WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON - President-elect Barack Obama has selected Leon E. Panetta to serve as the next director of the CIA, apparently concluding that a spy chief who understands politics might be more important than one with deep experience in intelligence matters.
The surprise pick of Panetta, a former congressman and Clinton administration official, would give Obama a CIA director with unquestioned loyalty to the White House and an experienced managerial hand to steer the new administration away from intelligence scandals.
But the selection, disclosed yesterday by Democratic officials who spoke on condition of anonymity, runs the risk of putting an outsider at the helm just as the CIA seemed to be regaining its footing after years of intense criticism for intelligence failures leading up to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and for the aggressive interrogation tactics the agency used in their aftermath.
Panetta, who was chief of staff to former President Bill Clinton, is regarded as a bright political operative and capable manager. But if confirmed by the Senate, he would be among the few directors in agency history with no prior experience at one of the nation's spy services.
Largely for that reason, Panetta's selection met with criticism on Capitol Hill.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat who begins her tenure this week as Intelligence Committee chairman, said she was not consulted on the choice, and she indicated that she might oppose it: "My position has consistently been that I believe the agency is best served by having an intelligence professional in charge at this time."
In picking Panetta, Obama risks raising anew questions about the politicization of the CIA, a concern raised by leading lawmakers.
A senior aide to Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV said the West Virginia Democrat, who is the outgoing intelligence chairman, "would have concerns" about a Panetta nomination because the senator "has always believed that the director of CIA needs to be someone with significant operational intelligence experience, and someone outside the political realm."
Democratic officials also confirmed that Obama has selected retired Adm. Dennis C. Blair, also from outside the intelligence community, as director of national intelligence, a position created in 2004 to oversee the operations of the CIA and the other 15 agencies that make up the U.S. intelligence community.
