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Daniel N. Hoffman

Daniel N. Hoffman

Daniel N. Hoffman is a retired clandestine services officer and former chief of station with the Central Intelligence Agency. His combined 30 years of government service included high-level overseas and domestic positions at the CIA. He has been a Fox News contributor since May 2018. He can be reached at danielhoffman@yahoo.com.

Columns by Daniel N. Hoffman

In this photo released by China's Xinhua News Agency, Chinese President Xi Jinping talks by video with patients and medical workers at the Huoshenshan Hospital in Wuhan in central China's Hubei Province, Tuesday, March 10, 2020. China's president visited the center of the global virus outbreak Tuesday as Italy began a sweeping nationwide travel ban and people worldwide braced for the possibility of recession. For most people, the new coronavirus causes only mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia. (Xie Huanchi/Xinhua via AP) **FILE**

Xi Jinping’s coronavirus Chernobyl exposes China’s fatal vulnerabilities

Three-plus decades later, the coronavirus pandemic has exposed Communist China's fault lines, lines eerily similar to the Soviet Union's. There are the same obsequious political apparatchiks, the same brittle and opaque bureaucracy, and the same state-controlled media deployed not to inform the public but to preserve the regime's control and protect the regime's image abroad. Published March 12, 2020

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks with President Obama in Hangzhou, China, on Sept. 5, 2016 in this file photo. (Associated Press) **FILE**

Obama’s Russia failures can’t be repeated in 2020 vote

The 2020 presidential election is in the Kremlin's crosshairs. Following DNI official Shelby Pierson's recent classified briefing to lawmakers, rumors are swirling about Russia aid to President Trump and Democratic front-runner Sen. Bernie Sanders. It appears Mr. Putin again is purposely advertising Kremlin interference to tarnish the candidates' reputations and sow chaos here. Published February 27, 2020

The intelligence community might not be on the hook to provide a definitive scientific analysis of climate change and global warming, but intelligence analysts can play a key role in assessing how climate change is already affecting our national security. (Associated Press/File)

Intelligence community can help on climate change

The intelligence community might not be on the hook to provide a definitive scientific analysis of climate change and global warming, but intelligence analysts can play a key role in assessing how climate change is already affecting our national security and what the trend lines suggest. Published February 13, 2020

CIA Director Gina Haspel leads a team that runs the spies behind enemy lines and produces the analysis on which President Trump and his team rely. (Associated Press/File)

Gina Haspel keeps CIA intelligence honest, apolitical

The recent successful U.S. strikes against ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and top Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani have highlighted the crucial, multifaceted role of the intelligence community in U.S. national security. Published January 30, 2020

Former Iranian hostage William J. Daugherty stands Wednesday June 29, 2005, in front of his home in Savannah, Ga. Daugherty, a retired CIA staff officer, was held hostage in Iran for 444 days after the seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran by Iranian militants. (AP Photo/Stephen Morton) **FILE**

U.S. hostages of Iran embassy takeover deserve compensation

There is no question that 9/11 victims deserve restitution, but it shouldn't come at the expense of our fellow U.S. citizens who were held hostage in Iran. The attack and takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran was the Iranian regime's first act of terrorism against the U.S. Published January 16, 2020

This photo provided by his family shows Darren James LaBonte, 35, in Afghanistan in 2007. Mr. LaBonte was one of seven CIA employees who died when a suicide bomber blew himself up at a U.S. base in Khost, Afghanistan on Dec. 30, 2009. (AP Photo/Courtesy of LaBonte's Family) ** FILE **

CIA patriots killed in the 2009 Khost attacks will be remembered

We honor our fallen colleagues by carrying on with the mission. That is why on Dec. 30, I remember our brave Khost Base patriots who gave their lives in service to a grateful nation, "far from home," as then-CIA Director Leon Panetta said, "doing the hard work that must be done to protect our country from terrorism." Published December 26, 2019

FILE - In this Sept. 30, 2019, file photo, Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks at a dinner marking the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. BEIJING (AP) — China's ruling Communist Party is holding a key meeting amid a drastically slowing economy, ongoing protests in Hong Kong and pushback abroad against Beijing's global ambitions. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)

A primer on China’s spy war targeting the U.S. and the West

Rather than becoming the "responsible stakeholder" that U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick forecast in 2005, President Xi Jinping has chosen instead to unsheathe China's aggressive military, economic and political policies to confront the United States and its allies. Published December 12, 2019

This image released by the Department of Defense on Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2019, and displayed at a Pentagon briefing, shows an image of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. (Department of Defense via AP)

Getting al-Baghdadi was big, but the fight’s not over

On Oct. 27, U.S. Special Forces conducted a dangerous but extraordinarily effective raid resulting in the death of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, without suffering a single casualty. Hours later, Abu Hassan al-Muhajir, spokesman for the terror group, was killed in a precision U.S. airstrike. Published November 7, 2019

Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan appears before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for his confirmation hearing to be the new U.S. ambassador to Russia, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2019. President Donald Trump's nominee faced questions about Russian election interference and the ouster of the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine at his Senate confirmation hearing. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Plenty of work to do for Donald Trump’s new man in Moscow

This month President Trump nominated Deputy Secretary of State John J. Sullivan to be the next ambassador to Russia. With a long and distinguished career in public service, including serving as acting secretary of state, Mr. Sullivan is an outstanding choice for one of the most complex and challenging of our senior diplomatic assignments. Published October 31, 2019

In this Monday, April 10, 2017, file photo, the chief of the Ukrainian Central Bank Valeria Gontareva makes a statement on her resignation during a press conference in Kyiv, Ukraine. Ukrainian officials on Monday, Oct. 21, 2019, lashed out at a parody song targeting Ukraine's former central bank chief Gontareva, and mocking an arson attack on her home, which was firebombed last month. (AP Photo/Sergei Chuzavkov, File) ** FILE **

Ukraine’s biggest story involves no Bidens or Trumps

The biggest scandal inside Ukraine -- perhaps one of the most consequential in all of Eastern Europe -- is a row between a courageous former central banker and a notorious oligarch. It is a high-stakes battle, with a clear cast of good and bad guys. Published October 24, 2019

FILE - In this Nov. 14, 1989 file photo two East German border guards patrolled atop of Berlin Wall with the illuminated Brandenburg Gate in background, in Berlin. (AP Photo/Jockel Finck, file)

The lessons of Berlin must be learned again in Hong Kong

Early into what would become a three-decade career in government service, I was completing an escape-and-evasion training exercise in the woods on Nov. 9, 1989, when, after weeks of unrest, the East German government announced that its citizens could visit West Berlin. Published October 17, 2019

Russian President Vladimir Putin has turned the dissemination of false news into a worldwide tool of influence. (Associated Press/File)

Fake news in Europe threatens U.S. media integrity

"Fake news" is a term that has become all too commonplace. Sometimes we're talking about a genuine piece of disinformation. Other times, fake news means simply a news report with which a politician does not agree. Published October 10, 2019

In this Sept. 24, 2018, file photo, CIA Director Gina Haspel addresses the audience in Louisville, Ky. Haspel is headed to Capitol Hill to brief Senate leaders Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2018, on the slaying of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi as senators weigh their next steps in possibly punishing the longtime Middle East ally over the killing. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley, File)

Why leakers pose such a danger to national security

A number of news networks faced criticism last month for running with a disputed story that the CIA had to exfiltrate a spy from Russia in part due to concerns about President Trump's mishandling of classified information. Published October 3, 2019

Paul Whelan, a former U.S. Marine accused of spying, is being held in Moscow's notorious Lefortovo Prison. (Associated Press/File)

Paul Whelan a Vladimir Putin pawn in Russia prison

Russian President Vladimir Putin, the onetime KGB operative who also served for a time as director of the FSB security police, is probably enjoying the sweet irony of being on the receiving end of rare harmony between Democrats and Republicans. Published September 26, 2019

FILE - In this Feb. 8, 2019, file photo, Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad smiles at the U.S. Institute of Peace, in Washington. Amid talk of a U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, Khalilzad, the U.S. envoy talking to the Taliban said Thursday, July 11, that America is not “cutting and running” from its longest war and that women will continue to have seats in peace talks to end nearly 18 years of fighting. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)

U.S. must mistrust but verify to nail down Afghan deal

Earlier this month, President Trump stunningly revealed that he had canceled peace talks with Taliban leadership at Camp David after the Afghan militant group claimed responsibility for an attack in Kabul that killed 12 people, including a U.S. soldier. Published September 19, 2019

FILE - In this June 5, 2019 file photo, Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, and Chinese President Xi Jinping exchange documents during a signing ceremony following their talks in the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia. From nukes to huge food aid shipments to a shared skepticism about the United States, Chinese President Xi and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will have a long list of topics to discuss when Xi heads north Thursday, June 20. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, Pool, File)

U.S. should worry as Russia-China ties heat up

Russia's Defense Ministry has announced the Chinese People's Liberation Army will join Russia and six other nations for Tsentr 2019, a massive, five-day military exercise involving over 100,000 troops that starts Monday. Published September 12, 2019