CIA hired outsiders for planned Al Qaeda assassinations

Executives from Blackwater, which has generated controversy because of its aggressive tactics in Iraq, helped the spy agency with planning, training, and surveillance.

The CIA spent several million dollars on the program, which did not capture or kill any terrorist suspects.

The fact that the CIA used an outside security company for the program was one major reason that Leon E. Panetta, the new CIA director, became alarmed and called an emergency meeting to tell Congress that the agency had withheld details of the program for years, the officials said.

It is unclear whether the CIA had planned to use the contractors to capture or kill Al Qaeda operatives or just to help with training and surveillance. American spy agencies have in recent years outsourced some highly controversial work, including the interrogation of prisoners.

But government officials said the thought of bringing outsiders into a program with lethal authority raised deep concerns about accountability in covert operations.

Officials said that the CIA did not have a formal contract with Blackwater USA for this program but instead had individual agreements with top company officials, including the company’s founder, Erik D. Prince, a politically connected former member of the Navy Seals and the heir to a large family fortune.

Blackwater’s work on the program actually ended years before Panetta took over the agency, after senior CIA officials themselves questioned the wisdom of using outsiders in a targeted killing program.

Blackwater USA, which has changed its name, most recently to Xe Services, and is based in North Carolina, has in recent years received millions of dollars in government contracts, growing so large that the Bush administration said it was a necessary part of its war operation in Iraq.

It has also drawn controversy. Blackwater employees hired to guard American diplomats in Iraq were accused of using excessive force on several occasions, including shootings in downtown Baghdad in 2007 in which 17 civilians were killed.

Iraqi officials have since refused to renew the company’s operating license.

Several current and former government officials interviewed for this report spoke only on the condition of anonymity because they were discussing details of a still classified program.

Paul Gimigliano, a CIA spokesman, declined to provide details about the canceled program, but he said that Panetta’s decision on the assassination program was “clear and straightforward.’’

“Director Panetta thought this effort should be briefed to Congress, and he did so,’’ Gimigliano said. “He also knew it hadn’t been successful, so he ended it.’’

A Xe spokeswoman did not return calls seeking comment.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat from California who leads the Senate Intelligence Committee, declined to give details of the program.

But she praised Panetta for notifying Congress. “It is too easy to contract out work that you don’t want to accept responsibility for,’’ she said.

The CIA this summer conducted an internal review of the assassination program that recently was presented to the White House and the congressional intelligence committees.

The officials said that the review asserted that Panetta’s predecessors did not believe that they needed to tell Congress because the program was not far enough developed.

The House Intelligence Committee is investigating why lawmakers were never told about the program.

According to current and former government officials, former Vice President Dick Cheney told CIA officers in 2002 that the spy agency did not need to tell lawmakers because the agency already had legal authority to kill Al Qaeda leaders.