CIA buildup in Afghanistan rivals peaks during Vietnam, Iraq wars

WASHINGTON -- The Central Intelligence Agency is in the midst of a major buildup in Afghanistan, part of a broad intelligence "surge" that will make the agency's station there among the largest in CIA history, according to U.S. officials.

When complete, the CIA's presence in the country is expected to rival the size of its massive stations in Iraq and Vietnam at the height of those wars. Precise numbers are classified, but one U.S. official said the CIA already has nearly 700 employees in Afghanistan.

The influx of spies, analysts and paramilitary operatives parallels the U.S. military expansion, and it comes as the nation's spy services are under pressure from Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal to improve intelligence on the Taliban and find ways to reverse a series of unsettling trends.

Among them are a twofold increase in the number of roadside bombs, a growing sophistication in the kinds of assaults aimed at coalition troops, and evidence that a Taliban group has developed an assembly line-like approach to the recruitment and grooming of suicide bombers, who then are sometimes assigned to other organizations.

The push also comes as the Obama administration is under pressure to show progress in Afghanistan, calculating it has only until next summer before public support for the war effort collapses.

The intelligence surge goes beyond the CIA to involve every major spy service, officials said, including the National Security Agency, which intercepts calls and e-mails, as well as the Defense Intelligence Agency, which tracks military threats.

The deployments come amid fresh warnings from U.S. spy services that the insurgency in Afghanistan has continued to gain territory and strength.

"The Taliban is at its most capable level since 2001, when it was ejected from the country," said a Defense Department official who has access to classified intelligence estimates. The official, and others, spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.

Overall, officials said the insurgency is believed to have 15,000 to 20,000 fighters. The estimates are imprecise, officials said, because there are loose affiliations among the groups, each of which is composed of fighters with varying commitments to the cause.

"You're not talking about fixed formations that rely solely on full-time combatants," a U.S. counterterrorism official said. "Numbers ebb and flow. Bands of fighters appear and vanish."

CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano declined to comment on the scope of the agency's presence in Afghanistan.

But a U.S. intelligence official said that spy agencies "anticipated the surge in demand for intelligence." The official said the intelligence community "has, for some time now, been deploying more officers to Afghanistan."

The CIA's buildup is the latest in a series of escalations there. After having only a handful of operatives in Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 attacks, the agency's presence climbed to an estimated 150 by the end of 2001, and 300 at the close of 2005.

McChrystal is expected to expand the use of teams that combine CIA operatives with soldiers from U.S. special operations forces.

The agency's role is likely to shift under McChrystal, who has placed a greater emphasis on protecting the Afghan population and rooting out government graft.

U.S. spy agencies have already stepped up their scrutiny of corruption in Kabul. A recent Senate report described a new wiretapping system activated last year that is aimed at tracing ties between government officials and drug kingpins in the country.

Officials said allegations of election fraud in the recent presidential race in Afghanistan were a significant setback, aiding the Taliban's efforts to portray the U.S.-backed government as illegitimate.

"The process has basically handed (the Taliban) a perfect propaganda theme to use," the Defense Department official said.