ADDRESS BY ADMIRAL STANSFIELD TURNER NAVY LEAGUE DINNER

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80B01554R002900100001-3
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 12
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 25, 2001
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: November 13, 1978
• Content Type: SPEECH

4 .
Approved F APR,elease 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1 002900100001-3
Address by Admiral Stansfield Turner
Director of Central Intelligence
Navy League Dinner
New York City
Monday, 13 November 1978
It is nice to be back in the Navy family.
Admiral Moorer, thank you for those very kind words. It is
really a great honor for me to be introduced by Admiral Moorer. All of
us here recognize him as one of the most outstanding Naval officers,-,one
of the most successful Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff this
country has ever had. I was privileged to be selected for flag rank
while Admiral Moorer was the Chief of Naval Operations. He always came
and'gave a lecture to the plebe admirals. I remember very well one of
the strictures that he told us, a piece of advice that I have followed
frequently.
He said, "Gentlemen, if you're ever going to have a press conference
or appear in public where you will be under interrogation, always have
three things in mind that you want to say. Then when you are asked that
terrible question that you can't answer, you give them one of those-
three things regardless of what the question was."
I have never thanked Admiral Moorer for that advice and I have also
never had the opportunity to tell him that that advice almost broke
up my marriage. Before my first TV appearance, where I was expected to
make remarks and then submit to questions, my wife and I were driving to
the studio and I was rehearsing to myself out loud both my prepared
remarks and the answers to the three Admiral Moorer questions. I didn't
differentiate between them, so when the first question came, and my wife
heard something that sounded like she had heard in the car, she was
puzzled. When the second question came and again I gave a prerecorded,
Admiral Moorer answer, she said, "This is rigged. My husband is a
phony. The questions have all been predetermined." In fact, I could
not answer the questions very well, so the Admiral's advice saved me. I
want to thank Admiral Moorer now and to assure him that, despite that
momentary loss of credibility, my marriage has stayed intact.
My marriage to the Navy has been a very happy one for me also. If
there has been one disappointment in spending the last 20 months on
detached duty as Director of Central Intelligence, it is not having been
the same part of the Navy family. In fact, I have found that it was
desirable not to participate in Navy events like this because I thought
I should stick to my own last in intelligence.
But there was no way I could not be here tonight for this wonderful
New York Navy League Dinner. First, because of my tremendous respect
and affection for Rear Admiral Jack Bergen, for all he has done for all
of us in the Navy and for our country. I know you join me in that
appreciation.
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 Approved Foiiielease 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80B015iiR002900100001-3
And secondly, I do want to say, with great sincerity, that since
becoming the Director of Central Intelligence, I have appreciated more
than ever what organizations dedicated to the security of our country,
like the Navy League, do for that security. In the last twelve months
in the world of American intelligence, I have seen a turnaround in the
public attitude towards our intelligence activities, in large measure as
a result of the support of groups like the Navy League. While there
will always be extremists who will criticize almost anything that the
Central Intelligence Agency does, in recent months we have seen the
responsible press, and the public in general, come to a renewed recogni-
tion that this country simply must know what is going on in the rest of
the world and the only way to do that is to have a first-class intelli-
gence service.
There is more to be done, however. There is still, in this country,
inadequate recognition that to do the job of national security requires
that we be able to keep some secrets. We are the most open society in
the history of the world, and that is exactly the way we want it. But,
if we are to prepare for possible inimical actions by other nations
against us, we must be able to make some of those preparations in
secret. We cannot afford to develop expensive weapon systems or complex
devices for collecting intelligence and then give their detailed charac-
teristics to other countries against whom we may find it necessary to
employ them. They can be too easily countered in these circumstances.
Nor can we afford as a nation to enter into negotiations for strategic
arms limitations or other kinds of treaties if our negotiating positions
are exposed in advance. Despite the obviousness of this, there is
still too great an unwillingness today to recognize the legitimacy
of secrets in our government. Let me give you a recent example.
In one of our major national newspapers one morning, there was a
very interesting juxtaposition. In column four there was a story about
an impending prosecution of two officials of ITT for alleged perjury in
connection with events in Chile some years ago. The thrust of the
story, however, was how bad it was that the Central Intelligence Agency
might be impeding this prosecution because it refused to release certain
secret documents. Over in column three was another story about a prose-
cution taking place in New Jersey--a prosecution for alleged murder--in
which a newspaper reporter of the New York Times refused to disclose
his notes and the defendent claimed those notes were necessary to prove
his innocence. As you know, that case ended with the reporter going to
jail for a while but he never disclosed his notes. These may seem
different, but in fact, they are the same problem--the problem of
protecting sources of information.
If newsmen or intelligence officers cannot protect the sources
from which they receive information, those sources will disappear and
information will disappear with them. The media in our country feel
very strongly about protecting their confidential sources, but at the
same time they are quick to criticize the Intelligence Community for
wanting to do the same thing.
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 Approved Fo, elease 2001/08/07: CIA-RDP80BOl 002900100001-3
Let me assure you that, while I believe there must be some secrecy
in government, at the same time I appreciate the fact that improper
secrecy in government can be very dangerous. We must find ways to find
that careful balance between a government that serves its people poorly
because it keeps too many secrets that the people are not informed, and
a government that serves its people poorly because it fails to keep
those secrets which are necessary for the people's security. We as a
nation must return to an understanding that there is a level of legiti-
mate secrecy, even in our open society. No one can run a business, nor
a newspaper, nor a government, without some privacy. And yet, we
recognize that because intelligence is a risk-taking business; because
the stakes are very high; because the wrong things could be kept secret
for the wrong reasons, we must find ways to reassure the American public
that secrecy, when it is used, is only used properly.
Out of the last several years of intense public criticism of the
intelligence process, a new set of oversight mechanisms have been
forged. In fact, a revolutionary step in our intelligence process has
been the evolution of oversight, external to the intelligence community
itself. Oversight is now the responsibility of both the Executive
Branch and the Legislative Branch.
The Intelligence Oversight Board in the Executive Branch has been
in being for almost three years now. It is composed of former Senator
Gore, former Governor Scranton, and Mr. Thomas Farmer of Washington.
These three gentlemen have but one responsibility--to look into the
legality and the propriety of the intelligence activities of this
nation. They report only to one man, the President of the United
.States, but anyone may call to their attention what they believe to be
abuses of the intelligence process.
Beyond this, in the Legislative Branch, we have had, for over two
years in the Senate and just over a year in the House of Representatives,
committees dedicated exclusively to the oversight of the intelligence
process. These committees have established a cooperative and very
helpful relationship with us in the intelligence community, but at the
same time, I assure you it is a relationship of strict oversight
and supervision. We are fully accountable to these committees and
report to them regularly.
Any naval officer, particularly one who has commanded at sea,
knows that accountability is an essential element of responsibility. I
believe that the addition of accountablity in intelligence through this
oversight process, is making America's intelligence activities more
responsible. We are more judicious to ensure that we look not only at
the benefits of potential intelligence activities, but at the risks as
well.
Now well you might ask me, "Are there not dangers in this?" Of
course there are. Too much oversight could increase the probability
that sensitive information will leak. Too much oversight could lead to
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
 Approved Release 2001/08/07: CIA-RQP80B015 90 100 1-rmust
intelligence by timidity, which is no intelligence ata9. o, e
find that proper balance here as well, between the benefits of account-
ability on one hand and the dangers of timidity on the other. That
balance is being forged today in the Congress in what will be known as
Legislative Charters for the Intelligence Community. I support this
effort and hope for the passage of these charters by the Congress in its
next session. First, because it will put intelligence activities on a
sound, legal foundation. But beyond that, it will give to the intelligence
officer on the street in a foreign country and to us in headquarters,
guidelines and a better understanding of what is expected of us and what
is not.
What does all this add up to today? I think it adds up to a very
exciting, a very important, I might even suggest an historic time in
American intelligence. We are crafting a new model of American intelli-
gence. A model that is uniquely tailored to the standards and values of
American society and will also ensure that we can retain the capability
to be the best intelligence service in the world.
It will take several more years after the passage of charter legis-
lation, for the relationships between the Intelligence Community and
the various oversight processes to settle down and operate smoothly. I
am confident we are moving in the right direction. We are moving toward
a good balance of the problems, the risks of leaks, the risks of timidity
on the one hand, and adequate assurance to the American public against
abuse, on the other.
Throughout this process, the understanding and support of the
American public will be essential. I depend upon you in the Navy League
for part of that support. I know that you are dedicated first to a
strong and effective Navy; but beyond that every one of you wants a
strong, effective national security and that includes the Army, the Air
Force, and your Intelligence Community. Through your example and your
influence, I look for greater understanding on the part of the American
public of these substantial changes and improvements that are taking
place in our intelligence process in this country and of the importance
of the job that we are trying to do. I sincerely believe today that we
are the number one intelligence service in the world. With your under-
standing and support, we're going to stay there. Thank you.
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
 Approved Fai elease 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80B015WR002900100001-3
NAVY LEAGUE DINNER
New York, N.Y.
Monday, 13 November 1978
Gosh it's nice to be back in the Navy family. Admiral Moorer,
thank you for those very kind words. It's really a great honor for me
to be introduced by Admiral Moorer. All of us here recognize him as
clearly one of the most outstanding Naval officers, one of the most
successful Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff this country has ever
had. I was privileged to be selected for flag rank while Admiral
Moorer was the Chief of Naval Operations. He always came and gave a
lecture to the plebe admirals. I remember very well one of the strictures
that he told us, a piece of advice that I have followed frequently. He
said, "Gentlemen, if you're ever going to have a press conference or
appear in public where you will be under interrogation, always have
three things in mind that you want to say. Then when you get asked that
terrible question that you can't answer, you give them one of those
three things regardless of what the question was." I've never thanked
Admiral Moorer for that advice which I have used frequently, but I've
also never had the opportunity to tell him that that advice almost broke
up my marriage. Now the circumstances were this. Before my first TV
appearance, when I was supposed to make remarks and then submit to
questions, my wife and I were driving to the studio and I was rehearsing
to myself out loud both my prepared remarks and the answers to the three
Admiral Moorer questioners. I didn't differentiate between them and so
when the first question came, and my wife sat there and she heard
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
 Approved For F ease 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554RRQ02900100001-3
something that sounded like she'd heard it in the car before, she began
to worry. And when the second question came and again I gave a pre-
recorded Admiral Moorer answer to this question, she said, "This is
rigged, my husband's a phony, the questions have all been predetermined."
In fact, I couldn't answer the questions, so I took the Admiral's
advice. Thanks anyway, Admiral Moorer, my marriage has stayed intact.
My marriage to the Navy has been a very happy one for me. And if
there has been one disappointment in spending the last 20 months on
detached duty as Director of Central Intelligence, it's not having been
the same part of the Navy family. In fact, I have found that it was
desirable not to participate in Navy events like this because I thought
I should stick to my own field of intelligence. But there was no way
tonight I could not be here for this wonderful New York Navy League
Dinner. First, because of my tremendous respect and affection for Rear
Admiral Jack Bergen, for all he has done for all of us in the Navy and
for our country. I know you join me in that. And secondly, I do want
to say with great sincerity that since becoming the Director of Central
Intelligence, I have appreciated even more than ever what organizations
dedicated to the security of our country, like the Navy League, do for
that security.
I have in the last twelve months in the world of American
intelligence seen a turnaround in the public attitude towards our
intelligence activities, in large measure, I believe, as a result of the
support of groups like the Navy League. While there will always be
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
 Approved For lease 2001/08/07: CIA-RDP80BO1554 02900100001-3
extremists who will criticize almost anything that the Central Intel-
ligence Agency does, I believe that in recent months we have seen
responsible press, and the public in general, come to a new recognition,
or rather a renewed recognition, that this country simply must know what
is going on in the rest of the world and the only way to do that is to
have a first-class intelligence service. There is more to be done,
however.
There is still in this country inadequate recognition that to do
the jab of national security requires that we be able to keep some
secrets. Now we are the most open society in the history of the world
and that's exactly the way we want it. If we are going to be able to
prepare for possible inimical actions by other nations against ours, we
simply must be able to make some of those preparations in secret. We
cannot afford to develop expensive weapon systems or complex devices for
collecting intelligence and then give their detailed characteristic to
other countries against whom we may find it necessary to employ them.
They can be too easily countered in these circumstances. Nor can we
afford as a nation to enter into negotiations for strategic arms limita-
tions or other kinds of treaties if our negotiating positions are going
to be exposed in advance. Despite the obviousness of this, there is, in
my view, still too great an unwillingness today to recognize the legitimacy
of secrets in our government. Let me give you a recent example.
In one of our major national newspapers one morning there was a very
interesting juxtaposition. In column four there was a story about an
impending prosecution of two officials of ITT for alleged perjury in
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
 Approved For4ease 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80B0155 02900100001-3
connection with events in Chile some years ago. The thrust of the
story, however, was how bad it was that the Central Intelligence Agency
might be impeding this prosecution because it refused to release certain
secret documents. Now over here in. column three, was another story
about a proses ago. The thrust of the story, however, was how bad it
was that the Central Intelligence Agency might be impeding this prosecu-
tion because it refused to release certain secret documents. Now over
here in column three, was another story about a prosecution that was
taking place right near here in New Jersey--a prosecution for alleged
murder--in which a newspaper reporter of the New York Times was refusing
to disclose his notes which the defendent claimed were necessary to
prove his innocence. As you know, that case ended, the reporter went to
jail for a while but he never disclosed his notes. Now these may seem
different to you, but in fact, they are the same problem--the problem of
protecting your sources of information.
If newsmen or intelligence officers cannot protect the sources from
which they receive information, those sources are going to disappear and
the information will not be forthcoming. The media in our country feel
very strongly about this, but at the same time they are very quick to
criticize us for wanting to defend our sources. Now let me assure you
that at the same time I respect the fact that improper secrecy in
government can be a very dangerous thing. We must find ways to walk in
careful balance between a government that serves its people poorly
because it keeps so many secrets that the people are not informed, and a
government that serves its people poorly because it fails to keep those
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
 Approved For !Wease 2001/08/07: CIA-RD'80B0155. 02900100001
secrets which are necessary for the people s security. We as a na ion
must simply return to an understanding that there is a level of legitimate
secrecy, even in our open society. No one can run a business without
some privacy; no one can run a newspaper; and certainly not a government.
And yet, we recognize that because, in the intelligence element of
government, we are in the risk-taking business. Because the stakes are
very high, the wrong things are kept secret for purposes of cover-up or
wrong-doing, and so forth, that we must find ways to reassure the
American public that secrecy is being properly enforced.
Out of the last several years of intense public criticism of the
intelligence process in our country we have forged a new set of
oversight mechanisms for that purpose. In fact, it is a very revolu-
tionary step in our intelligence process that we have evolved a process
of oversight, external to the intelligence community itself. Oversight
both from within the Executive Branch and also from the Legislative
Branch. In the Executive, we have an Intelligence Oversight Board which
has been in being for almost three years now. It is composed today of
former Senator Gore, former Governor Scranton, and Mr. Thomas Farmer of
Washington. These three gentlemen have only one responsibility -- to
look into the legality and the propriety of how we are conducting our
intelligence activities as a nation. They report only to one man, the
President of the United States, and anyone in the intelligence community
or without may come and report to them what they believe are abuses of
the intelligence process. But beyond this in the Legislative Branch,
we have had, for over two years in the Senate and just over a year in
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80B01554R002900100001-3
 Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
the House of Representatives, committees dedicated exclusively to the
oversight of the intelligence process. These committees have formed a
very cooperative and very helpful relationship with us in the intelligence
community, but I assure you that it is a relationship of oversight
and supervision. We report to these committees regularly and we are
fully accountable to them.
Any naval officer, particularly one who has held command at sea,
knows that accountability is an essential element of responsibility. I
believe that the addition of accountablity through this oversight
process in intelligence today, is making your country's intelligence
activities more responsible. We are being more judicious in ensuring
that we look not only at the benefits of a potential intelligence
activities, but at the risks as well. Now well you might ask me, "Are
there not dangers in this?" And of course, there are. Too much oversight
will lead to leaks of information or it will lead to intelligence by
timidity, which is no intelligence at all. We must find that proper
path to balance the benefits of accountability on one hand and the
dangers of losing out to timidity on the other. And that balance is
being forged today in the Congress in what will be known as Legislative
Charters for the Intelligence Community. I hope for and support passage
of these charters by the Congress in its next session. Why? Because,
first of all, it will put our intelligence activities on a sound, legal
foundation. But beyond that, it will give to the intelligence officer
on the street in foreign countries and to us in headquarters, guidelines
or an understanding of what is expected of us and what is not and how
this oversight process is going to work.
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
 Approved Forase 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP8013015510290010 001-3
What does all this add up to today? I think it adds up to a very
exciting, a very important, I might even suggest an historic time in
American intelligence. What we are doing is crafting a new model of
American intelligence. A model that is uniquely tailored to the standards
and values of American society and yet is also determined to ensure that
we can retain the capability for being the best intelligence service in
the world. We're not there yet. In my view it's going to take several
more years--the passage of this legislation for charters, the settling
down of the relationships between us in the Intelligence Community and
the various oversight processees. I am confident we are moving in the
right direction, we are moving to where we can balance the problems, the
risks of leaks, the risks of timidity on the one hand, and the risks of
not enough assurance to the American public against abuse, on the
other. Throughout this process the support, the understanding of the
American public is going to be essential; an understanding of this
continuing importance of intelligence to our country today. I depend
upon you in the Navy League for part of that support. I know that you
are dedicated first to a strong and effective Navy; but beyond that
every one of you wants a strong, effective national security and that
includes the Army, the Air Force, and your Intelligence Community.
Through your example and your influence, I look for greater understanding
on the part of the American public of these substantial changes and
improvements that are taking place in our intelligence process in this
country and of the importance of the job that we are trying to do. I
sincerely believe today that we are the number one intelligence service
in the world. With your understanding and support, we're going to stay
there. Thank you.
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
 Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3
Approved For Release 2001/08/07 : CIA-RDP80BO1554R002900100001-3