Proposals for Intelligence Reorganization, 1949-2004

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Order Code RL32500

CRS Report for Congress

Received through the CRS Web

Proposals for Intelligence Reorganization,

1949-2004

Updated September 24, 2004

Richard A. Best, Jr.

Specialist in National Defense

Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division

Congressional Research Service ˜ The Library of Congress

Proposals for Intelligence Reorganization, 1949-2004

Summary

Proposals for the reorganization of the United States Intelligence Community

have repeatedly emerged from commissions and committees created by either the

executive or legislative branches. The heretofore limited authority of Directors of

Central Intelligence and the great influence of the Departments of State and Defense

have inhibited the emergence of major reorganization plans from within the

Intelligence Community itself.

Proposals to reorganize the Intelligence Community emerged in the period

immediately following passage of the National Security Act of 1947 (P.L. 80-253)

that established the position of Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) and the Central

Intelligence Agency (CIA). Recommendations have ranged from adjustments in the

DCI’s budgetary responsibilities to the actual dissolution of the CIA and returning

its functions to other departments. The goals underlying such proposals have

reflected trends in American foreign policy and the international environment as well

as domestic concerns about governmental accountability.

In the face of a hostile Soviet Union, early intelligence reorganization proposals

were more concerned with questions of efficiency. In the Cold War context of the

1950s, a number of recommendations sought aggressively to enhance U.S. covert

action and counterintelligence capabilities. The chairman of one committee charged

with investigating the nation’s intelligence capabilities, Army General James H.

Doolittle, argued that sacrificing America’s sense of “fair play” was wholly justified

in the struggle to prevent Soviet world domination.

Following the failed invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs, the unsuccessful

results of intervention in Vietnam, and the Watergate scandal, investigations by

congressional committees focused on the propriety of a wide range of heretofore

accepted intelligence activities that included assassinations and some domestic

surveillance of U.S. citizens. Some forcefully questioned the viability of secret

intelligence agencies within a democratic society. These investigations resulted in

much closer congressional oversight and a more exacting legal framework for

intelligence activities. At the same time, the growth in technical intelligence

capabilities led to an enhanced — but by no means predominant — leadership role

for the DCI in determining community-wide budgets and priorities.

With the end of the Cold War, emerging security concerns, including

transnational terrorism, narcotics trafficking, and proliferation of weapons of mass

destruction, faced the United States. Some statutory changes were made in the mid1990s, but their results were not far-reaching. In the aftermath of the September 11,

2001 attacks and the Iraq War, some observers urge reconsidering the intelligence

organization. The 9/11 Commission has specifically recommended the establishment

of a National Intelligence Director to manage the national intelligence program.

Current intelligence organization issues can be usefully addressed with an awareness

of arguments pro and con that were raised by earlier investigators; this

recommendation has been incorporated in a number of bills, including S. 2845. This

report will be updated as circumstances warrant.

Contents

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Intelligence Reform Proposals Made by Commissions and Major

Legislative Initiatives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

The Truman Administration, 1945-1953 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

The First Hoover Commission, 1949 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Intelligence Survey Group (Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report), 1949 . . . . . . . . 6

Summary of the Truman Administration Intelligence Investigations . . . . . . 7

The Eisenhower Administration, 1953-1961 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Second Hoover Commission, 1955 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

The Doolittle Report, 1954 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Bruce-Lovett Report, 1956 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Summary of the Eisenhower Administration Intelligence Investigations . . 11

The Kennedy Administration, 1961-1963 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

The Taylor Commission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

The Kirkpatrick Report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Summary of the Kennedy Administration Intelligence Investigations . . . . 15

The Johnson Administration, 1963-1969 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

The Nixon Administration, 1969-1974 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

The Schlesinger Report, 1971 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Summary of the Nixon Administration Intelligence Investigation . . . . . . . 16

The Era of Public Investigations, 1974-1981 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Murphy Commission (Commission on the Organization of the

Government for the Conduct of Foreign Policy), 1975 . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Rockefeller Commission (Commission on CIA Activities within

the United States), 1975 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Church Committee (Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental

Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities), 1976 . . . . . . . . . 21

Pike Committee (House Select Committee on Intelligence), 1976 . . . . . . . 23

Clifford and Cline Proposals, 1976 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Proposed Charter Legislation, 1978-1980 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

The Executive Branch Response, 1976-1981 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

The Turner Proposal, 1985 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Iran-Contra Investigation, 1987 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Boren-McCurdy, 1992 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Commission on the Roles and Capabilities of the U.S. Intelligence

Community (Aspin/Brown Commission), 1995-1996 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

IC21: Intelligence Community in the 21st Century, 1996 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

The Response to Aspin/Brown and IC21: The Intelligence

Authorization Act for FY1997 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Congressional Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Presidential Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Implementation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Joint Inquiry on the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001;

Additional Views of Senator Shelby, 2002 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States

(The 9/11 Commission), 2004 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Major portions of this report previously appeared as a separate section of the

1996 Staff Study published by the House Permanent Select Committee on

Intelligence, IC21: Intelligence Community in the 21st Century. That report was

prepared by Richard A. Best, Jr. and Herbert Andrew Boerstling.

Proposals for Intelligence Reorganization,

1949-2004

Introduction

The National Security Act of 1947 (P.L. 80-253) established the statutory

framework for the managerial structure of the United States Intelligence Community,

including the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the position of Director of

Central Intelligence (DCI). A fundamental intent of this legislation was to

coordinate, and to a certain extent centralize, the nascent intelligence efforts of the

United States as an emergent superpower in the face of a hostile Soviet Union. In

addition, the act provided the CIA with the ability to assume an operational role by

charging it with:

Perform[ing] such other functions and duties related to intelligence affecting the

national security as the National Security Council may from time to time direct.1

In 1947, the foundation of the present-day Intelligence Community consisted

only of the relatively small intelligence components in the Armed Services, the

Departments of State and the Treasury, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI),

and the fledgling CIA. Since 1947, however, the Intelligence Community “has

greatly expanded in size and acquired a much broader range of responsibilities in the

collection, analysis, and dissemination of foreign intelligence.”2

The U.S. Intelligence Community is defined in the National Security Act as

amended. It currently includes the following:

Central Intelligence Agency;

National Security Agency;

Defense Intelligence Agency;

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency;

National Reconnaissance Office;

Intelligence elements of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps,

the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of the Treasury,

the Department of Energy, and the Coast Guard;

! Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Department of State;

Section 102(d)(5), National Security Act of 1947, P.L. 80-253; hereafter cited as National

Security Act of 1947.

CRS Report 89-414 F, Intelligence Community Leadership: Development and Debate

Since 1947, by (name redacted), June 27, 1989, p. 1; hereafter cited as Prados, 89-414 F.

(Out of print report; available upon request from the author.)

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Elements of the Department of Homeland Security concerned with

analyses of foreign intelligence information; and

! Coast Guard.

Beginning in January 1948, numerous independent commissions, individual

experts, and legislative initiatives have examined the growth and evolving mission

of the Intelligence Community. Proposals by these groups have sought to address

perceived shortcomings in the Intelligence Community’s structure, management,

role, and mission. These proposals have ranged in scope from basic organizational

restructuring to the dissolution of the CIA.

In 1948 and 1949, two executive branch commissions examined the intelligence

and operational missions of the CIA, and identified fundamental administrative and

organizational loopholes in P.L. 80-253. By the 1950s, however, the physical growth

and evolving mission of the Intelligence Community led subsequent commissions to

broaden the scope of their proposals to include the enhancement of the DCI’s

community-wide authority, and the establishment of executive and legislative branch

intelligence oversight committees. Unlike the intelligence investigations of the

1970s and 1980s, these early studies were primarily concerned with questions of

efficiency and effectiveness rather than with issues of legality and propriety.

Following the Vietnam War and “Watergate,” investigatory bodies became

increasingly critical of the national intelligence effort. Beginning in the mid-1970s,

the impetus shifted to the legislative branch where investigatory committees led by

Senator Frank Church and Representative Otis G. Pike issued a broad range of

proposals, including the separation of the DCI and CIA Director positions, dividing

the CIA’s analytical and operational responsibilities into two separate agencies, and

the establishment of congressional oversight committees. In 1976 and 1977,

respectively, recommendations by the these committees led to the establishment of

the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) and the House Permanent Select

Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI). These committees were heavily involved in the

investigations into the Iran-Contra affair of the mid-1980s.

With the end of the Cold War, and in the wake of the Aldrich Ames espionage

case, both the executive and legislative branches undertook studies to determine the

future roles, capabilities, management, and structure of the Intelligence Community.

These studies include such issues as the need to maintain the CIA as a separate entity,

the extent and competence of U.S. counterintelligence (CI) efforts, and the

managerial structure of intelligence components in the armed services and the

Department of Defense (DOD). A comprehensive examination of the DCI’s roles,

responsibilities, authorities, and status was also undertaken. In an era of budgetary

constraints and shifting policy concerns, these studies also examined personnel

issues, allocation of resources, duplication of services, expanded use of open source

Intelligence (OSCINT), and the need for maintaining a covert action (CA) capability.

The results of this effort were reflected in organizational adjustments made by the

Intelligence Authorization Act for FY1997 (P.L. 104-293), but some observers have

subsequently concluded that this legislation did not go far enough and that, in the

50 USC 401a(4)

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light of the events of September 11, 2001 and the Iraq War, intelligence organization

questions need to be reevaluated.

The history of these investigations has witnessed the gradual transformation of

intelligence from a White House asset to one that is shared between the executive and

legislative branches. Congress not only has access to intelligence judgments but to

most information that intelligence agencies acquire as well as to the details of

intelligence activities. Congress has accepted some responsibility as a participant in

the planning and conduct of covert actions. In significant measure, this process has

been encouraged by these external intelligence investigations.

This report provides a chronological overview and examination of the major

executive and legislative branch intelligence investigations made from January 1949

to date. Major proposals are listed in chronological order with a brief discussion of

their respective results. Proposals specifically relating to congressional oversight of

the Intelligence Community are not included in this report.

Intelligence Reform Proposals Made by

Commissions and Major Legislative Initiatives

The Truman Administration, 1945-1953

Following the Second World War, the United States emerged as a global

political, military, and economic leader. In the face of Soviet aggressiveness, the

U.S. sought to enhance its national defense capabilities to curb the international

spread of communism and to provide security for the nation itself.

The National Security Act (P.L. 80-253), signed July 26, 1947, established the

statutory framework for the managerial structure of the United States Intelligence

Community, including the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the position of

Director of Central Intelligence (DCI). The act also created a semi-unified military

command structure under a Secretary of Defense, and a National Security Council

(NSC) to advise the President “with respect to the integration of domestic, foreign,

and military policies relating to the national security.”4 The fundamental intent of

this legislation was to coordinate U.S. national defense efforts, including intelligence

activities, in the face of a Soviet Union intent upon expanding and leading a system

of communist states.

In response to the rapid growth and changing role of the Federal government

following the Second World War, several studies were conducted to examine the

structure and efficiency of the executive branch, including the intelligence agencies.5

Between 1948 and 1949, two important investigations of the national intelligence

Section 101(a), National Security Act of 1947.

For a comprehensive examination of similar Commissions see CRS Report RL31446,

Reorganizing the Executive Branch in the Twentieth Century: Landmark Commissions, by

(name redacted), June 10, 2002.

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effort were conducted. The first, the Task Force on National Security Organization

of the First Hoover Commission, was established by a unanimous vote in Congress.

The second, known as the Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, was initiated by the NSC

at the request of President Harry S. Truman.

The First Hoover Commission, 1949

The Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the government

was established pursuant to P.L. 80-162 of July 27, 1947.6 Under the chairmanship

of former President Herbert Hoover, the twelve member bipartisan commission

conducted a comprehensive review of the federal bureaucracy, including the

intelligence agencies. The commission’s Task Force on National Security

Organization was headed by Ferdinand Eberstadt, a strong advocate of a centralized

intelligence capability who had been instrumental in drafting the National Security

Act of 1947.7

Hearings conducted by the task force began in June 1948. On January 13, 1949,

the Hoover Commission submitted the task force’s 121 page unclassified report to

Congress.8 Known as the Eberstadt Report, it found the “National Security

Organization, established by the National Security Act of 1947, [to be] soundly

constructed, but not yet working well.”9 The report identified fundamental

organizational and qualitative shortcomings in the national intelligence effort and the

newly created CIA.

A principal concern of the task force was the adversarial relationship and lack

of coordination between the CIA, the military, and the State Department. It

suggested that this resulted in unnecessary duplication and the issuance of

departmental intelligence estimates that “have often been subjective and biased.”10

In large measure, the military and State Department were blamed for their failure to

consult and share pertinent information with the CIA. The task force recommended

“that positive efforts be made to foster relations of mutual confidence between the

[CIA] and the several departments and agencies that it serves.”11

The report was reprinted as The Hoover Commission Report on Organization of the

Executive Branch of the Government (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1970).

For background on Eberstadt, see Jeffrey M. Dorwart, Eberstadt and Forrestal: A National

Security Partnership, 1909-1949 (College Station, TX: Texas A & M University Press,

1991).

The Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government, Task Force

Report on National Security Organization, Appendix G, January 1949; hereafter cited as the

Eberstadt Report.

Eberstadt Report, p. 3.

Eberstadt Report, p. 76.

Eberstadt Report, p. 16, paragraph d.

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In short, the report stressed that the CIA “must be the central organization of the

national intelligence system.”12 To facilitate community coordination in the

production of national estimates, a founding intent of CIA, the task force

recommended the creation within CIA “at the top echelon an evaluation board or

section composed of competent and experienced personnel who would have no

administrative responsibilities and whose duties would be confined solely to

intelligence evaluation.”13 To foster professionalism and continuity of service, the

report also favored a civilian DCI with a long term in office.14

In the arena of covert operations and clandestine intelligence, the Eberstadt

Report supported the integration of all clandestine operations into one office within

CIA, under NSC supervision. To alleviate concerns expressed by the military who

viewed this proposal as encroaching upon their prerogatives, the report stated that

clandestine operations should be the responsibility of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS)

in time of war.15

In examining the daily workings of the CIA, the task force found the agency’s

internal structure and personnel system “not now properly organized.”16 This led to

recommendations for the adoption of clearer lines of departmental responsibilities,

and the establishment of proper personnel selection and training systems.17 In

response to legislative concerns regarding intelligence budgets, the report supported

establishing a legal framework for budgetary procedures and authorities, and in

maintaining the secrecy of the CIA budget in order to provide the “administrative

flexibility and anonymity that are essential to satisfactory intelligence.”18 The report

also addressed, and rejected, the possibility of placing the FBI’s counterintelligence

responsibilities in the CIA.19

Of particular concern was the level of professionalism in military intelligence,

and the glaring inadequacies of medical and scientific intelligence, including

biological and chemical warfare, electronics, aerodynamics, guided missiles, atomic

weapons, and nuclear energy.20 The report declared that the failure to appraise

scientific advances in hostile countries (i.e., the Soviet Union) might have more

immediate and catastrophic consequences than failure in any other field of

Arthur B. Darling, The Central Intelligence Agency: An Instrument of Government to

1950 (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1990), p. 293. This is a

reprint of an official CIA history prepared in the early 1950's.

Eberstadt Report, p. 16.

Darling, introduction to Chapter VIII.

Darling, introduction to chapter VIII.

Eberstadt Report, p. 76.

Darling, pp. 295-298.

Darling, p. 297.

Darling, p. 289.

Eberstadt Report, p. 77; Darling, p. 296.

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intelligence. Accordingly, the report stressed that the U.S. should establish a central

authority “to collect, collate, and evaluate scientific and medical intelligence.”21

Intelligence Survey Group

(Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report), 1949

On January 8, 1948, the National Security Council established the Intelligence

Survey Group (ISG) to “evaluate the CIA’s effort and its relationship with other

agencies.”22 Commissioned at the request of President Truman, the group was

composed of Allen W. Dulles, who had served in the Office of Strategic Services

(OSS) during the Second World War and would become DCI in 1953, William

Jackson, a future Deputy DCI, and Matthias Correa, a former assistant to Secretary

of Defense James V. Forrestal when the latter had served as Secretary of the Navy

during the war. Under the chairmanship of Dulles, the ISG presented its findings,

known as the Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, to the National Security Council on

January 1, 1949.

The 193-page report, partially declassified in 1976, contained fifty-six

recommendations, many highly critical of the CIA and DCI.23 In particular, the

report revealed problems in the agency’s execution of both its intelligence and

operational missions. It also criticized the quality of national intelligence estimates

by highlighting the CIA’s — and, by implication, the DCI’s — “failure to take charge

of the production of coordinated national estimates.”24 The report went on to argue

that the CIA’s current trend in secret intelligence activities should be reversed in

favor of its mandated role as coordinator of intelligence.25

The Dulles Report was particularly concerned about the personnel situation at

CIA, including internal security, the high turnover of employees, and the excessive

number of military personnel assigned to the agency.26 To add “continuity of

service” and the “greatest assurance of independence of action,” the report argued

that the DCI should be a civilian and that military appointees be required to resign

their commissions.27

Eberstadt Report, p, 20.

Mark M. Lowenthal, U.S. Intelligence: Evolution and Anatomy (Westport, CT: Praeger,

1992), p. 20.

“The Central Intelligence Agency and National Organization for Intelligence: A Report

to the National Security Council,” January 1, 1949. Hereafter cited as the Dulles-JacksonCorrea Report; the declassified report remains highly sanitized. A version was reprinted in

William M. Leary, ed., The Central Intelligence Agency: History and Documents

(University, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1984).

Lowenthal, p. 20; Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, p. 5, 11.

Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, p. 39.

DCI Hillenkoetter disputed these findings by producing evidence that CIA’s employee

turnover was no different than in other government agencies and that only two percent of

CIA personnel were active duty military. Darling, p. 327.

Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, p. 138.

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As with the Eberstadt Report, the Dulles Report also expressed concern about

the inadequacies in scientific intelligence and the professionalism of the service

intelligence organizations, and urged that the CIA provide greater coordination.28

This led to a recommendation for increased coordination between the DCI and the

Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the arena of

counterespionage. In turn, the report recommended that the Director of FBI be

elevated to membership in the Intelligence Advisory Committee (IAC), whose

function was to help the DCI coordinate intelligence and set intelligence

requirements.29

The principal thrust of the report was a proposed large-scale reorganization of

the CIA to end overlapping and duplication of functions. Similar to the Eberstadt

Report, the Dulles study suggested incorporating covert operations and clandestine

intelligence into one office within CIA. In particular, the report recommended that

the Office of Special Operations (OSO), responsible for the clandestine collection of

intelligence, and the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC), responsible for covert

actions, be integrated into a single division within CIA.30

Accordingly, the report recommended replacing existing offices with four new

divisions for coordination, estimates, research and reports, and operations. The heads

of the new offices would be included in the immediate staff of the DCI so that he

would have “intimate contact with the day-to-day operations of his agency and be

able to give policy guidance to them.”31 These recommendations would become the

blueprint for the future organization and operation of the present-day CIA.

Summary of the Truman Administration

Intelligence Investigations

The Task Force on National Security Organization was almost immediately

eclipsed by the Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, that found a sympathetic ear in the

White House. On July 7, 1949, the NSC adopted a modified version of the Dulles

Report, and directed DCI Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter to begin implementing its

recommendations, including the establishment of a single operations division at CIA.

In 1953, the OSO and OPC were merged within the CIA to form the Directorate of

Plans (DP). (DP was designated the Directorate of Operations (DO) in 1973.)

Although the Eberstadt Report was not as widely read among policymakers as

the Dulles study, it did play a principal role in reorganization efforts initiated by DCI

Walter Bedell Smith in 1950. The two reports, and the lessons learned from fall of

China to the Communists and the unexpected North Korean invasion of South Korea

in June 1950, prompted Smith to create an intelligence evaluation board called the

Board of National Estimates (BNE). Designed to review and produce National

Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, pp. 3-4, 149.

Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, p. 58. Although the DCI served as chairman of the IAC,

he was not given budgetary or administrative authority over the other intelligence agencies.

Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, pp. 129, 134.

Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report, p. 11.

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Intelligence Estimates (NIEs), the BNE was assisted by an Office of National

Estimates (ONE) that drew upon the resources of the entire community.32

The Eisenhower Administration, 1953-1961

The Eisenhower Administration witnessed the Soviet Union solidify its hold

over Eastern Europe, crushing the Hungarian revolution, and the rise of Communist

insurgencies in Southeast Asia and Africa. This was a period in which extensive

covert psychological, political, and paramilitary operations were initiated in the

context of the threat posed by Soviet-led Communist expansion. However, between

1948, when a covert action program was first authorized through NSC Directive

10/2, and 1955 there was no formally established procedure for approval.

Between 1954 and 1956, this prompted three investigations into U.S.

intelligence activities, including the CIA. The first, the Task Force on Intelligence

Activities of the Second Hoover Commission on Organization of the Executive

Branch of the Government, was sponsored by Congress. The second, the Doolittle

Report, was commissioned at the request of President Dwight D. Eisenhower in

response to the Second Hoover Commission. The third, the Bruce-Lovett Report

was initiated by the President’s Board of Consultants on Foreign Intelligence

Activities (PBCFIA), and reported to President Eisenhower.

Second Hoover Commission, 1955

The Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government,

also chaired by former President Hoover, was created pursuant to P.L. 83-108 of July

10, 1953. Known as the Second Hoover Commission, it contained a Task Force on

Intelligence Activities under the chairmanship of General Mark W. Clark. In May

1955, the task force submitted both classified and unclassified reports. The classified

version was sent directly to President Eisenhower, and has not been declassified

according to available information. The unclassified version was sent to Congress.

The unclassified report’s seventy-six pages contained nine recommendations

and briefly described the evolution of the Intelligence Community and its thencurrent functioning. The report initiated the official use of the term “Intelligence

Community.”33 Until that time, the U.S. had sought to apply increasing coordination

to departmental intelligence efforts, without the concept of a “community” of

departments and agencies.

The task force began by expressing the need to reform the CIA’s internal

organization, including the recommendation that the DCI concentrate on intelligence

issues facing the entire community by leaving the day-to-day administration of the

The work of the BNE is described in Donald P. Steury, ed., Sherman Kent and the Board

of National Estimates: Collected Essays (Washington: Center for the Study of Intelligence,

1994).

Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government, A Report to the

Congress, Intelligence Activities, June 1955, p. 13, hereafter cited as Clark Task Force

Report.

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CIA to an executive officer or chief of staff.34 It foresaw the need for better oversight

of intelligence activities and proposed a small, permanent, bipartisan commission,

including Members of Congress and other “public-spirited citizens,” to provide

independent oversight of intelligence activities that were normally kept secret from

other parts of the government.35 The full commission’s report elaborated on this by

recommending the establishment of both a congressional oversight committee and

a presidential advisory panel.

The task force also expressed concern about counterintelligence and

recommended systematic rechecking of all personnel every five years “to make sure

that the passage of time has not altered the trustworthiness of any employee, and to

make certain that none has succumbed to some weakness of intoxicants or sexual

perversion.”36

In addition, the task force recommended that the CIA replace the State

Department in the “procurement of foreign publications and for collection of

scientific intelligence.”37 Finally, there were a number of “housekeeping”

recommendations such as the need to construct an adequate CIA headquarters, to

improve linguistic training, and to raise the salary of the DCI to $20,000 annually.38

The Doolittle Report, 1954

In response to the establishment of the Second Hoover Commission’s Task

Force on Intelligence Activities, President Eisenhower sought and secured an

agreement for a separate report to be presented to him personally on the CIA’s

Directorate of Plans, that now had responsibility for both clandestine intelligence

collection and covert operations. Accordingly, in July 1954, Eisenhower

commissioned Lieutenant General James Doolittle (USAF) to report on the CIA’s

covert activities and to “make any recommendations calculated to improve the

conduct of these operations.”39

On September 30, 1954, Doolittle submitted his 69-page classified report

directly to Eisenhower. Declassified in 1976, the Doolittle Report contained fortytwo recommendations. The report began by summarizing contemporary American

Cold War attitudes following the Korean War:

Clark Task Force Report, pp. 70-71. For a more detailed account of the evolution of the

DCI’s roles and responsibilities, see Herbert Andrew Boerstling, “The Establishment of a

Director of National Intelligence,” unpublished Master of Arts Policy Paper, Boston

University, August 1995.

Clark Task Force Report, p. 71.

Clark Task Force Report, p. 74.

Clark Task Force Report, pp. 72-76.

The Report on the Covert Activities of the Central Intelligence Agency, September 30,

1954, Appendix A, p. 54; hereafter cited as the Doolittle Report.

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It is now clear that we are facing an implacable enemy whose avowed objective

is world domination by whatever means and at whatever cost. There are no rules

in such a game...If the United States is to survive, long-standing American

concepts of “fair play” must be reconsidered. We must develop effective

espionage and counterespionage services and must learn to subvert, sabotage and

destroy our enemies by more clever, more sophisticated and more effective

methods than those used against us. It may become necessary that the American

people be made acquainted with, understand and support this fundamentally

repugnant philosophy.40

The report went on to recommend that “every possible scientific and technical

approach to the intelligence problem” be explored since the closed society of the

Eastern Bloc made human espionage “prohibitive” in terms of “dollars and human

lives.”41

In examining the CIA, Doolittle found it to be properly placed in the

organization of the government. Furthermore, the report found the laws relating to

the CIA’s functions were sufficient for the agency to meet its operational needs, i.e.

penetration of the Soviet Bloc.42 The report went on to issue several

recommendations calling for more efficient internal administration, including

recruitment and training procedures, background checks of personnel, and the need

to “correct the natural tendency to over classify documents originating in the

agency.”43 It also called for increased cooperation between the clandestine and

analytical sides of the agency, and recommended that the “Inspector General ...

operate on an Agency-wide basis with authority and responsibility to investigate and

report on all activities of the Agency.”44 Finally, the report mentioned the need to

provide CIA with accommodations tailored to its specific needs, and to exercise

better control (accountability) of expenditures in covert projects.

Shortly after submitting the written report, General Doolittle voiced his concern

to President Eisenhower over the potential difficulties that could arise from the fact

that the DCI, Allen Dulles, and the Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, were

brothers and might implement policies without adequate consultation with other

administration officials.45

Bruce-Lovett Report, 1956

In 1956, PBCFIA’s chairman, James Killian, president of the Massachusetts

Institute of Technology, directed David Bruce, a widely experienced diplomat, and

Robert Lovett, a prominent attorney, to prepare a report for President Eisenhower on

Doolittle Report, pp. 6-7.

Doolittle Report, pp. 7-8.

Doolittle Report, p. 10.

Doolittle Report, p. 14.

Doolittle Report, p. 17.

John Ranelagh, The Agency: the Rise and Decline of the CIA (New York: Simon and

Schuster, 1987), p. 278.

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the CIA’s covert action programs as implemented by NSC Directive 10/2. The report

itself has not been located by either the CIA’s Center for the Study of Intelligence or

by private researchers. Presumably, it remains classified. However, Peter Grose,

biographer of Allen Dulles, was able to use notes of the report prepared years earlier

by historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.46

According to Grose’s account of the Schlesinger notes, the report criticized the

CIA for being too heavily involved in Third-World intrigues while neglecting the

collection of hard intelligence on the Soviet Union. Reportedly, Bruce and Lovett

went on to express concern about the lack of coordination and accountability of the

government’s psychological and political warfare program. Stating that “no charge

is made for failure,” the report claimed that “No one, other than those in CIA

immediately concerned with their day-to-day operation, has any detailed knowledge

of what is going on.”47 These operations, asserted Bruce and Lovett, were in the

hands of a “horde of CIA representatives (largely under State or Defense

cover),...bright, highly graded young men who must be doing something all the time

to justify their reason for being.”48

As had Doolittle, Bruce and Lovett criticized the close relationship between

Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and his brother DCI Allen W. Dulles. Due to

the unique position of each brother, the report apparently expressed concern that they

could unduly influence U.S. foreign policy according to their own perceptions.49

The report concluded by suggesting that the U.S. reassess its approach to covert

action programs, and that a permanent authoritative position be created to assess the

viability and impact of covert action programs.50

Summary of the Eisenhower Administration

Intelligence Investigations

As a result of the Second Hoover Commission’s Report and General Doolittle’s

findings, two new NSC Directives, 5412/1 and 5412/2, were issued pertaining to

covert activities in March and November 1955, respectively. Together, these

directives instituted control procedures for covert action and clandestine activities.

They remained in effect until 1970, providing basic policy guidelines for the CIA’s

covert action operations.

Peter Grose, Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles, (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1994),

pp. 445-448; also the CIA’s Center for the Study of Intelligence Newsletter, Spring 1995,

Issue No. 3, pp. 3-4. In writing this book, Grose reported using notes Arthur M. Schlesinger,

Jr. discovered in the Robert Kennedy Papers before they were deposited at the John F.

Kennedy Library; p. 598, n. 33 and n. 34. Reportedly, the JFK Presidential Library has

unsuccessfully searched the RFK papers for the report.

Grose, p. 446; from excerpts of the Schlesinger notes.

Grose, p. 446; this observation is also taken from excerpts of the Schlesinger notes.

Grose, p. 447.

Grose, pp. 447-448; from excerpts of the Schlesinger notes.

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In 1956, in response to the Clark Task Force, and to preempt closer

congressional scrutiny of intelligence gathering, President Eisenhower created the

President’s Board of Consultants on Foreign Intelligence Activities (PBCFIA) to

conduct independent evaluations of the U.S. intelligence program. PBCFIA became

the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB) in 1961. Permanent

intelligence oversight committees were not established in Congress until the mid1970s.

When the Bruce-Lovett Report was first issued in the autumn of 1956, its

immediate impact was muted due to the contemporaneous Suez Canal crisis and the

Soviet invasion of Hungary. However, it did establish a precedent for future

PBCFIA investigations into intelligence activities.

The Kennedy Administration, 1961-1963

In the 1950s, the Eisenhower Administration had supported covert CIA

initiatives in Iran (1953) and Guatemala (1954) to overthrow governments unfriendly

to the United States. These operations were planned to provide the United States

with a reasonable degree of plausible deniability. During the last Eisenhower years,

revolution in Cuba resulted in a Communist government under Fidel Castro. In the

context of the Cold War, a communist Cuba appeared to justify covert U.S. action

to secure a change in that nation’s government. In April 1961 an ill-fated U.S.

backed invasion of Cuba led to a new chapter in the history of the Intelligence

Community.

On April 17, 1961, some 1,400 Cuban exiles of the Cuban Expeditionary Force

(CEF), trained and supported by the CIA, landed at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba with the

hope of overthrowing the communist regime of Fidel Castro. Known as Operation

Zapata, the invasion was a complete disaster. Over the first two days, Castro

succeeded in defeating the invasion force and exposing direct U.S. involvement.

The fiasco led to two official examinations of U.S. involvement and conduct in

Operation Zapata. The first, the Taylor Commission, was initiated by President John

F. Kennedy in an attempt to ascertain the overall cause of the operation’s failure. The

second, the Kirkpatrick Report, was an internal CIA investigation to determine what

had been done wrong.

The Taylor Commission

On April 22, President Kennedy asked General Maxwell Taylor, former Army

Chief of Staff, to chair a high-level body composed of Attorney General Robert

Kennedy, former Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Arleigh Burke, and DCI Allen

Dulles to ascertain the reasons for the invasion’s failure. Known as the Taylor

Commission, the study group’s 53-page classified report was submitted to President

Kennedy on June 13, 1961.

Declassified in 1977, the report examined the conception, development, and

implementation of Operation Zapata. The commission’s final report focused on

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administrative rather than operational matters, and evenly leveled criticism at the

White House, the CIA, the State Department, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.51

The report found that the CIA, at White House direction, had organized and

trained Cuban exiles to enter Cuba, foment anti-Castro sentiment, and ultimately

overthrow the Cuban government. Originally intended by the Eisenhower

Administration as a guerrilla operation, Zapata was supposed to operate within the

parameters of NSC Directive 5412/2, that called in part for plausible U.S. deniability.

However, in the Kennedy Administration, the operation grew in size and scope to

include a full-scale military invasion involving “sheep-dipped” B-26 bombers, supply

ships and landing craft.52 The report found that “the magnitude of Zapata could not

be prepared and conducted in such a way that all U.S. support of it and connection

with it could be plausibly disclaimed.”53

In large measure, the report blamed the operation’s planners at the CIA’s

Directorate of Plans for not keeping the President fully informed as to the exact

nature of the operation. However, the report also criticized the State Department,

JCS, and the White House for acquiescing in the Zapata Plan, that “gave the

impression to others of approving it” and for reviewing “successive changes of the

plan piecemeal and only within a limited context, a procedure that was inadequate

for a proper examination of all the military ramifications.”54

The Taylor Commission found the operation to be ill-conceived with little

chance for ultimate success. Once underway, however, the report cited President

Kennedy’s decision to limit overt U.S. air support as a factor in the CEF’s defeat.55

This decision was apparently reached in order to protect the covert character of the

operation. The report criticized this decision by stating that when an operation had

been approved, “restrictions designed to protect its covert character should have been

accepted only if they did not impair the chance of success.”56

The failure in communication, breakdown in coordination, and lack of overall

planning led the Taylor Commission to conclude that:

The Executive Branch of government was not organizationally prepared to cope

with this kind of paramilitary operation. There was no single authority short of

the President capable of coordinating the actions of CIA, State, Defense and

USIA [U.S. Information Agency]. Top level direction was given through ad hoc

Grose, p. 532.

“Sheep-dipped” is a colloquial intelligence term used for administrative arrangements

designed to ensure that the origin of a person or object is non-traceable.

The report was published as Operation Zapata: The “Ultrasensitive” Report and

Testimony of the Board of Inquiry on the Bay of Pigs (Frederick, MD: University

publications of America, Inc., 1981), p. 40; hereafter cited as the Taylor Report.

Taylor Report, p. 43.

Taylor Report, p. 38.

Taylor Report, p. 40.

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meetings of senior officials without consideration of operational plans in writing

and with no arrangement for recording conclusions reached.57

The lessons of Operation Zapata led the report to recommend six courses of

action in the fields of planning, coordination, effectiveness, and responsibility in

overall Cold War strategy. The report recommended the creation of a Strategic

Resources Group (SRG) composed of representatives of under-secretarial rank from

the CIA and the Departments of State and Defense. With direct access to the

President, the SRG would act as a mechanism for the planning and coordination of

overall Cold War strategy, including paramilitary operations. The report

recommended including the opinions of the JCS in the planning and implementation

of such paramilitary operations. In the context of the Cold War, the report also

recommended a review of restraints placed upon the United States in order to make

the most effective use of the nation’s assets, without concern for international

popularity. The report concluded by reaffirming America’s commitment to forcing

Castro from power.58

The Kirkpatrick Report

Concurrent with the Taylor Commission, DCI Dulles instructed the CIA’s

Inspector General, Lyman B. Kirkpatrick, Jr., to conduct an internal investigation to

determine what the CIA had done wrong in the Cuban operation. Completed in five

months, the report was viewed by the few within CIA who read it as professionally

shabby.59 Whereas the Taylor Report had more of the detached perspective of a

management-consultant, the Kirkpatrick Report was viewed as a personal attack

against the CIA and DCI Dulles.

The 170-page report remains classified. However, in 1972, Kirkpatrick

published an article in the Naval War College Review that apparently reflected the

findings of his report.60 In particular, Kirkpatrick criticized the Zapata planners at the

Directorate of Plans for not having fully consulted the CIA’s Cuban analysts before

the invasion. The article also criticized the operation’s internal security, that

Kirkpatrick claimed was virtually nonexistent. Calling the operation frenzied,

Kirkpatrick accused the CIA of “playing it by ear” and misleading the President by

failing to inform him that “success had become dubious.”61 In Kirkpatrick’s view,

the CIA bore most of the blame, and the Kennedy Administration could be forgiven

for having trusted the advice of the operation’s planners at the Agency.

Taylor Report, p. 39.

Taylor Report, pp. 44-53.

Ranelagh, p. 380.

Lyman B. Kirkpatrick, Jr., “Paramilitary Case Study - Bay of Pigs,” Naval War College

Review, (November-December 1972). By the same author, see The U.S. Intelligence

Community: Foreign Policy and Domestic Activities (New York: Hill and Wang, 1973).

Evan Thomas, The Very Best Men, Four Who Dared: The Early Years of the CIA, (New

York: Simon & Schuster, 1995), p. 268. Thomas was given special permission to review

the report for use in his book even though it remains classified.

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Summary of the Kennedy Administration

Intelligence Investigations

On May 4, 1961, following the Bay of Pigs, President Kennedy reconstituted the

PBCFIA as the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB). Although

little is known of the Kirkpatrick Report’s impact, the Taylor Report influenced

Kennedy’s desire to improve the overall management of the intelligence process. In

1962, this prompted the President to instruct the new DCI, John McCone, to

concentrate on his community-wide coordination role:

As [DCI], while you will continue to have overall responsibility for the Agency,

I shall expect you to delegate to your principal deputy, as you may deem

necessary, so much of the detailed operation of the Agency as may be required

to permit you to carry out your primary task as [DCI].62

The Johnson Administration, 1963-1969

No major investigations of the Intelligence Community were conducted under

President Lyndon B. Johnson. In large measure, this was due to America’s growing

preoccupation with the Vietnam conflict and the strain that this placed on the

community’s resources. The only major investigation during the Johnson

Administration was the Warren Commission on the assassination of President

Kennedy. Former DCI Allen Dulles served on the commission.

The Nixon Administration, 1969-1974

During the Vietnam War, the Intelligence Community devoted enormous

attention in both manpower and resources towards achieving U.S. policy objectives

in Southeast Asia. As the U.S. effort in Vietnam and Laos wound down, and

attention turned towards strategic weapons concerns with the Soviet Union, some

members of the Nixon Administration believed that the community was performing

less than adequately. In 1970, President Richard M. Nixon and National Security

Advisor Henry A. Kissinger undertook a review of the Intelligence Community’s

organization.

The Schlesinger Report, 1971

In December 1970, President Nixon commissioned the Office of Management

and Budget (OMB) to examine the Intelligence Community’s organization and

recommend improvements, short of legislation. In March 1971, the report, “A

Review of the Intelligence Community,” was submitted by Deputy OMB Director

James R. Schlesinger, a future DCI.

Known as the Schlesinger Report, the study’s forty-seven pages noted the

community’s “impressive rise in...size and cost” with the “apparent inability to

achieve a commensurate improvement in the scope and overall quality of intelligence

Memorandum for the Director of Central Intelligence, January 16, 1962; quoted in Prados,

89-414F, p. 45.

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products.”63 The report sought to uncover the causes of this problem and identify

areas in which constructive change could take place.

In examining the Intelligence Community, Schlesinger criticized

“unproductively duplicative” collection systems and the failure in forward planning

to coordinate the allocation of resources.64 In part, the report cited the failure of

policymakers to specify their product needs to the intelligence producers.65 However,

the report identified the primary cause of these problems as the lack of a strong,

central Intelligence Community leadership that could “consider the relationship

between cost and substantive output from a national perspective.”66 Schlesinger

found that this had engendered a fragmented, departmental intelligence effort.

To correct these problems, Schlesinger considered the creation of a Director of

National Intelligence (DNI), enhancing the DCI’s authority, and establishing a

Coordinator of National Intelligence (CNI) who would act as the White House-level

overseer of the Intelligence Community to provide more direct representation of

presidential interest in intelligence issues.67 In the end, the report recommended “a

strong DCI who could bring intelligence costs under control and intelligence

production to an adequate level of quality and responsiveness.”68

Summary of the Nixon Administration

Intelligence Investigation

The Schlesinger Report led to a limited reorganization of the Intelligence

Community under a Presidential directive dated November 5, 1971. In part, the

directive called for:

An enhanced leadership role for the [DCI] in planning, reviewing, and evaluating

all intelligence programs and activities, and in the production of national

intelligence.69

Consequently, two boards were established to assist the DCI in preparing a

consolidated intelligence budget and to supervise community-wide intelligence

production. The first, was the ill-fated Intelligence Resources Advisory Committee

(IRAC), that replaced the National Intelligence Resources Board (NIRB) established

A Review of the Intelligence Community, March 10, 1971, p. 1; hereafter cited as the

Schlesinger Report.

Schlesinger Report, pp. 8-9.

Schlesinger Report, p. 9.

Schlesinger Report, p. 13.

Schlesinger Report, pp. 25-33.

U.S. Congress, Senate, 94th Congress, 2nd session, Select Committee to Study

Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities Intelligence, Final Report,

1976, Book I, p. 66; hereafter cited as the Church Committee Report.

“Reorganization of the U.S. Intelligence Community,” Weekly Compilation of Presidential

Documents, November 4, 1971, pp. 1467-1491, 1482.

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in 1968 under DCI Richard Helms. The IRAC was designed to advise the DCI on

the preparation of a consolidated budget for the community’s intelligence programs.

However, IRAC was not afforded the statutory authority necessary to bring the

intelligence budget firmly under DCI control. The second, and the only long lasting

result of the Nixon directive, was the establishment of the Intelligence Community

Staff (ICS) in 1972. Created by DCI Helms, the ICS was meant to assist the DCI in

guiding the community’s collection and production of intelligence. However, the ICS

did not provide the DCI with the statutory basis necessary for an expanded

community-wide role.70 In 1992, DCI Robert Gates replaced the ICS with the

Community Management Staff (CMS).

The Era of Public Investigations, 1974-1981

In the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s, there had been widespread public

agreement on the need for an effective national security structure to confront Sovietled Communist expansion. However, by the late 1960s, the war in Vietnam had

begun to erode public consensus and support for U.S. foreign policy. The

controversy surrounding the Watergate Investigations after 1972, and subsequent

revelations of questionable CIA activities involving domestic surveillance, provided

a backdrop for increasing scrutiny of government policies, particularly in such fields

as national security and intelligence.

Between 1975 and 1976, this led the Ford Administration and Congress to

conduct three separate investigations that examined the propriety of intelligence

operations, assessed the adequacy of intelligence organizations and functions, and

recommended corrective measures. A fourth panel, convened earlier to look more

broadly at foreign policy, also submitted recommendations for intelligence reform.

Murphy Commission (Commission on the Organization of the

Government for the Conduct of Foreign Policy), 1975

The Commission on the Organization of the Government for the Conduct of

Foreign Policy, created pursuant to the Foreign Relations Authorization Act for

FY1973 (P.L. 92-352) of July 13, 1972, was headed by former Deputy Secretary of

State Robert D. Murphy. It looked at national security formulation and

implementation processes rather than the government as a whole. As such, the

Murphy Commission was more focused than either of the two Hoover Commissions

and devoted greater attention to intelligence issues. Although it made reference to

the need to correct “occasional failures to observe those standards of conduct that

should distinguish the behavior of agencies of the U.S. Government,”71 the

commission’s approach was marked by an emphasis of the value of intelligence to

national security policymaking and was, on the whole, supportive of the Intelligence

Community.

Prados, 89-414F, p. 46.

U.S., Commission on the Organization of the Government for the Conduct of Foreign

Policy, Report, June 1975, p. 92.

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Many of the Murphy Commission’s recommendations addressed problems that

have continued to concern successive intelligence managers. The commission noted

the fundamental difficulty that DCIs have line authority over the CIA but “only

limited influence” over other intelligence agencies.72 Unlike other observers, the

Murphy Commission did not believe that this situation should be changed

fundamentally: “[It] is neither possible nor desirable to give the DCI line authority

over that very large fraction of the intelligence community that lies outside the CIA.”

At the same time, it recommended that the DCI have an office in close proximity to

the White House and be accorded regular and direct contact with the President. The

commission envisioned a DCI delegating considerable authority for managing the

CIA to a deputy while he devoted more time to community-wide responsibilities.

The commission also recommended that the DCI’s title be changed to Director of

Foreign Intelligence.73

The commission provided for other oversight mechanisms, viz., a strengthened

PFIAB and more extensive review (prior to their initiation and on a continuing basis

thereafter) of covert actions by a high-level interagency committee. It argued that

although Congress should be notified of covert actions, the President should not sign

such notifications since it is harmful to associate “the head of State so formally with

such activities.74“ It was further recommended that intelligence requirements and

capabilities be established at the NSC-level to remedy a situation in which “the work

of the intelligence community becomes largely responsive to its own perceptions of

what is important, and irrelevant information is collected, sometimes drowning out

the important.75“ It also recommended that this process be formalized in an officially

approved five-year plan. A consolidated foreign intelligence budget should also be

prepared, approved by an inter-agency committee and OMB and submitted to

Congress.

Although the importance of economic intelligence was recognized, the

commission did not see a need for intelligence agencies to seek to expand in this

area; rather, it suggested that the analytical capabilities of the Departments of State,

Treasury, Commerce, Agriculture, and the Council of Economic Advisers should be

significantly strengthened.

The commission noted the replacement of the Board of National Estimates by

some eleven National Intelligence Officers (NIOs) who were to draw upon analysts

in various agencies to draft National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs). This practice was

criticized because it laid excessive burdens on chosen analysts and because NIEs had

in recent years been largely ignored by senior officials (presumably Secretary of State

Kissinger) who made their own assessments of future developments based on

competing sources of information and analysis. Thus, the commission recommended

a small staff of analysts from various agencies assigned to work with NIOs in

Commission on Organization of the Government, p. 98

Commission on Organization of the Government, pp. 98-99.

Commission on Organization of the Government, pp. 100-101.

Commission on Organization of the Government, p. 101.

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drafting NIEs and ensure that differences of view were clearly presented for the

policymakers.

Rockefeller Commission (Commission on CIA Activities

within the United States), 1975

Prior to the mid-1960s, the organization and activities of the Intelligence

Community were primarily the concern of specialists in national security and

governmental organization. The Murphy Commission, although working during a

subsequent and more politically turbulent period, had approached intelligence

reorganization from this perspective as well. The political terrain had, however, been

shifting dramatically and the Intelligence Community would not escape searching

criticism. During the era of the Vietnam War and Watergate, disputes over national

security policy focused attention on intelligence activities. In 1975, media accounts

of alleged intelligence abuses, some stretching back over decades led to a series of

highly publicized congressional hearings.

Revelations of assassination plots and other alleged abuses spurred three

separate investigations and sets of recommendations. The first was undertaken

within the Executive Branch and was headed by Vice President Nelson A.

Rockefeller. Other investigations were conducted by select committees in both

houses of Congress. The Senate effort was led by Senator Frank Church and the

House committee was chaired by Representative Otis Pike. These investigations led

to the creation of the two permanent intelligence committees and much closer

oversight by the Congress. In addition, they also produced a number of

recommendations for reorganization and realignment within the Intelligence

Community.

Established by Executive Order 11828 on January 4, 1975, the Commission on

CIA Activities within the United States was chaired by Vice President Rockefeller

and included seven others appointed by President Ford (including then-former

Governor Ronald Reagan). The commission’s mandate was to investigate whether

the CIA had violated provisions of the National Security Act of 1947, precluding the

CIA from exercising internal security functions.

The Rockefeller Commission’s 30 recommendations76 included a number of

proposals designed to delimit CIA’s authority to collect foreign intelligence within

the United States (from “willing sources”) and proscribe collection of information

about the domestic activities of U.S. citizens, to strengthen PFIAB, to establish a

congressional joint intelligence committee, and to establish guidelines for

cooperation with the Justice Department regarding the prosecution of criminal

violations by CIA employees. There was another recommendation to consider the

question of whether the CIA budget should be made public, if not in full at least in

part.

Report to the President by the Commission on CIA Activities Within the United States,

June 1975.

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The commission recommended that consideration should be given to appointing

DCIs from outside the career service of the CIA and that no DCI serve longer than

10 years. Two deputies should be appointed; one to serve as an administrative officer

to free the DCI from day-to-day management duties; the other a military officer to

foster relations with the military and provide technical expertise on military

intelligence requirements.

The CIA position of Inspector General should be upgraded and his

responsibilities expanded along with those of the General Counsel. Guidelines

should be developed to advise agency personnel as to what activities are permitted

and what are forbidden by law and executive orders.

The President should instruct the DCI that domestic mail openings should not

be undertaken except in time of war and that mail cover operations (examining and

copying of envelopes only) are to be undertaken only on a limited basis “clearly

involving matters of national security.”

The commission was specifically concerned with CIA infiltration of domestic

organizations and submitted a number of recommendations in this area. Presidents

should refrain from directing the CIA to perform what are essentially internal security

tasks and the CIA should resist any effort to involve itself in improper activities. The

CIA “should guard against allowing any component ... to become so self-contained

and isolated from top leadership that regular supervision and review are lost.” Files

of previous improper investigations should be destroyed. The agency should not

infiltrate American organizations without a written determination by the DCI that

there is a threat to agency operations, facilities, or personnel that cannot be met by

law enforcement agencies. Other recommendations were directed at CIA

investigations of its personnel or former personnel, including provisions relating to

physical surveillance, wire or oral communications, and access to income tax

information.

As a result of efforts by some White House staff during the Nixon

Administration to use CIA resources improperly, a number of recommendations dealt

with the need to establish appropriate channels between the agency and the Executive

Office of the President.

Reacting to evidence that drugs had been tested on unsuspecting persons, the

commission recommended that the practice should not be renewed. Also, equipment

for monitoring communications should not be tested on unsuspecting persons within

the United States. An independent agency should be established to oversee civilian

uses of aerial photography to avoid any concerns over the improper domestic use of

a CIA-developed system.

Concerned with distinguishing the separate responsibilities of the CIA and the

Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the commission urged that the DCI and the

Director of the FBI prepare and submit to the National Security Council a detailed

agreement setting forth the jurisdictions of each agency and providing for effective

liaison between them.

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The commission also recommended that all intelligence agencies review their

holdings of classified information and declassify as much as possible.

Church Committee (Senate Select Committee to Study

Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence

Activities), 1976

Established in the wake of sensational revelations about assassination plots

organized by the CIA, the Church Committee had a much wider mandate than the

Rockefeller Commission, extending beyond the CIA to all intelligence agencies.77

It too, however, concentrated on illegalities and improprieties rather than

organizational or managerial questions per se. After extensive and highly publicized

hearings, the committee made some 183 recommendations in its final report, issued

April 26, 1976.78

The principal recommendation was that omnibus legislation be enacted to set

forth the basic purposes of national intelligence activities and defining the

relationship between intelligence activities and the Congress. Criticizing vagueness

in the National Security Act of 1947, the committee urged charters for the several

intelligence agencies to set forth general organizational structures and procedures,

and delineate roles and responsibilities. There should also be specific and clearly

defined prohibitions or limitations on intelligence activities. The effort to pass such

legislation would consume considerable attention over a number of years, following

the completion of the work of the Church Committee.

A number of recommendations reflected the committee’s views on the

appropriate role of the National Security Council in directing and monitoring the

work of the intelligence agencies. The apparent goal was to encourage a more formal

process, with accountability assigned to cabinet-level officials. The committee

concluded that covert actions should be conducted only upon presidential

authorization with notification to appropriate congressional committees.

Attention was given to the role of the DCI within the entire Intelligence

Community. The committee recommended that the DCI be recognized by statute as

the President’s principal foreign intelligence advisor and that he should be

responsible for establishing national intelligence requirements, preparing the national

intelligence budget, and for providing guidance for intelligence operations.

The DCI should have specific responsibility for choosing among the programs

of the different collection and production agencies and departments and to insure

against waste and unnecessary duplication. The DCI should also have responsibility

An informed account of the Church Committee’s work is Loch K. Johnson, A Season of

Inquiry: Congress and Intelligence, 2nd. ed. (Chicago: Dorsey Press, 1988).

U.S. Congress, Senate, 94th Congress, 2nd session, Select Committee to Study

Governmental Operations with respect to Intelligence Activities, Foreign and Military

Intelligence, Final Report, Book I, S.Rept. 94-755, April 26, 1976; hereafter cited as the

Church Committee Report.

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for issuing fiscal guidance for the allocation of all national intelligence resources.

The authority of the DCI to reprogram funds within the intelligence budget should

be defined by statute.79

Monies for the national intelligence budget would be appropriated to the DCI

rather than to the directors of the various agencies. The committee also

recommended that the DCI be authorized to establish an intelligence community staff

to assist him in carrying out his managerial responsibilities. The staff should be

drawn “from the best available talent within and outside the intelligence

community.”80 Further, the position of Deputy DCI for the Intelligence Community

should be established by statute (in addition to the existing DDCI who would have

responsibility primarily for the CIA itself). It also urged consideration of separating

the DCI from direct responsibility over the CIA.

The DCI, it was urged, should serve at the pleasure of the President, but for no

more than ten years.

The committee also looked at intelligence analysis. It recommended a more

flexible and less hierarchical personnel system with more established analysts being

brought in at middle and upper grades. Senior positions should be established on the

basis of analytical ability rather than administrative responsibilities. Analysts should

be encouraged to accept temporary assignments at other agencies or on the NSC staff

to give them an appreciation for policymakers’ use of intelligence information. A

system should be in place to ensure that analysts are more promptly informed about

U.S. policies and programs affecting their areas of responsibility.

In addressing covert actions, the committee recommended barring political

assassinations, efforts to subvert democratic governments, and support for police and

other internal security forces engaged in systematic violations of human rights.

The committee addressed the questions of separating CIA’s analysis and

production functions from clandestine collection and covert action functions. It listed

the pros and cons of this approach, but ultimately recommended only that the

intelligence committees should give it consideration.

Reflecting concerns about abuses of the rights of U.S. citizens, the committee

made a series of recommendations regarding CIA involvement with the academic

community, members of religious organizations, journalists, recipients of government

grants, and the covert use of books and publishing houses. A particular concern was

limiting any influence on domestic politics of materials published by the CIA

overseas. Attention was also given to proprietary organizations CIA creates to

conduct operations abroad; the committee believed them necessary, but advocated

stricter regulation and congressional oversight.

Church Committee Report, pp. 434-435.

Church Committee Report, p. 435.

CRS-23

The committee recommended enhanced positions for CIA’s Inspector General

(IG) and General Counsel (GC), urging that the latter be made a presidential

appointee requiring Senate confirmation.

In looking at intelligence agencies other than the CIA, the committee

recommended that the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) be made part of the

civilian Office of the Secretary of Defense and that a small J-2 staff provide

intelligence support to the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It was urged that the directors of

both DIA and the National Security Agency (NSA) should be appointed by the

President and confirmed by the Senate. The committee believe that either the

director or deputy director of DIA and of NSA should be civilians. Turning to the

State Department, the committee urged the Administration to issue instructions to

implement legislation that authorized ambassadors to be provided information about

activities conducted by intelligence agencies in their assigned countries. It also stated

that State Department efforts to collect foreign political and economic information

overtly should be improved.

Funding for intelligence activities has been included in Defense Department

authorization and appropriations legislation since the end of World War II. The

Church Commission advocated making public, at least, total amounts and suggested

consideration be given as to whether more detailed information should also be

released. The General Accounting Office (GAO) should be empowered to conduct

audits at the request of congressional oversight committees.

Tests by intelligence agencies on human subjects of drugs or devices that could

cause physical or mental harm should not occur except under stringent conditions.

The committee made a number of recommendations regarding procedures for

granting security clearances and for handling classified information. It also

recommended consideration of new legislative initiatives to deal with other existing

problems. Finally, the Committee recommended the creation of a registry of all

classified executive orders, including NSC directives, with access provided to

congressional oversight committees.

Pike Committee (House Select Committee

on Intelligence), 1976

The House Select Committee on Intelligence, chaired by Representative Otis G.

Pike, also conducted a wide-ranging survey of intelligence activities. In the conduct

of its hearings, the Pike Committee was far more adversarial to the intelligence

agencies than the Senate Committee. Publication of its final report was not

authorized by the House, although a version was published in a New York tabloid.

The Pike Committee’s recommendations, however, were published on February 11,

1976.81 There were some twenty recommendations, some dealing with congressional

U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, 94th Congress, 2nd session, Select Committee

on Intelligence, Recommendations of the Final Report of the House Select Committee on

Intelligence, H.Rept. 94-833, February 11, 1976.

CRS-24

oversight, with one dealing, anomalously, with the status of the Assistant to the

President for National Security Affairs.

The Pike Committee recommended that covert actions not include, except in

time of war, any activities involving direct or indirect attempts to assassinate any

individual. The prohibition was extended to all paramilitary operations. A National

Security Council subcommittee would review all proposals for covert actions and

copies of each subcommittee member’s comments would be provided to

congressional committees. The committee further recommended that congressional

oversight committees be notified of presidential approval of covert actions within 48

hours. According to the proposal, all covert actions would have to be terminated no

later than 12 months from the date of approval or reconsidered.

The committee recommended that specific legislation be enacted to establish

NSA and define its role in monitoring communications of Americans and placed

under civilian control.

The Pike Committee further recommended that all “intelligence related items”

be included as intelligence expenditures in the President’s budget and that the total

sum budgeted for intelligence be disclosed.

The committee recommended that transfers of funds be prohibited between

agencies or departments involved in intelligence activities. Reprogramming of funds

within agencies would be dependent upon the specific approval of congressional

oversight and appropriations committees. The same procedures would be required

for expenditures from reserve or contingency funds.

The Pike Committee also looked at the role of the DCI. Like many others who

have studied the question, it recommended that the DCI should be separate from

managing any agency and should focus on coordinating and overseeing the entire

intelligence effort with a view towards eliminating duplication of effort and

promoting competition in analysis. It advocated that he should be a member of the

National Security Council. Under this proposal the DCI would have a separate staff

and would prepare national intelligence estimates and daily briefings for the

President. He would receive budget proposals from agencies involved in intelligence

activities. (The recommendations did not indicate the extent of his authority to

approve or disapprove these recommendations.) The DCI would be charged with

coordinating intelligence agencies under his jurisdiction, eliminating duplication, and

evaluating performance and efficiency.

The committee recommended that the GAO conduct a full and complete

management and financial audit of all intelligence agencies and that the CIA internal

audit staff be given complete access to CIA financial records.

The committee recommended that a permanent foreign operations subcommittee

of the NSC, composed of cabinet-rank officials, be established. This subcommittee

would have jurisdiction over all authorized activities of intelligence agencies (except

those solely related to intelligence gathering) and review all covert actions,

clandestine activities, and hazardous collecting activities.

CRS-25

It was recommended that DIA be abolished and its functions divided between

the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the CIA. The intelligence components of

the military services would be prohibited from undertaking covert actions within the

U.S. or clandestine activities against U.S. citizens abroad.

Relations between intelligence and law enforcement organizations were to be

limited. Intelligence agencies would be barred from providing funds to religious or

educational institutions or to those media with general circulation in the United

States.

The committee recommended that specific legislation be considered to deal with

the classification and regular declassification of information.

It was also recommended that an Inspector General for Intelligence be

nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate with authority to investigate

potential misconduct of any intelligence agency or personnel. He would make annual

reports to the Congress.

The committee also made recommendations regarding the organization and

operations of the FBI and its role in investigating domestic groups.

In an additional recommendation, Representative Les Aspin, a member of the

committee, urged that the CIA be divided into two separate agencies, one for analysis

and the other for clandestine collection and covert operations. A similar

recommendation was made by Representative Ron Dellums, who also served on the

committee.

Clifford and Cline Proposals, 1976

In 1976 hearings by the Senate Committee on Government Operations, Clark

Clifford (who had served as President Johnson’s final Secretary of Defense and, in

an earlier position in the Truman Administration, had been involved in legislation

creating the CIA) proposed the creation of a post of Director General of Intelligence

to serve as the President’s chief adviser on intelligence matters and as principal point

of contact with the congressional intelligence committees. There would be a separate

director of the CIA whose duties would be restricted to day-to-day operations.82

In the same year, Ray Cline, a former Deputy Director of the CIA, made a

number of recommendations.83 He recommended that the DCI exert broad

supervisory powers over the entire intelligence community and the CIA be divided

into two agencies, one to undertake analytical work and the other for clandestine

services. He also proposed that the DCI be given cabinet rank, a practice that would

find support in both the Reagan and Clinton administrations.

U.S. Congress, Senate, 94th Congress, 2nd session, Committee on Government

Operations, Oversight of U.S. Government Intelligence Functions, Hearings, Jan. 21-Feb.

6, 1976, pp. 203-204.

In his book Secrets, Spies, and Scholars (Washington: Acropolis Books, 1976).

CRS-26

Proposed Charter Legislation, 1978-1980

Subsequent to the establishment of permanent intelligence oversight committees

in the Senate in 1976 and the House of Representatives in 1977, attention in

Congress shifted to consideration of charter legislation for intelligence agencies.84

It was envisioned that the charter legislation would include many of the

recommendations made earlier by the Church and Pike Committees. Introduced by

Senator Walter Huddleston and Representative Edward Boland, the draft National

Intelligence Reorganization and Reform Act of 1978 (S. 2525/H.R. 11245, 95th

Congress) would have provided statutory charters to all intelligence agencies and

created a Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to serve as head of the entire

Intelligence Community. Day-to-day leadership of CIA could be delegated to a

deputy at presidential discretion. The draft legislation contained numerous reporting

requirements (regarding covert actions in particular) to Congress and an extensive list

of banned or restricted activities. The draft legislation of more that 170 pages was

strongly criticized from all sides in hearings; some arguing that it would legitimize

covert actions inconsistent with American ideals and others suggesting that its

complex restrictions would unduly hamper the protection of vital American interests.

The bills were never reported out of either intelligence committee, although the

Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (P.L. 95-511) provided a statutory base

for electronic surveillance within the United States.

Charter legislation was also introduced in the 96th Congress. It contained many

of the provisions introduced in the earlier version, but also loosened freedom of

information regulations for intelligence agencies and the requirements of the HughesRyan amendments of 1974 requiring that some eight committees be notified of covert

actions. This legislation (S. 2284, 96th Congress) came under even heavier criticism

from all sides than its predecessor. It was not reported by the Senate Intelligence

Committee, but other stand-alone legislation did pass and a shorter bill reducing the

number of committees receiving notification of covert actions — and “significant

anticipated intelligence activities” — was introduced and eventually became law in

October 1980 as part of the FY1981 Intelligence Authorization Act (P.L. 96-450).

The Executive Branch Response, 1976-1981

Concurrent with, and subsequent to, these legislative initiatives, the Executive

Branch, in part to head off further congressional action, implemented some of the

more limited recommendations contained in their respective proposals. Presidents

Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan each issued detailed Executive

Orders (E.O.) setting guidelines for the organization and management of the U.S.

Intelligence Community.

The effort to pass intelligence charter legislation is described in John M. Oseth,

Regulating U.S. Intelligence Operations: A Study in Definition of the National Interest

(Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1985); also, Frank J. Smist, Jr., Congress

Oversees the United States Intelligence Community, Second Edition, 1947-1994 (Knoxville,

TN: University of Tennessee Press, 1994).

CRS-27

Issued by President Ford on February 18, 1976, prior to the release of the

Church and Pike Committee findings, Executive Order 11905 undertook to

implement some of the more limited recommendations of the Rockefeller and

Murphy Commissions. In particular, E.O. 11905 identified the DCI as the

President’s primary intelligence advisor and the principal spokesman for the

Intelligence Community and gave him responsibilities for developing the National

Foreign Intelligence Program (NFIP). It also delineated responsibilities of each

intelligence agency, provided two NSC-level committees for internal review of

intelligence operations, and established a separate three-member Intelligence

Oversight Board to review the legality and propriety of intelligence activities. It

placed restrictions on the physical and electronic surveillance of American citizens

by intelligence agencies.85

On January 24, 1978, President Carter issued Executive Order 12036, that

superseded E.O. 11905.86 Carter’s Executive Order sought to define more clearly the

DCI’s community-wide authority in areas relating to the “budget, tasking,

intelligence review, coordination and dissemination, and foreign liaison.”87 In

particular, it formally recognized the establishment of the National Foreign

Intelligence Program budget and the short-lived National Intelligence Tasking Center

(NTIC), that was supposed to assist the DCI in “translating intelligence requirements

and priorities into collection objectives.”88 E.O. 11905 also restricted medical

experimentation and prohibited political assassinations.

President Reagan continued the trend towards enhancing the DCI’s communitywide budgetary, tasking, and managerial authority. On December 4, 1981, he issued

Executive Order 12333, detailing the roles, responsibilities, missions, and activities

of the Intelligence Community. It supplanted the previous orders issued by

Presidents Ford and Carter. E.O. 12333 remains the governing executive branch

mandate concerning the managerial structure of the Intelligence Community.

E.O. 12333 designates the DCI “as the primary intelligence advisor to the

President and NSC on national foreign intelligence.”89 In this capacity, the DCI’s

duties include the implementation of special activities (covert actions), liaison to the

nation’s foreign intelligence and counterintelligence components, and the overall

protection of the community’s sources, methods, and analytical procedures.90 It grants

Executive Order 11905, February 18, 1976, United States Foreign Intelligence Activities,

as summarized in (name redacted), Intelligence Reform: Recent History and Proposals,

CRS Report 88-562 F, August 18, 1988, p. 18; hereafter cited as Prados, 88-562 F. (Out of

print report; available upon request from the author.)

Executive Order 12036, January 24, 1978, United States Intelligence Activities; hereafter

cited as Executive Order 12036.

Lowenthal, p. 107.

Bruce W. Watson, Susan M. Watson, and Gerald W. Hopple, United States Intelligence:

An Encyclopedia (New York: Garland Publishing, 1990), p. 231.

Section 1.5(a), Executive Order 12333, December 4, 1981, United States Intelligence

Activities.

Executive Order 12333, Section 1.5 (d,e,h).

CRS-28

the DCI “full responsibility for [the] production and dissemination of national foreign

intelligence,” including the authority to task non-CIA intelligence agencies, and the

ability to decide on community tasking conflicts.91 The order also sought to grant the

DCI more explicit authority over the development, implementation, and evaluation

of NFIP.92

To a certain extent, E.O. 12333 represented a relaxation of the restrictions

placed upon the community by Carter. Although it maintained the prohibition on

assassination, the focus was on “authorizations” rather than “restrictions.”

“Propriety” was removed as a criterion for approving operations. Arguably, the

Reagan Administration established a presumption in favor of government needs over

individual rights.93 However, in the absence of legislation, the DCI continued to lack

statutory authority over all aspects of the Intelligence Community, including

budgetary issues.

The Turner Proposal, 1985

In 1985, Admiral Stansfield Turner, DCI in the Carter Administration,

expressed his views on the need for intelligence reform94. In part, Turner

recommended reducing the emphasis on covert action and implementing a charter for

the Intelligence Community. The most important recommendation involved the

future of the DCI of which Turner maintained:

The two jobs, head of the CIA and head of the Intelligence Community, conflict.

One person cannot do justice to both and fulfill the DCI’s responsibilities to the

President, the Congress, and the public as well.95

Turner went on to propose the separation of the two jobs of DCI and head of the

CIA with the creation of a Director of National Intelligence, separate and superior to

the CIA. Turner also recommended placing less emphasis on the use of covert action

than the Reagan Administration.

Iran-Contra Investigation, 1987

During highly publicized investigations of the Reagan Administration’s covert

support to Iran and the Nicaraguan Resistance, the role of the Intelligence

Community, the CIA, and DCI Casey were foci of attention. Much of the

involvement of National Security Council staff was undertaken precisely because

legislation had been enacted severely limiting the role of intelligence agencies in

Central America and because efforts to free the hostages through cooperation with

Executive Order 12333, Section 1.5(k,h).

Lowenthal, p. 107.

See Oseth, Regulating U.S. Intelligence Operations, especially p. 155.

In his book Secrecy and Democracy: The CIA in Transition (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,

1985).

Secrecy and Democracy, p. 273.

CRS-29

Iranian officials had been strongly opposed by CIA officials. The executive branch’s

review, chaired by former Senator John Tower, expressed concern that precise

procedures be established for restricted consideration of covert actions and that NSC

policy officials had been too closely involved in the preparation of intelligence

estimates.96 The investigation of the affair by two congressional select committees

resulted in a number of recommendations for changes in laws and regulations

governing intelligence activities.

Specifically the majority report of the two congressional select committees that

investigated the affair made a number of recommendations regarding presidential

findings concerning the need to initiative covert actions. Findings should be made

prior to the initiation of a covert action, they should be in writing, and they should

be made known to appropriate Members of Congress in no event later than fortyeight hours after approval. Further, the majority of the committees urged that

findings be far more specific than some had been in the Reagan Administration.

Statutory inspector general and general counsels, confirmed by the Senate, for the

CIA were also recommended.97 Minority members of the two committees made

several recommendations regarding congressional oversight, urging that on extremely

sensitive matters that notifications of covert actions be made to only four Members

of Congress instead of the existing requirement for eight to be notified.98

These recommendations were subsequently considered by the two intelligence

committees. A number of provisions was enacted dealing with covert action findings

in the Intelligence Authorization Act for FY1991 (P.L. 102-88).

Boren-McCurdy, 1992

A major legislative initiative, reflecting the changed situation of the post-Cold

War world, began in February 1992, when Senator David Boren, the Chairman of the

Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and Representative Dave McCurdy, the

Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, announced

separate plans for an omnibus restructuring of the U.S. Intelligence Community, to

serve as an intelligence counterpart to the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense

Reorganization Act of 1986. The two versions of the initiative (S. 2198 and H.R.

4165, 102nd Congress) differed in several respects, but the overall thrust of the two

bills was similar. Both proposals called for the following:

U.S., President’s Special Review Board, Report, 1987, pp. V-5 — V-6.

U.S. Congress, 100th Congress, 1st session, Senate Select Committee on Secret Military

Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and U.S. House of Representatives Select

Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran, Report of the Congressional

Committees Investigating the Iran-Contra Affair with Supplemental, Minority, and

Additional Views, S.Rept. 100-216/H.Rept. 100-433, November 17, 1987, pp. 423-427;

hereafter cited as the Iran-Contra Report.

Iran-Contra Report, pp. 583-586.

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Creating a Director of National Intelligence (DNI) with authority to

program and reprogram intelligence funds throughout the

Intelligence Community, including the Defense Department, and to

direct their expenditure; and to task intelligence agencies and

transfer personnel temporarily from one agency to another to support

new requirements;

Creating two Deputy Directors of National Intelligence (DDNIs);

one of whom would be responsible for analysis and estimates, the

other for Intelligence Community affairs;

Creating a separate Director of the CIA, subordinate to the new DNI,

to manage the agency’s collection and covert action capabilities on

a day-to-day basis;

Consolidating analytical and estimative efforts of the Intelligence

Community (including analysts from CIA, and some from DIA, the

Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) at the State Department,

and other agencies) into a separate office under one of the Deputy

DNIs (this aspect of the proposal would effectively separate CIA’s

analytical elements from its collection and covert action offices);

Creating a National Imagery Agency within the Department of

Defense (DOD) to collect, exploit, and analyze imagery (these tasks

had been spread among several entities; the House version would

divide these efforts into two new separate agencies); and

Authorizing the Director of DIA to task defense intelligence

agencies (DIA, NSA, the new Imagery Agency) with collection

requirements; and to shift functions, funding, and personnel from

one DOD intelligence agency to another.

This major restructuring effort would have provided statutory mandates for

agencies where operational authority was created by executive branch directives.

Both statutes and executive branch directives provided the DCI authority to task

intelligence agencies outside the CIA and to approve budgets and reprogramming

efforts; in practice, however, this authority had never been fully exercised. This

legislation would have provided a statutory basis for the DCI (or DNI) to direct

collection and analytical efforts throughout the Intelligence Community.

The Boren-McCurdy legislation was not adopted, although provisions were

added to the FY1994 Intelligence Authorization Act (P.L. 102-496) that provided

basic charters for intelligence agencies within the National Security Act and set forth

in law the DCI’s coordinative responsibilities vis-à-vis intelligence agencies other

than the CIA. Observers credited strong opposition from the Defense Department

and concerns of the Armed Services Committees with inhibiting passage of the

original legislation.

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Commission on the Roles and Capabilities of the U.S.

Intelligence Community (Aspin/Brown Commission), 19951996

Established pursuant to the Intelligence Authorization Act for FY1995 (P.L.

103-359) of September 27, 1994, the Commission on the Roles and Capabilities of

the U.S. Intelligence Community was formed to assess the future direction, priorities,

and structure of the Intelligence Community in the post-Cold War environment.

Originally under the chairmanship of Les Aspin, after his sudden death the

commission was headed by former Secretary of Defense Harold Brown. Nine

members were appointed by the president and eight nominated by the congressional

leadership.

The Report of the Aspin/Brown Commission99 made a number of

recommendations regarding the organization of the Intelligence Community.

Structural changes in the NSC staff were proposed to enhance the guidance provided

to intelligence agencies. Global crime — terrorism, international drug trafficking,

proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and international organized crime —

was given special attention with recommendations for an NSC Committee on Global

Crime. The Commission also recommended designating the Attorney General to

coordinate the “nation’s law enforcement response to global crime,”and clarifying

the authority of intelligence agencies to collect information concerning foreign

persons abroad for law enforcement purposes. It urged that the sharing of relevant

information between the law enforcement and intelligence communities be expanded,

and their activities overseas be better coordinated.100

The Commission noted that it considered many options for dealing with

limitations in the DCI’s ability to coordinate the activities of all intelligence agencies.

The Aspin/Brown Commission recommended the establishment of two new deputies

to the DCI — one for the Intelligence Community and one for day-to-day

management of the CIA. Both would be Senate-confirmed positions and the latter

for a fixed six-year term. The DCI would concur in the appointment of the heads of

“national” intelligence elements within DOD and would evaluate their performance

in their positions as part of their ratings by the Secretary of Defense. “In addition,

the DCI would be given new tools to carry out his responsibilities with respect to the

intelligence budget and new authority over the intelligence personnel systems.”

The Aspin/Brown Commission recommended the realignment of intelligence

budgeting procedures with “discipline” (i.e. sigint, imagery, humint, etc.) managers

having responsibilities for managing similar efforts in all intelligence agencies. “The

DCI should be provided a sufficient staff capability to enable him to assess tradeoffs

between programs or program elements and should establish a uniform, community-

Report of the Commission on the Roles and Capabilities of the United States Intelligence

Community, Preparing for the 21st Century: An Appraisal of U.S. Intelligence (Washington:

Government Printing Office, 1996).

100

Ibid., p. xix.

CRS-32

wide resource data base to serve as the principal information tool for resource

management across the Intelligence Community.”101

Responding to a longstanding criticism of intelligence budget processes, the

Commission recommended that the total amounts appropriated for intelligence

activities be disclosed — a recommendation that was implemented by the Clinton

Administration for Fiscal Years 1997 and 1998. Subsequently, however, figures

were not made public.

In regard to congressional oversight, the Aspin/Brown Commission

recommended that appointments to intelligence committees not be made for limited

numbers of years but treated like appointments to other congressional committees.

IC21: Intelligence Community in the 21st Century, 1996

In addition to the Aspin/Brown Commission, in 1995-1996 the House

Intelligence Committee undertook its own extensive review of intelligence issues.

Many of the conclusions of the resultant IC21 Staff Study were consistent with those

of the Commission.102 The “overarching concept” was a need for a more “corporate”

intelligence community, i.e. a collection of agencies that recognize that they are parts

of “a larger coherent process aiming at a single goal: the delivery of timely

intelligence to policy makers at various levels.” Accordingly, “central management

should be strengthened, core competencies (collection, analysis, operations) should

be reinforced and infrastructure should be consolidated wherever possible.”103

Specific IC21 recommendations provided for a radically restructured community

and included

101

the DCI should have a stronger voice in the appointment of the

directors of NFIP defense agencies;

the DCI should have greater programmatic control of intelligence

budgets and intelligence personnel;

a Committee on Foreign Intelligence should be established within

the National Security Council;

two DDCIs should be established; one to direct the CIA and

managing analysis and production throughout the Community and

the other responsible for IC-wide budgeting, requirements and

collection management and tasking, infrastructure management and

system acquisition;

Ibid., p. xxi.

102

U.S. Congress, 104th Congress, House of Representatives, Permanent Select Committee

on Intelligence, Staff Study, IC21: Intelligence Community in the 21st Century, April 9,

1996.

103

Ibid., p. 9.

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establishment of a Community Management Staff with IC-wide

authority over, and coordination of, requirements, resources and

collection;

there should be a uniformed officer serving as Director of Military

Intelligence with authority to manage/coordinate defense intelligence

programs (JMIP and TIARA);

the Clandestine Service, responsible for all humint, should be

separated from the CIA, reporting directly to the DCI;

a Technical Collection Agency should be established to create an ICwide management organization responsible for directing all

collection tasking by all agencies and ensuring a coherent, multidiscipline approach to all collection issues;

there should be common standards and protocols for technical

collection systems, from collection through processing, exploitation

and dissemination;

a Technology Development Office should be established to perform

community research and development functions; and

congressional oversight should be strengthened by the establishment

of a joint intelligence committee; alternatively the House

intelligence committee should be made a standing committee

without tenure limits.

The Response to Aspin/Brown and IC21:

The Intelligence Authorization Act for FY1997

Congressional Response. The recommendations of the Aspin/Brown

Commission and the IC21 Study led to extensive congressional consideration of

intelligence organization issues. The House Intelligence Committee considered

separate legislation on intelligence organization (H.R. 3237, 104th Congress); the

Senate included extensive organizational provisions as part of the intelligence

authorization bill for FY1997 (S. 1718, 104th Congress). In addition, the Defense

Authorization Act for FY1997 (P.L. 104-201) included provisions establishing the

National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA)104 that combined elements from

intelligence agencies as well as the Defense Mapping Agency which had not been

part of the Intelligence Community.105

104

105

In 2003 NIMA was renamed the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA).

For the creation of NIMA, see (name redac ted), “The Creation of the National

Imagery and Mapping Agency: Congress’s Role as Overseer,” Occasional Paper Number

Nine, Joint Military Intelligence College, April 2001.

CRS-34

The conference version of the FY1997 intelligence authorization legislation,

eventually enacted as P.L. 104-293, included as its Title VIII, the “Intelligence

Renewal and Reform Act of 1996.” The act established within the NSC two

committees, one on foreign intelligence and another on transnational threats. The

former was to identify intelligence priorities and establish policies. The latter was

to identify transnational threats and develop strategies to enable the U.S. to respond

and to “develop policies and procedures to ensure the effective sharing of

information about transnational threats among Federal departments and agencies,

including law enforcement agencies and the elements of the intelligence community.

...”106

Two deputy DCI positions were established, one for Deputy DCI and the other

for a Deputy DCI for Community Management, both Senate-confirmed positions.

While the Deputy DCI would have responsibilities coterminous with those of the

DCI, the Deputy DCI for Community Management would focus on the coordination

of all intelligence agencies. Congress did not attempt to establish a position for a

head of the CIA separate from that of the DCI.

In addition to the two deputy DCIs, the legislation provided for three assistant

DCIs — for Collection, for Analysis and Production of Intelligence, and for

Administration. The statute calls for all three assistant DCI positions to be filled by,

and with, the advice and consent of the Senate. The statute is clear that the positions

were envisioned as being designed to enhance intelligence capabilities and

coordination of the efforts of all intelligence agencies. In addition, the legislation

required that the DCI concur in the appointment of three major defense intelligence

agencies — NSA, the NRO, and NIMA (later renamed the National GeospatialIntelligence Agency). If the DCI failed to concur, the nominations could still be

forwarded to the President, but the DCI’s non-concurrence had to be noted. The act

required that the DCI be consulted in the appointment of the DIA director, the

Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research, and the director of the

Office of Nonproliferation and National Security of the Energy Department107. The

FBI director is required to give the DCI timely notice of an intention to fill the

position of assistant director of the FBI’s National Security Division.

The act gave the DCI authority to develop and present to the President an annual

budget for the National Foreign Intelligence Program and to participate in the

development by the Secretary of Defense of the Joint Military Intelligence Program

(JMIP) and the Tactical Intelligence and Related Activities Program (TIARA).

Moreover, the DCI gained authority to “approve collection requirements, determine

collection priorities, and resolve conflicts in collection priorities levied on national

106

Codified at 50 USC 402(i)(4)(F); transnational threats were defined as “any transnational

activity (including international terrorism, narcotics trafficking, the proliferation of weapons

of mass destruction and the delivery systems for such weapons, and organized crime) that

threatens the national security of the United States.” 50 USC 402(i)(5)(A).

107

Subsequently modified in 2001 by P.L. 107-108 to substitute the Director of the Office

of Intelligence and the Director of the Office of Counterintelligence of the Department of

Energy. More recently, legislation signed in 2003 added the Assistant Secretary for

Intelligence and Analysis of the Department of the Treasury (P.L. 108-381).

CRS-35

collection assets, except as otherwise agreed with the Secretary of Defense pursuant

to the direction of the President.”108

Presidential Statement. President Clinton signed the legislation on October

11, 1996, but in so doing he stated concerns about provisions that “purport to direct”

the creation of two new NSC committees. “Such efforts to dictate the President’s

policy process unduly intrude upon Executive prerogatives and responsibilities. I

would note that under my Executive authority, I have already asked the NSC to

examine these issues.” Furthermore, he criticized provisions requiring the DCI to

concur or be consulted before the appointment of certain intelligence officials. This

requirement, he argued, “is constitutionally questionable in two areas: regarding

limitations on the President’s ability to receive the advice of cabinet officers; and

regarding circumscription of the President’s appointment authority.”

The statement also noted the “strong opposition” by DCI John Deutch to

provisions establishing three new assistant DCIs, each requiring Senate confirmation.

President Clinton added: “I share his concerns that these provisions will add another

layer of positions requiring Senate confirmation without a corresponding gain in the

DCI’s authority or ability to manage the Intelligence Community. I understand that

the DCI intends to seek repeal or significant modification of these provisions in the

105th Congress. I will support such efforts.”109

Implementation. George Tenet, nominated to succeed John Deutch,

responded to a question from Senator Robert Kerrey during his Senate confirmation

hearing in May 1997, that “I may have some changes in the law in my own mind, if

I’m confirmed, that allows us to meet your objectives. And I want to come work

with you on it.” Tenet also indicated that he believed that the DCI’s statutory

responsibilities for coordinating the work of all intelligence agencies was adequate.110

In May 1998, the Senate Intelligence Committee held a hearing on the

nomination of Joan A. Dempsey as the first Deputy DCI for Community

Management. In opening remarks, Chairman Shelby noted discussions with the

executive branch regarding the positions established by P.L. 104-293:

we have reached an accommodation with the Director of Central Intelligence on

these positions, and we expect that the President to put forward a nominee for the

position of Assistant Director of Central Intelligence for Administration, or

ADCI, soon. We have agreed to allow the DCI to fill the positions of ADCI for

Collection and ADCI for Analysis and Production without exercising the

108

50 USC 403-3(c)(1)(3).

109

Statement on Signing the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1997, October

11, 1996, Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, October 14, 1996, p. 2039.

110

U.S. Congress, 105th Congress, 1st session, Senate, Select Committee on Intelligence,

Nomination of George J. Tenet to be Director of Central Intelligence, S. Hearing 105-314,

May 6, 1997, pp. 64, 89.

CRS-36

Senate’s right for advice and consent for up to one year while we assess the new

management structure.111

Dempsey in her testimony succinctly set forth the fundamental problem of

intelligence organization:

It’s somewhat amusing to me — and I’ve spent most of my career in the

Department of Defense ... and when I was in DOD there was always this fear that

a very powerful DCI with a full-time emphasis on intelligence and managing the

community would fail to support the DOD the way it needed to be supported

with intelligence. Since I’ve come over to the Central Intelligence Agency side

of the intelligence community, I’ve found the same fear, but this time directed

at what DOD is going to do to subvert the role of the DCI.

She noted, however, the establishment of coordinative mechanisms such as the

Defense Resources Board and the Intelligence Program Review Group and “constant

accommodations made by Secretaries of Defense and DCIs to work together to find

solutions to problems.” In general, she argued, “the relations have been good.”112

The following February, the Senate Intelligence Committee met to consider the

nomination of James Simon as Assistant DCI for Administration. At the hearing, the

Vice Chairman, Senator Robert Kerrey, noted that the DCI had taken the interim

steps of appointing Acting Assistant Directors for collection and for analysis. He

added: “I expect Presidential nominations for these positions will be forthcoming

soon.”113 He noted, however, that “Once the 1997 Authorization Act was passed, the

Community resisted mightily the appointment of Assistant Directors of Central

Intelligence for collection and analysis.”114

Simon testified that he would be responsible for “the creation of a process to

ensure that the needs of all customers — strategic and tactical, intelligence and

battlefield surveillance, traditional and novel — are articulated, validated, and made

manifest in our programs.”115 Simon noted in passing the importance of a highly

capable staff to perform coordination missions; he referred to the former Intelligence

Community Staff as having had “a certain percentage of people there who, frankly,

had retired in place or were considered to be brain dead and wanted a quiet place

where they could make it to retirement without being bothered. A greater proportion

111

U.S. Congress, 105th Congress, 2d session, Senate, Select Committee on Intelligence,

Hearing, Nomination of Joan A. Dempsey to be Deputy Director of Intelligence for

Community Management, Senate Hearing 105-1056, May 21-22, 1998, p. 1.

112

Ibid., p. 40.

113

U.S. Congress, 106th Congress, 1st session, Senate, Select Committee on Intelligence,

Hearing, Nomination of James M. Simon, Jr., to be Assistant Director of Central

Intelligence for Administration, Senate Hearing 106-394, February 4, 1999, p. 3.

114

Ibid., p. 4.

115

Ibid., p. 41.

CRS-37

were those that their agencies either didn’t want or that they felt were not progressing

acceptably within their own agency. . . . “116

Both Dempsey and Simon were confirmed by the Senate and served for several

years in their respective positions. In July 2003 Dempsey, having left the DDCI

position, was appointed Executive Director of the President’s Foreign Intelligence

Advisory Board; Simon retired in 2003. Only in July 2004 was Larry Kindsvater

confirmed by the Senate as DDCI for Community Management; nominations for

assistant DCI positions have not been submitted. The statutory provisions remain in

place, however.

Despite the effort that went into the FY1997 legislation, the efforts intended to

enhance the DCI’s community-wide role have not been fully implemented.117 The

FY1997 Act established four new Senate-confirmed positions having responsibilities

that extend across all intelligence agencies. Since enactment, the Senate has received

nominations for only two individuals to these positions (both were duly confirmed

and sworn in) but both left office in 2003 and replacements have not yet been

nominated. Some observers also believe that the DCI’s authorities in the preparation

of budgets for all intelligence agencies have not been fully exercised.118 Observers

suggest that there is little likelihood that serious efforts will be made, however, to

seek repeal of the provisions at a time when intelligence agencies are under scrutiny

for their abilities to “connect the dots” on international threats.

Joint Inquiry on the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001;

Additional Views of Senator Shelby, 2002

In the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center

and the Pentagon, the two congressional intelligence committees agreed to conduct

a Joint Inquiry into the activities of the Intelligence Community in connection with

the attacks. The Joint Inquiry undertook an extensive investigation and conducted

a number of public and closed hearings. The two Committees’ recommendations

were published in December 2002 some of which addressed issues of Intelligence

Community organization. The unclassified version of the Inquiry’s report was

published in mid-2003.

Principally, the two committees urged that the National Security Act be

amended to create a statutory Director of National Intelligence, separate from the

116

Ibid., p. 43.

117

A somewhat pessimistic academic assessment of the effects of the IC21 study can be

found in Abraham H. Miller and Brian Alexander, “Structural Quiescence in the Failure of

IC21 and Intelligence Reform,” International Journal of Intelligence and

Counterintelligence, Summer 2001. Management of ISR programs is discussed in CRS

Report RL32508, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) Programs:

Congressional Oversight Issues.

118

See U.S. Congress, 107th Congress, 2d session, Senate Committee on Intelligence and

House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Joint Inquiry into Intelligence

Community Activities Before and After the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001, S.Rept.

107-351, H.Rept. 107-792, December 2002, pp. 347-348.

CRS-38

head of the CIA. This DNI would have the “full range of management, budgetary

and personnel responsibilities needed to make the entire U.S. Intelligence

Community operate as a coherent whole.” These would include “establishment and

enforcement” of collection, analysis, and dissemination priorities; authority to move

personnel between Intelligence Community elements; and “primary management and

oversight of the execution of Intelligence Community budgets.”

The committees also recommended that Congress consider legislation, similar

to the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986 which reorganized the Defense Department,

to instill a sense of jointness throughout the Intelligence Community, including joint

education, joint career specialties, and more “joint tours” in other agencies that would

be designated as “career-enhancing.”

The then-Vice Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senator Richard

Shelby, submitted additional views that also advocated organizational changes in the

Intelligence Community.119 Shelby argued that “The fragmented nature of the DCI’s

authority has exacerbated the centrifugal tendencies of bureaucratic politics and has

helped ensure that the IC responds too slowly and too disjointedly to shifting

threats.”Accordingly, the “office of the DCI should be given more management and

budgetary authority over IC organs and be separated from the job of the CIA

Director.”120

Further, Shelby argued that the basic structure of the National Security Act

needs to be re-examined to separate “central” analytical functions from “resourcehungry collection responsibilities that make agencies into self-interested bureaucratic

‘players.’” Shelby acknowledged that, “Creating a true DCI would entail removing

dozens of billions of dollars of annual budgets from the Defense Department, and

depriving it of ‘ownership’ over ‘its’ ‘combat support organizations.’ In

contemporary Washington bureaucratic politics, this would be a daunting challenge;

DOD and its congressional allies would make such centralization an uphill battle, to

say the least.”121 Shelby also recalls the Goldwater-Nichols precedent in urging that

the Intelligence Community be restructured, but cautions that the Intelligence

Community should not be reformed solely to meet the terrorist threat: “we need an

Intelligence Community agile enough to evolve as threats evolve, on a continuing

basis. Hard-wiring the IC in order to fight terrorists, I should emphasize, is precisely

the wrong answer, because such an approach would surely leave us unprepared for

the next major threat, whatever it turns out to be.”122

119

“September 11 and the Imperative of Reform in the U.S. Intelligence Community,”

Additional Views of Senator Richard C. Shelby, Vice Chairman, Senate Select Committee

on Intelligence, December 10, 2002.

120

Ibid., p. 3.

121

Ibid., p. 16.

122

Ibid., p. 18 (italics in original).

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National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon

the United States (The 9/11 Commission), 2004

Established by the Intelligence Authorization Act for FY2003 (P.L. 107-306),

the 9/11 Commission, chaired by former New Jersey Governor Thomas H. Kean,

undertook a lengthy investigation of the “facts and circumstances relating to the

terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.” Although the Commission’s mandate

extended beyond intelligence and law enforcement issues, a number of principal

recommendations, made public on July 22, 2004 address the organization of the

Intelligence Community. The Commission argues that with current authorities the

DCI is:

responsible for community performance but lacks the three authorities critical for

any agency head or chief executive officer: (1) control over purse strings, (2) the

ability to hire or fire senior managers, and (3) the ability to set standards for the

information infrastructure and personnel.123

The 9/11 Commission recommends the establishment of a National

Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), responsible for both joint operational planning and

joint intelligence, and the position of a Director of National Intelligence. In addition

to overseeing various intelligence centers, the DNI would manage the National

Foreign Intelligence Program and oversee the agencies that contribute to it. The

Community Management Staff would report to the DNI. The DNI would manage the

agencies with the help of three deputies, each of whom would also hold a key

position in one of the component agencies. A deputy for foreign intelligence would

be the now-separate head of the CIA, a deputy for defense intelligence would be the

Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, and the deputy for homeland intelligence

would be either an FBI or Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official. The

DNI would not have responsibilities for intelligence programs affecting only Defense

Department consumers. The report does not describe how the person serving

simultaneously as the DNI’s assistant for defense intelligence and as an Under

Secretary of Defense would resolve any differing guidance from the DNI and the

Secretary of Defense. The 9/11 Commission also recommends a separate intelligence

appropriation act the total of which would be made public.124

123

U.S., National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, The 9/11

Commission Report, July 2004, p. 410.

124

For further background on the 9/11 Commission proposals, see CRS Report RL32506,

The Position of Director of National Intelligence: Issues for Congress.

CRS-40

Conclusion

The efforts of committees, commissions and individuals to encourage

restructuring of the U.S. Intelligence Community have led to numerous changes

through internal agency direction, presidential directives and executive orders, and

new statutes. The general trend has been towards more thorough oversight both by

the executive branch and by congressional committees. The position of the DCI has

been considerably strengthened and DCIs have been given greater staff and authority

to exert influence on all parts of the Community. They have not, however, been

given “line” authority over agencies other than the CIA, and the influence of the

Defense Department remains pervasive. Some have argued that, in the light of the

Intelligence Community’s inability to provide warning of the September 2001 attacks

on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and inaccurate intelligence estimates

about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, the need for reorganizing the Intelligence

Community has become self-evident. Others argue that many of the reforms that

have been proposed could make matters worse. The issue appears to be moving

higher on the congressional agenda. Specific legislation to reorganize the nation’s

intelligence effort, including S. 2845, is currently under consideration and the 9/11

Commission’s recommendations are receiving widespread interest.

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