Created at a time when the CIA needed to staff America’s growing war zones, the post-9/11 change has been controversial among officers. While this gave them more flexibility, some former operations officers say the result was that the officers received less mentorship and thoughtful career development as a result.

Under the new policy, the so-called CIA mission centers – units within the agency focused on particular geographic regions or transnational challenges – will have more control over assignments and language and other training. that an operations officer receives over the long term.

While there is some flexibility in the new policy, sources say – officers won’t be locked into one geographic area exclusively – in general, they won’t become a free agent until later in their careers.

With a few variations, the new policy is a throwback to how the agency managed the careers of its young officers before the Counter-Terrorism Wars.

“The agency appears in many ways to be trying to replicate some of the things that worked long before counter-terrorism wars dominated everyone’s attention,” said Thad Troy, a former operations officer who served as a station chief in several. European capitals. He warned he was unaware of the policy change.

Linking agents to a geographic area or functional issue “serves a global mission better because you develop and refine that geographic issue – or in some cases, specific business expertise – and give agents a place to grow, develop and establish a mentorship, ”Troy said.

“In general, we are always looking for ways to develop our workforce professionally,” a CIA spokesperson said in a statement. “Our people are our top priority.” The agency declined to comment on details of any change in staff management.

Change isn’t just about countering China, according to sources, which CIA Director Bill Burns has made one of his top priorities for the agency and which has come to dominate the public conversation about the future of China. the agency.

“We are very focused on China these days, although I hasten to add that in all of our conversations about China, we have made it clear that we are the Central Intelligence Agency, we are not the Chinese Intelligence. Agency, “Deputy Director David Cohen said. at a recent intelligence conference.

But, he added, “what we have achieved is that we really need to improve and synchronize our efforts around China.”

“A difficult target”

The Chinese Communist Party is what intelligence professionals call a “tough target” – difficult for the CIA to penetrate, either through digital means or by recruiting human spies.

Current and former intelligence officials say US intelligence inside China – especially human intelligence which is the bread and butter of the CIA – is desperately poor, for a myriad of reasons.

Former officials say the new policy change could help tackle this challenge by training geographic experts for the long haul – and helping them put them in the right places with the right profession.

“For us, it’s important to the overall mission to have expertise in a geographic area or on an issue,” Troy said. “You don’t get that in six months, but over the course of working in an area or on a problem for 10 years or more.”

Some critics believe that the agency’s emphasis on counterterrorism missions – which have become a part of the careers of almost every officer and have often had officers operating from armored convoys in countries where they speak little la local language – left its anemic traditional spy chops.

“As the counterterrorism mission expanded, the House Standing Special Committee on Intelligence believes the IC has treated traditional intelligence missions as secondary to the fight against terrorism,” a 2020 report said. on the intelligence community’s ability to counter China. “The inattention of the 1990s to strategic and emerging threats remained largely irreversible.”

Meanwhile, the rapid proliferation of big data and ubiquitous surveillance technology has made the job of intelligence collectors immeasurably more difficult. Gone are the days when a CIA operations officer could simply pick up a new passport and adopt a new identity in another country, senior officials have publicly acknowledged.

“China has become our biggest and most formidable challenge,” Jennifer Ewbank, CIA deputy director for digital innovation, said at a recent intelligence conference. “The plans and intentions of despots and terrorists – things that have yet to happen – are increasingly difficult to uncover through traditional means.”

Yet senior officials insist the agency has not taken its eyes off the ball when it comes to counterterrorism. Burns, speaking at the Wall Street Journal CEO Council summit on Monday, listed China, Russia, Iran and “the continuing counterterrorism challenges that we cannot overlook or avoid” when asked what which prevents him from sleeping at night.

The change in the way the CIA manages its operations officers is one of many it has undertaken to strengthen its espionage and analytical capabilities targeting China.

In addition to the new mission center, the agency also added a weekly meeting with the Burns focused exclusively on China, Cohen said at a recent intelligence conference. He’s also allocating more of his budget to the problem, Cohen said.

The office of the director of national intelligence said in December that U.S. spy agencies had increased their spending on China by nearly 20% in the past fiscal year.

“We need specialists with deep linguistic and operational expertise to advance our collection goals,” said a former officer who warned they were unaware of the policy change.

“It doesn’t mean that people shouldn’t have different experiences, it just means we have a mission to perform and it doesn’t always include what we individually desire.”