officials, however, said that the CIA had numerous operatives with experience in Afghanistan, as the country was considered strategic during the Cold War, and because the U.S. has been involved in active warfare there for the last eight years. Security procedures A U.S. intelligence official said the danger of using informants was inherent but unavoidable. Intelligence agencies have to rely on unsavory individuals to penetrate terrorist groups because no one else has the access. Those hazards would be neither denied nor ignored by the CIA officers. Former intelligence officials said they were deeply troubled about al-Balawi's ability to get close to so many CIA officers. A former agency case officer expressed surprise that "a potential hostile" was able to be in immediate proximity to a large number of CIA operatives. "Why the officers would show a source all their faces, that alone was a terrible decision," said one former senior CIA paramilitary operative who served in Afghanistan. Larry C. Johnson, a former CIA officer and counter-terrorism agent, said that a source supposedly as significant as al-Balawi should never have been brought inside the base, because it risked exposing him. Robert Baer, a former CIA officer, said that the agency would be outsourcing intelligence and would have to go to the Jordanians "because we simply cannot, as blond haired blue eyed Americans, cannot get into these camps." He said the attack would make the CIA more reluctant to engage with informants. He added that the attack would have been a huge setback for the CIA's intelligence collection in Afghanistan. "You're talking about an institutional nightmare," said Tim Weiner, author of the book Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA. Former 9/11 Commission chairman Lee H. Hamilton predicted that the attack would forever change how the CIA handles informants. "They will never forget this lesson," he said. Media reports and commentary Media reports said the attack struck at the heart of American covert operations in the region, with some characterizing it as the CIA's Pearl Harbor. It raised doubts about the reliability of the Afghan forces that are being trained by the United States and its allies, and on the practicality of Western exit strategies that involve training the Afghan army and policy with the aim of enabling them to fight the Taliban on their own. David Ignatius, a columnist for the Washington Post and the author of the book Body