'UNSHACKLING' THE CIA WON T GIVE IT INTELLIGENCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000100200057-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 15, 2007
• Sequence Number: 57
• Publication Date: April 23, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
7 'ARTICLE AP Approved For Release 2007/06/15: CIA-RDP99-00498R000100200057-0
1 1111Jn1/.Llir 1[t 13r'N V.L Lliil\
ON PAGE 23 APRIL 1980
STAT
"Intelligence is not. a science,"
Admiral Stansfield Turner, director of
the Central Intelligence Agency,`.de
Glared recently in an address :to- the
American Society of Newspaper-Edi-
tors in Washington:, "It is.a: craft
even, at times, an art. An 'element of`?
trust is vital because without, it;. flexi-
'bility is lost. And an intelligence orga-
nization that lacks flexibility is- just,
another bureaucracy."
Trust. As Mr. Dooley once said,
"Thrust iverybody - but cut th'. ca-
ards." Admiral Turner, bespeaking the
Carter administration's case for "un-
shackling" the CIA in anew legislative
charter, has a peculiarly one-sided
notion of trust. It is that Congress,
representing the American people,
should.trust him and the CIA, but that
'Congress should not be trusted.
Yet as the CIA director conceded
elsewhere in his address, "In practice,
in my three years of association with
the committees of-Congress, they have
exercised extraordinarily , good. judg-
ment. The CIA director says he is not
now employing journalists as spies; the
charter should specifically forbid such
employment.
.The legislative charter also should
not go too far in relieving the CIA from
the reasonable requirements of.: the
amendment governiTtg' clandestine
operations that the president must the current law, genuine secrets are
protected. from disclosure. Admiral
personally approve all covert opera- 1 Turner is also disingenuous in his
tions. The administration wants a pro- argument that the CIA should .in-effect
vino requiring the. president to ap be immune even from judicial review
prove only covert operations involving of its secrecy stamp9. Sources must be
"substantial" risks and, in effect, leav- -protected; but it is one thing to say
i
tr,-the CIA to determine what - - _ -
it u
nn
p
those operations are.
On that, the administration has
changed its position since early 1977,
when soon-to-be Secretary of State
- CyrusVance was declaring that covert 'the debate over "unshackling" the CIA.
activities should be undertaken only That is that the-primary mission of the
in "the most extraordinary circum- -agency is not covert operations. It is to
stances" and that on, all of them .thee gather intelligence, to analyze it, to
.president "shoulsign off in writing, evaluate it, and to disseminate it to
saying that he believes this vital to the.
those. who-need it (and their responsi-
national security." bility is to act upon it). Keeping the
The administration was right then, CIA from repeating its past abuses has
wrong now. The U.S. should not go little if anything: to do with that mis=,
back to the days when..the CIA had the sion. Indeed, one can make a case that
"flexibility" and used it to plot murder the CIA's diversion into cloak-and-
of foreign leaders, to spy on American dagger operations had much to do with
citizens, and to operate its own foreign its failures in its primary mission.. ,=:
policy or, with a wink from the White, to August 1978 a to
-secret CIA
p
report auviseu that Iran is not in a
ment and have not pressed us -fora bo-ngress-and the American people. revolutionary or even pre-revolution-
level of detail that was unnecessary." 1 . Nor- should the CIA be given such revol su
Five months vlater,the
olut on-
Nor does he cite a single. instance in vague authority as to permit it to spy ary situation." or
which the eight committees of Con- { shah left the country on his.extended
on the political activities of American ,vacation." In February y
to inform "in timely fashion" before.i Admiral Turner acknowledged that
rights and liberties -activities that the CIA had been caught b surprise b
any covert operations can beunderta were justified on the grounds of "in- by by
events in Iran.
ken, have betrayed their trust.., herent power. In bills before the Sen- The CIA's failure did not come.
The argument, though, is not about gate, they would be codified. The case about because of shackles placed upon,
the number of ; committees which against 'is simple.. Government cannot should be informed in timely fash be trusted. Admiral Turner's argu it by the Congress. It came about be-
ion." On that, there is a consensus that m genu- causeof its own political and intellec-
ents to the contrary are disino tual inflexibility in pursuing the art
eight committees. with 163 members, ous. The Founding Fathers. knew what
plus staffers, is probably too many. The' they were doing when they wrote cer and craft of intelligence. The way to.
argument is over what is "timely fash=' tain"?? prohibitions'-.on 'governmental avoid such failures in the future is not
ion ' and what" kind .of, -operations power into the Constitution. to give the CIA the authority it abused
should be reported, and how they in the past. but by? structuring- it to~
Admiral Turner demonstrates their ?
should be controlled, and who should understanding, and his own lack of it, pursue its s primary mission..
make the decisions. in declaring that he "wouldn't hesi
'
`
.The Carter administration
s.
posi tate" to use journalists in secret intelli-
State of. the Union - address, "unwar-
practice justified. The function of jour-
nalists is to, get news,- independent of
any government, including their own.
It is not self-serving, it is, rather, serv-
ing the interests of the people for
whom that news is-.vital, to point-out
that that function can not be exercised
requirement in. the: J974 -Iughes-Ryan I freely if journalists are suspected, of
_
being spies in-the pay of their govern-
ranted restraints on our ability to col-
lect intelligence"_ should be removed..
One of those is the legal requirement,
proposed in the major Senate bill, that
the president give Congress prior no-
tice of covert activities. Another is the.
Admiral Turner does not, that any-
sources have been blown by, reason-
able access to nonsecrets.
Something is missing- in much of
Approved For Release 2007/06/15: CIA-RDP99-00498R000100200057-0 ,