Denial is his middle name

Following up on my post yesterday about Rumsfiend's secret spy office, they're denying it.

The Pentagon acknowledged Sunday that it is trying to improve its network of spies abroad but denied a published report that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had reinterpreted U.S. law to create an espionage unit under his control.

Pentagon spokesman Lawrence DiRita said it was "accurate and should not be surprising" that the Pentagon would try to improve its human spying capability, an area that the 9/11 Commission concluded was inadequate.

[...]

DiRita denied that Rumsfeld controls a secret group of spies. "There is no unit that is directly reportable to the Secretary of Defense for clandestine operations as is described in The Washington Post," he said in a statement. "Further, the Department is not attempting to 'bend' statutes to fit desired activities, as is suggested in this article."
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Maybe Ashcroft wrote Rums a memo approving it.

The newspaper said the unit was established "using 'reprogrammed' funds without explicit congressional authority or appropriation."

Under U.S. law, Pentagon intelligence missions are subject to less rigorous congressional oversight than similar operations carried out by the CIA.

Rumsfeld fought for months against an intelligence overhaul bill passed by Congress late last year that leaves intact the CIA's control over human intelligence and which puts 15 U.S. intelligence agencies under a newly created national intelligence director. The Defense secretary dropped his objections only after House Republican leaders inserted language that was seen as preserving the Pentagon's autonomy.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said on CBS' Face the Nation that he knew nothing of such a Pentagon unit and expected his panel to hold hearings about it. He said that he "would doubt" the unit was illegal.

See there. All legal.

Spy vs. Spy