Wall Street Journal Interviews High-Ranking McLean Secret Neighbor

The Wall Street Journal wrote about one of McLean's most secret neighbors last week: A little-known CIA veteran who is guiding Gen. David Petraeus as he takes the helm of CIA in the fall.

Michael Morell, a 31-year agency veteran, Morell has been at the center of nearly every fight against al-Qaida and has seen the limits of U.S. intelligence. He was President George W. Bush's intelligence adviser on Sept. 11, 2001, and the CIA's devil's advocate before the raid on Osama bin Laden's hideout in Pakistan, the Journal said.

In a rare interview, Morell, a longtime agency power with a nearly nonexistent public profile, emphasized the importance of humility for an agency stained by intelligence misses over 9/11 and weapons in Iraq, and controversy over interrogation techniques and rendition. "We end up having bits of information that have a multitude of possible explanations," he said. "You've got to be really humble about the business we're in," the Journal reported.

Some agency veterans say Morell may be too much of an insider. He has never worked anywhere else, and might miss areas where the CIA's culture or management are due for a change, the Journal story said.

Morell has already briefed his new boss in Kabul. Petraeus, the agency's fifth director in eight years, is the four-star general who led allied troops in Afghanistan, the Journal said.

During a two-hour briefing Morell presented Petraeus with a blue briefing book emblazoned with the CIA seal and detailing every critical program, organization and operation at the agency.

A few pieces of unclassified advice that Morell has reportedly delivered to Petraeus:

• Don't pull rank in meetings by sitting at the head of the table.
• Hold an all-hands meeting shortly after his swearing-in ceremony.
• Eat in the employee cafeteria once a week for meals with agency officers.

The story reports: The son of an autoworker, Morell joined the CIA in 1980 straight out of the University of Akron in Ohio. He began as an economic analyst stationed in the Philippines with a $15,193 annual salary. Now a slim 52-year-old with short, sandy hair and rimless glasses, he quickly developed a reputation for being focused and intense.

Read the entire story.