The CIA's tough task in recruiting spies

Here's one way the CIA's spies might have learned more about what Saddam Hussein was really up to with his weapons of mass destruction programs: Send in an undercover agent playing an oil businessman to curry favor with Mr. Hussein's two sons, Uday and Qusay, who were known to entertain such visitors and had heavy hands in the country's security apparatus.

It is conceivable that Uday, especially, who was known to have an alcohol and drug problem, would have conveyed Iraqi secrets. "What better thing to do than send in some guy who could play a sleazeball - bring Uday, Qusay sports cars, girls, whatever - and simply elicit information?" asks Robert Baer, a former undercover operative who left the CIA in 1998. "It's not a nice business, espionage. Nor is it particularly safe, but there are a lot of things that can be done."

But those kinds of things weren't done. Not then, and apparently not now. With news that Osama bin Laden's trail is still cold, the failures - no eyes on the ground in Iraq before the US invasion nor among the Al Qaeda leadership prior to 9/11 - are the focus of a plethora of investigations and reports, including the current intelligence reform bill being debated in Congress.

Nearly everyone agrees the spy program needs help. Government officials, former and current intelligence officials, and outside experts alike agree that policymakers need better information on those who would harm America's interests - from members of the Al Qaeda terror network to rogue regimes like North Korea and Iran.

But Mr. Baer and other former officials say the agency must do more than add officers and beef up language courses to change the agency's culture. They think recruiting efforts need to be redirected. They suggest enlisting first- or second-generation Americans living abroad. Moreover, they say, the agency must stop hiring operatives from the cold-war era to train today's recruits.

Michael Scheuer, a former senior intelligence official, says recruiting a terrorist to spy for the US today is much different from soliciting a Communist. During the Soviet era, he says, the CIA targeted the party's youth. It wasn't easy: Many had just come through the Communist youth organization and embraced Marxist ideology. But if the CIA spy could make contact with a young officer early, build a lasting friendship, the operative could find recruits.

"They would find that it was the politburo leaders who had the gravy jobs, nice apartments, dachas in the country, and cars," Scheuer says. "[The youth grew to] see it was nothing but gangsterism, and their disillusion with that and their growing admiration of American society made it easier for them to work with us."

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