Obama faces delicate task with CIA

Afterward, however, Mrs. Feinstein issued a statement saying: “The law must reflect a single clear standard across the government, and right now, the best choice appears to be the Army Field Manual. I recognize that there are other views, and I am willing to work with the new administration to consider them.”

Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, another top Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, said he would consult with the C.I.A. and approve interrogation techniques that went beyond the Army Field Manual as long as they were “legal, humane and noncoercive.” But Mr. Wyden declined to say whether C.I.A. techniques ought to be made public.

C.I.A. officials have long argued that publishing a list of interrogation techniques only allows Al Qaeda to train its operatives to resist them. But they say the secrecy has led to exaggeration and myth about the agency’s detention program.

During the presidential campaign, Mr. Obama’s aides said he would consider allowing the C.I.A to continue holding prisoners in overseas jails, but would insist that inspectors from the International Committee of the Red Cross be allowed to visit them. They also said he would end the practice of “rendering” terrorism suspects to countries that have used torture.

One of the retired generals meeting with the Obama team on Wednesday, Paul D. Eaton, who oversaw the training of Iraqi forces for the Army in 2003 and 2004, said in an interview Tuesday that it was crucial for leaders to send the right message on the treatment of prisoners.

General Eaton pointed out that Vice President Dick Cheney once dismissed waterboarding , the near-drowning tactic considered by many legal authorities to be torture, as a “dunk in the water” and said such statements influenced rank-and-file soldiers to believe that brutality was not really prohibited.

“This administration has set a tone problem for the military,” General Eaton said. “We’ve had eight years of undermining good order and discipline.”

It is widely expected that Mr. Obama will replace Michael V. Hayden , the C.I.A. director. Among those mentioned as possible candidates for the job are Stephen R. Kappes , a C.I.A. veteran who is the deputy director; Tim Roemer , a former congressman from Indiana who was a member of the Sept. 11 commission; Senator Chuck Hagel , the Nebraska Republican who is retiring from the Senate in January; and Jack Devine, a former head of the agency’s clandestine service who left the C.I.A. before the Sept. 11 attacks.

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The flap over Mr. Brennan, who served as a chief of staff to George J. Tenet when he ran the C.I.A., was the biggest glitch so far in what has been an otherwise smooth transition for Mr. Obama. Some C.I.A. veterans suggest that the president-elect may have difficulty finding a candidate who can be embraced by both veteran officials at the agency and the left flank of the Democratic Party .

A. B. Krongard, the C.I.A.’s third-ranking official under Mr. Tenet when the detention and interrogation program was created, called Mr. Brennan a “casualty of war” and said he believed C.I.A. tactics were being second-guessed for political purposes. The demise of Mr. Brennan’s candidacy, Mr. Krongard said, “is a huge loss to the country.”

But Mr. Krongard said he believed that ultimately, under a new director and a new set of policies, the agency would find common ground with Mr. Obama.

“The C.I.A.’s no different than any other place,” he said. “Probably 25 percent of the people there really like him, 25 percent don’t like him, and 50 percent are open-minded.”

This article, "After sharp words on CIA, Obama faces a delicate task," was first published in The New York Times.

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