House committee investigating secret CIA counter-terrorism plan

The probe will look into a program to kill Al Qaeda leaders, and at Cheney’s possible role in hiding the plot from Congress. It marks a new level of scrutiny of Bush-era counter-terror efforts.

By Greg Miller
LA Times

4:15 PM PDT, July 17, 2009

Reporting from Washington — The House Intelligence Committee launched an investigation today into a secret CIA effort to assemble paramilitary teams to kill Al Qaeda leaders, a probe that will focus in part on whether agency officials were instructed by former Vice President Dick Cheney to hide the program from Congress.

The program, launched after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, was ended by new agency Director Leon E. Panetta last month shortly after he learned about it, and before it became operational.

The investigation is aimed at determining whether CIA or other officials violated laws that require the executive branch to keep Congress fully informed of "significant" intelligence activities. It opens a new front in the ongoing scrutiny of the agency's counter-terrorism efforts under the Bush administration.

Members of Congress didn't learn about the program until June 24, when Panetta arranged emergency briefings with the intelligence committees in both chambers. Panetta told lawmakers then that Cheney had instructed the CIA not to share information about the program with Congress.

(More here.)