CORRESPONDENCE WITH(Sanitized)

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 104
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 22, 2003
• Sequence Number: 3
• Content Type: MF

STAT Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Next 6 Page(s) In Document Exempt
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For.Releaae2lobe4)brlier.16ArilkbPatfM00165A0008 n9quaa3-2?
Executive Regiutry
WasIlington. D. C.20505
Dear Mr. Gross,
JUN kii77
7 -64(7/7,0
How kind of you to share your honors paper with me. It
arrived at a significant time as we approach the climax of a
study of Executive Order 11905 and other aspects of the intel-
ligence structure and mission as directed by Presidential Review
Memorandum/NSC-11 -- documents you should be aware of in con-
nection with your study.
I commend you on a well-written paper. Professor Taubman
was right in suggesting that it would be of interest to me. In
all frankness, I have found that much of the material covered by
your sources is about the CIA of the past. There have been many
changes -- in attitude as well as form. For example, the portion
of Agency resources devoted to covert action has been steadily
decreasing and is only a very small percentage of the total budget
ndw. Also, any covert action proposal must be approved by a Cabinet-
level committee, certified by the President as important to our
national security, and reported to seven committees of the Congress.
In addition, there is an Intelligence Oversight Board, created by
Executive Order 11905, which checks on any suspected irregularities
or improprieties.
I am confident that the procedure directed by the President
for the thorough study of our intelligence structure and missions
will result in additional safeguards and decisions which will
strengthen our intelligence community. It should be of special
interest to you that some of the recommendations in your paper
are among the options which we will be considering. You should
watch for the President's decisions with special interest.
Thank you again for your thoughtfulness in sharing your paper
with me. I hope that you will maintain your interest in our
intelligence community.
Mr. Jonathan S. Gross
Yours since
STANSFI LD TURNER
Apwidile'd For Releas 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
%
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
The Director of Central Intelligence
voshillgorios
Dear Bill,
;
Jkj 1877
Thank you for mentioning Jonathan Gross'
honors paper and suggesting*that he share it
with me. It is a well-written paper and I have
found it especially interesting since we are
coming down to the wire on presenting options
to the President for strengthening our intel-
ligence structure and missions.
Some of the points in Mr. Gross' paper
are among the options we will be considering,
so I suggested to him that he will be interested
in seeing what the President decides.
Thanks again for arranging for me to see
this paper.
Yours,
STANSFIELD TURNER
Professor William Taubman
Department of Political Science
Amherst College
Amherst, Massachusetts, 01002
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A
00290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A00080
201Y31eg"trY
May 31, 1977
Admiral Stansfield Turner
Director of Central Intelligence
C.I.A.
Washington, D.C. 20505
Dear Admiral Turner:
Professor William Taubman of Amherst College has
informed me that, in his conversations with you, you
have expressed an interest in reading my honors work.
I have enclosed a copy of my thesis in the hope that
your readiness to be concerned with an undergraduate's
project will not be disappointed. I do so fully
realizing that the subject of my work is one with which
you are much more intimately acquainted than I.
Therefore, the spirit in which I submit my synthesis
and interpretation of the CIA's record is based merely
upon a chance possibility that insight can be had from
outside, myself and my perspectives being well isolated
from the challenges that you surely face every day.
If you will but read my essay in a similar spirit, my
work will have made the transition from academia to a
world of increased responsibilities in a manner matching
my highest expectations. At least, 1 hope you enjoy
the paper for the well organized piece of writing which
I believe it is.
Sincerely,
28-rucayt4,?? S,
Jonathan S. Gross
" Class of 77, Amherst College
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
COMMENTS ON "THE CIA AND THE BUREAUCRATIC ROOTS
OF COVERT INTERVENTION" BY JONATHAN S. GROSS
1. Mr. Gross' proposal for reform seeks to reduce covert
operations, although not exclude them. He advocates splitting
the DCI from the Director of CIA; splitting operations from
intelligence analysis and production; and stripping the DCI of
any authority over operations. A new operational unit could
report to the Secretary of State; in any event, its main task
would be clandestine intelligence collection, not covert action
operations. Chapter V and the Conclusion, pages 55-70, sum it
up.
2. Drawing on published materials, albeit including the
authoritative and semi-documentary material of the recent Con-
gressional investigations, the author has compiled an interesting
basis for his analysis and conclusions. However, since he works
from the bias, partial knowledge, misinformation, faulty inter-
pretation, and other shortcomings of his public sources, a reviewer
must restrain the urge to take issue and "nitpick" if he has the
vantage of better information and insight.
3. The author faults an institutional bias toward covert
action (which, however real it may have been, is diminished, if
not absent today). He disdains the adequacy of Congressional and
Executive oversight (without reference to the experiences under
E.O. 11905 -- which is not mentioned per se -- SSCI and other
legislative, legal and regulatory restraints which have generated
a new attitude and compelled adherence to controls and restrictions
unknown during the period on which his sources concentrate).
4. Whatever the merits or demerits, he writes well, presents
a thoughtful, well-organized paper, has an interesting collection
of sources and quotes to support his thesis, and has produced a
readable, thought-provoking paper.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
STAT
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Jonathan S. Gross
ADMIRAL STANSFIELD TURNER
DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE
C.I.A.
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20505
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
THE CIA AND THE BUREAUCRATIC
ROOTS OF COVERT INTERVENTION
Jonathan S. Gross
Submitted to the Department of
Political Science of Amherst College
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of Bachelor of Arts with Honors
Professor William Taubman
April 12, 1977
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
CONTENTS
PREFACE
I. COVERT ACTION: ROOTS AND REFORM
II. CIA: ADMINISTRATIONS' BABY
111
1
9
III. THE INSTITUTIONAL BIAS TOWARD COVERT ACTION 15
Background: CIA/NSC Structure 17
Secrecy 20
CIA Activism 24
The Size and Resources of the CIA 28
CIA Access to Policy Officials: Policy
Exposure to Operations 31
IV. PROPOSALS FOR REFORM: INADEQUATE 35
Congressional Oversight 36
Executive Controls 45
V. EFFECTIVE REORGANIZATION: SEPARATION OF
CIA FUNCTIONS 55
CONCLUSION 68
FOOTNOTES 71
BIBLIOGRAPHY 83
11
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
PREFACE
"But it seems impossible to speak and yet say nothing,
you think you have succeded, but you always overlook something,
a little yes, a little no, enough to exterminate a regiment
of dragoons." Samuel Beckett, The Unnamable
This paper naturally is the product of many points of
view, opinions on methodology, and response to critical ap-
praisal. Lacking the opportunity to footnote all inputs,
there is a chance to acknowledge a few more contributors here.
My thanks to my advisor, Professor William Taubman; readers,
Professors George Kateb and Austin Sarat; and the members of
the Political Science Honors Seminar. I owe thanks to Linda
Greenberg and Selma Gross for help in preparing the various
drafts. My roommates also deserve thanks for often lending
a sympathetic ear even though they hadn't the slightest
interest in the topic.
111
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
I. COVERT ACTION: ROOTS AND REFORM
The United States has made much use of covert action in
the international affairs of the post-war world. The various
activities which fall under the rubric "covert action", such as
relatively small scale encouragement or financial assistance to
groups abroad and much larger scale paramilitary operations,
constitute a significant part of U.S. foreign policy. Even a
partial list of American exercise of covert action serves to
describe the extent of U.S. clandestine international involvement.
In 1948, the CIA passed money to non-Communist parties in
Italian elections; in 1951, the CIA played an instrumental role
in deposing premier Mossadeq of Iran; a long CIA involvement in
Guatemalan affairs culminated in the forceful overthrow of the
Arbenz government in 1954; similar CIA projects concerning Cuba
eventually led to the Bay of Pigs in 1961; the CIA funneled
money in support of strikes in British Guiana; the 1967 elections
in India were influenced by the passage of funds to rightist
parties; the CIA essentially directed a war in Laos through most
of the 1960's.1 The public list goes on, and there are many
other instances of covert action not yet revealed.
The ubiquitous use of covert action is one of many mani-
festations of U.S. activism in foreign affairs. Like the
Marshall plan and intervention in Greece, Korea, and Vietnam,
covert action is the outcome, an effect, of what some have called
1
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
2
an American "globalism."2 There are justifications given for
active U.S. involvement, which can be found in the various
strategic, ideological, and economic formulations that have
accompanied U.S. exploits. The justifications have reasoned
that it is necessary to respond to Soviet actions, to promote
democratic ideals, to insure international order, to oppose
threats to property, and to contain Communism. These perceived
needs set the stakes in the international arena so high that
they cause policy officials to assume an active global posture
and, at times, to pursue goals through covert action. The roots
of such perceptions ultimately can be traced to the institutions
and traditions of U.S. society. The many characters of the
American polity shape the manner in which it approaches the rest
of the world, and account for the great use of covert action. A
huge military-industrial complex creates pressures for active
international involvement. Many aspects of U.S. business --
profit seeking, multinational corporations, tremendous domestic
consumption -- propel American interests beyond national borders.
The traditional aversion to Communism and idealistic aspirations
for democratic values also color the American international stance.
Covert action can be ascribed largely to such societal factors.
While it is true that the great use of covert action through
the CIA is a manifestation of a general globalist orientation,
covert action is more than that. It also is a cause of inter-
national action. The mechanisms constructed for the conduct of
covert action and its subsequent implementation have contributed
to bring about more covert action. A kind of bureaucratic
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
dynamism must be added to the multiplicity of other reasons for
the perceived high stakes in international affairs and for
ubiquitous covert operations. The impact of this dynamism on
the decisions to initiate covert action varies from case to case,
and it really cannot be seen apart from the other numerous
determinants of international action. But, in Richard Fagen's
words, "to disentangle the web of causality in any particular
case may not be so important as to be sensitive to the multi-
plicity of factors which might be operative."3 This paper ex-
amines closely the causal links that inhere in the actual organ-
ization for the execution of intelligence policies. It notes
that the CIA and covert operations are very much an effect of
the various societal roots of American globalism, and that this
effect itself reinforces the inclination toward action. The
executive organ charged with the conduct of covert action, the
CIA, and its peculiar relationship to higher policy officials
illustrate a premise most succinctly phrased by Peter Blau:
In the course of operations, new elements arise in the
structure that influence subsequent operations.4
It will be shown that it is necessary to take into account the
sentiment expressed by Philip Selznick:
The organic, emergent character of the formal organi-
zation as a cooperative enterprise must be recognized.
This means that the organization reaches decisions,
takes action, and makes adjustments.5
Though undoubtedly affected by the overall environment of American
foreign policy, intelligence operations are very much influenced
by the inertia that exists in the present organization for
conduct of clandestine activities.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Insofar as intelligence organization and clandestine opera-
tions are themselves a cause of more operations, changing the
intelligence structure may alter U.S. clandestine presence in
international affairs. Because organization is but a cause
among many causes, the expectation that great alterations could
be achieved by merely considering organization might appear un-
founded. Yet such change in organization would not occur in a
vacuum. The Church and Pike Committee investigations and public
attention given to CIA covert action may indicate that the other
factors which bear upon the exercise of clandestine operations
have changed or are in the process of changing. These shifts
may or may not be sincere or enduring, but further concern for
reform of the intelligence structure might add substance to the
public questioning of CIA activity. Addressing intelligence and
operations as a cause of more involvement goes hand in hand with
scrutiny of intelligence operations as an effect of the general
U.S. disposition to be active internationally. A more opti-
mistic appraisal of the amount of change that might be triggered
by reorganization is permissible. Organizational reform, pro-
posed by this paper, could serve as a focus and concrete em-
bodiment of general alterations in the U.S. predisposition to
use covert action.
Since this paper does consider reform, it necessarily
reflects a particular point of view with respect to the use of
covert action and active U.S. international interference. Past
conduct of covert action will be characterized as "overuse" or
"extravagant", and the sense that the U.S. has done too much,
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
4
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
often serving dubious ends, permeates the text. This paper's
proposal for reform, therefore, will seek reduced engagement in
covert operations. Before initiating the main argument of the
paper -- that the American globalism embodied in the structure
of the CIA and use of covert action, causes more covert action --
it is necessary to outline a normative basis for desiring less
U.S. involvement.
The first step in supporting a position favoring reduction
in covert operations is to say that there is little wrong with
many of the stated goals of U.S. interference. Many impulses
which determine the extent of U.S. action owe their existence
to legitimate values. Much can be said in favor of checking
the spread of Communism, or at least in favor of halting the
expansion of Soviet style Communism. Security is a quality that
should be insured by some involvement in global affairs. Inter-
national order is preferable to allowing wanton international
interference by the
And the spread of a
very much desirable.
particularly covert
vation reveals that
legitimate values.
Soviet Union, Cuba, or terrorist groups.
respect for liberal democratic values is
But a reduction in U.S. interference,
action, is necessary because simple obser-
U.S. actions often have not served such
Salvador Allende may have been a Marxist,
but he was also an elected leader. Abetting his assassination
violated democratic ideals and therefore was illegitimate. (U.S.
association with Allende's assassination also was illegitimate
because assassination violates a higher sense of decency that
must circumscribe all international action. It would be a rare
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
5
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
case indeed where assassination could be justified.) Directing
a secret war in Laos did more to violate international order
than it served to check the spread of Communism or to insure U.S.
security. Too vigorous pursuit of legitimate ideals can result
in transgression of those same values. Without sufficient
caution in pursuing principles that may be legitimate in a
theoretical sense, policies turn out to have no reasonable rela-
tion to the goals which they presume to seek. Such policies
assume nonexistent abilities to
change, and are not always able
without doing
ment may have
inordinate damage
bring about beneficial or moral
to realize their stated aims
themselves. The Arbenz govern-
contained Communists and Mossadeq may have courted
Communist factions; but the overthrow of whole governments is
not justified by the eradication of such influences. Such lack
of a reasonable connection between the means of action, or the
damage incurred while acting, and the goals of U.S. policy calls
for a reduction in the use of covert operations.
The question why any covert action should be allowed must
be considered next. The answer lies in the fact that there are
circumstances where the means of covert action do bear a reason-
able relation to the legitimate goals noted above. Of course,
when such goals can be pursued openly, they should be. But
given that this is an imperfect world, it is evident that U.S.
goals may run counter to desires of other nations, groups of
nations, or groups within nations. The efficacy of open measures
may be precluded by the specific circumstances of time and place
when, in fact, the U.S. may have the capacity to effect some
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
6
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
good without violating a reasonable connection between means and
ends. For instance, it may happen that there is one particular
leader in a war torn African nation who could organize a working
peaceful government if he had secret access to $500,000. It may
be the case that the political circumstances prohibit his accep-
tance of an open American payment.6
Yet the secret contribution
7
may not be an unreasonable price when considered in light of the
cessation of bloodshed and the restoration of international tran-
quility that might redound to U.S. benefit.
While the exigencies of conducting a foreign policy in
conditions that may not be amenable to open action hint at the
possible utility and need for covert action, they also portray
what might be called a moral demand for covert action in partic-
ular instances. Clandestine operations may be the most reason-
able means for dealing with certain international situations.
Imagine circumstances where the sole alternatives to covert action
are not the more traditional means of open diplomacy, but are acts
of war or violence. Without recourse to covert operations,
efforts to rescue people hostage to terrorist groups or lawless
nations, for instance, might entail violence; or aid to a popu-
lation suffering under a tyrant in Latin America might be possible
only through military means. A not overly futuristic example
could find the U.S. or some allied nation facing nuclear black-
mail, which conceivably could be resolved in either open conflict
or by some effective covert operation. In such instances, covert
action may be the only reasonable method for achieving justi-
fiable goals. Therefore, covert action may be a logical and
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
8
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
necessary recourse, and some capability for those operations
should not be excluded.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
II. CIA: ADMINISTRATIONS' BABY
In order to avoid any misconceptions about the CIA's role
in foreign affairs, it is of paramount importance to recognize
that most of its major activities were desired, and, in most
cases, supervised by the highest level officials in the govern-
ment. Presidents, together with their cabinet appointees and
primary aides, without exception, have turned to the CIA at one
time or another for the fulfillment of tasks through covert action.
The final responsibility for the CIA's activities and the ultimate
source of the authority and scope of the Agency lie with each
post-war, executive administration.
The mandate for the complete spectrum of CIA activities is
said to reside in the National Security Act of 1947, in which
the CIA was created. An examination of that document reveals
that the CIA would advise the National Security Council (NSC)
on intelligence activities; coordinate intelligence activities;
coordinate, evaluate and disseminate intelligence; and perform,
for other agencies, intelligence related matters that can be
more efficiently accomplished centrally.1
The authority for
the conduct of covert, or simply general clandestine operations
is not specifically delineated in the Act. The authority for
such activities has been delegated to the Agency by the NSC
under the clause which reads:
9
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 1 0
it shall be the duty of the Agency ... to perform such
other functions and duties related to intelligence affecting
the national security as the National Security Council may
from time to time direct.2
Therefore, a wide range of CIA duties, particularly those con-
stituting the broad spectrum of clandestine activities delimited
by classical espionage at one extreme and subversion of foreign
governments at the other, has been commissioned by the policy-
makers who sit on the NSC. Although the flexibility granted the
NSC in the National Security Act provides a semantic loophole
for authorization of many activities by the CIA, it is evident
that the executive went much further than Congress had intended.
The lack of any mention of operations in the National Security
Act and other supporting evidence lead to the conclusion that
Congress did not mean to sanction covert action as it has been
practiced for the last 30 years.3
William G. Miller, the Church Committee Staff Director and
a man who probably has had as much access to CIA files and re-
lated congressional material as any other person, concluded:
there is little in the legislative history, in either
committee, executive session, or floor debate of that
time, that gives credence to the notion that Congress
intended to authorize what is now the full range of
covert action.''
Many legislators were completely ignorant of the question of
covert action. Representative Fred Busby asked in 1947, "I
wonder if there is any foundation for the rumors that have come
to me ... that through the CIA they are contemplating opera-
tional activities.H5 Furthermore, Clark Clifford, one of the
framers of the National Security Act of 1947, stated before the
Church Committee:
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Because those of us who were assigned to this task and had
the drafting responsibility were dealing with a new sub-
ject with practically no precedence, it was decided that
the act creating the Central Intelligence Agency should
contain a "catch all" clause to provide for unforseen
contingencies. Thus it was written that the CIA should
"perform such other functions and duties related to in-
telligence affecting the national security as t4e National
Security Council may from time to time direct."?
Clifford's testimony dispels the notion that the quoted clause
was specifically intended to facilitate implementation of covert
action, an idea often defended by those involved in the formu-
lation of covert action.7
CIA operations, therefore, are defined by National Security
Council Directives (NSCID's). These directives, through a
process of accretion over the span of a generation, have estab-
lished what is often called the "secret charter" of the Agency.
Richard Helms, testifying before the Senate Committee on Foreign
Relations about CIA operations in Chile, indicated the contractual
nature of the NSCID's, while affirming the notion that ultimate
responsibility for CIA action lies with the NSC. He stated:
the National Security directive ... is the document and
the charge under which these activities are carried out
... the authority for these things ought to be made clear
... this isn't something that we just did on our own, we
had an approval mechanism.
All intelligence policy-makers have echoed the words of the CIA's
most powerful director, Allen Dulles. He avowed that the CIA
had not carried out any activities of a political nature, given
any support to persons or movements, political or otherwise,
without approval at the highest levels in government.9 There
are several specific examples which serve to suggest that this
generally has been the case. In the absence of the NSCID's
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
11
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
12
themselves -- only a small number have been declassified -- the
evidence for the prescription of CIA activities by the NSC must
be culled from less direct discussions about the demands made
upon the Agency and from some knowledge of the operations
themselves. The instances that speak most directly to ultimate
responsibility of top policy-makers for CIA actions are ones
that depict the CIA as a reluctant but compliant operational arm
of the executive.
David Phillips, now a retired CIA officer, testified before
the Church Committee that the reaction in the Agency to the
NSCID's on operations in Chile was not favorable. He stated that
a typical reaction was: "My God, why are we given this assignment,"
andthat initial reaction from the station in Chile was: "You're
out of your mind. This is not going to work.u10 The fact that
the Agency often was compelled to undertake missions with which
it was not in agreement also is implied in William Colby's
testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee. The sub-
ject was Laos, where the CIA, in effect, had run a secret war
by aiding the creation of an army of Meo tribesmen and by ad-
vising that force in its military operations. Colby testified:
These activities grew in size over the years to meet
greater North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao pressure. The
size to which these operations grew made it difficult to
maintain normal intelligence procedures. Despite the
difficulties for the CIA, I submit that the Agency ful-11
filled the charge given it effectively and efficiently.
The implication obviously is that the Agency was merely an in-
strument in the hands of those officials assuming the responsi-
bility for conducting foreign policy from the uppermost offices
of the executive.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
At times the CIA was utilized as such a malleable instru-
ment for the designs of presidential administrations that the
Agency's deference in accepting the burdens of action put to it
might be characterized as approaching the absurd. Such a char-
acterization would be acceptable, except for the fact that the
activities in which the CIA engages have tremendously far-
reaching consequences. Yet, the ease with which administrations
established the CIA as a primary tool for the achievement of a
multitude of conceivable goals remains. A particularly instruc-
tive scheme for top-level policy making is available in a recon-
struction of a meeting at the White House on September 15, 1970.
CIA director Richard Helms had been summoned for a conference
with the President. Also present were John Mitchell and Henry
Kissinger. The topic was operations in Chile, and the discussion
must have been lively. Helms managed to take down a few notes.
1 in 10 chance, perhaps, but save Chile!
not concerned risks involved
no involvement of embassy
$10,000,000 available, more if necessary
full-time job -- best men we have12
This meeting was the initiation of the supersecret "Track II"
operations in Chile, designed to prevent Salvador Allende from
taking office as president by promoting and encouraging the
Chilean military to move against him.13 Track II was run with-
out the knowledge of the Ambassador to Chile, or the Departments
of State and Defense.14 The President and a handful of close
advisors were able to mobilize the resources of the CIA while
circumventing even the NSC as a whole, where the Secretaries of
State and Defense sit. The Agency, being a particularly facile
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
13
14
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
tool for use by the national security organization, also could
be cast in the role of special actor in operations by a more
select few, who are able to restrict access to knowledge of
certain CIA activities. Track II is an extreme example of the
fealty of the Agency to those highest eschelons in government,
and to the often insular judgements and perspectives commanding
the CIA's entrance into covert operations abroad.
,The CIA occasionally has been driven to the limits of the
law, in the strict, statutory sense of the National Security Act
of 1947, while responding to the demands of officials invested
with the authority to direct the Agency. An arrangement in
1966 between the FBI and the CIA opened the way for CIA involve-
ment in internal, domestic security functions. In response to
the persistent interest of the Nixon and Johnson White Houses in
determining the extent of foreign influence on domestic dissidents,
the CIA began collecting intelligence about American political
groups.15
The Rockefeller Commission Report concluded that the
"Presidential demands upon the CIA appears to have caused the
Agency to forego, to some extent, the caution with which it
might otherwise have approached the subject." 16 This is merely
a polite way of saying that Presidents and their influential
councils compelled the Agency to break the law which states that
"the Agency shall have no police, subpena, law-enforcement powers,
or internal security functions."17 Ultimate responsibility for
the greater part of CIA action, even its illegality, must be
placed in the upper levels of executive administration.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
III. THE INSTITUTIONAL BIAS TOWARD COVERT ACTION
The record of CIA activities reveals that the Agency has
not arrogated power and run amok without a mandate from elected
administrations and their appointed advisors. The Agency has
been fashioned and directed to fulfill the needs perceived by
those officials charged with the conduct of foreign policy and
national security affairs. In fact, the CIA has served too
well. As a tool of the executive, it is too easily handled and
too readily available for the execution of policies in the
foreign arena, and even in domestic affairs. Therefore, the
present state of the intelligence organization and its' relation-
ship to its administrative masters must be questioned in order to
insure more judicious use of the Agency's covert capability.
As long as the desire exists for a reduction in use of covert
action, as well as a restriction of the allowable conditions for
covert action, primary emphasis ought to be placed on evaluating
and modifying the perceptions and beliefs of the top policy-
makers. Those officials having the responsibility for the
direction of the CIA must bear the greater part of the scrutiny
for the extravagant implementation of clandestine abilities.
A portion of the propensity to use the CIA's covert capabilities
is determined by the bureaucratic-organizational orientation of
the policy-makers to the intelligence community. Such an orien-
tation is dependent upon, first, the organizational aspects of
15
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 16
the CIA itself -- its capabilities and adaptability for certain
tasks. Second, it is dependent upon the mechanisms for communi-
cation between the policy-makers and the Agency -- upon how
easily the Agency's potential can be tapped. Attention must
be given to the reasons for the overuse of CIA operational
ability which lie in the organization for formulation and exe-
cution of intelligence policies.
The way the CIA appears to officials responsible for
final policy decisions promotes its use. The relationship
between the policy-makers and the CIA is, in a sense, incestuous.
The executive has been free to create, free to shape the Agency
for its own purposes, and, in turn, the very organizational
features created and shaped have influenced the executive in
future relationships with the Agency. In this vicious cycle,
initial tendencies toward official use of covert operations
are reinforced. The fact that the CIA exists as it does allows
problems to be thrust upon it; it will be asked to carry out
policies because it is seen as an effective vehicle for that
purpose.
There are particular qualities that are responsible for
creating this demand. Administrators find the Agency an easy
tool to use because it promises the "benefits" of secrecy; it
appeals to the predisposition to attempt to do, to act, as
opposed to being inactive; it contains and concentrates many
resources which prompt administrative attempts at many goals; and
between the Agency and those who desire action, there are few
obstacles to the communication of that desire. Each of the
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
above categories, taken alone, can appear to be an innocuous
attribute of an agency charged with intelligence duties.
Secrecy is necessary for some uncontroversial intelligence
functions. Action and the gathering of resources for action
are unavoidable consequences of participating in the affairs of
the world. Easy communication and response between an agency
and high offices can facilitate the execution of well formed
policies. However, each quality also has its disadvantages and
unfortunate side effects, which will be enumerated. The combina-
tion of all these qualities in a particular kind of institution,
like the CIA, creates pernicious tendencies for extravagant use
of clandestine capabilities.
Background: CIA/NSC Structure
The basic organizational aspects of intelligence serve as an
important background for the visibility
enhance the liklihood of covert action.
security organization, of which the CIA
central entities, was created according
of the qualities which
The entire national
and the NSC are the
to the principle later
articulated in the report of the Commission on Organization of
the Executive Branch of Government in 1949 (the first Hoover
Commission). "Effective administration is not achieved by
establishing by legislation the precise functions and member-
ship of coordinating and advisory bodies within the executive
branch."1 As a consequence, the NSC, in the Church Committee's
words, is "an extremely flexible instrument."2 It has only
four statutory members: the President, the Vice President, the
Secretary of State, and the Secretary of Defense. If the
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
17
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
President wishes, others may be invited to attend NSC meetings,
and, although not members of the NSC, the Director of Central
Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
attend all NSC meetings as observers and advisors.3 The
18
President can create and abolish various subcommittees, in-
cluding those of particular interest here -- the two subcom-
mittees having direct intelligence responsibilities. The NSC
Intelligence Committee, which was created in 1971, consists of
subcabinet officials, including the President's Assistant for
National Security Affairs and the Director of Central Intelligence.
Its purpose was to present a forum for the viewpoints of the con-
sumers of intelligence estimates and evaluations.4
Under
President Ford's reorganization, no successor for this sub-
committee has been designated. The other subcommittee exercises
control over covert operations, and has existed in some form
since 1948. It was first called the Special Group, then the
303 Committee, the 40 Committee, and is nowlabeled the Opera-
tions Advisory Group. It is presently chaired by the Assistant
to the President for National Security Affairs, and has as
members the Director of Central Intelligence, the Chairman of
JCS, and representatives from the Departments of State and
Defense.5
The structure of the CIA itself is based upon the division
of functions into what are called directorates. There are four
major directorates within the Agency -- Intelligence, Operations,
Administration, and Science and Technology. Each is headed by
a deputy director who reports directly to the Director of
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Central Intelligence (DCI). The Directorate of Intelligence
evaluates, correlates, and disseminates foreign intelligence
and collects information by monitoring foreign radio broadcasts.
The Directorate of Operations, which was known as the Directorate
for Plans, handles the clandestine collection, covert operation,
and counterintelligence activities. The Directorate of Science
and Technology conducts research and development projects
relevant to intelligence collection and counterintelligence, and
provides technical services and supplies for CIA operations.6
The Directorate of Administration, formerly called the Director-
ate of Support, exercises all those functions implied in the
word "administration" -- contracting, communications, medical
services, personnel management, finance, and computer filing.7
The Director of Central Intelligence is the highest officer
of the CIA, and is responsible for all those functions embodied
in the four major directorates. The DCI also is charged with
the function of coordinating the intelligence activities of
government agencies and departments, and is the President's
chief foreign intelligence advisor with responsibility for pro-
ducing and coordinating national intelligence for senior policy-
makers.8 It is important to note that the DCI fills two sig-
nificant roles. He wears two hats; one as the commander of
the CIA directorates, and the second as the nation's chief in-
telligence officer reporting to the President through the NSC.
Because he deals with all intelligence activities of the other
departments as well as with CIA business, he is a focal point
of the entire intelligence organization. His peculiar position
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
19
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
and the structural relationships among the President and the
NSC, committees of the NSC, and the directorates of the CIA
serve as a skeleton for the institutional qualities which tend
to create or reinforce an executive impulse to use covert action.
The first of these qualities is secrecy.
Secrecy
Secrecy, its necessity and usefulness, has always been
identified with intelligence. However, regarding the whole of
CIA activities, only a small percentage of functions can be
categorized as truly secret. Allen Dulles wrote at the time
of the creation of the CIA:
A proper analysis of the intelligence obtainable by ...
overt, normal, and aboveboard means would supply us with
over 80 percent ... of the information required far the
guidance of our national policy. An impprtant balance
must be supplied by secret intelligence.
Dulles was discussing, of course, only collection of intelli-
gence and no operational activities other than those concomi-
tant with clandestine collection. Covert action must somehow
be added into his percentages. Still, the truly sensitive
areas of the CIA's work, areas where there may be a legitimate
concern for "protecting intelligence sources and methods from
unauthorized disclosure,"10 are the object of a small proportion
of the CIA's capabilities. It is upon those capabilities,
designed for use in sensitive activities, that policy-makers
tend to seize. The secrecy inherent in them, for various
reasons, appears to offer several advantages.
A reliance on covert policies has been a means to avoid
the difficult questions associated with intervention in the
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
20
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
affairs of another country. It particularly solves the poli-
tical problem of appearing to have too much to say and do with
those affairs, the problem of appearing to be a bully.11
The
enticing potential exists to do something, to achieve some
policy goal, without anybody recognizing the driving force
behind a particular turn of events. By shielding the President
and other senior officials from direct association with any
events, the fact that operations are "covert" makes it possible
to publicly deny responsibility,12 especially if some foul-up
should occur. The possibility of "plausible deniability" tends
to make it easier for policy-makers to enter into operations
that may be dubious in the first place. A realistic evaluation
of potential benefits opposed to a calculation of the risks
involved in a certain activity becomes difficult to make. For
example, in an instance of policy-making previously cited,
officials estimated that Track II operations in Chile had about
a one in ten chance of success. They also were allowed the
devilish assumption that they would not be held responsible for
condoning the assassination of a foreign leader. Obviously, it
is much easier to go through with a dubious operation if the
outcome, success or failure, will not be known to anyone out-
side the operation itself.
Emphasis on secrecy in the conduct of particular operations
eventually leads to exclusion of potential critics even at the
policy formulation stage. People and organizations, even those
in the executive branch, who are competent and available for
comment on policy alternatives, tend to be barred from beneficial
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
21
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
participation in formulation of those operations labeled
"sensitive." Therefore, secrecy brings with it the tendency
to formulate policies constructed from perspectives which are
accumulated in a rather parochial manner. Roger Hilsman wrote
about an extreme example of the detrimental exclusion of various
governmental entities in policy formulation, and the historical
record illustrates the dire consequences of that exclusion.
He noted that the emphasis on secrecy in CIA planning closed out
rival advocates concerning operations in the Bay of Pigs.13
The Secretary of State was forced by ... CIA's excessive
security restrictions to make a judgement without the
benefit of advice from his own intelligence staff ...
Robert Amory Jr., the DDCI, who was in charge of intel-
ligence research and estimates, was also kept in the dark.
This meant that the President was denied the judgement
of CIA's own estimators on the research side of the
organization. 14
Hilsman had wanted to employ his staff in the State DeparLment
to critically evaluate the feasibility of using a Cuban refugee
force against Cuba, a proposition that was generally in the air
around Washington at the time. He approached the Secretary of
State and was told not to do anything because "This is being too
tightly held."15 Apparently, the same thing must have occurred
with the Directorate of Intelligence in the CIA. The secrecy
in which the whole operation was cloaked placed the responsi-
bility for judging the feasibility and desirability of a Cuban
invasion upon a few individuals concentrated in the White House
and the Directorate of Operations. It negated the possibility
for obstacles, in the form of responsible debate by intramural
institutions, to the implementation of covert operations.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
22
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
It should be noted that the structure of the CIA, particu-
larly the division between the Directorates of Operations and
Intelligence, favors or, at least, facilitates the rejection of
pertinent and useful analysis even from within the national
security apparatus. The instance of excluding the Directorate
of Intelligence from theplans concerning the Bay of Pigs is a
startling example of the ease with which administrators may
focus upon elements of decision making favoring covert action.
Another example arises in connection with dirty tricks in Chile.
The Church Committee concluded that covert action decisions on
Chile were not entirely consistent with the intelligence estimates
(NIE's) being produced by the CIA's Directorate of Intelligence.
The Committee stated:
It appears that the Chile NIE's were either, at best,
selectively used or, at worst, disregarded by policy-
makers when the time came to make decisions regarding
U.S. covert involvement in Chile. 40 Committee decisions
regarding Chile reflected greater concern about the
internal and international consequences of an Allende
government than was reflected in the intelligence esti-
mates. At the same time as the Chile NIE's were be-
coming less shrill, the 40 Committee authorized greater
amounts of money for covert operations in Chile.-'-0
Both secrecy and the organizational structure of the CIA can
be seen to conspire against the inclusion of the capable,
though passive, resources contained in the CIA's own intelli-
gence and analysis division.
The fact that secrecy enshrouds the CIA's activities does
not make a complete case for far-reaching reform of the intelli-
gence community. Secrecy alone does not bring about poor
policies or a reliance on clandestine operations. It is a
medium in which preexisting qualities of thought and institu-
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
23
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
tional inclinations tend to be reinforced, or at best remain
unchallenged. If secrecy were attributable only to an intelli-
gence organization having responsibilities for making and
breaking codes, it would be impossible to argue that secrecy
could create pressures to catapault that organization into
covert operations. But the CIA is an organization imbued with
operational abilities and activist qualities. Secrecy tends
to enhance those qualities and present them in a flattering
light to administrators. The disposition of officials to
approach problems in an activist frame of mind, with perspectives
that favor action over inaction, is facilitated by the embodiment
of similar qualities in the CIA and by the medium of secrecy in
which those qualities may set to work. In describing the CIA
orientation toward action, and recalling that secrecy enables
policy-makers to freely chart any conceivable course of action,
it becomes more evident how the present existence of the CIA
favors use of covert action.
CIA Activism
The CIA necessarily reflects the administrative bias toward
"getting things done," toward an activist orientation in problem
solving. That orientation tends to enhance the inclination to
enter into "operative" activities because, being born of an
administrative disposition to meddle continuously in the affairs
of the world, an active CIA exists for further seduction toward
an activist frame of mind. Administrators could revel in the
knowledge that, in Roger Hilsman's words, "/The CIA'L7 job was
to smite our enemies, not to negotiate with them, or compromise
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
with them, or make agreements with them. It had the appeal
of patriotism."17
The action orientation of the CIA, and how it affects U.S.
foreign policy are revealed in a variety of ways. Leaders of
the intelligence community, apparently reflecting the temper of
the executive as a whole, embodied a sense of urgency in dealing
with the problems in foreign intelligence. This was compounded
by the feeling that U.S. intelligence was at a definite disad-
vantage with respect to its foreign counterparts. Allen Dulles
wrote:
in our free society our defenses and deterrents are
largely prepared in an open fashion, while our antagon-
ists have built up a formidable wall of secrecy and
security. In order to bridge this gap ... we have t90
rely more and more upon our intelligence operations. 1?
More recently, Deputy Secretary of Defense Ellsworth stated:
the very openness of our society already gives to the
intelligence analysts of foreign powers a considerable
advantage as they work to collect and understand our
capabilities and intentions, as well as our vulnerabilities.
19
The organizational perception of carrying an added burden in
confronting "enemies" abroad is consonant with the observation
that "impatience with sophisticated diplomacy and indirect
political action follows from the fact that the enemy has many
advantages in this game."20
Therefore, officials turn to the
CIA and its potential for ameliorating the perceived short-
comings of American foreign policy.
Administrators seek refuge from the troublesome and un-
wieldy machinations of traditional diplomacy in the comfort of
the CIA's "realistic" approach to most problems. The Agency can
be counted on to analyze the cold, hard facts of the world, and
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
25
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 26
automatically offer direct, tangible and substantive considera-
tions on how to operate. The type of thinking that exemplifies
the character of the Agency appeared in DCI William Colby's
approach to a Board of National Estimates internal to the CIA.
Colby replaced the Board with a system of eleven national in-
telligence officers, each responsible for a particular geo-
graphical or functional specialty. His rationale for the more
individualized responsibility was:
I have some reservations at the ivory tower kind of
problem that you get out of a board which is too separ-
ated from the rough and tumble of the real world. I
think there is a tendency for it to intellectualize and
then write sermons and appreciations.21
Such thinking epitomizes the CIA's tendency to formulate or be
receptive to programs with active orientations. Reflective
attitudes or other passive responses (for example, merely
collection of intelligence) seem to be rare amid the rush to
get something done. During the Senate hearing on the nomination
of William Colby to be DCI, it was noted that "there is no record
of an officer being promoted because he recommended the termin-
ation of a useless project."22 That is, once the Agency gets
rolling in an operation, it tends to continue or enlarge the
?
scope of its activity. Action tends to breed more action and
create pressures for greater involvement in covert activities.23
The Church Committee concluded that "the tendency of intel-
ligence activities to expand beyond their initial scope is a
theme which runs through every aspect of our investigative
findings."24
Clandestine activities, even the relatively harm-
less business of collecting intelligence covertly, have con-
sequences that tend to make CIA presence "operational." From
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
that point, the disposition of policy-makers to expand the scope
of CIA presence dominates policy decisions. A prime example of
the process of escalation of collection to dirty tricks is dis-
cussed in the Church Committee Staff Report -- Covert Action in
Chile. The report noted that development of "assets" for infor-
mation within the Chilean military necessarily created ties with
the group most likely to overthrow Allende5 Eventually, those
links to the Chilean military were seized by officials directing
the CIA from the White House in formulating Track II operations.26
The structure of the CIA, particularly the role played by
the DCI, facilitates an emphasis on the operational aspects of
intelligence. The work of Anne Karalekas in another supple-
mentary report to the Church Committee argued that the coordin-
ating responsibilities of the DCI in the intelligence community
are not supported by the requisite authority to carry them out,
and that coordination tends to take a back seat to operations.
She noted that the executive was given an opportunity to push for
an enhanced role of the DCI for the entire intelligence community,
possibly reorienting the Agency somewhat more toward the duties
specifically stipulated in the National Security Act of 1947.
(i.e. those charges delineating the DCI's advisory and coordina-
ting capacities and not the duties assigned over time by the
NSC, which were unmentioned in the Act.)
Nixon chose not to request Congressional enactment of
revised legislation on the role of the DCI. This ...
limited the DCI's ability to exert control over the
intelligence components. The DCI was once again left
to arbitrate with no real statutory authority.27
As a consequence, the CIA reflects the relative disinterest of
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
27
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
administrators in the coordinating capacities of the Agency, as
opposed to their affection for the CIA's operational potential.
The inequality in preference for particular aspects of the
Agency's abilities eventually focuses upon the stature of the
Directorate of Operations as it compares to the Directorate of
Intelligence.
Analysis and evaluation do not seem to enjoy the
respect given the operational side of the Agency. It is impor-
tant to note that every CIA director who has risen from within
the Agency itself has been elevated from the Directorate of
Operations. Administrators prefer the activist nature of that
directorate and, in Arthur Schlesinger's words, "no doubt
imprisoned in every President there LIq7 a James Bond signaling
to be let out.28
The Size and Resources of the CIA
Secrecy and the inclination to be active combine with yet
another attribute of the CIA to make possible use of covert
action on an inordinate scale. The Agency is immensely capable;
it concentrates a multitude of resources for translating the
inclination to act into substantive programs. The availability
of those resources is an open advertisement for administrators
to make use of them. Money begs to be spent, and people need to
be put to work. The secretive and activist aura which envelops
the CIA does nothing to inhibit the display of its great ability
and the temptation to make use of it.
The CIA has the resources, the people, equipment and money
to engage in the full spectrum of activities associated with
participation in foreign affairs. At one extreme, it collects
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
28
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
raw intelligence; it buys books and journals. At another
extreme, it wages war; it conducts invasions (Cuba) and air
raids (Laos). In between, the CIA has the ability to contact
and influence foreign officials in a manner associated with the
State Department or by funneling money and supplies to individ-
uals. A complete discussion of the enormity and multifaceted
nature of the CIA's capacity is beyond the scope of this paper,
but it is possible to suggest the magnitude of the Agency's
potential for action with a few examples. Then, it can be
postulated that the presence of great capacity, within a
structure of secrecy and activist inclinations, creates pressures
for realization of that capacity in covert action.
The CIA budget is a general indicator of the huge resources
that the Agency commands. The intelligence community as a
whole29 has an annual budget of about
6 billion.30 Most esti-
mates of the CIA portion of that budget hover around 20%; or the
CIA consumes about $1 billion of the total.31 The larger part
of the funds is allocated to the clandestine side of the CIA.
The Agency uses about two thirds of its money for operations --
a proportion that has been relatively constant for 10 years.32
The availability of this amount of money tends to propel the
Agency into many activities. Roger Hilsman noted with dismay
that because the CIA had a grip on a large amount of funds, it
found itself performing functions that would ordinarily fall under
State Department jurisdiction.
CIA became involved in many activities ... considered
to be outside its legitimate purview at the urging of
other agencies, such as the State Department, who would
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
29
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
normally be responsible for the activity but whose budget
did not provide for it.33
Hilsmanwent on to say that even a large program within the State
Department for producing National Intelligence Surveys was
dependent upon the CIA for about 40 percent of its budget. He
stated that "the State Department did not have the money, but
the CIA d1d."34
CIA resources are present throughout the globe. Beyond
the scope of men and equipment directly employed by the Agency,
numerous, so-called proprietaries are at the CIA's disposa1.35
The vastness of CIA presence can be suggested merely by noting
the size and distribution of its air proprietaries. Marchetti
and Marks stated that
the CIA is currently the owner of one of the biggest --
if not the biggest -- fleets of "commercial" airplanes
in the world. Agency proprietaries include Air America,
Air Asia, Civil Air Transport, Intermountain Aviation,
Southern Air Transport, and several other air charter
companies around the world.3?
Control of these companies enabled the CIA to supply and fly
planes in their secret war in Laos,37 as well as in other opera-
tions during the past thirty years.
CIA capacity also includes the ability to display its
usefulness to policy-makers. Th6,t is, the CIA not only contains
immense resources which tend to be viewed by the executive as
available for use in covert policies, it also has the personnel
to see that the perspectives which promote implementation of
covert potential are presented in policy formulation. Roger
Hilsman again shed some light on this subject.
Where the State Department ... at one time had three
people on its Laos desk, the CIA had six. This meant
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
30
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 31
that the CIA could always afford to be represented at
an interdepartmental meeting, that it could spare the
manpower to prepare the papers that would dominate the
meeting, and it could explore the byways and muster the
information and argiAments that gave its men authority
at those meetings?Jo
Ability in the field, ability in presenting the activist alter-
natives within the machinery of policy formulation, the original
inclination to act, and secrecy can all be seen as conspiring
to facilitate abundant use of covert operations.
CIA Access to Policy Officials: Policy Exposure to Operations
The relationship between the policy-makers, the President
and the NSC, and the CIA is carried on in an intimate setting.
The Agency reports directly to the NSC or to the President,
depending on the individual style of each administration. As
a result, lines of communication are short and direct,. and they
rapidly and continuously reinforce any inclinations to engage in
covert activities. All the other qualities which facilitate use
of covert action are magnified by the close interaction of the
Agency and the executive.
Generally acknowledged not to be a policy making organi-
zation, the CIA is nonetheless ubiquitous in its presence at
many levels of national security policy formulation. Its repre-
sentatives sit on 15 interagency subcommittees to "coordinate"
the intelligence community, and the DCI sits on all seven com-
mittees of the NSC and is present at all meetings of the NSC
itself. Most important to keep in mind about the DCI's role
on these committees is the fact that he invariably acts as the
chief intelligence officer of the nation in a coordinating
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
capacity, and he also is the head of the CIA. Therefore, the
DCI exposes the availability of the Agency for covert operations
whether he is present at a meeting as an advisor on intelligence,
as a coordinator for the intelligence community, or as the com-
mander of the CIA. The consequences of such an organization
were noted in a discussion by Marchetti and Marks. The topic
is a policy session concerning operations in Africa in 1969.
As the President's principal intelligence advisor, his
function is to supply the facts and the intelligence
community's best estimate of future events in order to
help the decision-makers in their work. What Helms
was saying to the NSC was entirely factual, but it had
the effect of injecting operations into a policy decision.39
"Inject" may be too forceful a word, but one gets the sense that
an adjunct to high level representation of the CIA is a great
amount of exposure for the operational abilities of the Agency.
The cards are stacked in favor of covert action.
Pressures from above often compel the Agency to present
its estimates and to make itself available for action in a
manner consonant with administrative inclinations already present.
One particularly blatant example of such browbeating appeared
when DCI Helms deleted a paragraph in the BoardLof National Esti-
mates' draft on Soviet strategic forces after an assistant to
Secretary of Defense Laird told Helms that the draft contradicted
the public position of the Secretary.40
Testimony taken before
the Church Committee also revealed that, in a pinch, the CIA
would be just as malleable as was necessary to retain the interest
of the higher ups.
When intelligence producers have a general feeling that
they are working in a hostile climate 5eferring to going
against the grain of their bossea7 what really happens is
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
32
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
not so much that they tailor the product to please,
although that's not been unknown, but mace likely they
avoid the treatment of difficult issues. '1
Richard Helms responded to questions from the Committee in a
similar manner, stating, "One does not want to lose one's
audience."42 The CIA's willingness to please and the policy-
33
maker's reliance upon the Agency for aid in policy decisions
combine to reinforce any original perspectives on the use of
the Agency's abilities.
The combination of immense capability and short, direct,
secret lines of communication to the sources of highest authority
is an anomaly in a nation predicated upon specific forms for
government -- on laws and procedures. The intimate relationship
between the executive and CIA embodies all the qualities that
do not exemplify the tradition of tempering the enactment of
policies with procedural checks, checks that could enable the
CIA and the executive to escape their cycle of inducing one
another into agreement with covert operations. Acknowledging
the fact that much business in government is conducted informally
-- Senate committee papers on government operations at the Presi-
dential level argue for a required "flexibility" in NSC business
and for the ability to adapt the bureaucratic machinery to a
Presidential "style"43 -- there is all the more reason to be
suspicious of transactions conducted with a powerful and secretive
organization. The fact that covert action approvals from the
40 Committee were regularly obtained over the phone illustrates
the ease with which executive desires may be realized through
expedient response from the CIA.44
The danger in placing a
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
capable and secretive agency within the direct influence of
those with the most authority is most succinctly summarized in
Richard Helms' comment referring to the limited aid the CIA gave
Mr. Hunt for the Watergate break-in -- that "when the President's
Chief of Staff speaks to you, one obviously assumes that he is
speaking with authority."45 If activities that the CIA performs
are indeed necessary, care should be taken to erect an organi-
zation that tempers the combination of secrecy, capability and
informal directness in the lines of command. The present organi-
zation magnifies rather than mitigates that combination. The
notion of the Presidency as a "best sanctuary" in which the
intelligence apparatus could operate has proven false. Richard
Helms stated:
I thought that when Congress in the National Security Act
of 1947 set up the Agency and had it report to the National
Security Council, which is to report to the President,
that that would give it the sanctuary it needed from all
of the pressures around Washington, either from the State
Department, the Defense Department, or anybody else who
wanted .0 pressure its estimates, its analyses, and so
forth 4b
Mr. Helms mistakes the lion's den for a sanctuary. The prox-
imity of the CIA to the highest authority, from the outset,
made possible the creation of an organization available for the
whims of the executive. Once created, that proximity has enabled
the perpetuation of the congenial and mutually reinforcing rela-
tionship between the CIA and its masters. Few obstacles bar the
two-way communication of the desirability and feasibility to
enter into covert action.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
IV. PROPOSALS FOR REFORM: INADEQUATE
Several types of reform of the CIA and the intelligence
community have been proposed. Not all have as their express
purpose the reduction of U.S. secret interference in the affairs
of other nations. The proposals which do have such a stated
purpose, or are championed by some as nonetheless fulfilling
that purpose, face two problems. They first must be able to
mitigate the institutional qualities of the CIA which tempt the
executive to use covert operations. Second, they must maintain
executive command and responsibility for the covert action which
is necessary and desirable. Only the highest authority should
exert effective and direct policy controls in the special instances
of secret political intervention. To say that the proximity of
the CIA to those officials having the greatest authority creates
pressures for implementation of the Agency's abilities is not to
say that the CIA should be beyond the reach of the executive.
Such a conclusion would make possible an even more pernicious
state of affairs with the CIA running loose, or being controlled
and directed only by lesser and possibly more adventurous offi-
cials. Therefore, the desire to alleviate ?the Agency's tendency
to feed the executive imagination creates a tension with the
desire to maintain Presidential responsibility for covert opera-
tions. The resolution of this tension and a solution to the CIA's
appetizing appearance for use in covert action is not an easy task.
35
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
In fact, the challenge is rarely met head on. Most proposals
for change seem to concede to the desire for executive control
before they address the necessity for mitigation of the institu-
tional qualities which favor covert action. As such, the pro-
posals usually are embellishments or minor alterations of the
present state of the intelligence apparatus. Though some may
represent a step in the right direction, their impact is minimal
and -the qualities that enhance the liklihood of covert action
largely remain intact. The poverty of these proposals illus-
trates the need for a more basic reconstruction of the CIA and
its relationship to the executive.
36
Congressional Oversight
Congressional oversight has been hailed as a panacea for the
ills of the intelligence community. On the contrary, it is only
a necessary but not sufficient step toward alteration of the CIA
in order to rid it of the tendency to spawn or nuture the notion
of covert action in the policy-making mind. Its immediate bene-
fit is that it appears to strike at one of the qualities favor-
able to implementation of covert operations. Oversight reduces
secrecy by allowing more people to join the review of policy; or
so it appears. But even before its effect upon secrecy can be
evaluated, there is the problem of getting oversight established
as a strong, functioning entity in the first place. Congressional
difficulty in creating effective oversight chastens a belief in
over sight as a remedial influence on secrecy.
Although currently there are seven congressional committees
with the power to investigate intelligence activities and to
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 37
receive intelligence briefings, the abundance of investigative
groups is an indication of the weakness rather than of the
strength of congressional oversight. No one is more aware of
this fact than the Congressmen themselves, though they have not
been able to get together to improve it. Representative Robert
Drinan stated before the Senate Armed Services Committee:
In the last 2 decades more than 200 bills aimed at making
the CIA accountable to Congress have been introduced.
None has been enacted ... 5_7 recent attempt ... came on
July 17, 1972, when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
reported out a bill requiring the CIA to submit regular
reports to congressional committees. That bill died in
the Senate Armed Services Committee.'
His statement points to three difficulties in creating effective
oversight. The first is the fact that he is a representative
castigating a Senate committee for its poor record on oversight.
The division between House and Senate has not been resolved on
the oversight issue yet. Second, Drinan noted the conflict
within the Senate itself. The jurisdictional issue in the Senate
as to whether the Armed Services Committee should share its
responsibilities as the parent committee of the CIA with the
Foreign Relations Committee has put the CIA and the question of
review and control in the crossfire between contending chairmen
in Congress.2
Third, even when the impulse to create effective
oversight is allowed to surface, bills embodying such efforts
simply never get passed.
Because Congress has difficulty in establishing oversight,
its willingness to assume that role must be severely questioned.
There may be a deep seated reluctance to shoulder the responsi-
bility of oversight. Senator Howard Baker suggested such a
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
notion by stating, "I think it is important to realize that
covert action cannot be conducted in public ... we cannot
"
approach covert action from a public relations point of view.3
Senator Barry Goldwater went even further and refused to
sign the final Church Committee report.4
Congressional disin-
clination to seize the reins on the CIA probably is the result
of many factors. One of the primary reasons is contained in a
few incisive remarks by Richard Helms before the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee:
... if you had known about the Bay of Pigs before it
happened ... what would it have looked like when you
were asked to admit did you know about the Bay of Pigs,
were you involved in it, and did you approve it ...
Would you really want to go back to the elctorate and
say: "Yes, I was the fellow who approved operations
which were going to cause trouble in a foreign country.5
It appears that Congress as a whole would like to answer Mr.
Helms, "No," even in the face of their ultimate constitutional
responsibility for committing the U.S. to major foreign policy
adventures, like that of sending troops abroad.
If the assumption is made that Congress will overcome its
jurisdictional disputes and its apparent reluctance to take on
the extra responsibility of oversight, the final effectiveness
of even a well organized joint Senate-House committee is question-
able. After overcoming intramural squabbles and the initial
congressional inertia on oversight, the new committee or commit-
tees will still be faced with the CIA. The Agency and its ability
to foster a reliance on covert action are a lot to handle with
simply a board of legislative reviewers. Any oversight commit-
tees will be far the weaker of the two structures for control
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
38
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 39
of the CIA; the executive overshadows it immensely. Oversight
alone cannot annul the wedding of the executive to its opera-
tional arm in the CIA.
Legislative committees will have to deal with the possibil-
ity that the executive and Congress will hold divergent per-
spectives on the precise function of oversight. A congressional
notion of oversight as control is not of necessity consonant
with executive ideas on the function of legislative oversight.
For example, Deputy Secretary of Defense Ellsworth revealed the
essentially passive role which the executive would assign a joint
congressional oversight committee. In his remarks before the
Senate Armed Services Committee in 1976, he said a joint con-
gressional committee
would be beneficial to everybody in the Government and to
everybody in the intelligence community, because of the
fact that it would improve and increase, presumably the
public's confidence, and therefore support, for necessary
information gathering functions.?
In other words, one way in which the executive looks at over-
sight is from a public relations perspective. Oversight imparts
at least an aura of respectability to intelligence activities,
which the executive sorely would like to maintain. No doubt
oversight would solve some of Congress' public relations problems,
in that representatives could tell their constituents that they
have taken steps to control the CIA. But oversight conceived as
public relations does not penetrate complete executive control.
Because executive and congressional conceptions of the
purpose of oversight are not necessarily consonant, the value
of such review inevitably will be reduced. The executive will
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 ko
be tempted to exclude the Congress on issues it deems most im-
portant, invariably the issues most likely to lead to covert
action. Congressional oversight will run headlong into the
type of thinking epitomized in Clark Clifford's memo to Presi-
dent Kennedy on October 25, 1961.
... efforts are made in Congress to initiate investi-
gations of intelligence activities or establish a joint
congressional committee on foreign intelligence. Such
efforts must be stoutly and intelligently resisted for
they could seriously hamper the efficient and effective
operation of our intelligence activities.?
Clifford's comments opposed the establishment of legislative
control, but it is evident that even after some structure for
oversight is created, the executive will be inclined to put up
some resistance. It is equally obvious that the executive has
at its disposal many means for avoiding the Congress; .the
secrecy that oversight promises to mitigate is not easily pene-
trable. In 1970, an Intelligence Evaluation Committee (IEC)
was revitalized in order to coordinate intelligence on domestic
dissidence.8
The Chief of Counterintelligence was the CIA
representative to the committee and the Chief of Operation
CHAOS had a primary role on the committee's Intelligence Evalu-
ation Staff. The committee and its staff illustrate the ability
of the executive to exclude the legislature on issues that it
knows are sensitive (for example, the use of the CIA in internal,
domestic functions embodied in CHAOS). The IEC was not created
by executive order. In fact, according to the minutes of the
IEC meeting on February 1, 1971, John Dean, a White House repre-
sentative, said he favored avoiding any written directive con-
cerning the IEC because a directive "might create problems of
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
congressional oversight and disclosure. Where the executive
wants to deny Congress current knowledge of particular intelli-
gence activities, the Congress is in no position to wield the
leverage necessary to pry into the recesses of White House policy-
making. It is at the mercy of those little, though important,
wiles depicted in John Dean's formula for fending off congres-
sional knowledge of, or involvement with the IEC.
If the White House is at all reluctant to concede to Con-
gress on questions concerning executive privilege, it is bound
to be most adamant in relation to intelligence. Allen Dulles
wrote wistfully of the British system for delineating the execu-
tive jurisdiction over information:
the theory of privilege, that all official information
belongs to the Crown and that those who receive it offi-
cially may not lawfully divulge it without the authority
of the Crown ... seems sound.i?
Where congressional desires clash with such a concrete assertion
of executive privilege, it is not assured that Congress will be
able to wrest any useful, necessary information or win executive
compliance in order to achieve effective oversight. The problem
has been vividly revealed during the Church Committee investiga-
tions of past intelligence activities. (Imagine a ten-fold in-
crease in difficulty gaining executive compliance on present
operations.) Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and CIA Director
William Colby simply boycotted all the covert action hearings, and
the committee had to accept the rebuff.11
Where the CIA did
cooperate with the Church Committee, the bad taste of futility
in attempting to subordinate the Agency even to a committee with
a broad investigative mandate remained. A staff member of the
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 42
Committee stated:
Those guys really knew what they were doing. I think
they defended themselves just like any other agency
would, except they're better. They had a whole office
set up to deal with us, and I sometimes had the feeling
that they ran operations against us like they run them
against foreign governments. It was like the CIA station
for the Congress instead of for Greece or Vietnam.12
Some of the abilities that make the CIA a handy tool for the
executive in foreign policy can be used to thwart the aims of
oversight. As a last resort, if the CIA cannot avoid appearing
before congressional committees on relatively equal ground, it
appears that CIA personnel, as representatives of the executive,
have been instructed to feel no compunction for failing to
adhere to the truth. Senator George McGovern asked Richard Helms
if the Agency felt it had the right or an obligation to mislead
congressional committees. Helms responded ?by referring specifi-
cally to questions on Chile that the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee had asked him previously. He said, "I felt obliged
to keep some of this stuff, in other words, not volunteer a good
deal of information."13 Where the executive and Congress lock
horns on knowledge of intelligence operations, the Congress is
at such a disadvantage that the prospects for meaningful control
by the legislature are dim.
Imagining the most ideal circumstances for the exercise of
congressional oversight -- a legislature with a unified purpose
in controlling the CIA and an executive willing to accede to most
congressional demands -- the usefulness of oversight is still
disputable. It does not even begin to address three of the four
salient CIA attributes that greatly facilitate the use of covert
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
action. Nothing is done about the activist disposition of the
Agency and its allure to policy-makers. The same can be said
for the CIA's great capacity easily available to the executive.
Even the hope that oversight would lessen the secrecy which en-
velops policy formulation and makes way for covert operations is
a dubious proposition. Senator Clifford Case astutely recognized
the liklihood that congressional committees would be drawn into
the circle of secrecy rather than serving to penetrate that
secrecy. He asked Richard Helms:
Do you have any comments as to how we can have a con-
gressional ... surveillance organization dealing with
covert activities, which by their nature have to be kept
secret? ... just how do you resolve this dilemma in your
mind. I have been very skeptical of an oversight com-
mittee because I can't see w4t good a committee does if
it can't tell what it knows.14
Such skepticism has been borne out by past experience. Through-
out its life span, the CIA has reported to the Armed Services
Committees and the Appropriations Committees of the House and
Senate. Allen Dulles wrote in 1963 that he did not recall "a
single case of indiscretion that has resulted from telling these
committees the most intimate details of CIA activities."15
Several hundred covert operation projects later, the tendency to
initiate covert action remains unchanged by such congressional
participation. Congressional involvement does not alter the
secret nature of CIA planning; rather, it only widens the scope
of secrecy somewhat. Congress has been in on the Agency's covert
action, if only by sharing information. Hence, Congress is re-
sponsible for the magnitude of such action in more than the simple
sense of allowing the CIA and the executive complete freedom to
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
14,3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 44
act. Senator John Sparkman noted:
I think we must be very careful to avoid the idea that
covert activities in foreign countries is something
totally unknown to us. We have known of it ... I do
not think that we can just shake our heads and say,
"The very idea of covert action in that country.10
Congress has exercised some sort of oversight of the CIA, but
the results obtained from that involvement are not promising for
the future effectiveness of congressional control.
It may be argued that the uproar over Watergate and the
astounding revelations of the Church Committee investigation
will alter the Congress' orientation toward the CIA; that
circumstances will compel the legislature to achieve meaningful
control of the Agency. The very notion of the need for some
galvanizing influence upon the legislature belies the possibility
for continued restraint of covert operations by the Congress.
Even the Church Committee's investigative work lost its vigor
in mid-task and ended rather anticlimatically. One staff member
noted, "We tended to say that most of the hard questions should
be studied."17 No guarantee exists that congressional oversight
will not fall to that complacent condition depicted in the words
of Allen Dulles: "I have found little hesitation on the part of
Congress to support and finance our intelligence work with all
its secrecy."18
Congressional oversight is not the answer to overuse of the
CIA's covert operational potential. The notion of the legisla-
ture as a solid and consistent restraint upon the CIA is flawed
from the outset. Compounding the fact that Congress is not a
body uniformly in favor of opposing the executive desire to
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
initiate covert action is the realization that the executive by
no means must pay homage to congressional oversight. The execu-
tive also has many devices for avoiding Congress where it may
desire to do so. Finally, congressional oversight addresses but
one of the four basic qualities of the CIA and the intelligence
structure that facilitate use of covert action. It is doubtful
that the one which oversight does promise to minimize -- secrecy
--is very much affected at all. Oversight is necessary as a
means for the Congress to assume its constitutional responsibility
for questions of war, even when submerged in covert intervention,
and of entering alliances, even when embodied in clandestine aid
to groups in foreign nations. Oversight allows the legislature
to be informed on such questions, or at least offers the possi-
bility to be informed, but unfortunately it does not Vitiate the
tendency to implement covert action, to create the submerged
questions of war and alliance in the first instance.
Executive Controls
For many, the alternative or complement to congressional
oversight is a reliance on executive, "in house" solutions to
the problem of the CIA's instigation of covert operations. In
light of the qualities of the CIA that make it so eligible for
covert operations, these alternatives are not effective. The full
panoply of recommendations for establishing control or restraint
in the executive branch -- legislation of oversight responsibility
to the NSC, inclusion of the Attorney General on the NSC, estab-
lishment of an operations advisory group to comment onand approve
all covert activities, creation of a special committee on foreign
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
46
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
intelligence to advise the NSC, rejuvenation of the President's
Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, audit by the Office of
Management and Budget -- is not adequate in that it fails to
address the basic CIA attributes which facilitate implementation
of covert operations. Such proposals are a step in the right
direction only because they attempt to harness the influence of
the Agency. However, the "in house" solutions actually are no
more'than embellishments or variations on the prior theme of
policy's attachment to covert action.
Internal audit has been said to be a key to monitoring and
controlling the activities of the CIA. The theory is that the
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) can watch where all the
money is flowing -- to various programs, overt and covert, opera-
tional and analytical -- and therefore enable the executive and
Congress to know how much and in what sort of activities money is
spent. A diminution of CIA clandestine operations cannot be
aided by audit, because the OMB is itself embedded in the execu-
tive. As such, it is in an odd position of checking up on its
boss, and its boss may choose to keep it as weak and ill informed
as is necessary. Marchetti and Marks indicated the debility of
the OMB even for monitoring CIA activities.
Its International Affairs Division's intelligence branch,
which in theory monitors the finances of the intelligence
community, has a staff of only five men: a branch chief and-
one examiner each for the CIA, the NSA, the National Recon-
naissance Office, and the DIA (including the rest of mili-
tary intelligence). These five men could not possibly do
a complete job in keeping track of the $6 billion spent
annually for government spying, even if they received full 10
cooperation from the agencies involved -- which they do not. '
The OMB's weakness in the intelligence field is a function of the
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
backing it gets from the executive, which is evident in the
amount and quality of the cooperation the intelligence agencies
are directed to offer. The notion that the various agencies are
allowed to resist intrusion by the OMB is epitomized in a letter
to the Armed Services Committee by Deputy Secretary of Defense
Ellsworth. He was discussing budget disclosures on Defense in-
telligence activities.
It is not a matter which can be debated in public without
... doing the very damage which the policy of non-disclosure
is designed to prevent ... it is absolutely necessary to
rely on the informed judgement of the President and those to
whom full knowledge of these extremely expensive and sensi-
tive systems and programs has been entrusted.20
The executive is able to grant itself immunity from the rigors
of audit on intelligence operations. Ellsworth's assertion of a
principle of non-disclosure often is crystallized in specific
instances. Marchetti and Marks discussed a CIA program into
which the OMB wished to probe:
the OMB examiner wanted to look into how the money was
being spent ... Helms promptly called a high White House
official to complain that the OMB was interfering with a
program already approved by the 40 Committee. The Whi_te
House, in turn, ordered the OMB to drop its inquiry. 2i
Internal audit can contribute little toward restraining the CIA's
entrance into covert action. It stands outside the formulation
of policy, hence the overriding influence of the 40 Committee.
The OMB lacks the ability to affect any of those qualities which
prompt use of covert action, and it invariably must respond to
the executive demands to keep out of sensitive operations. Those
operations are often ones which embody the full range of covert
action.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
47
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 48
In an effort to obtain impartial, outside review of intelli-
gence operations, some have suggested reliance on a "committee of
experienced private citizens, who shallhave the responsibility
to examine and report to he PresidenI7 periodically on the work
of Government foreign intelligence activities."22 The function
of this board, called the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory
Board (PFIAB), in no way alters the basic configuration of the
CIA's ability and position, and therefore the CIA's allure for
injection into covert operations. The past performance of the
PFIAB has been characterized as that of a "polite alumni visiting
committee." It had no more than a tiny staff and normally met
about two days a month.23 During President Eisenhower's tenure
in office, the Board met a total of nineteen times or about once
every two and a half months.24 The Board currently exists in
President Ford's reorganization of the intelligence apparatus but,
as before, the members are busy men preoccupied with primary
careers. Thus, they are susceptible to being overwhelmed by the
more able, more informed CIA personnel whom they are supposed
to be monitoring.25 The PFIAB is best viewed as a fine tool
for use in such circumstances which compelled its recreation in
1961. Then, it was called upon to review an intelligence blunder,
the Bay of Pigs, after the fact. Prior restraint cannot be exer-
cised by the Board. To hope that it can have great effect is to
place a feeble cap on an intelligence organization distorted in
favor of utilization of operational capacity.
A large portion of the remaining recommendations for reform,
chiefly from the Church Committee, pertain to the NSC and its
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
intelligence committees. To the extent that the proposals rely
upon these committees to restrain use of covert action, they
invest their hopes for reform in what has been part of the
problem. The notion of the executive, the NSC, restraining
itself is a strange, if not unrealistic idea. Obviously, such
proposals are manifestations of the wish to retain Presidential
responsibility for covert operations, but they do so by leaving
intact the administrative propensity to use the CIA's clandestine,
operational ability. The proven fact that the NSC, or Presi-
dential administrations in general, have instigated, desired or
been lured into using covert action lies unchallenged by chan-
neling reform within essentially the same national security
structure. Such recommendations can have only minimal influence
in establishing a permanent disinclination to use covert action,
and they are consonant with past procedures which have led to
extended use of covert action.
The Church Committee followed an interesting course by
recommending some alterations in the representation of the various
departments on intelligence committees. It suggested that the
Secretary of State should be a member of the Committee on Foreign
Intelligence which serves to coordinate and allocate intelli-
gence resources. The committee also recommended:
By statute, the Attorney General should be made an advisor
to the National Security Council in order to facilitate
discharging his responsibility to ensure that actions
taken to protect American national security in the field
of intelligence are also consistent with the Constitution
and the laws of the United States.27
The latter recommendation pertains more directly to domestic
intelligance than to restraint of covert action, but, together
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
14.9
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
with the proposal for representing the State Department on the
CFI, it illustrates the enervated nature of reform through a
mild reshuffling of committee representation. (Such alterations
will stand in sharp contrast to a cogent proposal for eliminating
from policy formulation direct representation of officials respon-
sible for executing covert operations.) Currently there are
thirteen individuals28 who sit on the NSC and its seven commit-
tees:29 The national security community is run by a small
group of high officials; this is probably necessary. However,
the size of this group reveals that the addition of one repre-
sentative to a particular committee has little effect because
the representative usually is present onone or more other com-
mittees.30
Alterations in perspective on the use of covert action
cannot be achieved by a little mix up of the same policy-makers.
It also is important to remember that the organization is flexible
and individuals may attend committee meetings where they are not
formal participants. Recall that the Attorney General was
present at the meeting with the President when Track II opera-
tions were initiated. The addition of the Attorney General to
this committee, the Secretary of State to that committee, or the
addition of any individual to a committee is practically irrele-
vant to reorienting intelligence away from covert operations.
The Church Committee continued with a battery of recommenda-
tions which seeks to enhance the power of the DCI as the coor-
dinator of national intelligence. The Committee suggested that,
"by statute, the DCI should be established as the President's
principal foreign intelligence advisor with,the,exclusive respon-
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
50
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 51
sibility for producing national intelligence for the President
and the Congress. "s' This recommendation is supported by pro-
posals granting the DCI authority for establishing intelligence
requirements for the entire intelligence community through
budgeting and general guidance. The target of the Committee's
recommendations here is increased effectiveness and efficiency
of the intelligence community and not the reduction of covert
operations. However, these recommendations bear on the problem
of covert operations because they pertain to the stature of the
CIA, in the person of the DCI. Because of the proximity of
the CIA to the NSC and the President, particularly because of
the dual nature of the DCI's responsibility as chief national
intelligence officer and head of the CIA itself, to enhance any
powers of the DCI must of necessity carry with it the possibility
of granting more stature to the operational side of the Agency.
There has to be a conflict between the desire for complete,
effective intelligence and the desire to attenuate the opera-
tional aspects of intelligence. It appears that the conflict is
irresolvable within the current organization that demands that
the DCI wear two hats. President Kennedy hoped to be able to
deal with the problem following the Bay of Pigs. He wanted to
redirect the thinking that had led to the disasterous operations
in Cuba at the expense of accurate analysis.32 Roger Hilsman
recalled the attempt made to achieve that change.
When John A. McCone took over as Director of Central
Intelligence, the President did tell him to keep the
two hats clearly in mind and to make as much distinction
as he could. But nothing really came of it.33
Without a basic organizational alteration in the command of the
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 52
intelligence community, attempts to improve performance in one
area harbor the tendency to increase the stature of operations.
Granting the DCI, in his current position, more authority for
coordinating national intelligence eventually will work at cross
purposes with a necessary moderation of CIA operational attraction.
Where recommendations are directed at the structure for the
command and control of the CIA, they merely amount to canonization
of past practice. The Church Committee stated:
By statute, the National Security Council should be
explicitly empowered to direct and provide policy
guidance for the intelligence activities of the U.S.,
including intelligence collectionx?counterintelligence,
and the conduct of covert action-3s+
By statute, an NSC committee (like the Operations Advisory
Group) should be established to advise ?the President
on covert action.35
The legislation establishing the charter for the Central
Intelligence Agency should specify that the CIA is the
only U.S./Government agency authorized to conduct covert
actions 3?
Legislating the functions of the national security organs, when
in the past they have been defined by executive orders, does
little to alter the conditions proven amenable to extensive
covert operations. The NSC has guided the conduct of covert
action; a committee like the Operations Advisory Group has always
existed; and only the CIA has executed the nation's covert opera-
tions. Legislation would make explicit these responsibilities
and firmly set ultimate authority for covert policies where
such authority has been blurred. But, without mitigating the
tendency to use covert operations, such legislation is a con-
cession to the stature of covert action. The recommended statutes
would amend and expand the National Security Act of 1947 to
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
embrace covert action where there had been no mention of covert
action at all. Emphasis on such statutes would leave the same
conditions that have aided initiation of covert operations in
the past.
The final outcome of the proposals for strengthening execu-
tive control or restraint of the CIA actually is consonant with
those past "reorganizations" which have been used to encourage
the use of covert action. Simply because the current recommen-
dations appear in a context which deplores the extent of covert
action is no insurance that such a perspective will prevail
permanently. Past recommendations have sounded suspiciously
similar to present ones, and they were offered as a means toward
utilization of CIA abilities to their fullest, and not toward a
reduction of such use. The Hoover Commission of 1955 recommended
the creation of the President's Board of Consultants on Foreign
Intelligence Activities and that the "Central Intelligence
Agency be reorganized internally to produce greater emphasis on
certain of its statutory functions,07 functions dealing with
analysis as opposed to operations. Such changes were made with
an increase of CIA activity in mind. Allen Dulles wrote that
"General Clark's task force L-Jf the Hoover Commission7
53
called for 'aggressive leadership, boldness and persistence.'
We were urged to do more, not less."38 The text of the Commission
report itself reads:
Instances have come to the attention of the task force
where too conservative an attitude has prevailed, often to
the detriment of vigorous and timely action in the field.39
Present proposals regarding executive remedies are essentially the
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 54,
same as those of 1955, emphasizing a Presidential board and
enhancement of the stature of analysis within the existing
organization. If these recommendations could have been used to
promote more operations in 1955, there obviously is no basic
alteration of the inclination to use covert action in the present
proposals. There is no guarantee that, upon a whim, the current
deprecation of covert action cannot be transformed into an
admiration like that of 1955. When and if that transformation
occurs, it will do so within a structure similar to that of 1955,
and will have at its disposal an organization that has proven to
facilitate covert action.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
V. EFFECTIVE REORGANIZATION
SEPARATION OF CIA FUNCTIONS
Most proposals for change do little to rid the CIA of those
attributes which instigate inordinate use of covert operations.
Secrecy, the bias toward action, the capability for action, and
the immediate availability of the CIA remain unchallenged. It
is true that as long as the ability to conduct covert action is
desired, these attributes will have to remain in one guise or
another, but they can remain within restricted limits. An in-
telligence organization is needed that reduces the tendency for
extended use of covert operations. Enduring obstacles must be
erected which interrupt the free play of the CIA's enticement
toward clandestine activities. Evidently, this cannot be achieved
by the recommendations already discussed, by overseeing the
subtle forces which invite policy-makers' demands for covert
action or by feeble alteration and reshuffling of the executive
mechanisms for governing the CIA. Rather than oversight of the
CIA's activities, a change in the view is necessary. That is,
rather than attempting to audit the CIA's funds, a change in
the amount and allocation of money is needed. Rather than
attempting to keep an eye on the assets of a huge and ubiquitous
agency,a reduction in the size of the CIA is called for. Rather
than attempting to distinguish the analytical and operational
facets of intelligence within the present national security
55
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
structure, where the two are fused in the person of the DCI and
in the CIA itself, a basic division of functions is essential.
Timid measures will not alleviate the inclination to stress
operations. Bold measures can chasten that inclination without
sacrificing the efficacy of essential intelligence functions or
responsible executive control of the few covert operations which
may be necessary.
Many who offer recommendations for altering the intelligence
community realize that their proposals are inadequate. The Church
Committee, in particular, was acutely aware of the poverty of the
measures it recommended. The Committee first suggested congres-
sional oversight committees, among other slight alterations in
the control and review of the CIA, and then followed with a
tentative proposal. It suggested that, after the creation of con-
gressional oversight, those committees should consider
separating the functions of the Director of Central Intelli-
gence and the Director of the CIA and ... dividing the
intelligence analysis and production from the clandestine
collection and covert action functions of the present CIA.'
The Committee withdrew from responsibility for concluding on the
merits of such a proposal by passing the buck to yet non-
existent oversight committees. However, the proposal is funda-
mental, the key to reorientation of the CIA away from imple-
mentation of covert action.
Separation of CIA function is not a new proposal.
Following the Bay of Pigs, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. made a
White House study which concluded that covert functions should
be placed in a new agency directly under the State Department for
policy guidance.2 At the same time, State DeparLment studies
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
56
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 57
commissioned by Dean Rusk reached a similar conclusion.3
Marchetti and Marks, before advocating the abolition of the
clandestine service, considered separating "the operational part
of the CIA ... from the non-covert components."4
The Church
Committee simply picked up the same thread of ideas and quickly
passed it on without arguing strenuously for its implementation.
Illustrating the merit in separating collection and operations
from the CIA is no more than picking up where the Church Com-
mittee chose to withdraw.
The Church Committegave a one page discussion to suggest
what the separation of functions might entail, listing several
advantages and disadvantages. The advantages can be elaborated
to see how they actually invest the intelligence organization
with a permanent abridgement of the tendency to initiate covert
action. The disadvantages are, at worst, mixed blessings. There
are seeds of healthy alterations of the intelligence community
even in what the Church Committee saw as disadvantages to the
separation of analysis from collection and separation of the
responsibilities of the DCI from those of the Director of the CIA.
The most immediate benefit is that the pressures for action
originating in large part from the proximity of operational
ability to high authority can be reduced by removing that part of
the CIA having potential for autonomous action on a broad front.
This is done first through the person of the DCI. The problem
of his dual role in the intelligence system would be solved.
In the Church Committee's words:
The DCI would be removed from the conflict of interest
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 58
situation of managing the intelligence community as a
whole while also directing a collection agency.-)
The Committee saw some conflict of interest in the two roles of
the DCI just as Marchetti and Marks stated that "intelligence
should not be presented to the nation's policy makers by the
same men who are trying to justify clandestine operations."6
Both formulations are somewhat severe in that they impute a
conscious malevolence to the DCI. There are no documentable
examples where the Agency can be said to plot or conspire to
draw policy-makers into covert operations. Rather, the problem
is the more subtle one of representation on the highest councils
and the attendant aura of availability of the CIA's covert capa-
cities. Divested of his authority over the operational aspects
of the CIA, the DCI can sit on the NSC and the seven NSC commit-
tees without speaking for operations, without injecting opera-
tions into policy formulation, and without facilitating the
propensity of policy-makers to ask within the context of an in-
telligence briefing, on Chile for instance, "How about a little
covert action here?" The executive mechanisms for control and
review of the CIA would be greatly altered. This is not simply
the addition of an extra official to this or that committee. In
one bold stroke, operations would be permanently removed eight
times from the policy formulation structure, once for each seat
the present DCI occupies in the NSC organization.7 The Church
Committee's fear that
the Director of Central Intelligence might lose the in-
fluence that is part of aving command responsibility for
the clandestine services
is a misplaced fear. The DCI's loss of influence as an authority
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 59
over operations is the point of reorganization. He becomes an
independent coordinating officer for intelligence able to handle
the community's analytical, budgetary, and advisory business
without embodying any operational aspects or subtly influencing
policy toward operations. The Church Committee also cited as a
disadvantage the fact that
if the clandestine services did not report to the DCI,
there would be the problem of esta-plishing an alternative
chain of command to the President.
But the present chain of command is not the only possible one.
The British have a system which keeps the research and analysis
functions in an organization separate from the secret intelli-
gence gathering, operational functions and subordinates the
latter very sharply to the Foreign Office.10
Creation of a
similar chain of command for CIA clandestine services is again
the point of reorganization. A separate agency embodying clan-
destine intelligence collection and operations can be established
with a new director. The new officer could report to the Secre-
tary of State, immediately facilitating the coordination of
covert intelligence activities with the State Department and
U.S. foreign policies in general. Presidential responsibility
would be retained through the Secretary of State's seats on the
NSC and the Operations Advisory Group. The restructuring of
authority would remove operations from intelligence in the general
sense of intelligence, maintain executive responsibility for any
necessary covert action, and reduce the presence of operational
ability in the formulation of national security policy. The
constant availability of CIA capacity for action which facilitates
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 bo
a reliance on covert acitivities would be minimized.
Further reorientation of the CIA away from operations is
made easy once the separation of clandestine functions from the
rest of the Agency is carried out. The agency for operations can
be created as a miniature of the present Directorate of Opera-
tions and, by allowing it to stand alone, the conditions which
have nurtured the growth of covert ability and the priority
given that ability can be avoided. With covert activities con-
cealed behind the large mass of overt intelligence functions --
research and estimating, monitoring foreign radio broadcasts,
etc. -- the covert aspects were allowed to blossom.11
Even if
the stature of operations were reduced relative to research and
analysis within the present CIA, which has operations buried amid
all intelligence functions, there would be no basic alteration
of the circumstances which brought about the distortion toward
operations initially. But with operations placed in a separate
agency, the balance between operations and the passive intelli-
gence functions is clear; the allocation of resources maintaining
covert action as only a special, extraordinary tool in the con-
duct of foreign policy is unambiguous. The Church Committee was
correct in stating that separation "would facilitate providing
the intelligence production unit with greater priority and in-
creased resources."12 Roger Hilsman's post-Bay of Pigs obser-
vation that the "basic trouble was that the agency simply was too
powerful for the narrow function foT which it was responsible"13
no longer need be true.
The authority of the new DCI, divested of his control over
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 61
operations, can be enhanced to any degree necessary for efficient
coordination of the intelligence community. The various intel-
ligence agencies can be subordinated to the DCI for review and
control without danger of increasing the tendency to favor oper-
ations. As the primary intelligence officer of the nation, with
the requisite authority of that position, the new DCI will be
better able to adjust the intelligence programs of the several
agencies to meet changing international conditions and to reduce
internal overlapping or duplication of effort.14
The operational agency will have responsibility only for
those activities which are legitimately related to intelligence.
Clandestine intelligence collection, of course, will be its main
task. The operations or covert action which it must be assigned
can be restricted in size by confining them to the classic in-
telligence "assets," the contacts which already exist as part
of clandestine collection. Money may be passed, information
transferred, or political influence insinuated through these
assets, but the paramilitary or grand scale operations can be
eliminated. William Colby's unease with the secret operation in
Laos15 or the ludicrous idea that an invasion of Cuba has any-
thing to do with intelligence can be erased. A truly secret
intelligence service can be created which will be effective
without being so capable that it will be propelled into opera-
tions that are unnecessary or outside the realm of intelligence.
The Church Committee's fear that "the Clandestine Service might
be downgraded and fail to secure adequate support"16 should be,
in part, the Committee's hope. The Clandestine Service should
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 62
receive adequate support, but considering the scope and frequency
of its past activities, that portion of the CIA requires a
diminishment in function -- a "downgrading" in size and authority.
A discussion during the Church Committee hearings on covert
action summed up the need for a small operational agency and
also revealed that a reduction in CIA size and capability should
be amenable to all parties. A former CIA officer, David A.
Phillips, spoke about a conversation he had with a man who was
on the beach at the Bay of Pigs.
He said that he knew failure was inevitable. He explained,
"ffreviou7 success will leave the desire on the part of
a chief executive or secretary of state to seek the easy
way to do things and to task us with an impossible job."
That's why I think it has to be small.17
The present CIA, with its great size and capacity, is too
easily brought into American foreign policy, The creation of
a small operational agency combats such insinuation of covert
action into the arsenal of policy tools.
Not coincidently, removal of operations fromthe present CIA
and restoration of the importance of research, analysis, and
coordination relative to collection and operations will create
an intelligence structure that resembles more closely the organi-
zation intended by Congress in 1947. A reconciliation between
the intelligence community and the National Security Act of 1947
can be effected by the establishment of a small, separate opera-
tional agency. The "clearinghouse" for intelligence, implied
in the statute, having coordinating and disseminating abilities
and an advisory capacity to the NSC, would remain where the
present CIA stands.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
A statement by Clark Clifford directly supports the pro-
posal for separating operations from the present CIA in light
of the original intelligence structure.
In the beginning, there was a separation between the CIA
and the group charged with covert acti ities. In the
early 1950's, they were consolidated.1
Most interesting to note about this initial separation of oper-
ations is the fact covert action was guided by the Departments
of Defense and State. A recapitulation of the early growth of
the CIA shows that
another office had been added to engage in covert opera-
tions or political warfare. The new office was in, but
not of, the CIA. It took its 4rectives from a State-
Defense committee, not the DCI.I9
In October 1950, DCI Walter Bedell Smith simply announced that
he would take administrative control of covert operations and
that State-Defense input would be channeled through the DCI.2?
Therefore, the present proposal not only is a better approxi-
mation of the intelligence system envisioned in the National
Security Act, but also attempts to restore original State
Department responsibility for a small operational agency.
Creation of the new agency will do much to ground CIA activities
in law, a condition not approached under the system of executive
directives which led the CIA beyond its original congressional
mandate.
Concomitant with the separation of CIA functions is the
double opportunity presented to Congress for oversight. There
may be easier access to the intelligence community through the
point of central coordination and dissemination, given the fact
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
63
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
that, at that point, there need be less concern for the statu-
tory admonishment for "protecting intelligence sources and
methods from unauthorized disclosure."21 Such sources and
methods are embodied largely in the collection and operations
functions. Appropriate units of Congress at least can be briefed
on the latest intelligence estimates available to the government.
Here, Congress can be as informed on intelligence as it chooses
'
to be.22 By gaining more exposure at the coordinating and
64
"final product intelligence" level, the legislature first would be
better informed on intelligence overall and, second, would be
better equipped to attempt responsible oversight of the oper-
ational facets of intelligence. Review of the operational agency
may still be difficult. Oversight committees will still face
the dilemma described by Senator Case -- it is difficult to
see "what good a committee does if it can't tell what it knows."
Such committees probably will face the inevitable executive dis-
inclination to cooperate. However, the separation of operations
allows the Congress, at minimum, to monitor the size and capacity
of the nation's covert action potential, and to restrain un-
necessary growth of the operational agency. Under such con-
ditions, the lack of a complete intrusion by the legislature into
executive secrecy can be tolerated. Being informed on intelli-
gence in general, and aiding the restraint of the capacity in the
operational facets of intelligence, Congress can render secrecy
a less pernicious quality. In doing so, Congress would better
approximate its constitutional role in conduct of foreign policy.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
There remains one main objection to the separation of
collection and operations from analysis and coordination. It
is expressed in William Colby's statement that
Separation from the clandestine branches further isolates
the analysts, and the farther away they are from the 23
smell of a problem the more artificial their judgement.
The Church Committee seemed confused as to whether it agreed
with this argument. First, the Committee posited that separa-
tion would improve the intelligence effort by altering the
relationship between analysis and collection:
The problem, seen by some in the intelligence community,
of bias on the part of CIA analysts toward collection
resources of the CIA would be lessened.24
On the same page in the Committee report, a disadvantage to
separation was offered.
The increasing, though still not extensive, contact
between national intelligence analysts and the Clan-
destine Service for the purpose ?mproving the espi-
onage effort might be inhibited.')
The Committee was unsure which result would ensue or which would
be more desirable. Lacking any forceful conclusion by the
Committee, strong pronouncements on the subject, like William
Colby's, remain unchallenged. In fact, Colby's statement is
more an adverse response to the short range inconveniences of
reorganization, ignorant of the long range benefits inherent in
separation of function, than an assertion of absolute truth.
There basically are two aspects that define the relation-
ship between collection and analysis. One concerns the flow and
identity of information to analysts from the field, and the
other concerns instruction given operatives in the field. Both
have always been impersonal, detached and separate relationships.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
65
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Analysts do not smell a problem or intelligence; they read it.
Operatives do not participate in evaluating raw intelligence;
they collect, sign, and transmit it. Donald Morris, a CIA
agent for sixteen years with experience in the Congo, Vietnam,
and Germany, indicated that he did not know the person in
analysis to whom he reported. The analysts might know who he
is or, more likely, how reliable an agent he is, but such an
assessment depends only upon the effectiveness of his reportage
and not upon the fact that he belongs to the same agency. The
fact thatCIA analysts can evaluate the reliability of sources in
detached circumstances is substantiated by the practice of
collecting from the other intelligence agencies, the DIA, NSA,
and armed forces intelligence. "Outside" information is used
despite such distinct separation of organizations. Furthermore,
the recent trial of "a competitive analysis" in which a team of
outsiders analyzed and challenged estimates prepared by the
regular intelligence community26 belies the assertion that
analysts must be intimately acquainted with the collection side
of intelligence.27
Directing operatives in the field also does not depend upon
embodiment of collection and analysis in the same agency. The
present DCI is a major participant in setting intelligence
requirements for the entire intelligence community. There is
no reason why the new chief intelligence officer cannot do
the same for a new collection and operations agency. Donald
Morris' experience supports the notion that there is no "magic"
in the relationship between analysts who desire a particular
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
66
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
type of information and the agent with the ability to collect it.
Operatives simply receive a directive stating the category of
intelligence that should be sought. The directive naturally
flows from the intelligence requirements set for the intelli-
gence community as a whole. Mr. Morris noted that more infor-
mation on Soviet industrial production was desired. While in
Germany, he simply received notice that he was to garner
information on Soviet high tensile strength steels -- no special
call from his analyst, no request for his services due solely
to the fact that he would report to a person employed by the
same agency in which he worked. In short, separation of col-
lection from analysis will have no debilitating effect on the
intelligence effort. If analytical judgements do become arti-
ficial, as Mr. Colby said they would, they willnot do .so because
of the proposed reorganization. Separation of functions does
little to change the essential relationships between analysts
and operatives in the field.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
67
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
CONCLUSION
The installation of operations and collection in an agency
separate from the present CIA would prove to be a mitigating
influence on the extended use of covert cation. The immediate
presence and availability of the operational aspects of intelli-
gence would be removed from policy-making in national security
affairs by splitting the present roles of the DCI and by
secreting operations in a separate agency not directly subor-
dinate to the NSC. Separation facilitates a reduction in the
size and omnipresent capability of operations, thus further
reducing the tendency for the executive to desire covert action.
Reorganization also promises Congress easier access to intelli-
gence in general and would allow the legislature to serve as a
more effective monitor of the limits on the growth of the oper-
ational agency. Thus, Congress would better approximate its
constitutional role as a check on the executive's actions. The
separation of functions can be achieved with little or no
sacrifice of the efficacy of the more classic intelligence
effort, and executive responsibility for the covert action which
may be necessary would be retained in lines of command through
the Secretary of State and the NSC. Decisions on the use of
covert action could be made free of the insidious organizational
influences that enhance the possibility of that use.
68
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
69
If any lesson is obvious in the history of the trials of
the CIA, it is that not only the substance of a national security
decision but the way in which it is reached is of great importance.
The CIA has epitomized ways of making and influencing decisions
that should not be tolerated. The establishment of a capable
operational arm directly and secretly subordinate to the
highest authority is an anomaly in a nation which has as its
foundation laws and procedure. Such circumstance violates the
perhaps too often invoked ideal that "this is a government of
laws, and not of men." The reorganization of CIA functions
aspires to a better realization of the commitment to the forms
and procedures of democratic government succinctly articulated
in that phrase.
New administrations may emphasize commitments to a more
democratic foreign policy, to leashing the clandestine services,
and may promise to reform the intelligence community for the
execution of open and popular policies. Such sentiments are
significant because they harbor a hope that the many societal
factors which thrust American influence to all areas of the
world are changing. They might herald a retreat from the
globalism that largely has determined the great use of covert
action. Without such general alteration in the tenor of U.S.
foreign policy, reform directed solely at organization -- a par-
ticular cause of covert action -- may not have an enduring effect.
But the organic restructuring and redistribution of CIA
functions at bottom represents an honest orientation away from
covert policies. This reform effectively deals with covert
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 70
action's bureaucratic roots in the NSC and CIA. As such it
could be a vehicle that gives substantive expression to any
other changes in perspective on the use of covert operations.
The proposal for separating the functions of the present CIA
is faithful to the disaffection with past use of covert action.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
FOOTNOTES
I. COVERT ACTION: ROOTS AND REFORM
1. Jerrold Walden, "Restraining the CIA," in Surveillance and
Espionage in a Free Society, ed. Richard H. Blum (New York:
Praeger Publishing, 1972), pp. 222-9.
2. Willaim Taubman, ed., Globalism and Its Critics: The American
Foreign Policy Debate of the 1960's (Lexington Mass: D.C. Heath
and Company, 1973)
3. Richard R. Fagen, Politics and Communication (Boston:
Little, Brown and Company, 1966), p. 69.
4. Peter M. Blau, The Dynamics of Bureaucracy (Chicago: The
University of Chicago Press, 1963), p. 2.
5. Philip Selznick, "Foundations of the Theory of Organization,"
in Complex Organizations: A Sociological Reader, ed. Amitai
Etzione (New York: Holt, Rhinehart and Winston, Inc., 1961), p. 23.
6. "To Bribe or Not to Bribe," New York Times, February 23, 1977,
p. A22.
II. CIA: ADMINISTRATIONS' BABY
1. The National Security Act of 1947, sec. 102, 61 stat. (1947)
2. Ibid.
3. The question of congressional intent naturally is a difficult
one, especially in light of the fact that the CIA was conducting
numerous operations by 1948. It had major covert operations
under way in roughly fifty countries by 1953. (U.S. Congress,
Senate, Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with
respect to Intelligence Activities, Covert Action, Hearings, 94th
Cong., 1st sess., 1976, p. 8. gereafter referred to as Church
Committee, Covert Action Hearings7) The passage of the Central
Intelligence Act of 1949, which freed the CIA from ordinary
budgetary review but also made no mention of operations, compounds
Approved For Release 2004/01/217:1CIA-RDP8OM00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
72
the problem. Paralleling the difficulties in determining con-
gressional intent is the question of the original executive
conception of covert action. Anne Karalekas argued that senior
officiahpresent in 1947 did not plan to develop large scale
continuing covert operations. (U.S. Congress, Senate, Select
Committee to Study Governmental Operations with respect to In-
telligence Operations, Supplementary Detailed Staff Reports on
Foreign and Military Intelligence, S. Rept. 94-755, Book 4, 94th
Cong: 2nd sess., 1976, p. 31 and see pp. 25-31 for a full develop-
ment of this idea. gereafter referred to as Church Committee,
Final Report Book 47) Perhaps the best way to characterize the
expansion of CIA activity is to say that it grew beyond the
original expectations of both the Congress and the executive of 1947.
4. Church Committee, Covert Action Hearings, p. 4.
5. Victor Marchetti and John D. Marks, The CIA and the Cult of
Intelligence (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974) p. 323.
6, Church Committee, Covert Action Hearings, pp. 50-1.
7, See U.S. Congress, House, Select Committee on Intelligence,
U.S. Intelligence Agencies and Activities: Risks and Control of
Foreign Intelligence, Hearings, 94th Cong., 1st sess., 1976.
/Hereafter referred to as Pike Committee, Hearings7 Statement
of Mitchell Rogovin, Special Counsel to the DCI, pp. 1729-38.
8. U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, CIA
Foreign and Domestic Activities, Hearings, 94th Cong., 1st Sess.
1975, p. 3. ZHereafter referred to as Foreign Relations Committee,
CIA Activities7
9. Allen Dulles, The Craft of Intelligence (New York: Harper
and Row, 1963), p. 189.
10. Church Committee, Covert Action Hearings, p. 47.
11. U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Armed Services, Nomina-
tion of William E. Colby, Hearings, 93rd Cong., 1st sess., 1973,
p. 28. ZHereafter referred to as Armed Services Committee, Colby
Nomination7
12. Church Committee,
13. Ibid., p. 70.
14. Ibid., p. 13.
Covert Action Hearings, p. 98.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 73
15. U.S. Congress, Senate, Select Committee to Study Governmental
Operations with respect to Intelligence Activities, Intelligence
Activities and the Rights of Americans, S. Rpt. 94-755, Book 2,
94th Cong., 2nd sess., 1976, P. 69. LHereafter referred to as
Church Committee, Final Report Book 2
A special Agency section called CHAOS was established, and it
compiled files on 7,200 American citizens and developed a com-
puterized index with the names of more than 300,000 persons and
organizations.
16. U.S. Commission on CIA Activities Within the United States,
Report to the President (Washington: GPO, 1975), p. 31.
LHereafter referred to as Rockefeller Commission Report7
17. National Security Act, sec. 102.
The CIA's involvement in Watergate also can be viewed as a con-
sequence of executive direction. As such, it is another example
of executive responsibility for CIA activities. In July 1971,
Howard Hunt went to the CIA to collect some equipment -- a wig,
tape recorder and camera -- for a purpose which was not specified
at the time. The acquisition of the equipment had been arranged
between John Erlichman and the Director's deputy, General
Cushman. Another CIA deputy, General Walters, was instructed
to attempt to contain, by speaking to Acting FBI Director Gray,
the FBI's investigation of Watergate related funds that had
been "laundered" in Mexico. Until their unjustifiable intent
became obvious, the Agency's representatives did accede tothese
requests because it was inferred that the highest authority was
behind the demands. (U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Foreign
Relations, Nomination of Richard Helms to be Ambassador to Iran
and CIA International and Domestic Activities, Hearings, 93rd
Cong., 1st sess., 1974, pp. 68-73, 84-5. giereafter referred to
as Nomination of Richard Helms7
III. THE INSTITUTIONAL BIAS TOWARD COVERT ACTION
1. U.S. Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of
Government, Foreign Affairs: A Report to Congress, (Washington:
GPO, 1949), p. 24. /Hereafter referred to as Hoover Report 19497
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
74
2. U.S. Congress, Senate, Select Committee to Study Governmental
Operations with respect to Intelligence Activities, Foreign and
Military Intelligence, S. Rept. 94-755, Book 1, 94th Cong., 2nd
sess., 1976, p. 42. gereafter referred to as Church Committee,
Final Report Book 17
3. Rockefeller Commission Report, p. 71.
4. Ibid., p. 72.
5. Ibid.
6. For example, it provided the CIA's operation "Mongoose" with
gadgets designed to discredit Fidel Castro. It produced a
substance which, when smeared on Fidel's boots, would cause his
beard to fall out. (Taylor Branch, "The Trial of the CIA," New
York Times Magazine, September 12, 1976, p. 118.)
7. Rockefeller Commission Report, p. 84.
8, Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 432.
9. U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Armed Services, National
Defense Establishment, Hearings on S. 758, 80th Cong., 1st sess.,
1947, p. 525.
10. National Security Act, sec. 102.
11. Roger Hilsman, To Move a Nation (Garden City, New York:
Doubleday and Company, 1967), p. 85.
12. Church Committee, Final Report Book 4, p. 70.
13. Hilsman was director of intelligence and research in the
State DeparLment at the time.
14. Hilsman, p. 31.
15. Ibid.
16. Church Committee, Covert Action Hearings, p. 195.
17. Hilsman, p. 67.
18. Dulles, p. 48.
19. U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Armed Services, Establish-
ing a Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Hearings, 94th Cong.
2nd sess., 1976, p. 28. LHereafter referred to as Armed Services
Committee, Establishing a Committee7
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 75
20. Armed Services Committee, Colby Nomination, p. 87.
21. Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, P. 75.
22. Armed Services Committee, Colby Nomination, p. 86.
23. There are two dimensions to this action momentum. The first
refers to the mutual reinforcement of initial inclinations toward
action by the CIA and those charged with the CIA's direction.
There is also a momentum strictly internal to the CIA, which
itself is a topic meriting serious consideration. Pressures for
expansion of activities may be contained entirely within a
particular CIA directorate or operation, as was the case when
contacts were made with Sam Giancana of the Mafia for assassination
of Fidel Castro. (See statement of Arthur Schlesinger Jr. in
Pike Committee, Hearings, p. 1849 for this and other examples.)
But such autonomous CIA momentum, which undoubtedly has been
prevalent, is subsidiary to the basic atmosphere of inducement
and ready acceptance of action surrounding the executive and CIA.
Strictly internal expansion may add to the allure of the CIA in
the eyes of the executive by increasing CIA capability and
presence (as is the case in note 26 below), but it could not
exist without the congenial relationship between the CIA and
the executive. There could have been assassination plots only if
the administrative desire to interfere in Cuban affairs, in
general, existed. In the Church Committeds words, "Plots to
assassinate Castro [Jag not be understood unless seen in the
context of Operation MONGOOSE, a massive covert action program
designed 'to get rid of Castro'." (Church Committee, Final Report
Book 1, p. 143.)
24. Church Committee, Final Report Book 2, P. 4.
25. Church Committee, Covert Action Hearings, P. 153.
26. Circumstances concerning the CIA's communications from over-
seas speak metaphorically of the general tendency of the Agency
to expand, to become more active within the scope of its business.
Some CIA communication of raw intelligence to analysts at
headquarters in Langley Virginia is handled by an agency of the
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 76
U.S. Army. At one point, the CIA requested information space,
or communication time, on the network managed by the Army, and
it mentioned a figure which approximated the time that it thought
it needed. The Army replied that recent technological advances
had made possible the availability of communication time three
to five times in excess of the figure requested by the CIA.
The Agency immediately made use of the unexpected windfall. It
literally stuffs the communication network with an enormous
volume of intelligence data. Where the CIA initially gets a
toehold in some activity, expansion of that activity usually
follows. (This discussion is gleaned from a conversation with the
Assistant Technical Director of the Satellite Communications
Agency, U.S. Army, Fort Monmouth New Jersey.)
27. Church Committee, Final Report Book 4, p. 84.
28. Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., The Imperial Presidency, (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1973), p. 318.
29. This includes armed forces intelligence, the Defense
Department Intelligence Agency (DIA), the National Security
Agency (NSA), the Intelligence Bureau of the State Department,
the FBI, the AEC, and the Treasury Department.
30. Nomination of Richard Helms, p. 80.
31. Walden, p. 219.
32. Marchetti and Marks, p. 78. Marchetti and Marks' broad
notion of operations here includes all functions associated with
clandestine CIA activities. That is, they probably mean that
2/3 of the CIA budget has been going to the Directorate of
Operations.
33. Hilsman, p. 66.
34. Ibid., p. 70.
35. Proprietaries are business entities, wholly owned by the
CIA. They fall into two categories: operating companies which
actually do business as private firms; and non-operating com-
panies which appear to do business. Some of their functions are
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
provision of cover for intelligence collection, support of
covert operations, and direction of propaganda mechanisms.
(Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, PP.
36. Marchetti and Marks, p. 137.
37. Walden, p. 228.
38. Hilsman, pp. 65-6.
39. Marchetti and Marks, p. 295.
40. .Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 78.
41. Ibid., p. 82.
42. Ibid.
205-7.)
43. Henry M. Jackson, The National Security Council -- Jackson
Subcommittee Papers on Policy-Making at the Presidential Level
(New York: Praeger, 1965)
44. Church Committee, Covert Action Hearings, p. 189.
45. Nomination of Richard Helms, p. 73.
46. Ibid., p. 102.
IV. PROPOSALS FOR CHANGE: INADEQUATE
1. Armed Services Committee, Colby Nomination, p. 34.
2. Lyman B. Kirkpatrick, The U.S. Intelligence Community:
Foreign Policy and Domestic Activities (New York: Hill and Wang,
1973), p. 59.
3. Church Committee, Final Report Book 2, p. 380.
4. Ibid., p. 394.
5. Foreign Relations Committee, CIA Activities, p. 30.
6. Armed Services Committee, Establishing a Committee, p. 14.
7. Church Committee, Covert Action Hearings, p. 143.
8. Rockefeller Commission Report, p. 126.
9. Ibid.
10. Dulles, pp. 248-9.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
77
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
11. Branch, p. 116.
12. Ibid., p. 35.
13. Foreign Relations Committee, CIA Activities, p. 14.
Also compare present knowledge of CIA operations in Chile with
Helms' testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
in 1973:
Senator Symington. Did you try in the Central Intelligence
Agency to overthrow the government of Chile?
Mr. Helms. No, sir.
Senator Symington. Did you have any money passed to the
opponents of Allende?
Mr. Helms. No, sir.
Senator Symington. So the stories you were involved in that
war are wrong?
Mr. Helms. Yes, sir.
(Nomination of Richard Helms, p. 47.)
14. Foreign Relations Committee, CIA Activities, p. 29.
15. Dulles, p. 241.
16. Foreign Relations Committee, CIA Activities, p. 12.
17. Branch, p. 123.
18. Dulles, p. 194.
Congress itself is not beyond pressuring or stoking the desire
for covert operations. Congress may be somewhat dovish on such
operations at the present time, but history does not grant the
legislature such consistency in opposing aggressive action in
global affairs. Congress has often tugged the nation toward
war or intervention ever since the war-hawks of 1812. More to
the point of controlling CIA activities is the role of the
legislature in the Dominican "crisis" of 1965. The legislature
enabled the dispatch of the marines to Santo Domingo, thus
capping a long involvement of the U.S. in the internal affairs of
the Dominican Republic. The House of Representatives passed a
resolution by a vote of 315 to 52 justifying the unilateral use
of force on foreign territory by any nation which considers
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
78
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
79
itself threatened by international communism, directly or in-
directly. (Richard J. Barnet, Intervention and Revolution -- The
United States in the Third World, New York: The World Publishing
Company, 1968, p. 174.)
19. Marchetti and Marks, p. 336.
20. Armed Services Committee, Establishing a Committee, pp. 25-6.
21. Marchetti and Marks, p. 337. The actual operation was
deleted from Marchetti and Marks' text by the CIA, and the
deletion was upheld by the Supreme Court. I)
22. U.S. Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of
Government, Intelligence Activities: A Report to Congress
(Washington: GPO, 1955), p. 1. /Hereafter referred to as
Hoover Report 19557
23. Harry H. Ransom, "Can the Intelligence Establishment be
Controlled in a Democracy," in Surveillance and Espionage in a
Free Society, ed. Richard H. Blum, p. 212.
24. U.S. Congress, Senate, Select Committee to Study Governmental
Operations with respect to Intelligence Activities, Supplementary
Reports on Intelligence Activities, S. Rept. 94-755, Book 6,
94th Cong., 2nd sess., 1976, p. 274.
25. The Board also has no authority to serve as an effective
watchdog committee. For example, when it became aware of the
Huston Plan, it asked the Attorney General and the Director
of the FBI for a copy of the plan. The request was refused, and
the Board did not take the matter to the White House. (Church
Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 429.)
26. Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 429.
27. Ibid.
28. President, Vice President, Secretary of State, Secretary of
Defense, Chairman of JCS, DCI, Assistant to the President on
National Security Affairs, Deputy Secretary of State, Deputy
Secretary of Defense, Attorney General, Director OMB, Chairman
of the Council of Economic Advisors, Director of the Aims
Control and Disarmament Agency.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
29. Undersecretaries Committee, Senior Review Group, Committee
on Foreign Intelligence, VerificationPanel, Defense Program
Review Committee, Washington SpecialActions Group, Operations
Advisory Group.
30. Excluding the positions of President and Vice President, who
sit only on the NSC and for whom the NSC committees exist to offer
advice, three individuals sit on only one council -- the Director
of OMB, the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors, the
Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency; three
individuals sit on two councils -- the Secretaries of State and
Defense, and the Attorney General; a Deputy Secretary of State
sits on five; a Deputy Secretary of Defense and the Chairman
of JCS sit on six; the Assistant to the President on National
Security Affairs sits on seven; and the DCI sits on all eight.
31.
Church Committee, Final Report Book
1,
p.
434.
32.
Hilsman, p. 80.
33.
Ibid.
34.
Church Committee, Final Report Book
1,
p.
429.
35.
Ibid., p. 430.
36.
Ibid., p. 448.
37.
Hoover Report 1955, p. 70.
38.
Dulles, p. 259.
39.
Hoover Report 1955, p. 43.
V. EFFECTIVE REORGANIZATION
SEPARATION OF CIA FUNCTIONS
1. Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 451.
2. Hilsman, p. 79.
3. Ibid.
4. Marchetti and Marks, p. 375.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
80
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
5. Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, P. 450.
6. Marchetti and Marks, p. 375.
7, President Carter recently has cut the number of NSC committees
from seven to two. This does not mean that the proposed re-
organization is only three-eighths effective. The amount of
NSC business remains the same, and the DCI is always present just
as he was in the old system. The removal of his operational role
would have the same effect whether it be done now or during any
other administration.
8. Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 450.
9. Ibid.
10. Hilsman, p. 77.
11. Ibid., p. 79.
12. Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 450.
13. Hilsman, p. 77.
14. Hoover Report 1949, pp. 25-6.
15. See page 12.
16. Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 450.
17. Church Committee, Covert Action Hearings, P. 79.
18. Ibid., p. 53.
19. Kirkpatrick, p. 32.
20. Church Committee, Final Report Book 4, p. 37.
21. National Security Act, sec. 102.
22. Harry H. Ransom, "Can the Intelligence Establishment be
Controlled in a Democracy?" in Surveillance and Espionage in a
Free Society, ed. Richard H. Blum, p. 213.
23. David Binder, "U.S. Intelligence Officials Apprehensive of
New Shake-Ups Under Carter," New York Times, December 13, 1976,
p. 43.
24. Church Committee, Final Report Book 1, p. 450.
25. Ibid.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
81
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
82.
26. David Binder, "New CIA Estimate Finds Soviet Seeks Superiority
in Arms," New York Times, December 25, 1976, p. 1.
27. Members of the outside panel were: Richard Pipes, Professor
of Russian History at Harvard; Thomas W. Wolf of the Rand Cor-
poration; Lt. General Daniel 0. Graham, former head of DIA;
Paul D. Wolfowitz of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency;
Paul H. Nitze, former Deputy Secretary of Defense; John Vogt, a
retired Air Force General; and Professor William Van Cleve of
the University of Southern California and a former delegate to
SALT. They concluded, contrary to regular CIA analysis, that
the Soviet Union is seeking superiority over U.S. military forces
This conclusion is debatable, but even if it were completely
erroneous, the legitimacy of outside analysis would not be refuted.
One of the conditions for being on the panel was that each
member hold a more pessimistic view of Soviet plans than those
held by advocates of the rough parity thesis. The team's con-
clusions are better explained and colored much more by their
original views than by the fact that they were generally dis-
sociated from intelligence collection. (New York Times,
December 26, 1976, pp. 1,14.)
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Agee, Philip. Inside the Company: CIA Diary. New York: Stonehill
Publishing Company, 1975.
Baldwin, Hanson W. The Price of Power. New York: Harper and
Brothers, 1948.
Barnet, Richard J. "Dirty Tricks and the Intelligence Underworld."
Society, March/April 1975.
. Intervention and Revolution - The United States in the
Third World. New York: The World Publishing Company, 1968.
. "Next Move is Up to Congress: Oversight of Intelligence
Operations." Nation, March 13, 1976.
Berman, J. J., and Morton H. Halperin. "Fight Over Oversight:
Proposed Senate Committee to Oversee Intelligence Agencies."
New Republic, May 8, 1976.
Binder, David. "New CIA Estimate Finds Soviet Seeks Superiority
In Arms." New York Times, December 25, 1976.
. "U.S. Intelligence Officials Apprehensive of New Shake-
Ups Under Carter." New York Times, December 13, 1976.
Blau, Peter M. The Dynamics of Bureaucracy. Chicago: The
University of Chicago Press, 1963.
Blum, Richard H., ed. Surveillance and Espionage in a Free
Society. New York: Praeger Publishing, 1972.
Borosage, R. L. "Ford's Blueprint for Arrogance: Program to
Overhaul Intelligence Agencies." Nation, March 13, 1976.
Branch, Taylor. "The Trial of the CIA." New York Times Magazine,
September 12, 1976.
Dorsen, Norman, and Stephen Gillers, eds. None of Your Business:
Government Secrecy in America. New York: The Viking Press,
1974.
Dulles, Allen. The Craft of Intelligence. New York: Harper and
Row, Publishers, 1963.
83
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Etzione, Amitai, ed. Complex Organizations: A Sociological
Reader. New York: Holt, Rhinehart and Winston, Inc., 1961.
Fagen, Richard R. Politics and Communication. Boston: Little,
Brown and Company, 1966.
. "The United States and Chile: Roots and Branches."
Foreign Affairs, January 1975.
Falk, Richard A. "CIA Covert Action and International Law."
Society, March/April 1975.
Franck, Thomas M., and Edward Weisband, eds. Secrecy and Foreign
Policy. London: Oxford University Press, 1974.
Gelb, Leslie H. "Should We Play Dirty Tricks in the World?"
New York Times Magazine, December 21, 1975.
Haire, Mason, ed. Modern Organization Theory. New York: John
Wiley and Sons, -Inc., 1959.
Halperin, Morton H. "Activists at the CIA: The Cult of Incom-
petence." New Republic, November 8, 1975.
. "Did Richard Helms Commit Perjury?" New Republic,
March 6, 1976.
Harrington, Michael. "Intelligence: The Test for Congress."
Nation, February 7, 1976.
Hilsman, Roger. To Move a Nation. Garden City, New York:
Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1967.
Horowitz, Irving Louis. "Editorial." Society, March/April 1975.
Jackson, Henry M. The National Security Council -- Jackson Sub-
committee Papers on Policy-Making at the Presidential
Level. New York: Praeger Publishing, 1965.
Kirkpatrick, Lyman B., Jr. The U.S. Intelligence Community:
Foreign Policy and Domestic Activities. New York: Hill
and Wang, 1973.
Laird, Melvin R. "Let's Stop Undermining the CIA." Reader's
Digest,May 1976.
McGarvey, Patrick J. CIA: The Myth and the Madness. London:
Penguin Books, 1973.
McNamara, Robert S. The Essence of Security. New York: Harper
and Row, 1968.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
84
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
85
Marchetti, and John D. Marks. The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974.
Mill, John Stuart. Dissertations and Discussions: Political,
Philosophical, and Historical. Boston: William V. Spencer,
1865.
Morgenthau, Hans J. Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for
Power and Peace. 4th ed. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1967.
. Politics in the Twentieth Century. 3 vols. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1962.
Morris, Roger. "The Aftermath of CIA Intervention." Society,
March/April 1975.
Pettee, George Sawyer. The Future of American Secret Intelligence.
Washington: Infantry Journal Press, 1946.
Ransom, Harry Howe. The Intelligence Establishment. Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1971.
Roberts, Charles, ed. Has the President Too Much
York: Harper's Magazine Press, 1974.
Rositzke, Harry. "America's Secret Operations: A
Foreign Affairs, January 1975.
Schlesinger, Arthur M., Jr. The Imperial Presidency. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1973.
Taubman, William, ed. Globalism and Its Critics: The American
Foreign Policy Debate of the 1960's. Lexington Mass:
D.C. Heath and Company, 1973.
Power? New
Perspective."
U.S. Commission on CIA Activities Within the United States.
Report to the President. Washington: Government Printing
Office, 1975.
U.S. Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of
Government. Foreign Affairs: A Report to Congress.
Washington: Government Printing Office, 1949.
. Intelligence Activities: A Report to Congress.
Washington: Government Printing Office, 1955.
. Committee on the National Security Organization.
National Security Organization: A Report with Recommenda-
tions. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1949.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3 86
U.S. Congress. House. Committee on Armed Services. Special Sub-
committee on Intelligence. Inquiry into Classified Testi-
mony Taken April 22, 1974, Concerning the CIA and Chile.
Hearings, 93rd Cong., 2nd sess., 1974.
. Committee on Expenditures in the Executive
Departments. Report: National Security Act of 1947. 80th
Cong., 2nd sess., 1947.
. Select Committee on Intelligence. U.S.
Intelligence Agencies and Activities: Risks and Control
of Foreign Intelligence. Hearings, 94th Cong., 1st sess.,
1976.
. Senate. Committee on Armed Services. Establishing a
Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Hearings, 94th
Cong., 2nd sess., 1976.
? . National Defense Establishment.
Hearings on S. 758, 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947.
. Nomination of William E. Colby.
Hear^ ings, 93rd Cong., 1st sess., 1973.
. Committee on Foreign Relations. CIA Foreign
and ^ Domestic Activities. Hearings, 94th Cong., 1st sess.,
1975.
. Nomination of Richard Helms to be
Ambassador to Iran and CIA International and Domestic
Activities. Hearings, 93rd Cong., 1st sess., 1974.
? . Subcommittee on Multinational
Corporations. Multinational Corporations and U.S. Foreign
Policy. Hearings, 93rd Cong., 1st sess., 1973.
. Select Committee to Study Governmental
Operations with respect to Intelligence Activities.
Alleged Assassination Plots Involving Foreign Leaders.
S. Rept. 94-465, 94th Cong., 1st sess., 1975.
. Covert Action. Hearings, vol. 7,
94th Cong., 1st sess., 1976.
. Foreign and Military Intelligence.
S. Rept. 94-755, Book 1, 94th Cong., 2nd sess., 1976.
. Intelligence Activities and the
Rights of Amer^ icans. S. Rept. 94-755, Book 2, 94th Cong.,
2nd sess., 1976.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
. Supplementary Detailed Staff
Reports on Intelligence Activities and the Rights of
Americans. S. Rept. 94-755, Book 3, 94th Cong., 2nd sess.,
1976.
. Supplementary Detailed Staff
Reports on Foreign and Military Intelligence. S. Rept.
94-755, Book 4, 94th Cong., 2nd sess., 1976.
? . The Investigation of the Assassina-
tion of President John F. Kennedy: Performance of the
Intelligence Agencies. S. Rept. 94-755, Book 5, 94th Cong.,
2nd sess., 1976.
. Supplementary Reiorts on Intelli-
gence Activities. S. Rept. 94-755, Book 6, 94th Cong.,
2nd sess., 1976.
? . Huston Plan. Hearings, vol. 2,
94th Cong., 1st sess., 1976.
? . Mail Opening. Hearings, vol. 4,
94th Cong., 1st sess., 1976.
. Unauthorized Storage of Toxic
Agents. Hearings, vol. 1, 94th Cong., 1st sess., 1976.
Vincent, R. J. Nonintervention and International Order.
Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1974.
Wilcox, Francis 0. Congress, the Executive and Foreign Policy.
New York: Harper and Row, 1971.
Wilensky, Harold L. Organizational Intelligence: Knowledge and
Policy in Government and Industry. New York: Basic Books,
Inc., 1967.
Wills, Garry. Nixon Agonistes. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1969.
Wise, David. "Cloak and Dagger Operations: An Overview."
Society, March/April 1975.
. The Politics of Lying: Government Deception, Secrecy,
and Power. New York: Random House, 1973.
, and Thomas B. Ross. The Invisible Government. New
York: Random House, 1964.
Wooten, James T. "Califano, Sorenson, Schlesinger Named to Key
Carter Posts." New York Times, December 24, 1976.
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
87
lag
OFFICE OF THE DEAN
Approved MO Release 2004 CIA-RDP80M0Q,105A000800290003-3
TU TS UNIVERSITY
THE FLETCHER S HOOL OF LAW AND DIPLOMACY
Administered with he cooperation *yard University
Admiral Stansfield Turner
Director
Central Intelligence Agency
Washington, D.C. 20505
Dear Stan,
kExecutive Registry
1?i/0/611
MEDFORD, MASSACHUSETTS 02155
December 22, 1977
I have been almost continually in transit since our Board meeting
on the 13th, and I have only just returned to my office. I hasten to
write to thank you for attending our luncheon and addressing the Board
of Visitors.
The comment I received from a number of Board members, and in which
I share, is that we are delighted to see the Agency in such good hands
and addressing the unfortunate legacy in such a realistic and forthright
manner. Now that much of the hocus-pocus is gone, I trust that you will
be able to get down to the business of the Agency--a confidential and
elite intelligence organization. Stand firm among the snipping; your
support in the mainstream is strong.
Allow me to express the appreciation of all of us for your stimulating
and thought-provoking words.
With best regards.
EAGisp
[phone]
Sincerely,
4(-;
. c-
Edmund A. Gullion
Dean
Approved ForRelease2004/01/21:UA-RDP8OMM0165A000800290003-3
Cable FLETCHER TELEX/TWX 710-328-1128
TAT
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Next 1 Page(s) In Document Exempt
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved Far...Release 2004/02,1t.. CIA-RDP80M004.65A000800290003-3
? erii-
JI riCE OF THE DEAN
--
TUFTS UNIVERSITY
! ,HEA SCHOOL OF LAW AND DIPLOMACY
\i-hsin,Yr-orl with the cnoperatinn of Harvard University
Admiral Stansfield Turner
Director
Central Intelligence Agency
Washington, D.C. 20505
Dear Admiral Turner,
MPOFR MASSAC.Hh!,FTT C
December 20, 1977
I know that Dean Gullion will be writing to thank you for your
talk and discussion last week at the Board of Visitors meeting, but
I wanted to write to express my personal thanks. To one who grew up,
like so many others, being suspicious of the Agency, your conception
of the "new" Agency is a real breath of fresh air. It has always
seemed to me that one should be much more serious about a much smaller
list of secrets. I applaud your efforts to head in this direction.
I am getting to the age where I can look back a little--it seems
light years since my undergraduate days at Columbia in 1968 when the
CIA was a synomym for wife-beating and worse. Presumably, there is
some correlation between a more open agency and more public under-
standing, as well as vice versa. I think the direction in which
everyone is heading will make for difficult sailing but a deeper
harbor in the end!
With best wishes for the new Agency.
JAS/sp
Sincerely,
Jef y A. Sheehan
Assistant to the Dean
Approved ForRelease2004/01/21:=-RDP8OMM0165A000800290003-3
I IF C,L;
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
THE FLETCHER SCHOOL OF LAW AND DIPLOMACY
TUFTS UNIVERSITY
MEDFORD, MASSACHUSETTS 02155
Admiral Stansfield urner
Director
Central Intelligence gency
Washington, D.C. 20505
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
U
-
P506,11:Eon
TAT
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
SENDER HILL CHECK CLASS I---ISATION TOP AND BOTTOM
1-
r?
i UNCLASSCrenas-ecoof4itkailDENTI,
('
1 Ap`pruved Fur eA-RMAnoEoTo
. . OFFICIAL ROUTING SLIP
A8i
ITO
NAME AND ADDRESS
DATE
INITIALS
1
*?"",c..........,
2
ACTION
DIRECT REPLY
PREPARE REPLY
APPR Y AL
DISPATCH
RECOMMENDATION
COMMENT
FILE
RETURN
CONCURRENCE
INFORMATION
SIGNATURE
Remarks:
FOLD HERE TO RETURN TO SENDER
FROM: NAME. ADDRESS AND PHONE NO.
DATE
4 ? ? ? - a - IS
A
. I': I T I
76-v9115'! i I
inEar...-
Mel NO. 237 Use previous editions
1-67
uu5GPO: 1976 ? 202-953
(40)
0290003-3
029
003-3
STAT Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3
Next 2 Page(s) In Document Exempt
Approved For Release 2004/01/21 : CIA-RDP80M00165A000800290003-3