MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
At this precise moment, in the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, we are about to hang a right off this main road and pull up to the front gates of the CIA - the Central Intelligence Agency. We are here to interview the director.
(SOUNDBITE OF CAR WINDOW OPENING)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: You have a meeting with the director?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Stand by for me.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: Thank you.
KELLY: That would be Bill Burns. Elsewhere on the show today, you'll hear me question him on the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East - also what he calls the rising threat posed by ISIS. As Bill Burns prepares to step aside after four years running the CIA, we also asked how the agency is preparing to serve an incoming president, Donald Trump, with a well-documented history of attacking his intelligence chiefs. That's in a moment. First, another pressing priority...
China and the recent cyberattack by China into U.S. phone companies - the Salt Typhoon attack - Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, who chairs the Intelligence Committee, has called it, and I quote, "the worst telecom hack in our nation's history by far." Is it?
BILL BURNS: Oh, I have great respect for Senator Warner, and I think he's right to highlight the seriousness of this concern. It's something that we're still in the process of, you know, understanding the breadth of it as well. It's a reminder not to underestimate the Chinese services and their determination in the case of Salt Typhoon and U.S. telecom companies, but also what's called Volt Typhoon, which was an effort to penetrate critical infrastructure. And so, you know, it's not in our interest to underestimate Chinese capability or determination on these issues.
KELLY: Is it the start of something new? Would you describe this - because China, I think it's fair to say, has been seen as active in cyberattacks, but messier than some other actors, not the most sophisticated. Does this strike you as a new level of sophistication...
BURNS: Yeah...
KELLY: ...That they're able to do this?
BURNS: This is pretty sophisticated, yeah, and it's a reminder of what they're capable of. And it's a further reminder of one of the most significant priorities in this agency over the last four years, which has been to, you know, invest in long-term priorities, the People's Republic of China being one, the revolution in technology being a second because it's technology that's the main arena for competition with China. So we formed a new China mission center, the only single-country mission center that we have at this agency. We have tripled the budget at CIA for the China target across the whole CIA. It's now about 20% of the overall CIA budget.
So it's a reflection of the fact that we realize the challenge ahead. And, you know, this is one of those moments of, I think, revolutionary change on the international landscape, with intense major-power competition with China and with Russia, but also a revolution in technology unlike anything we've seen since the Industrial Revolution. What that means for us at CIA - and has meant over the last four years - is that we have to begin to revolutionize the practice of intelligence.
KELLY: So I do want to ask about the transition because the last time this particular president-elect transitioned in, Donald Trump had spent the campaign ridiculing and attacking the leaders of the intelligence community. He was sworn into office having just compared U.S. intelligence agencies to Nazis. How's that going this time around? How would it compare to this time around?
BURNS: Well, I've had a couple of conversations with my successor - at least, you know, the CIA director-designee, John Ratcliffe - and I promised him that we would ensure the smoothest possible transition here. I stressed to him that this is an apolitical institution - that I was confident that, you know, my colleagues here, for whom I have the deepest respect and admiration, would show him what CIA was capable of, just as they showed me what CIA is capable of. And so we'll continue to work hard at that because that's not only what I owe the women and men of CIA, but I think that's what's going to serve American interests the best, too.
KELLY: I mean, I'm asking in part because the relationship, if anything, deteriorated from there and led to the famous moment in Helsinki where the U.S. commander-in-chief suggested he believed Vladimir Putin over his own intelligence community. Did you, Bill Burns, ever figure out why?
BURNS: No, I didn't figure out why. And my hope, at least, is that in this new administration, that people will understand, you know, the significance of good intelligence for any national security, you know, goals that the new administration wants to set and to understand the reality that this is an apolitical institution - you know? - made up of men and women who are patriotic, who are deeply committed to the best interests of this country. And if you trust them and respect them, they'll produce amazing things.
KELLY: I'm just going to push you on this 'cause you are a Russia expert and a past U.S. ambassador in Moscow. You never figured out why Donald Trump was so deferential to Vladimir Putin?
BURNS: No. I mean, that's not something - and, you know, I've commented on that in the past before I was back in government, but it's not something I'm going to offer opinions about today.
KELLY: ...Comment on. OK. On briefings, has Trump asked for daily intelligence briefings? Is he getting them?
BURNS: There have been. I mean, these are, you know, managed by the director of national intelligence - by my friend Avril Haines. And there have been several briefings, and certainly CIA officers contribute to them.
KELLY: Same format as Joe Biden gets?
BURNS: Same in terms of the PDB at least - the president's daily brief - which is, you know, what's the basis for the briefings for President-elect Trump as well.
KELLY: And you mentioned John Ratcliffe, who, if confirmed by the Senate, will succeed you in this office on the seventh floor of headquarters. What have your conversations with him been like?
BURNS: Oh, very straightforward. I think he's been curious about, you know, what's transpired in the intelligence community since he was the director of national intelligence in the last year of the first Trump administration, and, you know, very focused on what our priorities have been, especially on China and on technology issues as well. And I, you know, look forward to further conversations with him before the 20 of January.
KELLY: Let me start to bring us full circle by asking a question I asked you when you started this job because I'm curious if your answer has changed. Given everything we've just been talking about, all the threats that you have to be across at all hours of the day and night, what does keep you awake at night?
BURNS: That was a good question four years ago. It still is now. I mean, you know, honestly, the thing that concerns me the most is risk to my officers. You know, I can, and the senior leadership here can, mitigate risk. It can try to anticipate it, can try to prevent it. But, you know, I have a lot of colleagues who are doing really hard jobs in really hard places right now, and I can't make risk go away. And every morning, I walk by our memorial wall, you know, in the lobby of headquarters, with 140 stars on the wall, which are a vivid reminder of the sacrifices that CIA officers make. And so that's something that is bound to keep me up at night.
KELLY: What do you have planned for the afternoon of January 20?
BURNS: Oh, probably sleep. I mean, there are lots of things that, you know, I haven't done over the last four years. I have three wonderful brothers, and we had a tradition for 20 years of going to the first round of the NCAA men's, you know, basketball tournament in March. And so this year, I'm determined to actually get there with the three of them.
KELLY: There we go - from the CIA to March Madness.
BURNS: That's true, yeah.
KELLY: Bill Burns - for a few more days, he is director of the CIA.
BURNS: Nice to see you, Mary Louise. Thank you very much.
(SOUNDBITE OF BUN B AND STATIK SELEKTAH'S "STILL TRILL (FEAT. METHOD MAN AND GRAFH)") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
