SecDef Rumsfield creates his own spy group (moved from ATSNN)

www.time.com
When it comes to spying, Donald Rumsfeld is an impatient man. The Defense Secretary hated having to wait for CIA spooks to make arrangements with Afghanistan's warlords before his special-operations commandos could infiltrate the country ahead of the 2001 U.S. invasion. These days Rumsfeld is even less inclined to depend on the CIA. Instead, he is pushing his generals to field a larger and more aggressive clandestine force to spy on terrorists worldwide and attack them.

Other Pentagon units also field secret agents. Code Names, a new book written by defense analyst William Arkin, identifies more than 100 secret units, intelligence programs and communications networks that the Pentagon has set up to fight terrorists. Many have exotic designations like Aztec Silence and Island Sun. "When you put together all these code names, it shows there's something going on out there and it's complex," says Arkin.

Many of the secret activities are run by the U.S. Special Operations Command in Tampa, Fla., whose 50,000 commandos have the green light to launch missions against terrorists. The command also maintains a clandestine force of several hundred undercover spies, who specialize, for example, in planting electronic sensors or scouting terrorist targets for attack. Nicknamed the Army of Northern Virginia because it is based at Fort Belvoir, outside Washington, the unit is so secretive that it frequently changes its name to throw off outsiders trying to track it. Known in the early 1980s as the Intelligence Support Activity, the outfit over the years has had code names like Capacity Gear and Gray Fox. Its operations include hunting for terrorists as well as for clandestine weapons-of-mass-destruction facilities in the Middle East.


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