Joe Lieberman: “if I may briefly respond to the Senator from Virginia, the case cited of the INR, the intelligence division at the State…”

“if I may briefly respond to the Senator from Virginia, the case cited of the INR, the intelligence division at the State Department, is an interesting one. They came to a different opinion than some other constituent agencies of the American intelligence community with regard to, for instance, prewar WMD in Iraq. But that was a matter of analysis primarily, not collection. They looked at the data. Incidentally, some of the data they looked at were data they got from these three agencies. These are the three largest collection agencies and they are unique in that they serve the whole community. There is certainly no intention to diminish the Secretary of Defense. The Secretary of Defense has a very powerful position and Senator Collins and I want to have the Secretary remain that powerful. We had very interesting testimony before our committee by a witness who said-- he had been in the Department of Defense and stepped out to work with a think tank where he watches all of this--over the years when there were conflicts or disagreements between the Secretary of Defense and the Director of Central Intelligence, the Secretary of Defense always wins because the Secretary of Defense has so much muscle. And that is the reality.”