plans last fall to hire 7,500 employees over the next five years to push the total NSA payroll to about 35,000. Among those being sought are linguists in Arabic and Chinese, regional analysts, communications signals intelligence specialists and computer experts.
The Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency also has taken its job search public, running ads for human intelligence officers for the first time in the Economist and other publications. The little-known DIA hired TMP Worldwide, a New York-based advertising and communications firm, to improve its name recognition and attract more candidates.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Wednesday March 09, 2005 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 2 inches; 79 words Type of Material: Correction
Intelligence applicants -- An article in Tuesday's Section A about concerns among counterintelligence officials that Al Qaeda sympathizers might be trying to get jobs at U.S. intelligence agencies said Barry Royden, a CIA counterintelligence expert, disagreed with other counterintelligence officials, and suggested that Royden had determined that terrorist groups had assigned people to infiltrate the CIA. In fact, Royden does not disagree with his colleagues, who said it was unclear whether Al Qaeda supporters were seeking to commit espionage.
The need to vastly improve counterintelligence efforts dominated the weekend Texas conference, which drew scores of current and former intelligence officials. The Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive, which Congress created in 2002 to coordinate counterintelligence efforts across the government, cosponsored the conclave, which was open to the media.
Michelle Van Cleave, director of the office, said the Bush administration had adopted a strategy that called for more pre-emptive action against foreign intelligence services and others viewed as threats to national security. She and other officials described the United States as the principal target for intelligence services from up to 90 countries around the world.
Paul Redmond, a longtime CIA officer who works for the counterintelligence office, called it an "actuarial certainty" that spies have infiltrated U.S. security agencies. He warned that, because of efforts since Sept. 11 to more widely share critical intelligence as part of broader reforms, the danger of espionage was growing.
"I think we're worse off than we've ever been," he said.
R. James Woolsey, who served as CIA director from 1993 to 1995, urged the agency to step up protections against spying by adherents of Wahabism and other extreme forms of militant Islam, which he compared to the threat from Soviet-era Communism.
"The Wahabis are not just a religious movement," he said.
Lisa Bronson, the undersecretary of Defense in charge of vetting exports of defense-related materials, said China has "2,000 to 3,000 front companies" working in America to obtain so-called dual-use civilian equipment or information that could be used to help Beijing's military.
