If Hayden becomes the new CIA director, he is expected to push the agency to be more willing to share resources and information with other services -- changes that Goss was seen as less enthusiastic about.
"I would expect to see a real strong effort to bring the agency more fully engaged with the rest of the intelligence community," said retired Vice Adm. Thomas Wilson, former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency and a longtime associate of Hayden's. "Always, one of the issues with the CIA was its unwillingness to share information and sources. I would think [Hayden] would try to further the progress that has been made" in breaking down interagency barriers.
Current and former CIA officials said Hayden would probably be welcomed by the staff because he was a career intelligence officer without the political background of his predecessors, including Goss, who was a Republican member of Congress from Florida before taking the CIA job.
But Hayden has little experience with human intelligence operations -- the core mission of the CIA -- and could face a difficult confirmation fight in the Senate because of his involvement in a controversial domestic espionage operation authorized by President Bush. Hayden was previously director of the National Security Agency, which for the last four years has eavesdropped on international phone calls and other communications of U.S. residents. Hayden has played a leading role in publicly defending the program, which the White House has described as narrow in scope and meant to allow monitoring of calls involving people suspected of being linked to Al Qaeda.
A senior Republican Senate aide, who was not authorized to speak on the record, said: "We've expressed some concerns" to the White House over the prospect of a Hayden nomination, largely because of the controversy surrounding the National Security Agency program, but also because of other criticisms of his stewardship of the agency.
Hayden has been faulted for computer systems the National Security Agency purchased during his tenure that have cost billions of dollars but have yielded disappointing results. He has also been criticized for placing greater emphasis on improving agency monitoring of China at a time when Al Qaeda had emerged as the nation's preeminent threat.
Times staff writers Richard B. Schmitt and Peter Wallsten contributed to this report.
