WASHINGTON – Some senior Defense Department officials are pushing to formally separate the National Security Agency from the U.S. Cyber Command, in a move that people familiar with the case say is the country’s top electronic spy agency under civilian leadership would bring.
According to a US official and another person familiar with the matter, the proposal in question has been circulated among Pentagon officials in recent days. It is supported by Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller, who was installed at the Pentagon in early November.
The proposal would split control of the two giant agencies in the last weeks of the Trump administration and comes amid revelations of a suspected Russian hack of US agencies. It appears to be a dusted version of a version previously driven into the Pentagon by then Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, according to another US official. “This is very preliminary,” the official said, adding that a meeting is scheduled next week to discuss the proposal.
Many current and former officials say the partnership between the two espionage entities is vital for sharing information and resources, but critics have said the arrangement could lead to bureaucratic headaches. Some officials also say the two agencies have dueling missions that are in conflict with each other as Cyber Command focuses on offensive operations while the NSA’s main purpose is intelligence gathering. Some advocates of divorce believe that the two agencies are simply too critical and too big to be managed by one leader.
The NSA and Cyber Command are both headquartered in Fort Meade, Maryland and run by General Paul Nakasone. The scheme is known as a “double hat,” with one person at the helm of both the US government’s top electronic spy agency and the military organization responsible for conducting offensive cyber operations against opponents abroad.
Formal separation of the NSA and Cyber Command has been under consideration for years by officials and lawmakers and was repeatedly weighed in during the Obama administration. It is controversial because it could politicize the intelligence produced by the NSA, one of the main feeds of highly sensitive information to the country’s military. It would also amount to a sweeping bureaucratic restructuring of intelligence and cybersecurity agencies during a change in presidential governments.
Following the surveillance revelations in 2013 from former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, a presidential task force recommended splitting the top post as part of a wider series of overhauls of how the US is engaged in surveillance activities, but the recommendation was rejected by the White House.
Defense and Cyber Command did not immediately respond to requests for comment. NSA declined to comment.
A spokesman for Army General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, declined to comment on General Milley’s position. Chairman Milley has not revised or endorsed any recommendation to split cybercom and NSA, said spokesman Colonel David Butler.
The possibility of a change before the end of the Trump administration has been criticized by the top House Democrat on intelligence issues.
“Any action to end the dual-hat relationship could have serious consequences for our national security, especially at a time when the country is grappling with perhaps the most damaging cyber attack in our country’s history,” said House Armed Services Chairman Committee. Adam Smith (D., Wash) said in a statement Saturday, referring to the suspected Russian hack of federal agencies and others.
It is not clear how the divorce could legally take place without the government proving to Congress that certain conditions required by law have been met, people familiar with the matter said.
Mr. Miller, who replaced Mark Esper as Secretary of Defense, took over the Department of Defense at the same time that Ezra Cohen-Watnick was appointed Acting Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security, a leading intelligence agency at the Pentagon. Mr. Cohen-Watnick, along with Kash Patel, who became Mr. Miller’s chief of staff, support the initiative, according to people in the intelligence community familiar with the case.
Mr Cohen-Watnick previously worked with the National Security Council on intelligence issues, but was removed in 2017 by former National Security Adviser HR McMaster. He moved to the Pentagon along with Mr. Patel, a former Republican aide on Capitol Hill and an employee of the National Security Council who was appointed Chief of Staff to Mr. Miller amid a wider series of staff changes at the Pentagon.
Write to Dustin Volz at [email protected] and Gordon Lubold at [email protected]
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