PUTTING BACK THE BITE IN THE C.I.A.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00561R000100060049-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 23, 2012
• Sequence Number: 49
• Publication Date: April 6, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/23: CIA-RDP91-00561 R000100060049-2
ARTICrJT A -ABED
33y Tail Szulc
Room S-407 on the Senate side of the
Capitol has more than its share of pro-
tective electronic devices inside and
armed guards outside. It is designed to
keep its secrets.
On Wednesday, Jan. 9, during the
Congressional Christmas recess, a
small group of Senators was summoned
back to Washington to meet in 5-407, the
most "secure" room in all of Congress,
with high officials of the Central Intelli-
gence Agency. The agenda: a presenta-
tion by the C.I.A. of its plans for covert,
paramilitary operations in Afghani-
stan.
The Senators included Birch Bayh of
Indiana, chairman of the Select Com-
mittee on Intelligence; Barry Goldwa-
ter of Arizona, vice chairman, and Jo-
seph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware - plus
the committee staff director, William
G. Miller, and the minority staff direc-
tor, Earl D. Eisenhower. The C.I.A.
was represented by the Deputy Direc-
tor of Central Intelligence, Frank C.
Carlucci, accompanied by John
McMahon, Deputy Director for Opera-
tions, the top man in clandestine opera-
tions.
What Mr. Carlucci spelled out at the
session was a new covert aid program
for the anti-Soviet Moslem guerrillas of
Afghanistan. Since last November, as
the Senators knew, the C.I.A. had been
secretly prow?ding the rebels with lim-
ited assistance - field hospitals and
communications equipment. But after
the Soviet invasion of Dec. 27, the Car-
ter Administration had decided to esca-
late that aid program dramatically.
The C.I.A. proposed to provide the Af-
ghan rebels with Soviet-made AK-47 as-
sault rifles from American stocks,
TOW antitank weapons and SAM-7 sur-
face-to-air missiles- and launchers.
(The SAM's were for use against an an-
ticipated spring offensive when the
weather would permit the Russians
greater use of planes and helicopters;
the offensive has since begun.)
The Senators listened. They offered
no major objections. The next day, Mr.
Carlucci advised the White House of the
results of the session, and President
Carter signed a Presidential Decision
(known as a P.D.) setting the program
in motion.
NEJ YORK TIMES MAGAZINE
6 APRIL 1980
For all the secrecy and the high-
stakes international gamble involved,
that progression from Room S-407 to
the signing of the P.D. was fairly rou-
tine. It was a standard example of Con-
gressional oversight of American intel-
ligence work as it has developed in the
last five years - a balancing of the
C.I.A.'s national-security require-
ments and the Congress's desire to
keep a hand in foreign-policy decisions
and safeguard Americans' individual
rights. According to sources in both
camps, the agency has been informing
the appropriate Congressional commit-
tees of its plans. and the committees
have, apparently with few exceptions,
gone along.
Today, however, that relationship is
undergoing dramatic change. The
C.I.A. and other intelligence agencies
are openly and successfully seeking
greater independence of Congressional
oversight and of a variety of other re-
straints, as well. According to its crit-
ics, the "unleashing" of the C.I.A. is
well under way.
NA bill that would deprive the Con-
gressional intelligence committees of
the right to review all C.I.A. covert
operations has been approved by the
House Foreign Affairs Committee. It is
likely that some such legislation will be
passed by Congress this year.
M A measure, once encouraged by the
Carter Administration, which would for
the first time have defined the powers
of the intelligence agencies, is given lit-
tle chance in Congress this year.
?A bill to amend the Freedom of In-
formation Act to protect the agency's
secrets is expected to pass the Senate.
Further protection has been granted by
a Supreme Court ruling.
doing the shouting. In the wake of the
Vietnam War, Congress took a long,
hard look at the freewheeling ways of
the C.I.A. The first concrete result was
the Hughes-Ryan Amendment to the
Foreign Aid Authorization Act of 1974.
According to this measure, no funds
could be spent on a covert intelligence
operation unless it was reported in a
"timely fashion" to the appropriaie
committees in Congress. Public: reports
of secret, widespread and illegal C.I.A.
moves against political dissenters in
the United States (code-named Opera-
tion CHAOS) led to the hasty creation of
the Select Committee to Study Govern-
mental Operations With Respect to In-
telligence Activities, with Senator
Frank Church of Idaho as chairman.
Along the way, the committee
learned in detail of C.I.A. plans to as-
sassinate Cuba's Fidel Castro and the
Congo's Patrice Lumumba, and of the
agency's crucial role in establishing a
climate in which Chile's President Sal-
vador Allende Gossens, a democrati-
overthrown by the Chilean military.
The committee also discovered that the
agency had been conducting mind-con-
trol experiments, feeding LSD and
other drugs to unwitting subjects; co-
vertly passing money to foreign politi-
cal parties to affect the outcome of elec-
tions, and recruiting American journal-
ists, clergymen. and academics for se-
cret intelligence work.
Congress demanded a curtailment of
the C.I.A.'s ability in effect. to make
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/23: CIA-RDP91-00561 R000100060049-2