Keeping America Safe: CIA Director Burns reflects

Summary

Consider This from NPR: Keeping America Safe – CIA Director Bill Burns Reflects

Release Date: January 14, 2025

In the latest episode of NPR's "Consider This," host Mary Louise Kelly engages in an in-depth conversation with Bill Burns, the outgoing Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). As Burns wraps up his four-year tenure, he provides valuable insights into the evolving threats facing the United States and shares his perspectives on leadership, global conflicts, and the future of intelligence operations.

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A Night Filled with Concerns: The Human Element

Bill Burns opens the discussion by addressing the personal toll of his role. Reflecting on what keeps him awake at night, Burns emphasizes the paramount importance of people within the intelligence community.

“The honest answer is people.”
— Bill Burns ([00:12])

He highlights the sacrifices made by CIA officers, pointing to the memorial wall at headquarters adorned with 140 stars, each representing a fallen colleague. This poignant reminder underscores the human cost of safeguarding national security.

“Every morning I walk by our memorial wall... that's something that is bound to keep me up at night.”
— Bill Burns ([00:38])

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Navigating Global Threats: Russia, Ukraine, and Beyond

Throughout his tenure, Burns has confronted a series of escalating global threats. He delves into the complexities of the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict, offering strategic assessments and recommendations for future administrations.

“Putin understands that time is not necessarily on his side, which is what I think he believes today.”
— Bill Burns ([04:37])

Burns asserts that the United States' support for Ukraine has been pivotal, detailing the provision of weapons and ammunition that have enabled significant advances against Russian forces. However, he acknowledges Ukraine's persistent manpower challenges, a vulnerability that Russia continues to exploit.

“The manpower disadvantage is something that Putin's taking advantage of.”
— Bill Burns ([05:08])

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Middle East Instability and Ceasefire Efforts

Shifting focus to the Middle East, Burns discusses the volatile situation following the Hamas attack on Israel and the subsequent Israeli response. He remains cautiously optimistic about the prospects for a ceasefire in Gaza, emphasizing the humanitarian imperative.

“This is not just about brackets in negotiating texts... it's about human beings.”
— Bill Burns ([06:15])

Burns underscores the critical need for political leaders to prioritize human lives over bureaucratic perfection, advocating for serious and swift negotiations to alleviate the suffering of civilians and hostages alike.

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The Persistent Threat of ISIS: Domestic Terrorism Concerns

Addressing the recent terrorist attack in New Orleans, Burns elaborates on the enduring threat posed by ISIS, particularly its Khorasan affiliate based in South Asia. He explains the agency's proactive measures in disrupting external plots and combating the organization's ability to inspire lone-wolf attacks.

“The danger that ISIS can pose... is a significant threat.”
— Bill Burns ([09:13])

Despite successful operations, such as thwarting a plot at a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna, Burns acknowledges the challenges in completely eradicating ISIS's influence and the unpredictable nature of radicalization.

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China’s Cyber Prowess and the Escalation of Cyber Attacks

A significant portion of Burns' tenure has been dominated by the rising cyber threats emanating from China. He discusses the sophisticated nature of recent cyber attacks, notably the Salt Typhoon incident targeting U.S. telecom companies.

“This is pretty sophisticated. Yeah.”
— Bill Burns ([10:47])

Burns highlights the CIA's strategic pivot towards prioritizing China, including the establishment of a dedicated China Mission Center and a tripling of the budget allocated to Chinese intelligence efforts. He characterizes the current landscape as a "revolution in technology," necessitating a corresponding evolution in intelligence practices.

“We have to begin to revolutionize the practice of intelligence.”
— Bill Burns ([11:55])

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Ensuring an Apolitical Transition: Handover to Successor John Ratcliffe

As Burns prepares to step down, he addresses the sensitive topic of transitioning leadership to John Ratcliffe, his designated successor. Drawing parallels to past administrations, he emphasizes the importance of maintaining the CIA's apolitical stance and fostering a seamless handover.

“This is an apolitical institution... made up of men and women who are patriotic.”
— Bill Burns ([13:21])

Burns expresses confidence in the incoming administration's ability to uphold the integrity of the intelligence community, contrasting the current transition with challenges faced during previous political upheavals.

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Looking Ahead: Personal Reflections and Future Plans

On a personal note, Burns shares his plans post-CIA, reflecting a desire to balance his professional responsibilities with personal passions. He looks forward to participating in his long-standing tradition of attending the NCAA men's basketball tournament with his brothers, signaling a return to a semblance of normalcy after years of high-stakes leadership.

“Probably sleep... I'm determined to actually get there with the three of them.”
— Bill Burns ([15:19])

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Conclusion

As CIA Director Bill Burns concludes his service, his reflections offer a comprehensive overview of the multifaceted challenges faced by the intelligence community. From geopolitical tensions and cyber warfare to the enduring fight against terrorism, Burns' insights provide a valuable roadmap for his successor and underscore the critical role of intelligence in national security.

This episode was produced by Noah Caldwell and Mark Rivers, edited by Ashley Brown and Courtney Dorning, with executive production by Sammy Yenigan.

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Notable Quotes:

• “The honest answer is people.” — Bill Burns ([00:12])
• “Every morning I walk by our memorial wall... that's something that is bound to keep me up at night.” — Bill Burns ([00:38])
• “Putin understands that time is not necessarily on his side, which is what I think he believes today.” — Bill Burns ([04:37])
• “This is not just about brackets in negotiating texts... it's about human beings.” — Bill Burns ([06:15])
• “The danger that ISIS can pose... is a significant threat.” — Bill Burns ([09:13])
• “This is pretty sophisticated. Yeah.” — Bill Burns ([10:47])
• “We have to begin to revolutionize the practice of intelligence.” — Bill Burns ([11:55])
• “This is an apolitical institution... made up of men and women who are patriotic.” — Bill Burns ([13:21])
• “Probably sleep... I'm determined to actually get there with the three of them.” — Bill Burns ([15:19])

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By providing a structured and comprehensive overview, this summary encapsulates the key discussions and insights from the episode, offering valuable context and understanding for listeners and non-listeners alike.

Transcript

[Mary Louise Kelly]

Shortly after he took over as CIA director, I sat down with Bill Burns in his office at CIA headquarters in Northern Virginia and asked him this question. What keeps you awake at night?

[Bill Burns]

Oh, one thing I've learned, especially in this job over the last four months, that there's a certain amount of interrupted sleep that comes with the job or comes with the territory. You know, the honest answer is people.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

When I caught up with him last week, same office, four years later, I wanted to know if the answer to that question had changed.

[Bill Burns]

You know, I have a lot of colleagues who are doing really hard jobs in really hard places right now, and I can't make risk go away.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

It hasn't.

[Bill Burns]

And every morning I walk by our memorial wall, you know, in the lobby of headquarters with 140 stars on the wall, which are a vivid reminder of the sacrifices that CIA officers make. And so that's something that is bound to keep me up at night.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

In the time Burns has served as chief of the Central Intelligence Agency, the threats to his colleagues and to the increased, intensified. Russia invaded Ukraine. Hamas attacked Israel. Israel responded, and the conflict has since destabilized large parts of the Middle East. China continues to challenge the US in a myriad of ways. And a 42 year old man inspired by ISIS committed an act of domestic terrorism in New Orleans. Consider this. Bill Burns is finishing up his tenure as CIA director, but the threats to America continue. Coming up, he reflects on the challenges he's navigating and what might await his successor. From npr, I'm Mary Louise Kelly.

[Bill Burns]

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[Mary Louise Kelly]

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[Bill Burns]

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[Mary Louise Kelly]

It'S consider this from NPR. On a shelf in his office at CIA headquarters, Director Bill Burns keeps a tiny scaled model of a house. It's the house in Kabul, Afghanistan, where Al Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri was killed by a US drone strike in 2022. When we went out to interview him last week, Burns pointed to the exact balcony on which Zawahiri was standing. There was pride in his voice. The CIA had never stopped looking for the guy, even more than two decades after 9 11. But it was also A reminder of challeng of adversaries that will outlast any single CIA director. As Burns wraps up four years running the Central Intelligence Agency, I wanted to ask about some of them, starting with Russia and Vladimir Putin. I know you're fond of joking that most of your gray hair came from dealing with Vladimir Putin. I will note your hair is entirely gray as we sit and speak today. You're about to leave government service. Vladimir Putin is still running Russia, is marking a quarter century doing so, and shows no signs he's going anywhere. So what's your best advice to your successor for how to handle him?

[Bill Burns]

Oh, I've had a couple of conversations with my successor, which on Radcliffe, and I'm not sure he needs my free advice.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

But you must have picked up a tip or two along the way.

[Bill Burns]

Yeah, no, I certainly have. In my long experience dealing with and interacting with Putin, I mean, I think he's a big believer in control and intimidation. He's deeply suspicious of people around him and always looking for vulnerabilities that he can take advantage of. And so, as the new administration thinks about the prospect of negotiations over Ukraine this year in 2025, the issue, I think, is going to be how do you help President Zelenskyy in Ukraine sustain enough leverage to ensure that those negotiations are not just on Putin's terms? And how do you continue to inflict on Russia so that Putin understands that time is not necessarily on his side, which is what I think he believes today.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

A CIA director, I know you don't do policy, but you do assess what is working and what isn't.

[Bill Burns]

Yes.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

Did the US hold back too much in an effort not to antagonize Russia in terms of weapons it supplied, in terms of limits on what Ukraine could do with them?

[Bill Burns]

I don't think so. I mean, I think there were some very careful choices that the President made over the course of this that enabled the Ukraine, Ukrainians not just to hold the line, but also to make some significant advances against the Russians, especially in.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

2022 or we're in 2025, and they're saying morale is low, they're being decimated.

[Bill Burns]

There are. But, I mean, the most recent supplemental assistance package, which was the subject of pretty intense debate in the Congress. I spent hours with the new speaker of the House talking to him about my experience on all those travels to Ukraine and what was at stake. And I think that's provided, at least in terms of weapons and amb. Ammunition and equipment, a boost for the Ukrainians, too. But they do face A huge manpower challenge. It's not a question of their courage or tenacity, which I don't doubt for a minute. But that manpower disadvantage is something that Putin's taking advantage of.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

The Middle east, who or what is blocking a ceasefire on Gaza at this point?

[Bill Burns]

At this point, I still think there's a chance. I mean, I've learned the hard way not to get my hopes up. I do think there remains. Remains a chance to get a deal. And we'll certainly, in this administration work very hard at that right up until January 20th. And I think the coordination with the new administration on this issue has been good. So I think there's a chance. I mean, and the thing that I always remember is that this is not just an abstraction. I mean, this is not just about brackets in negotiating texts. It's about human beings. It's about hostages held in hellish conditions. It's about their families with whom I meet regularly. And it's about Gazan civilians who are also hellish conditions right now and suffering terribly, especially through this winter. So there's every reason for political leaders to recognize that enough is enough, that perfect is rarely on the menu in the Middle east and that it's time to make a deal. And I do think the negotiations that are going on right now are quite serious and do offer the possibility at least, of getting this done in the next couple weeks.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

You just said coordination on this issue. The Middle east has been great with the incoming team, which suggests other issues that has perhaps been trickier.

[Bill Burns]

No, it's just the only one that I was speaking to is on this one, too. And that's the one I'm most familiar with anyway, as well.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

Isis, which I was not expecting to come in and ask you about in 2025, but we have a terror attack, a horrible terror attack in New Orleans last week, which is raising fresh questions. The man who drove that truck into the crowd had an Islamic State flag on his vehicle. The FBI says he posted videos proclaim support for isis. What is the state of isis?

[Bill Burns]

Oh, I think we're quite concerned, as has been FBI, about the rising threat posed by isis, especially isis. Khorasan based in South Asia.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

That's how you would describe it. A rising threat.

[Bill Burns]

A rising threat. Yeah. We can see the external plotting that that particular branch of ISIS is engaged in. And we're very sharply focused as an agency on dealing with that threat. Supporting the FBI in the New Orleans case, where, as FBI has said publicly, their belief is that the man who perpetrated that horrific act was inspired by isis, but operated alone. But we're quite concerned about other instances in which ISIS is doing external plotting. I mean last summer we shared intelligence with our Austrian counterparts that helped protect tens of thousands of concert goers at a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna and resulted in the arrest of four ISIS operatives. We also under the duty to warn that we operate under, provided the Russians and the Iranians with advanced intelligence on plots we knew that ISIS was engaged in and that resulted in a large number of deaths in Moscow in a terrorist attack there and in Iran.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

So there are all these efforts and yet ISIS is still able to reach, still able to inspire a 42 year old realtor in Houston. Do you have any visibility into how?

[Bill Burns]

No, I mean, I think it's a complicated story in that 42 year old, 2 year old's case of lots of other failures in his life apparently. So it's always hard to understand how people are inspired. But the danger that ISIS can pose, even if it's not involved in the actual plotting or carrying out of an act through its ability to inspire people, is a significant threat.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

One or two on China and the recent cyber attack by China into US phone companies. The Salt typhoon attack. Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, who chairs the Intelligence Committee has called it, and I quote, the worst telecom hack in our nation's history by far. Is it?

[Bill Burns]

Oh, I have great respect for Senator Warner and I think he's right to highlight the seriousness of this concern. It's something that we're still in the process of, you know, understanding the breadth of it as well. It's a reminder not to underestimate the Chinese services and their determination in the case of Salt typhoon and US telecom companies, but also what's called Vault Typhoon, which was an effort to penetrate critical infrastructure. And so it's not in our interest to underestimate Chinese capability or determination on these issues.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

Is it the start of something new? Would you describe this? Because China, I think it's fair to say, has been seen as active in cyber attacks, but messier than some other actors, not the most sophisticated. Does this strike you as a new level of sophistication that they're able to do this?

[Bill Burns]

This is pretty sophisticated. Yeah. And it's a reminder of what they're capable of. And it's a reminder of one of the most significant priorities in this agency over the last four years, which has been to invest in long term priorities. People's Republic of China being one, the revolution in technology being a second. Because it's technology that's the main arena for competition with China. So we formed a new China Mission center, the only single country mission center that we have at this agency. We have tripled the budget at CIA for the China target. Across the whole CIA, it's now about 20% to the overall CIA budget. So it's a reflection of the fact that we realize the challenge ahead. And this is one of those moments of, I think, revolutionary change on the international landscape with intense major power competition with China and with Russia, but also a revolution in technology unlike anything we've seen since the Industrial Revolution. What that means for us at CIA and has meant over the last four years is that we have to begin to revolutionize the practice of intelligence.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

So I do want to ask about the transition, because the last time this particular president elect transitioned in, Donald Trump had spent the campaign ridiculing and attacking the leaders of the intelligence community. He was sworn into office having just compared US Intelligence agencies to Nazis. How's that going this time around? How would it compare to this time around?

[Bill Burns]

Well, I've had a couple of conversations with my successor, at least the CIA director designee, John Ratcliffe, and I promised him that we would ensure the smoothest possible transition here. I stressed to him that this is an apolitical institution, that I was confident that my colleagues here, for whom I have the deepest respect and admiration, would show him what CIA was capable of, just as they showed me what CIA is capable of. And so we'll continue to work hard at that, because that's not only what I owe the women and men of CIA, but I think that's what's going to serve American interests the best, too.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

I mean, I'm asking in part because the relationship, if anything, deteriorated from there and led to the famous moment in Helsinki where the US Commander in chief suggested he believed Vladimir Putin over his own intelligence community. Did you, Bill Burns, ever figure out why?

[Bill Burns]

No, I didn't figure out why. And my hope, at least, is that in this new administration that people will understand the significance of good intelligence for any national security goals that the new administration wants to set and to understand the reality that this is an apolitical institution, you know, made up of men and women who are patriotic, who are deeply committed to the best interests of this country. And if you trust them and respect them, they'll produce amazing things.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

I'm just going to push you on this because you are a Russia expert and a past US Ambassador in Moscow. You never figured out why Donald Trump was so deferential to Vladimir Putin.

[Bill Burns]

No, I mean, that's not something. And I've commented on that in the past before I was back in government. But it's not something I'm going to offer opinions about today.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

On briefings, has Trump asked for daily intelligence briefings? Is he getting them?

[Bill Burns]

There have been, I mean, these are managed by the director of national intelligence, by my friend D'Avril Haynes, and there have been several briefings and certainly CIA officers contribute to them.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

Same format as Joe Biden gets.

[Bill Burns]

Same in terms of the pdb, at least. The president's daily brief, which is what's the basis for the briefings for President Elect Trump as well.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

And you mentioned John Ratcliffe, who, if confirmed by the Senate, will succeed you in this office on the seventh floor of headquarters. What have your conversations with him been like?

[Bill Burns]

Oh, very straightforward. I think he's been curious about what's transpired in the intelligence community since he was director of National Intelligence in the last year of the first Trump administration and very focused on what our priorities have been, especially on China and on technology issues as well. And I look forward to further conversations with him before this 20th of January.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

What do you have planned for the afternoon of January 20th?

[Bill Burns]

No, probably sleep. I mean, there are lots of things that I haven't done over the last four years. I have three wonderful brothers, and we had a tradition for 20 years of going to the first round of the NCAA men's basketball tournament in March. And so this year I'm determined to actually get there with the three of them.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

There we go. From the CIA to March Madness.

[Bill Burns]

That's true. Yeah.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

Bill Burns for a few more days. He is director of the CIA.

[Bill Burns]

Nice to see you there, Elise. Thank you very much.

[Mary Louise Kelly]

This episode was produced by Noah Caldwell and Mark Rivers. It was edited by Ashley Brown and Courtney Dorning. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. It's Consider this from npr. I'm Mary Louise Kelly.

[Bill Burns]

Want to hear this podcast without sponsor breaks? Amazon prime members can listen to Consider this sponsor free through Amazon Music. Or you can also support NPR's vital journalism and get consider this [e-mail] that's plus.NPR.org.