THE ROLE OF INTELLIGENCE IN FORMING NATIONAL SECURITY POLICY WITHIN THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP62S00545A000100100008-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 16
• Document Creation Date: December 12, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 16, 1998
• Sequence Number: 8
• Publication Date: July 9, 1959
• Content Type: PAPER

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THE ROLE OF INTELLIGENCE IN FORMING NATIONAL SECURITY
POLICY WITHIN THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH
An integral, and in fact a basic, element in forming national security
policy is the latest and best intelligence bearing on the substance of the
policy to be determined.
It will be desirable, at the outset, to explain the author's qualifications
to write upon the subject-matter of this article; to outline the manner in which
national security policy is currently formedwithin the Executive Branch; and to
define the term "intelligence" as used in this article.
Background Experience of the Author.
In 1951 the author served, in the early organization stages of the
Psychological Strategy Board, as that Board's Deputy Director. In that capacity,
he served as the Board's representative at meetings of the National Security
Council's subsidiary body (then named the "Senior Staff"), which was responsible
for preparing policy recommendations for consideration by the National Security
Council.
In early 1953, the author, as Administrative Assistant to President Eisenhower,
was asked by the President to study the organization and functioning of the
National Security Council mechanism and to make recommendations to strengthen and
vitalize its structure and operating procedures, and to serve as the President's
principal assistant with reference to the operations of the Council mechanism. He
served as Administrative Assistant (January-March, 1953) and as Special Assistant
to the President for National Security Affairs (March, 1953 - April, 1955, and
January, 1957 - July, 1958), a. total of almost four years. During this period,
the author assisted the President at 179 meetings of the National Security Council
(48% of all meetings held by the Council in its 11 3/4 years of existence from
September, 1947 through July 22, 1958), and presided, as Chairman of the Council's
Planning Board (the former "Senior Staff"), at 504 meetings of that
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Board. He also was a member, and for a while Vice Chairman, of the NSC
Operations Coordinating Board; attended meetings of the Council on Foreign
Economic Policy; and was the Presidents Representative on a small group
which considered special operations. Thus, for almost four years he was in
continuous touch with procedures for formulating, adopting, and coordinating
the execution of national security policy within the Executive Branch
through the NSC mechanism.
Current OReratin Procedures of NSC Mechanism.
The National Security Act states that the function of the Council is
"to advise the President with respect to the integration of domestic, foreign,
and military policies relating to the national security, so as to enable the
military services and the other departments and agencies of Government to
cooperate more effectively in matters affecting the national security." The
Act also gives to the Council the duty of "assessing and appraising the objec-
tives, commitments, and risks of the United States in relation to our actual
and potential military power." The primary statutory function of the Council
is to advise the President on integrated national security ox~ I].cY. The role
of the Council as a planning body is subservient to its policy function.
The Council (and its subsidiary Planning Board and its subsidiary Operations
Coordination Board) is an advisory mechanism to assist the President in coming
to policy decisions in the area of national security. The National Security Act
is sufficiently flexible so that each President may use this personal mechanism
as best suits his convenience. One President may use the Council mechanism in
one way; another President in another way. The best use is made of this mechanism
when a President uses it in a way which satisfies his personal requirements. It
has never been felt necessary to test whether the Congress can Constitutionally
require by statute that a President consult with certain persons, or in a certain
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way, before coming to a policy decision in the area of national security.
The NSC Planning Board, chaired by the President's Special Assistant
for National Security Affairs, is composed of officials of the Departments
and Agencies which are represented at the Council Table with reference to a
policy matter there under consideration. These officials have the rank of
Assistant Secretary or its equivalent.. or higher rank. Each is supported
by a Departmental or Agency Staff. Each has direct access to his Department
or Agency Chief and commands, for the performance of his duties, all the
resources of his Department or Agency.
The NSC Operations Coordinating Board, of which the President's
e0vi fa
Special Assistant for Security Operations Coordination is Vice Chairman, is
:*
composed of officials of the Departments and Agencies concerned with the
policies referred to the Board by the President for assistance in coordination
of planning. These officials have the rank of Under Secretary or its equivalent,
or higher rank. Each is supported by a small Departmental or Agency Staff.
Each has direct access to his Department or Agency Chief and carmiands, for
the performance of his duties, all the resources of his Department or Agency.
Under President Eisenhower, the normal procedure for operating the policy-
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making aspects of the NSCmechanism has been: (1) the NSC Planning Board
formulates recommendations as to national security policy and circulates them to
Council members and advisers well in advance of the Council Meeting at which
the same are scheduled to be considered; (2) the Council considers and approves
or modifies or rejects these recommendations, and submits to the President such
as it approves or modifies; (3) the President approves, modifies, or rejects
the Council's recommendations; transmits those policies to which he gives approval
to the Departments and Agencies responsible for planning to carry them into
effect; and - as a rule where international affairs are concerned - requests the
NSC Operations Coordinating Board to assist such Departments and Agencies in
flexibility for every President to deteinine, as he shell--elect, matters of
high policy which-it is his-responsibility to decide.' However, becAuse of the
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coordinating their respective planning to carry out their responsibilities
under the approved policies. Thus, the policy is first determined by the
President; second, the Departments and Agencies perform the planning needed
to carry out their responsibilities to the President under such policies,
being assisted in the coordination of such planning by the NSC Operations
Coordinating Board. It is, of course, fundamental that the planning to
execute policy responsibilities be carried out by the respective Departments
and Agencies which are directly charged by the President with such responsi-
bilities. No person or body should intervene, at a lower level, between the
President and the Department head directly responsible to him.
It is the function of the President to determine national security policy
in all areas under his executive control and responsibility. Accordingly,
national security policy may be formed in any way which the President finds
convenient and appropriate. The national security policies so formed, whatever
body or individual may submit the recommendations therefor, are the President's
policies.
During the period 1953-1955, with which the author is familiar, the great
bulk of national security policy determinations were made by the President as
a result of the operations of the NSC mechanism described above. Because of
this usual method of policy formulation, such policies were commonly, although
erroneously, referred to as "NSC policies." But there were occasions when
national security policy was determined by the President as a result of Cabinet
deliberations (though this was a rare occurrence) or by his executive decision
based on conferences with one or more of his principal Department or Agency
heads, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, or others within whose special competence
some particular subject would naturally fall. There should always be complete
flexibility for every President to determine, as he shall elect, matters of
high policy which it is his responsibility to decide. However, because of the
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utility and convenience of the NSC mechanism, and because the present Chief
Executive values the advantages of integrated recommendations and integrated
deliberations based thereupon, it has been during his tenure the more or
less standard operating procedure to seek to form national security policies
through the procedures above outlined.
The Term "Intelligence" Defined.
In this article, the author employs the term. "intelligence" to embrace
both factual intelligence and intelligence estimates based thereon. In the
forming of national security policy, both types of intelligence are of prime
importance.
The gathering of factual intelligence is today a matter of enonaous
scope and hardly-credible complexity. To the unsophisticated, the collection
of intelligence raises visions of Mata Hari. There are, indeed, many individuals
who work in the field of intelligence, in and out of formal governmental service,
exhibiting personal bravery and rare ingenuity and taking risks beyond the
ordinary calls of duty. Because all is grist that comes to the intelligence
mill, one need not seek to measure the results of the efforts of these individual
agents against the results of the world-wide scientific and technological opera-
tions employed in modern intelligence gathering.
In the continuing confrontation of the Free Peoples by another power openly
dedicated to world domination and to the swallowing of all mankind on this planet
into the maw of World Communism., the rapid gathering of germane intelligence as
to the operations of other nations in every field of endeavor has put the United
States into an electronic business that is world-wide, highly scientific,
incredibly complicated., and extremely expensive. One needs to realize the
limitless ramifications of current technological procedures, the almost over-
whelming raw material that comes flooding in every hour of the day and night to
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be sifted, analyzer,'_ codified, and most urgent of all - to be rapidly end
clearly expressed and placed in the hands of the decision-makers. For, in
the last anaiysis,'thevalid- se'of intelligence is to build intellectual
platforms iipon which
decisions can' be made. It is not gathered to be stored
awE#,y like a harvest. ` It must be- delivered in clear, concise form within
tle.shortest time feasible to focal points for use.
"This prompt 'delivery is essential both to those who conduct our foreign
affairs or direct our defensive military mechanisms and to those who frame our
decisions of high policy.: The sound concept that the national intelligence
effort should be centralized is not incon`sistient with -a-demonstrable need that
each of the several Departments has its' own intelligence arm. The man who
may ha ve toydispatch a SAO bomber,'an ICBM, a Polaris submarine, a lend task-
force, has a dual function with regard to intelligence he has a part in
acquiring the latest intelligence for use at central headquarters, all the
way:iip to the President; he also must himself have-and use the latest intelligence
in carry`ing' out his vital res55onsibilities.
It is for these reasons that the National Security. Act in 1947 created a
Central Intelligence Agency and a Director of Central Intelligence. The latter
i6-at one and'the wise time the chief officer of the Central Intelligence Agency,
the Chairman of the United States Intelligence Board, and the Foreign Intelligence
Adviser to the President and the National Security Council. Through a .series of
NSC Intelligence Directives, approved by the President on recommendation of the
National Security Council, the President has sought to make more efficient and
rapid-the gathering and dissemination of intelligence. These Directives put
emphasis on the centralization of 'authority and responsibility in the intelligence
field'and on'making the separate intelligence organizations of the respective
Services and of other Departments and Agencies contributory to, and not independent
of, such central authority, while still allowing them to meet their specialized needs.
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The President has shown a constant awareness of the urgency of perfecting
the national intelligence effort. He has given close attention to reports on
our national intelligence effort made by: (a) the committee headed by General
James A. Doolittle (October, 1954); (b) the Hoover Commission's Task Force on
Intelligence Activities headed by General Mark Clark (May, 1955); and (c) the
President's Board of Consultants on Foreign Intelligence Activities, now
headed by General John E. Hull and formerly chaired by Dr. James R. Killian.
Because of his continued awareness, the President formally established the
latter Board by Executive Order (February, 1956) and gave to it the continuing
mission of reviewing the conduct of our foreign intelligence activities and of
reporting thereon periodically to the Chief Executive.
The critical area of intelligence gathering and dissemination, at all levels
in operating the many intelligence arms, involves a truly vast annual expenditure.
In terms of the national survival, the prompt delivery of correct intelligence to
the President, the ultimate decision-maker, is an undebatable necessity.
Beyond the factual intelligence which has been described above, collected
and sifted and clearly expressed for understandable use and disseminated daily
in rapid fashion, is the requirement of making intelligence estimates based
thereon. Such estimates may be addressed to a particular country, area, situation,
armament, or function and set forth both the particular facts and the likely
future actions predicable thereon, or they may seek to arrange with logical con-
sideration and precision the broadest spectrum of intelligence materials into a
considered appraisal of what over-all developments may be in future time.
Both types of intelligence estimates can be of the greatest possible help to
the policy makers and planners. The preparation of such estimates requires an
expert competence. It also calls for objective thinking by those who have the
authority to agree or to differ. Because of the prophetic nature of any estimate,
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it is of great consequence that the final text should seek, not compromise,
but clarity. In nay experience, many of the coordinated national intelligence
estimates have clearly and fully set forth the dissenting views (whenever
dissents existed) held by competent members of the U.S. Intelligence Board
which prepared such estimates.
The Use of Intelligence in Polio Formulation.
The prompt circulation of daily, special, and national estimates to those
who make the recommendations and decisions on high policy is an obvious
necessity.
The special and national estimates should be reviewed in detail, dissected,
argued over, and become familiar material to the NSC Planning Board, which is
responsible for recommending policy action in relation to the subject-matter
which they cover. And they should be circulated in time to be studied and
weighed by the members of the National Security Council, before the subjects
to which they relate are to be taken up at the Council level. The NSC Planning
Board and the National Security Council should be "inseminated" with their
contents, as the author once expressed it to a high official in the British
Intelligence.
This "insemination" at the Planning Board level has been a part of its
standing operating procedure since 1953, as is more fully discussed below. At
the level of the members of the Council, such education is carried on in several
ways.
The Council members receive daily, weekly, special, and general intelligence
publications, and to be familiar with this material is a part of their function.
To make sure that Council members are fully aware of current intelligence, an
innovation was introduced at meetings of the National Security Council
beginning in 1953. Before then, the oral briefing on current intelligence was
given each day to the President alone, in the President's office. Since that
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time, however, it has been a part of the Council's established procedure, that
the first agenda item at each meeting be a briefing by the Director of Central
Intelligence on the latest important intelligence throughout the world, with
the meeting's
special focus on those areas which are to be the subject of/later agenda items.
This briefing is oral, assisted by visual presentations through geographi-
cal maps and charts on easels behind the Director's seat. The briefing
normally consumes between 15% and 25% of the Council meeting-time, and is
frequently interrupted by specific questions from the President and other
Council members. These questions often give rise to colloquies and extempor-
aneous expressions of views which are of consequence to the policy recommenda-
tions that are to be discussed.
This direct confrontation of the Council with current and special
intelligence, each week, has always seemed to the author an important aid to
policy consideration and formulation. Yet, so far as the author is informed,
the British Cabinet and the War Cabinet under Sir Winston Churchill carried
on their policy deliberations without the benefit of this stimulating and
focussing procedure.
In addition to the foregoing routine, the Director of Central. Intelligence
annually reports to the Council with reference to the problems that have faced
the Intelligence Community in the preceding period and the measures and means
adopted for dealing with them.
Under the National Security Act, the Central Intelligence Agency is
subject to the National Security Council and the Director is the Council's
Adviser on Foreign Intelligence; in fact, it is in this advisory capacity that
the Director of Central Intelligence attends all meetings of the Council. From
time to time, the National Security Council Intelligence Directives, which form
the charter for the operations of the Intelligence Community, are reviewed and
revised by the President and Council.
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These NSC Intelligence Directives (or "nonskids," as they are called)
are detailed and often complicated, especially in their relation to the func-
tional gathering and rapid dissemination of intelligence. Often, the revision
of such an NSCID may require months of prior study by a special panel of
scientists, technologists, and cryptanalysts - persons of the highest intellec-
tual and scientific standing - brought together to advise on methods and
procedures _My of these highly-classified studies.; which are necessary for
the purposes of the experts in the field,. involve most carefully-guarded secrets.
Yet it ins, important far. the Council? tq und.er,stand, in general terms, how the
vast-Intelligence Community of modern days is , organized, operates, and is super-
vised.. And the ,principles; growing out of the findings and recommendations of
-classified studies are matters for
CrunclF ardp especially, Presidential
times of-particular crisis. the function ,of intelligence is elevated in
ortAnce,-One thinks _ofsuch historical events as,;ln4q-China in 1954, Quemoy -
Matsu send the Tachens i~54-19 and Lebanon in 1955, to cite merely a few.
In the delibest4i,ons which led to Presic ental policy decisions, the intelligence
appraisal of the Director pf Central 1nte4igence, the foreign policy appraisal
by. the Secretary of State,, and. the ,mil,itary appraisal by the Joint Chiefs of Staff
were indispensable ingredients. beforethe, die was. cast and the policy set.
The NSC.Plann pg Board necessarily probes deeply into the latest intelligence
on each subject coming before it. A Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence
Agency is in regular attendance at.-the Planning Board Table. To the Board's
deliberations he. bra nge; en info rmed ,knows edge of the contents of special and
general Intelligence Estimates. He is prepared and qualified to (and does)
participate from his point: of view on. the matters currently under debate at the
Planning Board Table. It. would be as unthinkable to overlook his views as the
Treasury, Budget, USIA, AEC, ICA, and the two cognizant Special Assistants to the
President. At the informal Wednesday luncheon meeting which always precedes the
IIOCB" meeting, the Director of Central Intelligence has an opportunity to thrash
out problems of a sensitive nature. At the more formal Board meetings which
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views of the representative of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is also seated
at the Table as adviser on military issues.
The Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Special
Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs seek to coordinate
the work of preparing and submitting Intelligence Estimates with the appropriate
items to appear on the forward agenda of the NSC Planning Board. To that end,
the Planning Board Agenda, is tentatively scheduled for a period of 2 or more
months ahead, so that the flow of intelligence work may be arranged to meet
the policy-makers' demands. Of course, history sometimes takes a hand. In
such an event, the scheduled forward agenda may have to be suspended for
immediate consideration of a Special Intelligence Estimate that is urgently
required. There can be nothing static or cut-and-dried in scheduling ahead the
Planning Board's work-load (and consequently the Council's forward agenda);
for it is entirely unpredictable how long a time may be consumed in the prepara-
tion of particular policy recommendations or that interruptions may be forced by
extrinsic happenings. In each and every case, one factor is essential: a founda-
tion of the latest and best intelligence to build upon and the constant rechecking
of intelligence material as time marches on to the Council deliberation and the
Presidential decision.
Turning for a moment from policy formulation through the NSC Planning Board
to coordination of planning to carry out approved policy through the NSC Operations
Coordinating Board, we find again the necessary ingredient of current intelligence.
At the weekly meetings of the 1'OCB,n over which the Under Secretary of State
presides, there are in regular attendance senior representatives of Defense,
Treasury, Budget, USIA, AEC, ICA, and the two cognizant Special Assistants to the
President. At the informal Wednesday luncheon meeting which always precedes the
"OCB" meeting, the Director of Central. Intelligence has an opportunity to thrash
out problems of a sensitive. nature. At the more formal Board meetings which
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follow, he is a full participant. The coordination of the planning of the
responsible Departments and Agencies to carry- out a policy which the President
has approved requires a knowledge of up-to-the-minute intelligence quite as
much as did the making of the policy so to be carried out.
Annually, the United States Intelligence Board (USIB) prepares an
Estimate of the World Situation. This document, sometimes running to 60 or
more printed pages, buttressed by tables and special supporting matter, is
awaited each year with the greatest interest - and anxiety - by those who
comprise the policy-making mechanism. It is an invaluable production. Here
are distilled the painstaking efforts of the entire Intelligence Community,
working through the USIB, to state as of the year-end the dimensions of the
foreign threat to our national security. It is invaluable because it is
written with scrupulous care, it is documented, and it sets forth with clear
distinction - where differences of opinion occur - the opposing views of the
experts who cannot agree with the majority estimate. The author conceives
this annual basic estimate to be of great consequence: as a stimulant, as a guide,
as a frank expression of differing views on matters which may be of highest
consequence. It forms each year the departure point for the recurring review
of our basic national security policy.
The first step is to schedule the annual National Estimate for discussion
at two or three meetings of the NSC Planning Board. At these meetings, it
receives 7 to 10 hours of controversial discussion and search for better under-
standing. The Estimate's contents are analyzed and dissected so that attention
can be focussed upon its most important conclusions. In some years, distinguished
Consultants from "outside of Government" are invited to these Planning Board
meetings (such men as General Gruenther, John J. McCloy, Arthur W. Burns,
Karl R. Bendetsen, Robert R. Bowie, and the like). These Consultants are asked,
after study and review of the high points in the Estimate, to discuss them with
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the Planning Board at a meeting of several hours' duration.
In such years, these points - together with the Consultants' and
Planning Board's reactions to them - have been brought before the National
Security Council at several Council meetings wholly devoted to considera-
tiori'of these matters. Short papers presenting the policy issues and
implications involved are prepared by the Planning Board as a basis for
Council' discussion a't these meetings.
I`lze purpose of the procedure just described is not, of course, to try
at the Planning Board or Council level to change, revise, or rewrite any
part of the'Annual Estimate. The purpose is to sharpen understanding of
the important aspects of the Estimate and to study and discuss in open
meeting policy implications thereof. By this procedure, the Council members
become sharply aware of the high points in the Estimate and the differences
''In view regarding them, and can join in a "give and take" discussion
without feeling' bound by the more formal " presentation of carefully-prepared
policy recommendations. One has to remember that almost as important as the
`ultimate policy decision itself is the intellectual controversy which
precedes-the decision, the full and frank discussions; the exposure of views
which have not become fully formed in departmental exercise, the emergence
of hovel and interesting ideas at the highest level.
Such a precursor to the Planning Board's annual review of basic national
security policy, which takes place each spring, is a cogent illustration of the
essential role in the formulation of national security policy that is filled
by`th.e Intelligence Community.
Perhaps it is appropriate, at the close, to indicate what in the author's
view is the ideal procedure for formulating a national security policy. Let
us take as an example, - not the annual review of basic national security
policy,, which may consume several months, but a national policy on the
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State of Ruritania.
First, the Ruritania item is scheduled far ahead on the Planning Board
agenda. Then, the Planning Board at its first of 3, 4, 5, or more sessions
on this subject, will have before it a National Intelligence Estimate on
Ruritania. It will also have before it a factual and analytical statement,
prepared by the responsible Department or Departments or sometimes by an
interdepartmental committee, on the military, economic, political, and other
germane factors relative to Ruritania. Sometimes, this factual data and
analyses based thereon are supplied in separate memoranda, sometimes as a
Staff Study. In the preparation of this factual and analytical material on
Ruritania are involved the vast resources of the informed Departments and
Agencies of government; the brains and experience of the operating personnel
who work day after day in the particular area of Ruritania and who have learned
the hard way the strengths and limitations that are involved; the very persons
who staff the Departments and Agencies that will be called upon to implement the
policy on which they are working when and if such policy receives Presidential
approval. The Intelligence Estimate and the factual and analytical material are
explained, discussed, and chewed over by the Planning Board in one or more
meetings. Often, a senior representative of a responsible Department is asked
to attend at the Planning Board Table, and be questioned and cross-questioned
about the factual subject matter and tentative policy recommendations. The
Board seeks to squeeze out of the material all the juice that it contains.
After these proceedings, a draft of policy statement is prepared by the
responsible Department or by an interdepartmental or special committee. This
draft will consist of the "general considerations" (drawn from the Intelligence
Estimate and the factual and analytical material referred to above and upon which
the policy recommendations will be based), the "general objectives" of the
proposed U. S. policy toward Ruritania., the more detailed proposed "policy guidance"
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in the differing areas of U.S. - Ruritania relations, and appendices covering
anticipated financial costs of the proposed policy and military and economic
expenditures and factual data for past and future years.
At as many Planning Board meetings as are required, this draft statement
is discussed, torn apart, and revised. In the intervals between such meetings,
revised texts are drafted by the Planning Board Assistants for consideration at
the next following meeting. Finally, through this arduous intellectual process,
there result either agreement on clarity and accuracy of text, correctness of
facts, and validity of policy recommendations or, - as is often the case, -
sharp differences of opinion on certain major recommendations or statements.
In the latter case, the draft policy statement will set forth clearly and
succinctly these opposing views (often in parallel columns).
Nhen the draft policy has been thus shaped, reshaped, corrected, revised,
and finally stated, it is circulated to the Council at least ten days before
the meeting at which the policy on Ruritania is to be taken up. Thus, sufficient
time is provided for the Council members to be briefed on the paper and familiarize
themselves with its contents and for the Joint Chiefs of Staff to express their
formal military views on the exact text which the Council is to consider (which
views are also circulated in writing to Council members before the meeting).
Here, then, is the author's concept of how the integrating procedure of the
NSC mechanism should work when it is working at its best. Such a procedure is
the desired goal, a goal often approximated in actual performance. The views of
all having a legitimate interest in the subject are heard, digested, and put
together, or, in the case of disagreement, separately stated. In a good number
of cases, the views of experts or knowledgeable people from "outside" of govern-
ment are sought and worked into the fabric at the Planning Board level. The
intelligence estimates, the military views, the political views, the economic
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views, the fiscal views, the psychological impact, - all are canvassed
and integrated before the President is asked to hear the case argued and to
come to his decision.
It is certainly true that human beings are fallible and that the
instruments which they create are always susceptible of improvement. The
mechanism which I have described, and its operation, can ,and will be
improved as time goes on. But the clear course of this integrative process
seems to the author mechanically and operatively sound. And, underlying
this clear course, there should always be, the firm base of the best and
latest intelligence.
Approved For Release 2001/08/30 : CIA-RDP62SO0545A000100100008-7