President Bush's speech on CIA head nomination [ 2006-05-15 10:48 ]
(May 15,2006)
THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. This week I nominated
General Mike Hayden to be the next Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
The work of the CIA is essential to the security of the American people. The
enemies who struck our Nation on September the 11th, 2001, intend to attack us
again, and to defeat them, we must have the best possible intelligence. In Mike
Hayden, the men and women of the CIA will have a strong leader who will support
them as they work to disrupt terrorist attacks, penetrate closed societies, and
gain information that is vital to protecting our Nation.
General Hayden
is supremely qualified to lead the CIA. For the last year, he's been our
Nation's first Deputy Director of National Intelligence, and has played a
critical role in our efforts to reform America's intelligence capabilities to
meet the threats of a new century. He has more than 20 years of experience in
the intelligence field. He served for six years as Director of the National
Security Agency and has a track record of success in leading and transforming
that large intelligence agency. He also has held senior positions at the
Pentagon and the National Security Council, and he served behind the Iron
Curtain in our embassy in Bulgaria during the Cold War.
Mike knows our intelligence community from the ground up. He's been both a
producer and a consumer of intelligence and has overseen both human and
technical intelligence activities, as well as the all-source analysis derived
from those activities. Mike was unanimously confirmed by the Senate last year
for his current post, and this week members of both parties have praised his
nomination. I urge the Senate to confirm him promptly as the next Director of
the CIA.
During General Hayden's tenure at the NSA, he helped establish and run one of
our most vital intelligence efforts in the War on Terror -- the Terrorist
Surveillance Program. As the 9/11 Commission and others have noted, our
government failed to connect the dots in the years before the attacks of
September the 11th. We now know that two of the hijackers in the United States
made phone calls to al Qaeda operatives overseas, but we did not know about
their plans until it was too late.
So to prevent another attack, I authorized the National
Security Agency -- consistent with the Constitution and laws -- to intercept
international communications in which one party has known links to al Qaeda and
related terrorist groups. This terrorist surveillance program makes it more
likely that killers like the 9/11 hijackers will be identified and located in
time. It has helped prevent possible terrorist attacks in the United States and
abroad, and it remains essential to the security of America. If there are people
inside our country who are talking with al Qaeda, we want to know about it. We
will not sit back
and wait to be attacked again.
This week, new claims have been made about other ways we are tracking down al
Qaeda to prevent attacks on America. It is important for Americans to understand
that our activities strictly target al Qaeda and its known affiliates. Al Qaeda
is our enemy, and we want to know their plans. The intelligence activities I
have authorized are lawful and have been briefed to appropriate members of
Congress, both Republican and Democrat. The privacy of all Americans is fiercely
protected in all our activities. The government does not listen to domestic
phone calls without court approval. We are not trolling through the personal
lives of millions of innocent Americans. Our efforts are focused on links to al
Qaeda terrorists and its affiliates who want to harm the American people.
Americans expect their government to do everything in its power under our
laws and Constitution to protect them and their civil liberties. That is exactly
what we are doing. And so far, we have been successful in preventing another
attack on our soil. The men and women of the CIA are working around the clock to
make our Nation more secure. I am confident that General Hayden will strengthen
the CIA and integrate its vital work with our other intelligence agencies, so we
can defeat the terrorists of the 21st century.
Thank you for listening.
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