...I think the Bush administration has come to the conclusion that existing agencies are unreliable and that working outside the conventional arena, actually creating new offices and directorates with people they can wholly trust (& control) are a better investment for the American people.

Last year, U.S. News has learned, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and CIA Director George Tenet created a new top-secret office to develop cutting-edge spy satellite technologies. The office is an arm of the CIA's Directorate of Science and Technology. The new office maintains bogus commercial "cover" facilities outside the agency's headquarters in Langley, Va., and CIA officials are talking to defense contractors about developing new satellites. "Tenet formed the office," says a former senior Pentagon official, "because he wanted exquisite intelligence collection capabilities." According to several former Pentagon and CIA officials with close ties to U.S. intelligence, the office was created, in part, because of the NRO's declining performance. The CIA denies this but won't discuss the new satellite operation.

Let's be real blunt here. Tenet and Rumsfeld don't do anything without Bush's knowledge, consent or initiative. While Lindy and others reading this may immediately mouth aloud "Shadow Government!" - the truth is it is closer to assertive use of laws and powers. I think there is a real fear of spy infiltration in some of the existing offices and that putting their own people into another set of directorates with duplicate tasks increases the chances of success. It seems like a waste of money - or it can be viewed as not putting all your eggs in one basket. I bet the Bush administration views it in the form of the latter.

Being blackmailed by the primary defense contractors, (which for all intents and purposes have cozy relationships with altogether too many contracting agents and military officials within the government) is not any way to develop national security tools. If Tenet, Rumsfeld & Co. are seeking other smaller contractors and negotiating deals outside the conventional contracting arrangements under legal loophole covers - it would not surprise me.

The whole LORAL fiasco and the subsequent loss of classified missile technology has surely created a sense of distrust between the administration and some of the largest Satellite makers. The bigger they are, the more bloated and easily infiltratable by individuals who do not have America's best interests at heart. No one needs perform blatant sabotage anymore when they can simply steal new technology and create cost overruns and delays from within. A satellite that blows up on the launch pad is not much worse than a cost overrun or delay that prevents launch for a year - or for that matter a bad deal negotiated by a "cozy" contracting agent or military official.

The Bush administration is anything but conventional or let themselves take "no" for an answer - and in some regards this is probably a very good thing.