The Perfect Soldier: Special Operations, Commandos, and the Future of Us Warfare by James F. Dunnigan
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Dirty Little Secrets
Stupid CIA Tricks
by James Dunnigan
August 8, 2006
Discussion Board on this DLS topic
There was a major embarrassment at the CIA
when it was discovered that Italian detectives had been able to
identify and track some CIA agents because the agents had used a
frequent flyer card to travel around Europe. That card provided enough
information for the Italians to identify the CIA men as CIA employees.
All this was going on because the Italian agents were trying to find
out if the CIA was involved in the abduction of a Kurdish terrorist
from Italy in 2003. Although this was done with the cooperation of
Italian counter-terrorism officials, it was also done without the
permission of the Italian government. That has turned into a major
scandal in Italy, where fear of terrorists and anti-Americanism both
compete for media attention.
The CIA is conducting an investigation to find out how widespread
this sort of sloppiness is among its field agents. One thing that will
probably come out of this is that the CIA agents thought that, since
they were operating in an allied country, and with obviously
cooperative Italian counter-terrorism agents, they did not have to use
the kind of precautions meant to keep them safe in a hostile
environment.
While European counter-terrorism organizations have been diligent
at tracking, and fighting, Islamic terrorism in Europe, their political
bosses are faced with media and public attitudes driven more by fear
(of terrorist attack) and a desire to blame someone else (like the
U.S.) This creates some strange situations. Like Italian courts trying
to track down and arrest American CIA employees.
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