PRESIDENT BUSH is expected to nominate Air Force General Michael Hayden as the director of the CIA today — a potentially controversial choice because of his role in a secret wiretapping programme.

The appointment of General Hayden, the deputy to John Negroponte, the Director of National Intelligence, would expand military influence in America’s intelligence community. Even Republicans voiced concern about the Pentagon’s growing control of US intelligence operations yesterday. General Hayden would be “the wrong person, the wrong place at the wrong time”, Peter Hoekstra, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said.

General Hayden, 61, would replace Porter Goss, who resigned last Friday after losing a turf war with Mr Negroponte, who wanted the CIA’s intelligence analysis role to be shifted to his department. White House aides said that Mr Goss had been an ineffectual leader, but there were suspicions that his dismissal may have been connected to a growing ethics scandal. Kyle “Dusty” Foggo, third in command at the CIA, is being investigated as part of a corruption inquiry. Mr Foggo denies any wrongdoing but is expected to resign this week.

Neither Mr Goss nor the White House have given a reason for his resignation. Mr Goss said that it would remain “one of those mysteries”.

General Hayden’s Senate confirmation hearings would probably focus on his previous job as director of the National Security Agency. That agency oversaw Mr Bush’s secret eavesdropping programme, which triggered accusations from Democrats and some senior Republicans that it was illegal.

US citizens in telephone and e-mail contact with terror suspects abroad were monitored but wiretaps were installed without warrants. Under US law, wiretapping without a warrant is illegal. Mr Bush argued that his authority as a wartime president superseded the law.

If confirmed, Mr Hayden would take over an agency in disarray and would have to convince staff that he could stand up to Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary, whose department controls 80 per cent of the intelligence budget.

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