CIA DEPUTY CALLS SECRECY VITAL

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000100090009-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 13, 2011
• Sequence Number: 9
• Publication Date: May 1, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/01/13: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100090009-2
ARTICLE APPEARED
ON PAGE i (American Newspaper Publishers
May 1982
CI dlkwp Calls secrecy vital
"We must come to grips with the very
difficult issue of secrecy to protect the in-
vestment that we make in our ability to
collect, to process and to report on foreign
intelligence," the deputy director of central
intelligence told a General Session.
Adm. Bobby R. Inman.said that legisla-
tion to make it a crime to publish the
names of U.S. covert foreign intelligence
agents and to limit the applicability of the
Freedom of Information Act to the Central
Intelligence Agency will help but not com-
pletely solve the secrecy problem.
"I can't guarantee to you that they will do
the job entirely because we are still caught
with the psychology of leaks," said Inman.
In response to a question from Charles
S. Rowe, chairman of the FOI/First
Amendment Working Group of the ANPA
Government Affairs Committee, Inman
said he does not believe there is "any high
likelihood that one will need to use" the
agents' identities legislation now before a
House-Senate conference committee.
"I am in hopes it will have the deterrent
effect," Inman said; to which Rowe, co-
publisher and editor of The Free Lance-
Star In . Fredericksburg, Va., responded,
"What you call the deterrent. effect, we
would call the chilling effect."
Inman urged ANPA to continue its dia-
logue with intelligence officials on FOIA
issues.
Although the administration has said it
wants a full exclusion for the CIA from the
FOIA, Inman said that as a private citizen
he would favor legislation introduced by
Sen. John H. Chafes (R-R.1.), providing
i less than a full exclusion, as "a good com-
promise."
Inman decries the "psychology of leaks."
Director William Casey'very good."
The session was named "The State of .
Intelligence," and Inman rated it "marginal IiI
for some of the kinds of problems the
United States can expect to face in the
next two decades.
The nation's intelligence and warning
capabilities against a surprise attack "from
our principal adversary" are better than
they have ever been, he said, and U.S. *
Intelligence does well in monitoring military
developments. But it does "substantially
less well" in the political and economic
areas, he added, and "very poorly" in ,
maintaining an "encyclopedic" knowledge
about the nations of the world.
He asked publishers to give `strong sup-;
port" to the program now before Congress
r 'to rebuild U.S. intelligencecapability. ^
_. ~._,..~.. .J
And a private citizen Is what he will be-
come July 1, after 30 years in the Navy.
The White House announced less than a
week before the Convention that Inman
will leave government service. Inman told
the publishers he had made the decision to
do so in 1980 but had had his "arm ...
twisted severely" to help shape a long-
range program to rebuild U.S. intelligence
capability.
"I've done that," Inman said, "and it
seemed to me now was the right time to
get off the train." He denied any dis-
agreements on major policy issues and
called his working relationship with CIA
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/01/13: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100090009-2