This Christian Science Monitor editorial advocates increased reliance on polygraph screening by the FBI. Excerpt:
We will find spies and we will prosecute them,” said President Bush at his first press conference last week. But catching a spy red-handed, as the FBI apparently did with agent Robert Hanssen this month, is like trying to dazzle a master magician with his own magic trick. Something extraordinary is called for.
The FBI itself failed to detect Mr. Hanssen’s alleged dealings with the Russians for 15 years. Was that the agency’s fault or a result of the fact that he was a 27-year veteran specializing in counterintelligence?
Up to now, the FBI has been reluctant to regularly use one tool in its bag of tricks – lie detectors – to catch employees who breach national security.
The agency has generally put an individual’s right to privacy and a need to maintain a climate of trust above the government’s need to know.
Lax use of these polygraph machines at the FBI has been cited as one possible reason why agent Hanssen was allegedly able to remain undetected for so long. The FBI gives such tests to all applicants as a matter of course, but does not do routine testing of agents, in sharp contrast with the CIA.
You can help set the editors at the Christian Science Monitor straight about polygraph “testing” by e-mailing them a letter at OpEd@csps.com. Be sure to include your name, hometown, and state so that your letter may be considered for publication.