John Stokes

Obama set to create domestic spying agency

As part of what will be the most significant reorganization of the US intelligence community in decades, the Obama administration seems set to establish a new intelligence agency to spy inside America.

The new agency, which is expected to be part of the Department of Homeland Security, will be responsible for gathering intelligence on internal threats and will be modeled on Britain’s MI5. The concept is part of a series of sweeping recommendations being drawn up by the intelligence transition team which began work immediately after the election.

Team leader is John Brennan who is being tipped to be either the next head of the CIA or a new Director of National Intelligence. However, Brennan comes with some baggage in that he was close to George Tenet, the then head of the CIA, in the immediate aftermath of 9.11 when the controversial kidnapping and torture policy was agreed and implemented by the CIA. 

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