Intel argot

EX-CIA CHIEF MICHAEL HAYDEN: YES, WE SPY

Former CIA chief Michael Hayden drew laughs from a banquet room full of former intelligence officers Friday when he was asked about an assertion by the current spy agency’s head, John Brennan, that the CIA doesn’t “steal secrets.”

In a February 24 interview on National Public Radio that drew public ridicule from some former spies, Brennan was asked about hints from President Barack Obama that he’d like to get the CIA back to “its traditional roots—espionage, stealing secrets—reversing this trend we've seen toward a paramilitary force,” as NPR interviewer Mary Louise Kelly put it.

“We don’t steal secrets,” Brennan responded. “We uncover, we discover, we reveal, we obtain, we elicit, we solicit. All of that.”