After nearly 20 years of intense counter-terrorism wars against Islamist militias, former intelligence officers and overseers are pushing for the CIA to return to “silent” espionage. China has become the biggest problem for the United States today, they said.
Such changes will help the agency to better staff its outposts in areas that are critical to China. For example, there has been a lot of Chinese infrastructure investment in West Africa.
In particular, it will help the CIA train its staff in the long term. This, for its part, could affect the lives of future spies, especially in the early stages of their careers, since after the 9/11 attacks officers were given more freedom to perform various tasks and were not restricted by a programmed “trajectory”. This gave them more flexibility, however, it deprived them of thoughtful career development.
After all, officials insist that the CIA does not lose focus when it comes to the fight against terrorism.
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