A good spy is hard to find
Some say that the CIA already had its brain drain--in the 1990s when intelligence budgets were slashed and recruitment slowed to a near freeze. "It set up a situation where the people who should have been coming in in the '90s and would now have 10 years' experience aren't there," says a former intelligence official. The good news: The agency started hiring again in 1998. But at this point, about 40 percent of its workforce has been there seven years or less. With a bulge of people near retirement, this has left the agency scrambling to find experienced managers--while fighting a war against terrorism.
In some ways, however, the CIA is ahead of the curve. Many of its recruits were thrown into positions of responsibility early to deal with new threats. And hiring is at record levels. The CIA had some 2,000 openings last year--and last month alone, the agency received 11,780 resumes.
Stealing secrets. Some parts of the CIA, however, such as its Clandestine Service, will take time to rebuild. Veterans say that it takes seven to 10 years to become a trained, qualified, and experienced case officer. "You can steal secrets in different ways than you did 40 years ago," says James Pavitt, who recently ran the Directorate of Operations, which recruits spies. "But in the end, it's still the ability to convince someone to commit espionage."
The workforce of the National Security Agency, which eavesdrops on communications worldwide, is also growing younger. With some 30,000 employees, the NSA will hire 1,500 people a year for the next few years. With 1,000 retiring annually, that leaves a net yearly gain of about 500 people, though many with experience are leaving. Still, an NSA spokesperson says the agency has "an ample number of experienced middle managers."
The FBI, meanwhile, was blessed by its past. A hiring freeze in the 1980s means that relatively fewer FBI personnel are now eligible to retire. For instance, the bureau has 11,800 special agents. During the next four years only about 1,400, or 12 percent, of them can retire. Meanwhile, in 2003 and 2004, the bureau hired 1,900 new agents. So, like the CIA, the FBI will see its next big retirement bulge in two decades. What the nation's antiterrorism needs will be then is anybody's guess. -Kevin Whitelaw and Chitra Ragavan
This story appears in the November 22, 2004 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.
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