AN OPPORTUNITY UNFULFILLED: THE USE AND PERCEPTIONS OF INTELLIGENCE AT THE WHITE HOUSE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP89G00720R000500110001-3
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 11
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 25, 2013
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: December 1, 1989
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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An Opportunity Unfulfilled:
The Use and Perceptions of
Intelligence at the White
House
Robert M. Gates
"COLLECTION, PROCESSING and
analysis all are directed at one goal?
producing accurate reliable intelli-
gence. . . . Who are the customers
who get this finished product? At the
very top of the list is the President.
He is, of course, the Central Intelli-
gence Agency's most important cus-
tomer." (CIA Information Pamphlet)
What have the CIA's most important
customers had to say about how well
it achieves that goal? "I am not satis-
fied with the quality of our political
intelligence," said Jimmy Carter in
1978. "What the hell do those clowns
do out there in Langley?" asked Rich-
ard M. Nixon in 1970. "CIA Director
McCone . . . made recommendations
for checking and improving the quality
of intelligence reporting. I promptly
accepted the suggestions . . . ," ex-
plained Lyndon B. Johnson (Memoirs).
"During the rush of. . . events in the
final days of 1958, the Central Intel-
ligence Agency suggested for the first
time that a Castro victory might not
be in the interests of the United
Robert M. Gates is deputy director of central
intelligence. He headed the analytical direc-
torate of the CIA for more than five years and
served as chairman of the National Intelli-
gence Council. He served on the National
Security Council staff from 1974 to 1979.
THE WASHINGTON QUARTERLY ? WINTER 1989
States," said Dwight D. Eisenhower
(Memoirs).
A search of presidential memoirs
and those of principal assistants over
the past 30 years or so turns up re-
markably little discussion or perspec-
tive on the role played by directors of
central intelligence (DCIs) or intelli-
gence information in presidential de-
cision making on foreign affairs. What
little commentary there has been, as
suggested by the introductory quotes,
is nearly uniformly critical. Similarly,
in intelligence memoir literature, al-
though one can read a great deal about
covert operations and technical
achievements, one finds little on the
role of intelligence in presidential de-
cision making. Thus, on both sides of
the relationship there is a curious, dis-
creet silence.
Why this dearth of firsthand reflec-
tion and evaluation in a major area of
foreign affairs and national security
history? Partly, perhaps, it is because
both parties are still reluctant to dis-
cuss what they perceive as sensitive
information. Partly, it may be because
senior officials have difficulty distin-
guishing what they learn or see in in-
telligence reports from other sources
of information, ambiguities in the role
of intelligence in policy-making, con-
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Robert M. Gates
fusion over what is intelligence, the
inclination of senior officials to believe
they already knew what they just read
in an intelligence report, and the com-
mon predilection of senior officials to
rely on and recall personal contacts as
opposed to the written word or anon-
ymous experts.
This void in the study of presidents,
intelligence, and decision making?
apart from covert action?is also ex-
plained by factors that continue to
dominate the relationship between
presidents and the CIA and the intel-
ligence community: intelligence col-
lection and assessment are black arts
for most presidents and their key ad-
visers, neither adequately understood
nor adequately exploited. For intelli-
gence officers, presidential and senior
level views of the intelligence they re-
ceive and how they use it (or not) are
just as unfamiliar, giving rise among
intelligence officers to wishful think-
ing and even conceit. In short, over
the years, both the White House and
the CIA have failed to maximize the
opportunity for better intelligence
support for the president and decision
making.* This situation is not peculiar
to any single administration or partic-
ular view of the CIA, but rather is a
problem of personal relationships, bu-
reaucratic cultures, and the policy pro-
cess itself.
Setting the Scene
To understand how intelligence is
used and regarded at the White House
first requires an understanding of the
context in which it is received. The
sheer volume of information flowing
to the president is staggering. More
than 200 agencies seek to draw his
attention to programs, proposals, or vi-
tal pieces of information. An astonish-
ing amount of their work finds its way
to the White House.
36
Policy agencies such as the Depart-
ment of State (DoS), the Department
of Defense (DoD), the Arms Control
and Disarmament Agency, and others
prepare and send great quantities of
paperwork to the president. Most
presidents also receive considerable
information and analysis on foreign af-
fairs from the media. These sources of
information join a river of correspon-
dence to the president from countless
consultants, academics, think tanks,
political contacts, family, friends, po-
litical supporters, journalists, authors,
foreign leaders, and concerned citi-
zens. (Lest one thinks such correspon-
dence can easily be disregarded, it is
this author's impression that most
presidents often attach as much?if
not more?credibility to the views of
family, friends, and private contacts as
they do to those of executive agen-
cies.) In sum, despite the mystique of
intelligence for the public, for most
presidents it is just one of a number
of sources of information. Intelligence
reporting must compete for the presi-
dent's time and attention, and that
competition is intense.
It is the responsibility of the White
House staff, including the National
Security Council (NSC) staff, to im-
pose order on this avalanche of paper
and to reduce it to manageable pro-
portions. The NSC alone processes
some 10,000 "action" papers a year?
not including intelligence analyses or
other purely "informational" papers.
Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski, president
Carter's national security adviser, once
asked this author to calculate how
many pages of reading material he sent
to president Carter weekly. The total
averaged many hundreds of pages?
despite the NSC being among the
most disciplined of White House of-
fices with respect to the length and
number of items going to the presi-
dent. These, then, are the first hur-
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Opportunity Unfulfilled
dies that intelligence faces: a presi-
dent with a heavy schedule, inundated
by paper and demands for decisions,
surrounded by senior assistants who
have as a main role trying to keep that
president from being overwhelmed by
paper, and a president with vast and
varied nonintelligence sources on
which he also relies and in which he
often has considerable confidence.
What Intelligence Does the
President Receive?
The president routinely receives only
one intelligence document that is not
summarized or commented upon by
someone outside the intelligence com-
munity: the President's Daily Brief
(PDB). This is the CIA's principal ve-
hicle for reporting and analyzing cur-
rent developments for the president.
He receives this, usually via his na-
tional security adviser every morning,
along with a package that has varied
little from president to president: a
few (3-6) DoS and CIA cables of spe-
cial significance; occasionally a sensi-
tive intelligence report from the CIA,
the Defense Intelligence Agency, or
the National Security Agency (NSA);
selected wire service items; DoS or
CIA situation reports (rarely both) if
there is a crisis abroad; and often NSC
and DoS morning cable summaries.
Contrary to what is commonly
believed, this is the only regularly
scheduled package of current intell-
igence the president receives during
the day.
Through the course of the day, how-
? ever, the national security adviser
keeps the president apprised of signif-
icant developments overseas and may
hand carry especially important cables
directly to the president. In a crisis,
the flow of information increases.
THE WASHINGTON QUARTERLY ? WINTER 1989
More analyses and reports will be
given to the president. He will receive
current intelligence orally in meetings
with his senior White House, DoS,
DoD, and intelligence advisers, as
well as from the media?which is
often the first source of information.
Nevertheless, on a day-to-day basis,
apart from the PDB, successive pres-
idents generally have seen only that
current intelligence selected by the
national security adviser, who works to
make that morning package as suc-
cinct as he responsibly can.
It was not always this way, even in
modern times. Before the Kennedy
administration, the president, his na-
tional security adviser, and the NSC
staff relied on the CIA and DoS to
provide incoming cables and informa-
tion as soon as they were processed.
It was an approach that led to consid-
erable competition and redundancy
and placed a president at the mercy of
the bureaucracies for information.
This system was revolutionized,
however, when president Kennedy
created the White House Situation
Room to which DoS, the NSA, DoD,
and the CIA began to provide uneval-
uated or raw intelligence information
electronically?an approach with its
own readily apparent shortcomings.
(Many a time, an overeager White
House aide has run to a president with
a dramatic but unevaluated intelli-
gence report and later sheepishly had
to return to acknowledge the source
was poor or there had been a mistake.)
One result of the establishment of
the Situation Room was a significant
diminution in the value to the White
House of the CIA's and other agen-
cies' current intelligence reporting
that to this day the intelligence com-
munity has not fully grasped. Only
analysis by experienced intelligence
specialists lends value to current in-
telligence reporting provided the
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Robert M. Gates
White House. Even so, because of the
Situation Room, intelligence informa-
tion from abroad is sometimes in the
president's hands before reaching the
DCI and other senior intelligence of-
ficials.
Naturally, the president receives in-
formation through channels other than
the early morning folder and the oc-
casional cable during the day. For ex-
ample, most presidents routinely have
received current intelligence reports in
meetings and the key judgments of
important National Intelligence Esti-
mates (and other intelligence as well)
either directly from the DCI or
through the national security adviser.
All DCIs also have briefed the presi-
dent and his senior advisers both in-
dividually and in formal meetings of
the National Security Council. More-
over, discussion at such meetings
serves to convey information to the
president from diverse sources. The
president also receives abbreviated
versions of intelligence assessments in
many policy papers.
Nevertheless, each of the four pres-
idents that this author has observed?
Nixon, Ford, Carter, and Reagan?has
received an infinitesimal part of pub-
lished intelligence and only a fraction
even of analysis specifically prepared
for senior policymakers. This has
placed a premium on the President's
Daily Brief, on the willingness and
ability of the DCI to give important
assessments (published or oral) di-
rectly to the president, and on the
willingness of the national security ad-
viser to forward key intelligence re-
ports to the president. Disinterest or
reluctance on the part of a DCI (or
national security adviser) to take an
activist, even aggressive role in this
respect is a severe?even irrepara-
ble?handicap to ensuring that intel-
ligence information and assessments
reach the president.
38
What Presidents Think of What
They Receive
Perhaps in recognition of how busy
presidents are, for years there has
been an adage at the White House that
the absence of criticism should be re-
garded as praise. Along these lines,
presidential comments on intelligence
assessments are so rare that one is un-
derstandably tempted to assume sat-
isfaction with what is being received.
Regrettably, however, this is doubtful.
Many of the infrequent comments are
critical, as illustrated at the outset of
this article.
The negative perceptions of intel-
ligence of most presidents and their
senior advisers while in office or after-
ward are due to several factors. The
first and most significant is failure.
Whether Nixon's unhappiness over
poor estimates of planned Soviet in-
tercontinental-ballistic-missile deploy-
ments or Carter's over failure to fore-
cast the Iranian revolution or untimely
upward revisions of North Korean
troop strength, these presidents and
their advisers-7-with some justifica-
tion?believed CIA assessments ei-
ther contributed importantly to policy
disasters or made them vulnerable to
later criticism. Moreover, presidents
expect that, for what they spend on
intelligence, the product should be
able to predict coups, upheavals, riots,
intentions, military moves, and the
like with accuracy. In the early morn-
ing hours when the national security
adviser must repair to the president's
study with the usually bad news about
such events, the chief executive will
not unnaturally wonder why his bil-
lions for intelligence do not spare him
unpleasant surprise.
Second, presidents do not like con-
troversy within the executive branch,
and they like it even less when it be-
comes public. Nor do presidents wel-
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Opportunity Unfulfilled
come debate over basic facts once they
have made a decision. Whether the
issue is troublesome assessments on
Vietnam ( Johnson), the public dispute
between the CIA and DoD over
whether the SS-9 had multiple reentry
vehicles or multiple independently
targeted reentry vehicles (Nixon),
North Korean force levels (Carter), or
the Soviet gas pipeline (Reagan),
these and other intelligence debates
over technology transfer, arms-control
verification, Soviet military spending,
Soviet weapon programs, and many
more have caused controversy and
weakened support for policy. To the
extent intelligence information results
(in the eyes of the White House offi-
cials) in internal government contro-
versy, problems with the Congress, or
embarrassing publicity, it will draw
presidential ire or, at a minimum,
leave the president with unflattering
views of his intelligence services.
Third, presidents do not welcome
new intelligence assessments under-
cutting policies based on earlier as-
sessments. Professionals constantly re-
visit important subjects as better and
later information or improved analyti-
cal tools become available. When this
revisitation results in changing the sta-
tistical basis for the U.S. position in
the Mutual and Balanced Force Re-
duction talks, substantially elevating
estimates of North Korean forces as
the president is pressing to reduce
U.S. forces in South Korea, or "dis-
covering" a Soviet brigade in Cuba, it
is no revelation to observe that presi-
dents regard those professionals less
than fondly.
Fourth, successive administrations
have generally regarded with skepti-
cism the growing direct relationship
between Congress and U.S. intelli-
gence agencies. In recent years, the
provision of great quantities of highly
sensitive information and analysis to
THE WASHINGTON QUARTERLY ? WINTER 1989
members of Congress and their staffs
has largely eliminated the executive's
long-standing advantage of a near mo-
nopoly of information on foreign af-
fairs and defense. The flow of infor-
mation to the Hill has given the
Congress a powerful tool in its search
for a greater voice in the making of
foreign and defense policy vis-?is
the executive. Presidents cannot be
indifferent to the fact that intelligence
has provided Congress with that tool
and that the White House is nearly
helpless to blunt it except in very rare
cases.
Fifth, presidents and their national
security teams usually are ill informed
about intelligence capabilities; there-
fore, they often have unrealistic ex-
pectations of what intelligence can do
for them, especially when they hear
about the genuinely extraordinary ca-
pabilities of U.S. intelligence for col-
lecting and processing information.
When they too soon learn the limita-
tions, they are inevitably disap-
pointed. Policymakers usually learn
the hard way that, although intelli-
gence can tell them a great deal, it
only rarely?and usually in crises in-
volving military forces?provides the
kind of unambiguous and timely in-
formation that can make day-to-day
decisions simpler and less risky. Intel-
ligence officers occasionally encourage
such exaggerated expectations by pre-
tending a confidence in their judg-
ments they cannot reasonably justify
and by failing to be candid about the
quality and reliability of their infor-
mation and the possibility of other out-
comes. Once bitten by an erroneous
or misleading intelligence assessment,
most White House officials?including
presidents?will be twice shy about
relying on or accepting unquestion-
ingly another.
Finally, beyond these broad factors
affecting the White House?intelli-
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Robert M. Gates
gence community relationship are nar-
rower, more parochial bureaucratic
stresses. Often, staff at the White
House do not know how to use effec-
tively the vast system they direct. Too
often, an intelligence bureaucracy that
does not want outside direction offers
little help. There is a long-standing
perception at the White House that
changing the way the intelligence bur-
eaucracies do business?for example,
even the presentation of intelligence
information to the president?is just
too hard, takes too much time and en-
ergy, and ultimately yields little.
A useful case study illustrating the
simultaneous contribution of intelli-
gence to presidential policy-making
and the problems it can bring is the
ratification proceedings of the Inter-
mediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF)
Treaty. The capabilities of U.S. intel-
ligence to monitor deployed Soviet
INF weapons and associated treaty
provisions made the treaty possible in
the first place. However, uncertainties
in some areas relating to the treaty,
disagreements within the intelligence
community on the number of nonde-
ployed INF missiles, public disclosure
of these disagreements, and exploita-
tion of them in the Senate's ratification
proceedings all presented problems to
executive policymakers. For the
White House, on this issue?as so
many others?intelligence was a bit-
tersweet player.
Presidents and other principals over
the years have faulted the CIA for lack
of imagination in anticipating the
needs of the president and for insuf-
ficient aggressiveness in keeping itself
informed on policy issues under con-
sideration. Neither presidents nor
their assistants for national security af-
fairs have felt it their responsibility
regularly to keep senior agency offi-
cials well informed in this regard, to
provide day-to-day detailed tasking, or
40
to provide helpful feedback. For guid-
ance, the CIA thus often has had to
rely on what the DCI can pick up in
high-level meetings and contacts. The
skill and interest of different DCIs in
this has varied greatly. Indeed, some
DCIs have neither sought nor wanted
guidance or feedback from the White
House or have sought it on some is-
sues and resisted it on others.
What Is To Be Done?
A president and his national security
team (the vice president, the secretar-
ies of state and defense, and the na-
tional security adviser) should view in-
telligence as an important asset in
foreign-policy making and?despite
recent improvements?should be pre-
pared to devote more time to working
with the DCI to provide useful guid-
ance and direction to the collection
and analysis efforts of CIA and the rest
of U.S. intelligence. Contrary to the
view of those who are apprehensive
over a close relationship between pol-
icymakers and intelligence, it is not
close enough. More interaction, feed-
back, and direction as to strategy,
priorities, and requirements are critical
to better performance. This can be ac-
complished without jeopardizing the
independence and integrity of intelli-
gence assessments and judgments.
There has been progress in the last
10 years, though much more can be
done. The Carter and Reagan admin-
istrations have worked constructively
at a high level to inform the CIA of
the analytical needs of the president
and to advise the agency of perceived
shortcomings in collection and analy-
sis.
In 1978 Brzezinski sent a memoran-
dum to then DCI Stansfield Turner
that made the following points:
? Greater attention needs to be paid
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Opportunity Unfulfilled
to clandestine collection targeted on
the thinking and planning of key
leaders or groups in important ad-
vanced and secondary countries,
how they make policy decisions and
how they will react to US decisions
and those of other powers.
? Political analyses should be focused
more on problems of particular con-
cern to the US government. Too
many papers are on subjects periph-
eral to US interests or offer broad
overviews not directly linked to par-
ticular problems, events or devel-
opments of concern to the US gov-
ernment.
? There needs to be greater attention
to the future. More papers are
needed that briefly set forth facts
and evidence and then conclude
with a well-informed speculative
essay on the implications for the
future: "We expect and hope
for thought-provoking, reasonable
views of the future based on what
you know about the past and pres-
ent. . . . Analysts should not be
timorous or bound by convention."
After the Iranian Revolution, the
Carter White House took other steps
to ensure better communication of in-
telligence needs. The Political Intel-
ligence Working Group (the deputy
national security adviser, the under
secretary of -state for political affairs,
the deputy director of central intelli-
gence, and later the under secretary of
defense for policy) was established at
the White House to organize remedial
action in response to the president's
November 1978 note criticizing polit-
ical intelligence. The group inter-
preted its charter broadly and worked
to improve and better focus field re-
porting by DoS, CIA, and attaches; to
resolve bureaucratic impediments to
good reporting; and to tackle other
problems in order to improve collec-
THE WASHINGTON QUARTERLY ? WINTER 1989
tion and analysis and make intelli-
gence more responsive. As part of the
work of this informal group, senior
staff representatives of Brzezinski met
weekly with representatives of the
secretary of state and the DCI to re-
view foreign developments or issues
of current concern to the president and
to provide feedback on intelligence
coverage. These efforts had a salutary
effect in improving communication
between the intelligence community
and the White House and improved
intelligence support to the president.
A major innovation of the Reagan
administration in this regard was the
president's decision in 1981 that his
President's Daily Brief should be pro-
vided each day also to the vice presi-
dent, the secretaries of state and de-
fense, the national security adviser,
and later the chairman of the joint
chiefs of staff. They all were to have
the same information as the president.
Most significantly, primarily for secu-
rity reasons, the PDB was to be deliv-
ered to these principals in person by a
senior analytical officer of the CIA,
who would sit with the principal, then
carry the document back to the CIA.
These arrangements provided an op-
portunity unique in U.S. intelligence
history for intelligence professionals to
have immediate, informed feedback
from principals?their follow-up ques-
tions, tasking for further collection and
analysis, and a sense of the priorities
and concerns of the top officials in the
government. Intelligence support was
thereby improved as was the under-
standing of intelligence officers of pol-
icy dynamics and reality of the deci-
sion-making arena which they were
supporting.
The day-to-day dialogue between
intelligence officers and policymakers
at all levels has increased significantly
in recent years. Intelligence officers
have been more aggressive in this re-
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gard and policymakers more receptive.
Routine weekly meetings between the
DCI and, separately, the secretaries of
state and defense and the national se-
curity adviser have contributed to im-
proved relevance and timeliness of in-
telligence support. The NSC staff and
several Reagan national security advis-
ers worked with intelligence managers
to improve responsiveness to presi-
dential intelligence needs and to rem-
edy shortcomings in intelligence sup-
port. With Reagan's encouragement,
the President's Foreign Intelligence
Advisory Board studied substantive
and bureaucratic problems in the in-
telligence community and offered rec-
ommendations for improvement.
In sum, the dialogue essential to
better intelligence support has im-
proved, but such progress is highly
perishable with frequent turnover in
senior policy officials. Moreover, this
improved dialogue until recently fo-
cused primarily on current intelligence
or crisis-related subjects. More can be
done to institutionalize improved
White House intelligence guidance
policy, attention to requirements, in-
vestment, and dialogue on strategy
and longer-range issues.
Overcoming White House
Suspicion and CIA Isolation
Presidents expect their intelligence
service to provide timely, accurate,
and farseeing information and analy-
sis. Thus, a high proportion of presi-
dential comments on the quality of in-
telligence are critical?prompted by
the failure of intelligence agencies to
meet expectations. Indeed, all but one
quote at the outset of this article was
in response to a specific situation
where intelligence was perceived to
have failed to measure up. In short,
presidents often consider intelligence
as much another problem bureaucracy
42
as a source of helpful information, in-
sight, and support.
This point is perhaps most graphi-
cally illustrated by a story involving
president Johnson. Former DCI Rich-
ard Helms recalls a private dinner in
the White House family quarters dur-
ing which president Johnson engaged
John J. McCloy in a discussion about
intelligence. He told McCloy things
were going well in intelligence, but
then continued:
Let me tell you about these in-
telligence guys. When I was
growing up in Texas, we had a
cow named Bessie. I'd go out
early and milk her. I'd get her in
the stanchion, seat myself and
squeeze out a pail of fresh milk.
One day I'd worked hard and got-
ten a full pail of milk, but I wasn't
paying attention, and old Bessie
swung her shit-smeared tail
through that bucket of milk.
Now, you know, that's what these
intelligence guys do. You work
hard and get a good program or
policy going, and they swing a
shit-smeared tail through it.
The dynamics of the relationship
between the White House and the
CIA and the lack of understanding of
each other's perspective and motives
are usually difficult for the players
themselves to discern. They are even
less clear to outside observers. Al-
though most journalists and academi-
cians focus on alleged distortions of
intelligence to support policy, the
players know that the relationship ac-
tually is often characterized by dis-
agreement on substance and suspicion
of motives. To the extent intelligence
professionals are isolated (or isolate
themselves) from White House and
NSC officials and are unresponsive to
their information requirements or sug-
gestions on strategy, this adversarial
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nature of the relationship will be em-
phasized.
Although the routine order of busi-
ness and internal organization may
vary from administration to adminis-
tration, there are ways to improve this
relationship and intelligence support
to the President. The DCI with his
senior managers and the president
with his staff must both promote and
maintain close personal ties at all lev-
els. Both must aggressively seek new
ways to inform intelligence officers
about policy initiatives under consid-
eration or underway in order to deter-
mine how intelligence can make a con-
tribution and how best to put
intelligence information and assess-
ments before the president. There
should be closer contact on questions
of long-term intelligence strategy, in-
vestment, and performance.
The role of the DCI is central to
understanding the president's needs
and conveying analysis to him. DCI
aggressiveness in putting substantive
matters before the president (and DCI
access to the president) has varied
greatly, though. The DCI should work
closely with the national security ad-
viser?perhaps the best source of in-
formation on issues of topical interest
to the president and the foreign affairs
and defense agendas. Finally, feed-
back from the president and his na-
tional security team is critical. Con-
trary to the views of some, the CIA
cannot properly do its work in splen-
did isolation?and should not. Time-
liness, relevance, and objectivity are
not incompatible.
The responsibility for making intel-
ligence more relevant, timely, and
helpful is not that of the DCI and
senior officials of the intelligence com-
munity alone. The president and his
senior national security team must
take seriously their responsibility for
the quality of intelligence support
THE WASHINGTON QUARTERLY ? WINTER 1989
Opportunity Unfulfilled
they get. They must be willing to
make time for regular dialogue as to
their intelligence requirements and for
understanding intelligence capabili-
ties, the impact of competing priorities
for collection and analysis, and major
investment decisions. They must be
willing to play an active role in guiding
intelligence strategy and determining
priorities.
The above suggestions apply to im-
proving the quality and usefulness of
intelligence to the president. They
will not remove the several causes of
presidential displeasure?intelligence
support to Congress, revised assess-
ments that have policy implications,
surprises, and politically disagreeable
assessments. Even here mitigating
steps can and have been taken. More
can be done.
Intelligence professionals should
take the initiative to let the national
security adviser, the NSC staff, or a
cabinet officer know when an estimate
or other form of analysis will revise
earlier assessments and have a signifi-
cant impact on the president's poli-
cies. This would include, in particular,
advance warning of new and important
conclusions in military estimates.
There is, of course, a risk that a policy
official will try to change or stop pub-
lication of an unwelcome or embar-
rassing estimate. Here the DCI must
and, this author is confident, will stand
his ground to protect the integrity of
the assessment and the process.
Intelligence needs to develop a
mechanism for better informing the
White House about support provided
to the Congress. The intelligence
agencies are part of the executive
branch; the DCI is appointed by and
reports to the president. It is not im-
proper or inappropriate for the intelli-
gence community to keep the presi-
dent's foreign affairs and congressional
affairs staff better and regularly ad-
43
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Robert M. Gates
vised of papers provided to the Con-
gress, as well as possibly controversial
testimony or briefings. Keeping the
executive informed about CIA deal-
ings with Congress is an important as-
pect of building presidential confi-
dence that the CIA is not trying to
undercut him or his policies when re-
sponding to legitimate congressional
requests.
Finally, ground rules should be de-
veloped for the disclosure of declassi-
fied intelligence. The long-standing
absence of a systematic approach con-
tributes to leaks; to White House sus-
picion of obstructionism, bureaucratic
games, or pursuit of a contrary policy
agenda by intelligence professionals;
and concern on the part of intelligence
officers over the appearance of politi-
cization of intelligence by White
House or other policymaker-directed
declassification of information. Many
in the executive branch and Congress
agree that intelligence information un-
dergirding major policy decisions must
often be made available for public ed-
ucation or to gain support for national
security decisions. There is wide-
spread demand for unclassified publi-
cation of intelligence assessments or
research on issues of moment to the
country. Who should make these de-
cisions? This is not the place to pro-
pose solutions, but the problem exists
and it seriously affects the relationship
between the president and the intel-
ligence agencies on one hand and the
executive and legislative branches on
the other.
The usefulness of the CIA to pres-
idents in that area for which the CIA
44
was primarily established?collection,
reporting, analysis, and production of
information?at times has suffered be-
cause of self-imposed isolation by CIA
and the frequent lack of time and
often opportunity on the part of pres-
idents and their national security
teams to play a central role in devel-
oping intelligence policy and strategy.
The CIA and other U.S. intelli-
gence agencies represent an important
national asset. The rebuilding of the
intelligence community over the past
decade has vastly augmented the
CIA's collection and analysis capabili-
ties and sharpened its skills. The
White House and the intelligence
community, under the leadership of
the DCI, need to build on past prog-
ress and intensify their efforts to en-
sure that intelligence strategy, invest-
ment, and policy are driven by a
genuinely national perspective and re-
quirements. Only thus can the two in-
stitutions seize the opportunity further
to improve intelligence support to the
president and, concomitantly, better
serve the policy-making process.
Note
*This article addresses the CIA?White House
relationship in terms of intelligence assess-
ments and substantive support to the policy
process. Although the CIA's involvement in
operational activities abroad, especially covert
action, plainly affects the relationship with the
White House and the president, this article
does not address that aspect. Although a com-
plex and controversial subject warranting sep-
arate treatment, the operational-covert action
element of the relationship does not signifi-
cantly affect the analysis or conclusions of this
article.
THE WASHINGTON QUARTERLY ? WINTER 1989
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Declassified and Approved For Release 2013/11/19: CIA-RDP89G00720R000500110001-3
mr,:s
sza,
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