Political Skills Assist Panetta as Spymaster

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WASHINGTON—Intelligence reports landing on CIA Director Leon Panetta's desk last July made the alarming claim that the Pakistani Taliban could have a nuclear device.

Mr. Panetta soon called his Pakistani counterpart with an offer, according to a senior intelligence official. The Central Intelligence Agency would hunt down Pakistan's top terrorist target, but Mr. Panetta needed information on any nuclear threat.

The nuclear threat didn't check out. But a month later, a CIA drone killed Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud.

Since then, Pakistani information long sought by CIA headquarters at Langley, Va., has flowed with greater regularity, assisting a string of operations that has significantly weakened Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda terror network, intelligence officials said.

The 71-year-old Mr. Panetta, a former congressman and White House chief of staff under Bill Clinton, has brought to Langley a politician's focus on repairing strained relationships, especially with mercurial Pakistan. Pakistani and American officials say has paid off—notably with the capture of 20 al Qaeda and Taliban militants in recent months.

'This Is the Toughest Job I've Had'

Read more from Mr. Panetta's discussion with the Journal.

When Mr. Panetta was appointed by President Barack Obama to lead "The Agency" over a year ago, some lawmakers and CIA officers worried his political background would be a liability. But his experience forging relationships and cutting deals seems to be helping his evolution to spymaster.

In a city divided by partisan battling, Mr. Panetta hasn't yet drawn the kind of political fire faced by other administration officials, despite his agency's sensitive covert actions in Pakistan. A continuing program to hunt down al Qaeda operatives with unmanned drone flights—a program the CIA declines to acknowledge publicly—has exposed the administration to charges of extrajudicial killing. Pakistan has drawn heavy criticism in recent years from both sides of the political divide.

Eyeing human rights groups' calls for probes and disclosures on the drone program, a nervousness among officers also remains about investigations into current and future CIA counterterror programs, a former senior intelligence official said.

Mr. Panetta, in an interview this past week in his seventh-floor office overlooking CIA's wooded campus, said CIA officers are primarily focused on doing their jobs well. "What I have to do is give them the greatest assurance that I can that I'm going to fight for them and try to protect them," he said, "and that's the best assurance I can give anybody."

Moreover, Mr. Panetta has never before had direct responsibility for lives—a fact driven home on Dec. 30 when seven CIA officers were killed in a suicide bombing across the Pakistani border in Afghanistan.

"I've had a lot of tough jobs in this town," Mr. Panetta said in the interview. "This is the toughest job I've had."

Tensions between the U.S. and Pakistani spy services had been growing steadily since 2005, when the U.S. first began to confront Pakistan about withholding intelligence. Charges included allegations that some officers in Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency had ties to al Qaeda-affiliated groups and the 2008 bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul.

In March 2009, Mr. Panetta traveled to India and Pakistan to meet with top officials. By making India his first stop, Mr. Panetta signaled to Pakistan that he was cultivating relationships beyond the ISI, said Bruce Riedel, a former CIA official who ran the Obama administration's first review of Afghanistan and Pakistan policy.

"He brings to this part of the job the political skills of someone who knows that you often have to work with people with different agendas and keep your eyes open while you're working with them," Mr. Riedel said.

Mr. Panetta made sure to keep in regular contact with ISI chief Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha. Their relationship reached a turning point in August with the CIA's killing of Mr. Mehsud, believed to be responsible for the assassination of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

The U.S. had long been debating whether to go after Mr. Mehsud since he hadn't attacked the U.S. directly, said an official familiar with the debates. But the intelligence reports provided Mr. Panetta an opportunity to give the Pakistanis something they'd long sought: Mr. Mehsud's demise.

Pakistani officials say Mr. Panetta has also worked to reduce civilian deaths from the drone strikes. That has reduced Pakistani anger over the campaign, they said. About 20 noncombatants have died in drone strikes since Mr. Panetta took office, compared with the 400 to 500 militants killed, a U.S. counterterrorism official said.

Such moves showed a respect for the Pakistanis as equal partners, a senior Pakistani official said. "He's been able to get much more cooperation," the official said. "He puts everything in a political context.He tries to understand what your needs are," the official said.

Mr. Panetta said that the long-strained relationship has "improved a great deal" though he shied away from saying it had turned a corner. One senior intelligence official cautioned that the relationship with ISI has often been cyclical.

Between the CIA and ISI, "there is a greater sense of trust and confidence," said White House counterterrorism chief John Brennan, who attributed it to Mr. Panetta's efforts.

The relationship has proved to be valuable in the wake of the Dec. 30 attack on the CIA's base outside the Afghan city of Khost. Mr. Panetta directed his staff to redouble their efforts against al Qaeda in response. CIA drones have executed 22 missile strikes since then, according to a senior intelligence official, including one on March 8 that killed an al Qaeda explosives expert involved in the attack.

In late January, a joint Pakistani-CIA raid captured another top target, the second in command of the Afghan Taliban, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar. Coordinated operations are also under way against the Haqqani Network, a militant faction believed to have aided in the Khost attack, officials said.

Captures of al Qaeda and Taliban militants are reviving debates over what to do with detainees. Senator Christopher S. Bond, the top Republican on the Senate intelligence panel, said the CIA won't get information it needs from detainees under current policies, which allow the CIA to use only the 19 interrogation techniques the military uses.

"This administration has a risk-averse mentality," Mr. Bond said. "You need to get the information."

Mr. Panetta largely chalks the critique up to politics, saying Mr. Baradar has provided intelligence in multiple CIA interrogation sessions.

"I realize that that's been an issue that has kind of gotten into the political arena," he said. "I understand the concerns of some members, but I really do feel like we have the tools in place to do what we have to do to get the intelligence that we need," he said.

Write to Siobhan Gorman at siobhan.gorman@wsj.com

Political Skills Assist Panetta as Spymaster - WSJ.com