CIA to New Hires: Analyze This
June 10 -- Want to combat terrorism for the CIA? Then fill out your application. Your graduate school application, that is.
As America beefs up its intelligence-gathering capabilities in an attempt to snuff out future terror attacks, an increasing premium is being placed on hiring experienced analysts — many with lengthy academic CVs — who can help anticipate the nature of those threats.
To be sure, the CIA is working to collect more leads about terror groups by adding field agents to work abroad and ramping up its various eavesdropping technologies. But the challenge faced by the CIA (among other agencies) when grappling with the likes of al Qaeda is not only to collect raw data about potential terrorist threats, but to interpret it — as the congressional inquiry into America's pre-Sept. 11 intelligence coordination has demonstrated.
That's why many of the people now joining the agency's anti-terror efforts don't fit the popular-culture image of spooks lurking undercover in far-flung corners of the globe. Some of the CIA's key people may, in fact, more closely resemble newly minted Ph.D.s than, say, Jack Ryan, protagonist of the Tom Clancy spy novels.
The More Experience, the Better
Take the job of counterterrorism analyst, for instance. These are the people who synthesize raw information and draft reports assessing the threat posed to the United States by terror groups. Analysts also can help shape U.S. policy by briefing government officials from outside the agency.
"Analysts will be responsible for imagining the worst and planning to counter it," President Bush said Thursday in his speech calling for the creation of a new Cabinet post to coordinate security measures.
So who is being hired to fill this kind of crucial role? While the CIA continues to recruit undergraduates on college campuses, a more typical analyst hire is someone with years of academic study on — and preferably time on the ground in — the Middle East, Asia, or even in other areas of international affairs, including security.
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