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CHURCH COMMITTEE REPORTS

APPENDIX II
ADDITIONAL COVERT ACTION RECOMMENDATIONS
Throughout its inquiry, the Committee received numerous recommendations
concerning covert action from maI1£Y individuals and
groups, including:
(a) Clark Clifford, former Counsel to President Truman, former
Member and Chairman of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory
Board, former Secretary of Defense;
(b) Cyrus Vance, former General Counsel, Department of Defense;
former Secretary of the Army; former Deputy Secretary of Defense;
former Special Representative of the President; former Member of
U.S. Delegation to Paris Peace Negotiations;
(c) Morton Halperin, Director, Project on National Security and
Civil Liberties; former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for
International Affairs; former Assistant for Planning, National Security
Council Staff; former Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution;
(d) David Phillips, former Central Intelligence Agency employee;
President, Association of Retired Intelligence Officers;
(e) Harvard University Institute of Politics, Study Group on Intelligence
Activities. This group was established in September 1975, on
the basis of an understanding between the Institute of Politics and the
staff of the Select Committee to examine aspects of the National
intelligence community's mission and structure. Its endeavor was
an entirely voluntary one, with neither party having any former obligations
to the other. The group met approximately 11 times between
October 1975 and ,January 1976, and included Graham Allison, Philip
Areeda. Francis Bator, Robert Bowie, John Bross, Morton Halperin,
Philip Heyman, Ernest May, Jonathan Moore, Robert Pursley, Walter
Slocombe, ,J. T. Smith, and Franklin Lindsay.
(f) The House Select Committee on Intelligence Activities;
(g) The Commission on the Organization of the Government for the
Conduct of Foreign Policy (the Murphy Commission).
The Committee also considered suggestions made in numerous journal
and magazine articles.
Selected statements, suggestions and recommendations from these
sources follow.
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A. STATEMENT OF. CLARK M. CLIFFORD
I welcome your invitation to appear here today to discuss with your
committee the problems surrounding the conduct of covert activities.
The public has given much attention to this subject and a national
dialogue has ensued. Some contend that it is necessary in the preservation
of our democratic form of government to have a full disclosure of
operations in this delicate area to ascertain if abuses have occurred.
Others contend, with equal sincerity, that such an inquiry damages
our country's image in the world and adversely affects the ability of
our intelligence services to perform their tasks.
It is my opinion that the inquiry being conducted by this committee
became absolutely necessary as the result of certain disclosures
which demonstrated that gross abuses had occurred. Our country may
sustain some temporary reduction in the effectiveness of its intelligence
operations, but I consider this temporary in nature, and an appropriate
price to pay in presenting the facts to the American people
and in making progress toward the goal of preventing repetition of
such abuses in the future. With the right kind of machinery, our country
can take those actions which it believes necessary to help maintain
freedom in the world and, at the same time, avoid the opprobium that
has been directed toward us as the result of improper activities in the
field of clandestineand covert operations.
In 1946, Pr~sident Truman stated that we must have a formalized
intelligence agency. The lessons learned as the result of Pearl Harbor
and increased tensions following World War II convinced him that
we needed an institutionalized peacetime intelligence agency. As a result,
the Central Intelligence Agency was created in the National
Security Act of 1947.1
Because those of us who were assigned to this task and had the
drafting responsibility were dealing with a new subject with practically
no precedents, it was decided that the act creating the Central
Intelligence Agencv should contain a "catch-aIl" clause to provide
for unforeseen contingencies. Thus, it was written that the CIA should
"perform such other functions and duties related to intelligence affecting
the national security as the National Security Council may
from time to time direct." It was under this clause that. earlv in the
operation of the 1947 Act. covert activities were authorized. ·1 recall
that such activities took place in 1948 and it is even possible that some
planning took place in late 1947. It was the original concept that
covert activities undertaken under the act were to be carefully limited
and controlled. You will note that the language of the act provides
that this catch-all clause is applicable onlv in the event that the
national security is affected. This was considered to be an important
limiting and restricting clause.
1 Appendix B. Hparing, Vol. 7, p. 210.
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However, as the cold war continued and Communist aggression
became the major problem of the day, our Government felt that it
was necessary to increase our country's responsibilities in protecting
freedom in various parts of the world. It seems apparent now that
we also greatly increased our covert activities. I have read somewhere
that as time progressed we had literally hundreds of such
operations going on simultaneously.
It seems clear that these operations have gotten out of hand. The
knowledge regarding such operations has become so widespread that
our country has been accused of being responsible for practically
every internal difficulty that has occurred in every country in the
world. Our reputation has been damaged and our capacity for ethical
and moral world leadership has been impaired. The need to correct
this unfortunate development is long past due.
As one attempts to analyze the difficulty, and hopefully offer constructive
suggestions for improvement, he finds much confusion existing
within the system. It is clear that lines of authority and responsibility
have become blurred and indistinct.
The Xational Security Council, under the Act of 1947, is given the
responsibility of directmg our country's intelligence actinties. My
experience leads me to believe that this function has not been effectively
performed. The members of the NSC already have full-time jobs
and do not have the time to oversee meticulously the actions of the
intelligence community. Even though special committees have been
set up from time to time to perform this task, we learn that many
covert activities are undertaken without the knowledge of the National
Security Councilor its special committee. In the staff report
on covert action in Chile,2 the startling statement is made that only onefourth
of all covert action projects are considered by the 40 Committee.
Another condition exists that helps explain the unfortunate predicament
in which we find ourseh-es. I believe, on a number of occasions,
a plan for covert action has been presented to the NSC and authority
is requested for the CIA to proceed from point A to point B. The
authority will be given and the action will be launched. 'When point B
is reached, the persons in charge feel that it is necessary to go to
point C, and they assume that the original authorization gives them
such a right. From point C, they go to D and possibly E, and even
further, this has led to some bizarre results, and, when an investigation
is started, the excuse is blandly presented that authority was
obtained from the NSC before the project was launched.
I believe that the present system is no longer adequate to meet the
task. The lack of proper controls has resulted in a freewheeling course
of conduct on the part of persons within the intelligence community
that has led to spectacular failures and much unfortunate publicity.
A new approach is ohviously needed for it is unthinkable that we
can continue to commit the egregious errors that have caused such
consternation to our friends and such delight to our enemies.
This inquiry today is part of the broad inYl~stigation conducted by
this committee to ascertain the facts. This is a preliminary phase
whirh hnnefully will lead to recommendations that will help eIimi-
2 Appendix A, Hearings. Vol. 7, p. 144.
514
nate the errors of the past, and provide the country \,ith the expectation
that we can operate successfully in the future in this sensitive
area with dignity and effectiveness. I know that this committee
will be considering the means by which we can attain the improvement
that is so necessary and is so desIred by our people.
In this connection, permit me to present to the committee a brief
five-point plan that I believe would make progress toward achieving
our goal.
First, the 1947 law creating the CIA should be substantially
amended and a new law should be written covering intelligence functions.
'We han~ had almost 30 years of experience under the old law
and have learned a great deal. I believe it has served us reasonably
well, but its defects have become increasingly apparent. A clearer,
more definitive bill can be prepared that can accomplish our purposes.
By creating clearer lines of authority and responsibility and by carefully
restricting certain activities, we can hopefully prevent the abuses
of the past.
Second, the creation of an effective joint House-Senate Committee
to oversee intelligence operations. I consider this the most important
function of a new law. Proper congressional oversight has been sadly
lacking. I would hope that a small oversight committee of possibly
five members of each chamber might be created. It should be considered
an assignment of outstanding importance and the members should
be willing to give the necessary time to it. By keeping the committee
small, security can be maintained and the possibility of disclosures
can be minimized.
With reference to covert activities, I believe it would be appropriate
for this committee to be informed in advance by the executive
branch of the Government before a covert project is launched. The
committee should be briefed and, if it approves, then the activity can
go forward. If the committee disapproves, it should inform the President
of its disapproval so that he will have the benefit of the joint
committee's reaction. If necessary, the President and the committee
can confer, after which the President may decide to abandon the
project or possibly modify it. If he persists in going ahead despite the
committee's disapproval, then the committee might choose to withhold
funds necessary to finance the activity in question. It is my feeling
that the importance of the decisionmaking process in this very
delicate field is such that there should be a joint effort by the executive
and legislative branches.
I would assume that this committee will have questions in that
regard, and I'm sure it will be valuable. for us to discuss it.
Third, a new position of Director General of Intelligence should
be created. This man would be the chief intelligence officer of the
Fnited St~tes. It would be his responsibility to correlate and synchronize
the activities of the various agencies within the intelligence
community. Under this concept there would still be a director of the
CIA, but his duties would be confined to the day-by-day operation of
that -agency. The Director General would be responsible for the product
that would be produced by the intelligence community, and he
would be the chief adviser to the President on intelligence matters.
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The Director General would also be charged with the duty of seeing
that ~e various agencies operated effectively and complied with the
law. In this connection, he \vould have under him a number of inspectors
who would assist him in carrying out this function.
Fourth, the decision regarding the undertaking of covert projects
should be made by the Director General of Intelligence and the National
Security Council, and he would have the responsibility of seeing
that such covert projects were properly carried out by the CIA and
other members of the intelligence community.
In the beginning, there was a separation between the CIA and the
group charged with covert activities. In the early 1950's, they were
consolidated. I believe that there should be much stricter control over
the launching of covert projects, but that after the basic decision is
made, then all the assets possessed by the CIA and other agencies
should be utilized.
The close supervision provided for in this concept \vill inescapably
diminish the number of covert operations. In my opinion, this is a
highly desirable result. Many of the plans launched in the past should
have been vetoed at their inception. I am sure that decisions have been
made in the field that never would have been made in higher levels
of our government. The guiding criterion should be the test as to
whether or not a certain covert project truly affects our national
security.
Fifth, the new intelligence agency should be forbidden to undertake
any domestic operations except to police its own employees. There
should not be any type of catch-all provision in the new law which
would permit the intelligence agency to spy on American citizens. All
domestic operations of this nature should be handled by the FBI. It
is equipped to do it and a close cooperation between the CIA and the
FBI is desirable and necessary. Certainly one agency charged with the
responsibility of domestic surveillance activities is enough.
·We have a big job to do in this country. Our people are confused
about our national goals and cynical about our institutions. Our national
spirit seems to have been replaced by a national malaise. It is
my conviction that the efforts of this committee will assist us in regaining
confidence in our national integrity, and in helping to restore
to our Nation its reputation in the "'orld for' dCC'eJl('y, fair dealing and
moral leadership.
B. STATEMENT OF CYRUS VANCE
Mr. VANCE. I would like to speak briefly to what I believe is the
central thrust of this committee's investigation: should there be any
covert action? If so, what kinds and under what restraints?
At the outset, I think it is important to underscore the distinction
between covert collection of intelligence and covert actions other than
collection. I believe that with respect to covert collection of intelli~
ence, the continuation of such collection should be permitted as I believe
it is essential to the national security.
With respect to covert actions, I would not recommend that all
covert actions be prohibited by law. I believe it is too difficult to see
that clearly into the future. I believe it would be wise to enact legislation
prohibiting involvement in assassinations, as has been suggested
by this committee. In addition, I would be in favor of legislation prohibiting
interference with the electoral processes in other countries. I
would note that the drafting of such legislation is a complex business,
and it would have to be so drafted as not to block covert intelligence
collection.
Now, with respect to other covert actions, I believe it should be the
policy of the United States to engage in covert actions only when they
are absolutely essentbl to the national seeurity.
The statutes, as now drafted, use the words "affect" or "are important
to." 3 I think those words are inadeqaute. I think covert actions
should be authorized only when they are essential to the national
security. Under such a test, I believe that the number of covert actions
would be very, very small.
As to procedures to insure that such a policy would be carried out,
I would suggest the following, and in the connection I might note that
I agree with most of the recommendations that Mr. Clifford has made.
First, I believe that any proposal for a covert action should first go
to the National Security Council, not a sub-Cabinet level committee.
The hi~hest level of the Government should focus upon the question,
and therefore it should go before the National Security Council.
I would further snggest that the Attorney General of the United
States be made a member of the National Security Council. This would
insure that the chief legal officer of the United States would be one
of those who would be passin~ upon the recommendation that goes
to the President if it is in the affirmative.
I would also recommend that the Pre8ident be required to give his
approval in writing. certifying that he believes the proposed action is
essential to the national security. After the President's approval, I
would suggest that 11 full and complete description of the proposed
action be communicat,ed immediately to a ioint Congressional oversip;ht
committee along the lines which Mr. Clifford has suggested. I believe
that such a step would then put the committee or any of its members
• Appendix B Hearings, Vol. 7, p. 210.
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in a position to express their disapproval or concerns about the proposed
action, and to communicate them to the President of the United
States.
I am not suggesting that the committee should have a veto. I do not
believe that is necessary. I am suggesting that the committee or its individual
members would be able to communicate with the President,
thus giving him the benefit of the committee's advice or of the advice
of individual members.
I believe this is and would be important to Presidents. I do not believe
there would be inevitable leaks from such a committee. I know
that the Congress can safeguard security matters which are essential
to our national security.
Finally, I believe it's necessary that a monitoring system be set up
which would require frequent reports. I would suggest at least
monthly to the highest level; namely, the National Security Council
and the Congress and to the joint oversight committee as to the progress
of any action which has been authorized to go forward. I think
this would tend to help in meeting the problem that Mr. Clifford suggested
with respect to a covert operation moving from A to B and then
from B to C and so on.
Again, Mr. Chairman, I would stress that I believe such actions
should and would be very rare and that under such a set of procedures
there would be adequate oversight to control such activities.
C. STATEMENT OF DAVID A. PHILLIPS
Mr. PHILLIPS. Mr. Chairman and Senators, for the record I would
like to make it clear that any viewpoints that I express today are personal
ones. They do not represent the Association of Retired Intelligence
Officers, an organization of intelligence people from all services.
of which I happen to be President.
I would like to discuss covert action and covert activity. There's
nothing new about covert action, the term which describes a variety
of hugger-mugger gambits which can be taken to influence another
nation's actions, attitudes, or public opinion.
What is new is the current controversy as to whether our country
should engage in covert action. This is a valid subject for debate. Even
though covert operations have been drastically reduced, American intelligence
personnel realize that many of the problems which beset the
intelligence community result from historical slips on the banana
peels of covert action. The biggest banana peel of all is that vague
phrase in the charter of CIA which reads "and other such functions
and duties ..." an ambiguous instruction which should be omitted
from future legislation.
There are two dimensions to covert operations. The first is the major
political or paramilitary endeavor, such as an attempt to change a
government-Guatemala, for instance--or to finance a secret army in
Southeast Asia. You might call this covert action with a capital "C,"
capital "A." King-size.
There is a second level of covert action, in the lower case; covert
action with a small "c," small "a." I call this "covert activity." Little
money, sometimes none, is spent on covert activity, where cooperative
friends are persuaded to influence a foreign government or some element
of it. The friend might be a government official responsive to
an ambassador's off-the-record request, that the local government
tighten up its laws concerning illegal narcotics traffic to the United
States. When the friend is met clandestinely by CIA, he is called an
"agent of influence." He might be a radio commentator or a local Bernard
Baruch whose park bench opinions carry political weight. The
agent of influence might be the foreign minister's mistress. Most covert
activities utilizing the agent of influence are useful to American
ambassadors in achieving low-key but important objectives of U.S.
foreign policy. These activities are known in intelligence jargon as
"motherhood," and revelations concerning them would not shock or
disturb the American public. To proscribe CIA operations in covert
activities would be imprudent.
Covert action, capital "C," capital "A", is another matter. In 25
years as a practitioner of covert action and covert activity in seven
countries I have found that most of our mistakes occur when we attempt
to persuade foreigners to do something which the United States
wants more than they do.
The most successfu'l operations have been those in which we were
requested to intervene-the percentage of such operations, when a
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foreign leader has asked for secret assistance, has been quite high.
Some aspects of covert operations are anachronistic. Dirty tricks,
such as besmirching the reputation of an individual, have been abandoned
and should not be revived. The expensive accessories of covert
action in the past, such as airlines and paramilitary units, should not
and need not be maintained as secret capabilities.
There is a basic question to be answered: Given the distemper of
the times, and the lack of credibility in government following Watergate,
can covert operations remain covert? If not, they should be
terminated. ~facy's' window is not the place for secret operations.
Some sort of compromise seems to be in order. If American intelligence
operators demand secrecy as essential in covert operations, executive
and congressional overseers have the even more important
duty of knowing what intelligence agencies are doing.
I am convinced that the CIA is the organization best suited to
carry out covert action operations. Despite this, I have reluctantly
come to the conclusion that the charter for covert action should rest
elsewhere. I say this more in sorrow than anything else. Effective and
responsible accountability override practical operational considerations.
This will be best achieved in the conduct of covert action by the
creation of a new, very small bureau or offiee. By statute this organization
would be staffed by no more than 100 persons.
Some 60 would be in a support role; perhaps 40 officers would be engaged
in the planning for and, on request, the execution of covert action
operations. All U.S. covert action eggs then, would be in one small
basket, a basket w'hich could be watched very carefully. Even if not
utilized, such an office would be justifiable in terms of money and effort
as a war plans unit, expandable in case of international conflict. A
joint congressional committee should find such a unit easy to monitor,
and the intelligence personnel working in it could then expect a reduced
number of congressional overseers, as opposed to the six committees
now observing covert operations.
The office I propose would call on expertise derived from experience.
It would not employ airlines or mercenaries or exotic paraphernalia.,
but would need the capability to provide friends with imaginative
advice and what British intelligence officers have sometimes called
"King George's cavalry"-money.
Covert action is a stimulating business. a headv experience for those
who sponsor it and for its practitioners. If not used in moderation it is
as dangerous as any stimuhll1t. But to suggest that covert action be
ahandonedas a political option in the future is, in my opinion, injudicious,
if not frivolous. Some sav that covert action should be abolished
hecause of past mistakes. Tliis would be as foolish as abolishing
the Office of the President because it has been once abused, or to disband
our armv in peace time would be.
The committee is aware of the 2-year study recently conducted by
the Murphy commission.· A conclusion of this review that:
Covert action should not be abandoned but should be employed only
where such action is clearlv essential to vital U.S. purposes, and then
only after careful high level review.
• RPpOrt of the CommiRRion on the Organization of the Government for thE' Conduct
of Foreign Policy, June 1975.
D. PREPARED STATEMENT OF MORTON H. HALPERIN
.Mr. Chairman, I consider it an honor and a privilege to be invited
to testify before this committee on the question of covert operations.
From this committee's unprecedented review of the activities of our
intelligence agencies must come a new definition of what the American
people will permit to be done in their name abroad. and allow to be
done to them at home. No problem is more difficult and contentious
than that of covert operations.
It appears that I have been cast in the role of the spokesman on the
left on this issue. It is an unaccustomed position and one that I accept
with some discomfort. It should be clear to the committee that there
are a great many thoughtful and articulate Americans whose views on
this question are considerably to the left of mine, at least as these
terms are normally used. I would not presume to speak for them. Nor,
Mr. Chairman, am I speaking for the organizations with which I am
now affiliated. I appear, as you requested, as an individual to present
my own views.
I believe that the United States should no longer maintain a career
service for the purpose of conducting covert operations and covert
intelligence collection by human means.
I believe also that the United States should eschew as a matter of
national policy the conduct of covert operations. The prohibition
should be embodied in a law with the same basic structure as
the statute on assassinations which the Committee has already
recommended.
These proposals are not put forward because I believe that no covert
operation could ever be in the American interest or because I could
not conceive of circumstances where the capability to conduct a covert
operation might seem to be important to the security of the United
States. I can in fact envision such circumstances. However, I believe
that the potential for covert operation has been greatly overrated and
in my view the possible benefits of a few conceivable operations are
far outweighed by the costs to our society of maintaining a capability
for covert operations and permitting the executive branch to conduct
such operations.
The relevations made by this Committee in its report on assassinations
are in themselves sufficient to make my case. I will rely on these
illustrations not because there are not many others of which we are
all aware but rather to avoid any dispute over facts.
The case against covert operations is really very simple. Such operations
are incompatible with our democratic institutions, with Congressional
and public control over foreign policy decisions, with our
constitutional rights, and with thp, principles and ideals that this
Republic stands for in the world.
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Let me begin with the last point. The CIA operations described in
this Committee's assassination report are disturbing not only because
murder was planned and attempted, but also because the operations
went against the very principles we claim to stand for in the world.
In Cuba, the Congo and Chile we intervened in the internal affairs of
other countries on our own initiative and in the belief that we had the
right to determine for others what kind of government their country
needed and who posed a threat to their welfare. We acted not because
we believed those that we opposed were the tools of foreign powers
kept in office by outside intervention; rather we acted in the face of
assertions by the intelligence community that the leaders we opposed
were popular in their own lands.
In the Congo our efforts were directed at keeping Lumumba from
speaking and keeping the parliament from meeting because we believed
that allowing him to speak or allowing the parliament to meet
would have meant that Lumumba would be back in office. In Chile
we preached to the military the need to ignore the constitution and to
overthrow a democratically elected government. We warned that the
alternative was deprivation and poverty for the Chilean people.
All of these things were undertaken in the name of the United
States but without the knowled~e or consent of the Congress or the
public. Nor could such consent have been obtained. Can you imagine
a President asking the Congress to approve a program of seeking to
reduce the people of Chile to poverty unless their military, in violation
of the constitution, seized power; or the President seeking funds
to be used to keep the Congolese Parliament out of session so that it
could not vote Lumumba back into office; or the authority to promise
leniency to Mafia leaders if they would help to assassinate Castro.
These programs were kept covert not only because we would be embarrassed
abroad, but also because they would not be approved if they
were subjected to the same Congressional and public scrutiny as other
progr!1ms. That is one major evil of having a covert capability and
allowmg our Presidents to order such operations. The assassinations
the~selves m.ay have been an aberration; the means and purposes of
our mterventlOns were not.
Another inevitable consequence of conducting covert operations
is. th~t it distorts our democratic system in ways that we are only 00gmmng
to understand. Covert operations by their nature cannot be
debated openly in ways required by our constitutional system. Moreover,
they require efforts to avoid the structures that normally govern
the conduct of our officials. One obvious area is lying to the public
and the Congress.
We should not forget that the erosion of trust between the government
and the people in this Republic began with the U-2 affair and
has continued through a series of covert operations including Chile.
Whet~er.or not perjury was committed-and I see little doubt that it
waS-It ~s surely t~e (!ase that the Congress and the public were
svstematIcallv deCeIved ahout the American intervention in Chile.
Sll{;h de?eption must stop if we are to regain the trust needed in this
n~tlOn; It cannot stop as long as we are conducting covert operations.
GIven .the cu!"rent ahsence of consensus on foreign policy goals. such
operatIons WIll not he accorded the deference the.v were ,!..riven in the
207-932 0 - 76 - 34
522
past. Critics will press as they do now on Angola and Portugal. And
administrations will feel the need and the right to lie.
Surely at this point in time it is not necessary to remind ourselves of
the certainty that the techniques that we apply to others will inevitably
be turned on the American people by our own intelligence services.
Whether that extends to assassination has sadly become an open question
but little else is.
The existence of a capability for covert operations inevitably distorts
the decision making process. Presidents confronted with hard choices
in foreign policy have to face a variety of audiences in framing a policy.
This is in my view all to the good. It keeps us from straying
far from our principles,from what a majority of our citizens are prepared
to support, from a policy out of touch with reality. The overt
policies of the American government ultimately come under public
scrutiny and Congressional debate long before'that they have been
subject to bureaucratic struggles in which the opposition of the policy
have their day in court.
Our intelligence analysts are free to explain why the policy will not
work. With covert policies none of this happens. Intelligence community
analysts were not told of the plans to assassinate Castro and so
they did not do the careful analysis necessary to support their view
that it would make no difference. The Assistant Secretary of State for
Latin America was kept in the dark about Track II in Chile so he was
not able to argue against it and inadvertently deceived the public.
In fact, I would argue that the route of covert operations is often
chosen precisely to avoid the bureaucratic and public debate which our
Presidents and their closest advisers come to despise. That is precisely
what is wrong with them. Our Presidents should not be able to conduct
in secret operations which violate our principles, jeopardize our
rights, an.d have not been subject to the checks and balances which
normally keep policies in line.
You will hear, I am sure, various proposals to cure these evils by
better forms of control. Such proposals are important. well-intentioned
and certainly far better than the status quo. but I have come
to believe that they cannot succeed in curing the evils inherent in having
a covert capability. The only weapon that opponents of a Presidential
policy, inside or outside the executive branch, have is public
debate. If a policy can be debated openly, then Congress may be persuaded
to constrain the President and public pressure may force a
change in policy. But if secrecy is accepted as the norm and as legitimate,
then the checks put on covert operations can easily be ignored.
Let me conclude by violating my self-imposed rule to draw only on
cases in the assassination report and discuss some rumored current
covert operations. I ask you to assume (since I assume that the Committee
is not prepared to confirm) that the United States now has
underway a major program of intervention in Angola and a plan to
create an independent Azores Repuhlic should that prove "necessary".
I ask you to consider how the Congress and the public would treat these
proposals if they were prespnted openly for public debate. Cong-ress
could, in principle, vote publicly to send aid to one side in the AnJ!Olan
civil war as other nations are doin~ and we could publicly invite the
people of the Azores to choose independence and gain our support.
523
But because we maintain a covert operations capability and because
such operations are permitted, the President can avoid debate in the
bureaucracy and with the Congress and the public. We can be drawn
deeply into commitments without our consent and have actions taken
on our behalf that we have no opportunity to stop by public pressure
or to punish at the polls.
Mr. Chairman, in response to the position I have outlined briefly
this morning, one is confronted with a parade of hypothetical horribles-
the terrorists with the nuclear weapons, a permanent oil embargo
and the like. To these I would reply in part that such scenarios
seem implausible and should they occur the likelihood that covert
capabilities could make an important difference also seems remote.
As to the consequences of legislating a total prohibition in light of
the possible unexpected catastrophe, I am content to call your attention
back to the committee's excellent treatment of this issue in your
assassination report.
This country is not, in my view, in such dangerous peril that it need
continue to violate its own principles and ignore its own constitutional
system to perpetuate a capability which has led to assassination attempts,
to perjury, and to the subversion of all that we stand for at
home and abroad. We are secure and we are free. Covert operations
have no place in that world.
E. RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE HARVARD UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE OF
POLITICS, STIJDY GROUP ON INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITIES, FOR REFORM
IN THE CoNDUCT OF COVERT OPERATIONS AND SECRET INTELLIGENCE
TO PROTECT THE BASIC INTEREST AND INTERNATIONAL STANDING OF
THE UNITED STATES
Additional safeguards are needed to govern intelligence collection
and covert operations in respect to activities that can discredit (1) the
United States' objectives, principles and interests; (2) private individuals
and institutions within the United States (in addition to
constitutional protections) ; and (3) foreign and international institutions
and persons important to the United States. Because of the
secret character of these activities, a "surrogate" system of safeguards
must be established for the normal safeguards of public scrutiny and
open debate accompanying overt government activities. These surrogate
procedures include the promulgation of basic guidelines, the
strengthening of review and approval procedures within the executive
branch, and the proper functioning of the congressional oversight
function.
We believe that some capacity for covert operations needs to be
preserved and available in snitable circumstances.1 Thus, such operations
should not be abolished or prohibited completely, but should be
better regulated and supervised. It is not easy to prescribe rigid rules
regarding covert operations. Within limits what is suitable or even
permissible will vary with circumstances. Measures which should not
be undertaken in peace time or against a democratic state might be
permissible during actual or threatened hostilities or against a totalitarian
regime. Thus, it would be unwise to freeze safeguards by the
rigidity of legislative prohibitions. There is need for some flexibility
to adjust to circumstances and to modify rules and procedures according
to changes in conditions and experience. Guidelines to govern
covert operations should thus be incorporated into executive orders
in preference to legislation. The Congress should direct the executive
branch to promulgate such orders and might propose the areas they
should cover.
1. Principle8 to Govern Covert Operati0118, and to Govern Secret 111.telliqence
and Counterintelligence to the Extent That the Principle8
Are Applicable
a. Covert operations must be consistent with, and in support of,
openly announced policies and objectives which have been established
by the normal processes of government.
b. At best, covert operations can provide tactical support for longterm
national policies openly arrived at and openly executed.
1 Morton Halperin believes that no clandestine operations should be permitted.
(524)
525
c. Covert operations must not be used as a convenient escape from
public review, nor to circumvent overt procedures for policy approval
where it is possible to accomplish the objective by overt means.
d. Covert operations in peace time should ordinarily be directed
to actions which will basically contribute to the strengthening of open
societies and to the resolution of international conflicts.
e. Some covert operations can only be justified in war or near-war
situations where the security of the United States is directly involved,
and where both the probability of exposure and the price of exposure
are much less than in peace time.
f. In the present situation, large-scale operations, such as the support
of guerrilla forces, which can neither be kept secret nor plausibly
denied, should not be undertaken covertly.
g. No covert operations shall be undertaken with the objective of
assassination, murder, terrorism or mass destruction (such as creating
epidemics or causing food shortages) . No clandestine support shall be
given knowingly to political or other groups for such purposes, and
positive efforts shall be made to prevent any support provided by the
United States from being used by others for such purposes. No covert
support, advice or assistance will be given to police or other forces
used for internal security purposes that systematically use torture,
concentration camps, etc. On the other hand, covert relationships have
in the past been used to moderate the activities of foreign security
forces, and this should not be prohibited. The receipt of information
from foreign security forces would not, of course, be barred, but the
provision of information to them about their "targets" would be. There
is not a consensus on this point; some believe that it is too narrow in
application (since funds given covertly or overtly for other purposes
would free resources for the tortures) ; others believe it is impractical,
given the need to exchange information and contacts with foreign
services regardless of their unsavory domestic practices.
h. Covert operations shall not be used to subvert the results of the
democratic processes of other countries. (1) This principle would not,
in itself, bar covert fundin~ of open ,political parties or organizations
where the opposition is receiving foreign funds. However, in countries
with democratic processes, covert operations should be restricted to
backing organizations with genuine prior existence and support within
the country; they shall not be used to create I2:roups which would not
exist on any significant scale without U.S. backing. (2) This principle
will not, in itself, bar covert operations where the government in
power-though initially democratically installed-is clearly engaged
in destroying those processes. However, the other limitations on covert
activities would remain in force.
i. Covert acts of war (coup-staging, guerrilla support, terrorism,
training of mercenaries, aerial bombing) should not be undertaken
except with congressional approval exercised through the Oversight
Committee or Committees (since War Powers Act requires Congressional
approval of overt acts of war).
j. Members or employees of private organizations whose integrity
can be regarded as major independent national assets should not be
used to provide cover for covert agents; nor should such organizations
526
themselv~ be.used as veh~cles for covert operations. The losses, through
compromIse, In the publIc acceptance of these groups as independent
private activities or as overt government activities, is almost always
far greater than the gain from using them as cover for intelligence
agents. The types of organizations which should be included in such
prohibition are:
-religious organizations;
-the press;
-charitable and educational foundations;
-universities and colleges;
-the Peace Corps and similar government agencies; and,
-any person who is abroad as a scholar, teacher or adviser with
overt U.S. Government support.
This prohibition should not exclude such organizations or individuals
from transmitting information to overt or covert agencies of the
government when it is gained through the normal activities of theseorganizations.
13. Procedures for Approval of Oovert Operations by the Executive
Branch
The procedures of the executive branch for review and approval
of covert activities must be strengthened. Since it is recognized that
in the world in which we live, not all activities of the government can
or should be conducted in the full light of public disclosure, a "surrogate"
must be established for the normal public scrutiny and open
debate accompanying over government actions.
Th() surrogate procedures must be rigorously defined and followed,
and must be equivalent to the impartial scrutiny and iudgment that
is applied to overt policies through executive branch review and
public consideration, congressional debate and legislative action. We
recommend that no clandestine action (including not only covert operations
but also major secret intelligence projects) should be undertaken
except pursuant to the following:
a. The President should appoint a permanent Spef"ial Committee
to examine and advise on all clandestine activities. The members of
the committee should be publicly identified and the Chairman should
be appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. It should
have a small, independent staff.
b. This Special Committee should be composed of persons of broad
intemational or public poliey judgment and experience, or both. They
should have the freedom from personal political eommitments and
ambitions and should have sufficient time ava·ilable to examine any
proposed action with whatever degree of time and attention is required
to evaluate both the likelihood and the long-term and short-term
implications of either success or failure. Further. they should be able
to review in whatever depth necessary the intelligence estimates underlying
the proposed action -and independently assess the likelihood
of success and the likelihood of exposure. They need not be full time
but they should not have other government responsibilities.
527
,c. All proposals for covert operations should be submitted to the
Special Committee in writing and should:
(1) state the objectives and the specific actions planned;
(2) show the conformity to the executive order guidelines
and overt U.S. policies;
(3) assess alternative overt means available;
(4) appra,ise the prospects for success and the consequences
of either success or failure.
d. Any such proposal should be submitted to the Special Committee
for appraisal before submission to the President. He should not
authorize any such action before he receives the report from the Special
Committee showing those approving, those dissenting, and those
absent. The Report should make specific findings as to compliance with
the guidelines. No proposed action should be undertaken until specifically
approved by the President in writing. If he decides to approve
the proposal, despite the objection of the majority of a Special Committee,
he should set forth his reasons for acting contrary to their
advice.
e. The Special Committee shall periodically review all on-going
covert operations and major secret intelligence activities to ensure that
the original justifications remain valid and that the activities shall
conform to the executive order ~uidelines and should report their
findings to the President. The committee should be required to approve
continuation, at each review, failing which approval, the President
would be required to re-authorize the operation, and should advise the
Special Committee of his reasons.
f. Exceptions: When the United States is engaged in hostilities, or
is endangered by imminent hostilities or other major threats to its
security, the President may approve of specific covert operations directed
against the enemy, potential enemy, or other source of threat
contrary to the guidelines if he makes explicit findings in writing
regardin~the conditions justifyin~ the action and files them both with
the Special Committee and Oversight Committee of Congress.
S. The Role and FunctWn8 of Oonqres8ional Oversiqht Oommittee
a. The function of Congressional Oversight should ideally be centralized
in a single joint committee of Congress, but at most in one
committee in each branch of the Congress, in order to minimize
duplicating or overlapping responsibilities with present standing
committees. .
b. Our stndv group believes that. in principle. the Oversight Committee
should be informed of any proposed covert operation before it
is undertaken and should be provided with the evaluation of the operation
and recommendations of the Special Committee in the executive
branch which is recommended above. However, the viability of the
princinle of advance notification will denend in the long run on the
rules for secrecv the Congress imposes on itself and on the effectiveness
of these rules in preventing unauthorized disclosure of secret and
sensitive information.
528
Note by Robert Pursley: The Oversight Committee should attempt
to ensure that the intelligence community is (1) doing the job
effectively; (2) perform.ing efficiently, i.e., costs and benefits are
balanced; and (3) acting consistently with foreign policy.
Comment by the Chairman:
I believe all members of the study group "'ould agree with this.
However, since there was not time to consult them, the statement
is included as a note rather than in the text.
4. Organizati01Ull Alternatives for the Clandestine Services
a. Alternatives.-There are four alternatives for location of the
clandestine services (CS) of the CIA (in this outline the term clandestine
services is used in preference to either DDO or DDP in order
to avoid confusion) :
1. State Department-The CS could be moved to the State
Department and either be consolidated with State Department
functions or be organized as a quasi-independent agency
under a State Department umbrella (the ACDA model).
2. Department of Defense-The CS could be made a civilian
operating agency of the Department of Defense reporting to
the Secretarv of Defense.
3. Independent Agency-The CS could be established as an
entirely independent agency" of Government reporting to the
President through the Nahonal Security Council.
4. Status Quo-The CS could be maintained as pa,rt of a
central intelligence function. Presumably its size and mission
would be reduced.
b. Assumptio-r.-8.-To discuss the above options rationally, one must
make certain assumptions about the future need of the United States
for CS. This outline assumes that we will want to maintain: a clandetsine
collection capacity; an international counterintelligence capability;
-and an ability to engage in some traditional covert action functions,
but that the actual level of covert action will be drastically
reduced. It also assumes that we will want our clandestine collection,
counterintelligence and covert action capacities to be targeted as
efficiently as possible and controlled as tightly as possible. Further, it
is assumed that such functions will benefit from improved cover and
other safeguards to clandestinity.
c. A Note on the Clandestine Services.-
1. General public opinion stimulated by the Agee book,
etc., seems to be that the CIA has engaged in practically
wanton intervention in the domestic political affairs of other
countries and that this intervention has been a self-sustaining
goal of our foreign policy. For the most part, American
"intervention" has been motivated by a desire to thwart
rea~ or predicted intervention by others-the Soviet Union,
Chma, Cuba. Arguably om policy has been as much or more
"counter-interwntionist," as "interventionist."
2. It is often forgotten that the CS is not organized solely
on geographic lines. A Soviet Bloc division has traditional1y
stationed case officers in any country there is a Soviet
529
"presence." The chief purpose 0 f these " speC'la1'ISts" has been
to monitor the activities of their KGB counterparts, Informed
(though not necessarily unbiased) sources report. th~t
"detente" has brought no abatement of KGB actIVIty m
Europe, Japan or ~he ~ess developed countries. This "KGB
matching and momtormg" functIOn should probably be at
the core of any future CS. . . .
3. Other appropriate roles for the C~ mclude I?omtormg
the activities of mternationally operatmg terrOrlst groups
and exploring third world political intentions regarding economic
controls of scarce natural resources.
4. The above functions cannot readily or completely be
carried out by overt United States representatives abroad.
Such representatives are constrained, as a general proposition,
to relations with esta~lishedelements in .the host country.
Clandestine representatIves can more readIly explore the
plans of opposition elements. Further, CS officers have ~arried
out important liaison functions with intelligence servIces
of host countries. It is assumed that such liaison should be
continued through the CS.
d. A Note about Organization.-The CIA is frequently discussed
as though it has two component parts-a CS and a directorate of
intelligence, which does analysis, estimating and intelligence production
(DDP/DDO and DDI). In point of fact, the Agency traditionally
has operated with four directorates. In addition to the DDI
and the CS, there have been a support directorate (DDS) and a directorate
chiefly concerned with science and technology (DDS&T).
The DDS contains a very substantial communications component
which not only handles communications for the CIA but also, in
many parts of the world, for the State Department. The DDI has
contained two major "collection" functions-the Foreign Broadcast
Information System (FBIS) and the Domestic Contact Service
(DCS). The latter, which overtly contacts Americans who travel
abroad in order to pick their brains regarding foreign technical and
economic developments has been an important source of intelligence.
Any rational plan for "divorcing" the CS and the DDI must
perforce include consideration of disposition or re-creation of the
functions and capacities which reside in the other two directorates
(the DDS and the DDS&T), as well as the DDI collection functions
(FBIS and DCS).
e. Goals or Prinoiples.-Any scheme of organization for the OS
~h~uld be. based upon cert~in rational goals or principles, though it
IS ImpOSSIble to define prmciples that are entirely consistent with
one another. Some suggested principles are set forth below:
, 1: A responsiv~ and effective inte1li~ence analytic function
IS VIt~1 to the.Umted States-the effectiveness and objectivity
of t~lS functlOn should not be compromised by operational
c(;msI~erations; nor shoulrl its ability to gain the widest posSIble
mput be jeopardized by stigmatization which may result
from proximity to covert activities.
, 2. The reg,uirements of the analytic function should be readIly
commumcated to the clandestine collector. Likewise, the
530
product of the clandestine collection system should b2 readily
communicated to the intelligence analyst.
3. When appropriate, the President and other policymakers
should receive raw clandestine intelligence from an agency
that is as disinterested a. conduit as possible.
4. The CS should be insulated from political misuse or from
Presidential zeal, real or apparent.
5. Clandestine functions should be made as accountable as
possible to public representatives, recognizing that secrecy can
be a legitimate operational imperative.
6. The "cover" under which clandestine collectors operate
should be preserved or improved.
7. The location of the CS should enable continuing evaluation
of the relative merit of human intelligence as opposed to
technical intelligence.
f. The following is an evaluation of the pros and cons of various
alternative locations for the CS in light of the assumptions, organizational
considerations and goals discussed above.
1. The State Department Opticmra.
Pro'8
(i) Might create better unity of foreign service and clandestine
reporting, reducing redundancy of effort.
(ii) Might enable better integration of intelligence and foreign
policy requirements in general.
(iii) Would enable establishment of independent intelligence analytic
function without overlay of operational concerns.
(iv) Would involve placing State's communications back in the
State Department.
b. Con'8
(i) Traditional jealously or suspicion of foreign service officers toward
their CS counterparts might cause substantial bureaucratic
friction.
(ii) Insulation from political aberration (e.q., the McCarthy period)
which in the past had not existed for the State Department
might no longer exist for the CS.
(iii) To the extent the CS is called on to perform "covert" functions,
the "taint" which these functions are said to place upon the
intelligence analytic function could, in effect, be transferred to the
entire foreign affairs establishment of the United States Government.
(iv) There may be a penalty in terms of responsiveness of collection
to intelligence requirements if clandestine collectors and intelligence
analysts are "divorced."
(v) To the extent the CS collects important intelligence information
which contradicts DOD perceptions, DOD might claim CS is
infected with a "State Department" bias.
2. The Defeme Department Optio~
a. Pro'8
(i) In terms of size, the DODconld easily envelop the CS.
(ii) A considerable portion of CS cover is already military in
nature. Thus there might be some marginal improvement in cover.
(iii) Location in the DOD would not result in a "tainting" of the
DOD since it already engages in intelligence and counterintelligence
functions.
531
(iv) Support and R&D functions for CS could readily be merged
with DOD components.
b.Oon's
(i) A Secretary of Defense's span of control is already very wide-query
whether he would have the capacity to give adequate direction
to the CS.
(ii) Might result in an increasing focus on military-to-military intelligence
liaison as opposed to civilian lines of liaison. Such a change
in focus may cause problems for command and control, and potentially
can affect intelligence production.
(iii) Insulation from political zeal might very well be imperfect
because of the traditional military attitude of "can do."
(iv) Civilian control at DOD of military functions is surprisingly
"thin." Presumably the CS, if placed in the Pentagon, would be subject
to civilian rather than military control and would tax an already
overextended group of civilians.
(v) The intelligence reporting of the CS might become tainted by a
military bias, real or perceived.
(vi) Because of the size of the DOD, the thinness of civilian control
over DOD functions, etc., the net result of placing the CS in the
Defense Department might well be to reduce, rather than enhance, CS
accountability to the public and Congress.
3. The bulependent ArJe1WY Opt~
a. Pro's
(i) If it is deemed imperative to split the CS from the intelligence
analytic functions of Government, the independent agency model
would seem preferable to the State Department or Defense Department
models in light of the "cons" outlined above.
(ii) The independent agency would presumably not be a large
agency, at least in relative terms. It might give public assurance that
the national policy is not heing dominated by a clandestine intelligence
colossus.
(iii) Tasking of this agency by the NSO directly might avoid the
bias or inefficiency which might rp-sult in tasking it through the State
Department on the one hand or the Defense Department on the other.
b. Oon's
(i) Cover problems would result. Stateside cover would be difficult
without a broader institutional envelop. The small size of the Agency
might reduce "clout" in seeking cover slots from other Departments.
This fact in turn could create incentives to use of commercial or even
"media" cover with attendant societal costs.
(ii) The new agency would be less insulated from Presidential zeal.
(iii) An entire support mechanism would have to be created for this
new agency.
(iv) Relationships of such an agency to the science and technology
of intelligence collection would be unclear unless it were to have its
own costly R&D function.
(v) It might require its own independent communications function.
4. The Statm Quoa.
Pro's
532
(i) Current location can assure closest tailoring of clandestine activities
to intelligence analytic requirements assuming adequate direction
'and control.
(ii) The status quo is an evolutionary product which may reflect
the wisdom of time.
(iii) It is hard to find a better location.
(iv) Present location is efficient from the point of view of using
extant support, communications and R&D functions.
(v) Present location preserves independence of the clandestine
function from potential military bias.
b. Oon's
(i) The CS has been the dominant directorate in the agency and
without a "divorce" this domination cannot be terminated.
(ii) History demonstrates that the present location inadequately
insulates from the fossibility of Presidential zeal.
(iii) Location 0 clandestine operations in the same agency charged
with analytic and estimative functions may have warped and may
continue to warp the intelligence product.
(iv) The status quo may be intolerable in light of the disclosures of
the Senate Intelligence Committee. One can argue that a shake-up is
needed for the sake of a shake-up.
g. Oonclusions
1. On balance it seems that the status quo, however imperfect, is
preferable than any of the three identified options for change. If the
status quo is maintained, there nonetheless need to be serious changes
within the current organizational arrangement:
a. By executive directive or by legislation, a career CS officer should
be precluded from appointment as the principal intelligence officer of
the U.S. Government.
b. Covert action should be dramatically circumscribed (if it has not
already been as a practical result of the House and Senate intelligence
committees' hearings and other recent disclosures and legislation).
c. The CS should be substantially reduced in size-the CS should be
a more tightly focused operation, focusing on Soviet and Chinese tar·
gets and possible other targets of clear and continuing significance
to the United States national security, such as resource cartels, and
international terrorist activities.
d. To these ends, the CS must be given more rigorous intra- and
inter-agency budget and planning scrutiny. Closer evaluation of the
CS intelligence product needs to be made. DDT and DDS&T analysts
should be required on a quarterly basis, to estimate the usefulness of
CS reporting in terms of its percentage contribution to finished intelligence
produot.
F. RECOMMENDATION OF THE HOUSE SELECT COMMITl'El!J ON
INTELLIGENCE CONCERNING COVERT ACTION
1. The Select Committee recommends that all activities involving
direct or indirect attempts to assassinate any individual and all paramilitary
activities shall be prohibited except in time of war.
2. The Select Committee recommends that as to other covert action
by any U.S. intelligence component, the following shall be required
within 48 hours of initial approval.
a. The Director of Central Intelligence shall notify the Committee
in writing, stating in detail the nature, extent, purpose, risks, likelihood
of success, and costs of the operation.
b. The President shall certify in writing to the Committee that
such covert action operation is required to protect the national security
of the United States.
c. The Committee shall be provided with duplicate originals of the
written recommendations of each member of the 40 Committee or
its successor.
3. All covert action operations shall be terminated no later than
12 months from the date of affirmative recommendation by the 40
Committee or its successor.
(533)
G. AMERICA'S SECRET OPERATIONS: A Pl<:RSPECTIVE
By Harry Rositzke
[From Foreign Affairs Magazine, January, 1975]
I
Thirty-three years after William J. Donovan set up the first genuine
American secret service, and as the first generation of American secret
operations officers fades away into unclassified retirement, the American
Intelligence Service, or AIS,' faces a new Administration, new
tasks in a new non-confrontation world, and new, as well as old, suspicions.
Its belated establishment led initially to a certain amount of
hostility both wirthin the foreign affairs establishment and vis-a-vis the
internal security organization that had come into being after World
War I, and these feelings have never wholly died out. And American
secret operations have developed in their brief career an unenviable
public image as well, both domestically and abroad.
Designed to cope with the Nazi, then the Stalinist, menace, the AIS
has come to be regarded by liberal opinion at home as a haven for
reactionaries and stunted cold warriors, as a sinister secret arm of our
foreign policy, as a rapist of American civil rights and academic
freedom, as co-conspirator with the White House in political skullduggery.
Abroad, "CIA" has become a symbol of American imperialism,
the protector of dictators, the enemy of the Left, the mastermind
of coups and counter-coups in the developing world. It is a strange and
remarkable record for an official institution in a democratic society.
"What is the action record of American secret intelligence? Where
does it stand today? What lies ahead?
II
During 'World War II the Donovan organization attained, on the
whole, a remarkable reputation. Kept out of the Southwest Pacific by
a jealous General MacArthur, yielding Latin American responsibilities
for the time being to the FBI, o~asionallyflawed by the high degree
of individualism Donovan encouraged, the Office of Strategic Services
(OSS) nonetheless rendered signal service in a host of situations. It
left a large legacy not only of trained men but of senior officials convinced
that such operations could be of great importance in supporting
American foreign policy.
For two years after the war the survivors of OSS fought for their
official lives. The former Research and Analysis Unit, essentially overt,
1 I choose this simple term to distinguish the Service sharply from the Central
Intelligence Agency (of which it is a lesser part) and to avoid the glut of titles by
which it has been designated: Special Operations, Policy Coordination, Plans,
Clandestine Services, Operations.
(534)
535
wound up briefly in the State Department, while the secret operations
fended for themselves. In 1947 the two were brought back together
under the umbrella of the Central Intelligence Agency, established by
law in the summer of 1947, a marriage of covert and overt that persists
tQ this day.
Those engaged in secret espionage operations found their main target
within months of the end of the European war: Soviet military
capabilities and intentions. By 1948, as the Berlin blockade signaled
the intensification of the cold war, the overriding purpose of the AIS
was to prO\ide the White House with early warning of Soviet hostilities,
both by strategic bombers and by ground troops through Poland.
In 1946 Washington knew virtually nothing about the U.S.S.R.
Four years of concentration on the Germans and Japanese had left
the Soviet files empty. Air Force resear~hers combed the Library of
Congress to flesh out the bare outlines of bombing target dossiers. Tens
of thousands of Eastern emigres in Europe were interrogated for the
simplest items of basic intelligence: roads, factories, city plans. Intelligence
peddlers sprang up by the dozen to satisfy the American market.
Any ship that visited a Soviet port was a gold mine.
Almost nothing came out of Moscow. A beleaguered embassy and
a few sequestered Western journalists passed on official handouts, read
the press, went nowhere, talked to no one. The Soviet Union, like Hitler's
Fortress Europe, had become a "denied area." Only secret agent
operations carried out by "illegal" entry could penetrate the target area
to provide early warning of an attack and, later, information on Soviet
progress in its atomic program.
For almost ten years, until the mid-1950s, the AIS dispatched agents
into the Soviet Union by air, land and sea from almost every point on
its outer periphery between Scandinavia and Japan. Most were
equipped with radIOS and sent in by air, some to make contact with
resistance groups in the Baltic States and in the Ukraine (where they
survived until the mid-fifties), others to become observers at selected
transportation points to give notice of unusual movement, or to collect
or measure earth and water samples neat: suspect uranium-processing
plants. A few tried to legalize themselves for permanent residence in
urban areas. Agents without radios went on brief in-and-out missions
on foot to observe, photograph, and exfiltrate.
At the same time hundreds of agents were being sent in to cover
military targets in Eastern Europe from bases in adjacent areas.
Border-crossing became the order of the day, easiest from Berlin, more
and more dangerous elsewhere as the barbed wire, plowed strips, and
alarm systems made the Iron Curtain more dense. Agents were sent
in to observe specific airfields or factories, to make contact with old
friends and recruit likely prospects, to establish themselves in strategic
locations, to act as couriers, to service dead drops, etc.
These cross-border operations involved enormous resources of technical
and documentation support, hundreds of training officers, thousands
of safe-houses, and, above all, hundreds of courageous men who
preferred to fight the Russians or the Communists rather than linger
in the DP camps or emigrate to Brazil. Scores of agents paid with their
lives for our concern. All this effort, however wasteful in retrospect,
was demanded by the requirements of the Pentagon and the field com536
manders in Europe. Their demands reflected the almost frantic fear
of a Soviet military move into vVestern Europe, especially after Korea.
With Stalin's death in 1953 and the easing of legal travel into the
Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, the lessening urgency of ground
military requirements, and the increased focus on Soviet political intentions,
the emphasis in AIS operations shifted to the "legal" approach,
the classic form of peacetime penetration. The Soviet official
stationed abroad became one target, as his connection with Moscow
and eventual reassignment to his headquarters made him a source of
the greatest potential value: an in-place agent in or near the corridors
of central power in the Party-government. The main agent source on
Soviet matters during the fifties was a Soviet military officer whose
reporting from 1953 to 1958 provided the U.S. government with
detailed documentary information on strategic as well as tactical military
matters, including the Berlin crisis. He was succeeded in the
crucial years 1961-63 by Colonel Penkovsky, whose coverage of Soviet
missile development was of vital strategic value.
From the late 1950s on, agent coverage of military-industrial targets
within the Soviet Union was gradually superseded by both photographic
and electronic coverage, which in terms of importance and
volume far exceeded reporting through human sources.
American operations against Communist parties during the early
years of the cold war were mainly designed to uncover their sources of
secret funds, to ferret out their underground apparatus, and to establish
their paramilitary capabilities and plans. On the political side,
an occasionally valuable insight into the councils of Party leaders
in Moscow came from their contacts with senior and respected Communist
party leaders abroad.
After the 20th Party Congress in 1956, with the shift from direction
to persuasion in Moscow's relations with foreign parties, more
and more serious political discussions with foreign party leaders took
place in Moscow. Senior party officials from Europe, Asia and Latin
America became a useful source for the political views and regional
intentions of the Soviet leadership. In the past 15 years the penetration
of parties in these areas has served, for example. to supply details
of the Sino-Soviet rift long before it became public, to record the
underlying rationale of Soviet policy toward the Asian subcontinent.
and to monitor the advice given the Arab parties during the various
Near East crises.
From the late fifties the requirements for intelligence coverage
broadened rapidly. Mideast tensions, troubles on the Indian subcontinent,
heady events in Africa, the spurt of Chinese activity abroad
in the mid-sixties. Castro's overseas programs, coups and countercoups
on four continents, the evolving situation in Indochina-all became
grist for Washington's intelligence analysts and targets for
agents' coverage.
The U.S. intelligence community soon became a global city desk
to support the role of global policeman. The policv-makers wanted to
know what was going on everywhere. The intelliQ'ence analysts set
requirements and nriorities that justified the collection of almost any
information. Good researchers are omnivorous, and the man on "Paraguayan
nolitical" wants to know as much ahout goings-on in Asuncion
as the Czech specialist about affairs in Prague. In the intelligence
537
sector, as in the public media, the information explosion brought fast
communication of more information with lesser interest.
Washington intelligence became an all-source glut: millions of
words daily from foreign radio broadcasts, thousands of embassy and
attache reports, a stream of communications intercepts, cartons of
photographs, miles of recorded electronic transmissions-and a handful
of agent reports. More and more, intelligence collection became
dev<Yt:ed to current intelligence, to 'the minutiae of history that fill the
daily and weekly bulletins to keep the policy-makers informed.
The AIS has not been immune to the pressures for such day-to-day
coverage. More and more of its assets have been devoted to reporting
from behind the scenes on current events, and a great deal of its
effort has been expended on the coverage of internal affairs in countries
of the most marginal importance to the U.S. interest. As the
Service became more tactical, and monthly production the yardstick
of accomplishment, it has naturally devoted less time to the strategic
operations that normally take years to develop.
III
Counterespionage operations are the hard (lore and essential resource
of any intelligence service, for their primary purpose is to
assist in guarding the nation's diplomatic and military secrets, including
its own intelligence operations.
In 1946 AIS knowledge of the wartime Soviet intelligence services
was confined to a scattering of names and operations culled from
captured German and Japanese documents, a brief British organizational
study, and a handful of wartime domestic spy cases. The counterespionage
files were rapidly filled in the next ten years with the
names of tens of thousands of Soviet "agents" that poured in from
emigres, intelligence mills. friendlv security services, and AIS contacts.
Anyone a "source" did not like became a Soviet agent: Soviet
officials, Communist partv members, hostile emigre leaders, leftist
politicians, liberal journalists and labor leaders, etc. Most of this
renorting was trash and treated as such.
During the 1950s hard information on the Soviet services and their
operations was gradually built up from direct surveillance. arrested
agents. intelligence defectors, and double-agent operations. Defectors
were the richest source, and in the early sixties served not only to
provide detailed information on Soviet intelligence personnel both
at home and abroad and on the organization of the Soviet intelligence
agencies and their methods of operation, but to identify hundreds
of Soviet agents, mainly in Europe, many in NATO, who were
arrested or monitored for further leads. The impressive list of exposures
of Soviet penetrations of European intelligence services in
the 19608 is directly tra~bleto leads, sometimes explicit, often vague,
from both Polish and Soviet intelligence defectors.
The main counterespionage purpose of the AIS, however, is to
detect and neutralize Soviet operations directed against strategic
U.S. 'targets. Soviet intelligence has made, and continues to make,
a determined effort to plant Or recrnit agents in the policy levels of
State and Defense, and in such intelligence omanizations as t'he National
Security Agency, the CIA and the FBI. Virtually all their
207-932 0 - 76 - 35
538
operations against American targets originate ahroad (they recog'llize
the security and psychological hazards of recruiting an American
official at home), and it has been the task of the AIS to uncover overseas
leads and transmit them to the FBI for follow-up once a recruited
or potential agent returns to the States.
For some years now the KGB, the Soviet civilian service, has carried
on a systematic program to recruit Americans attached to official
installations abroad. It is mainly int~rest,ed in younger personnel,
both file clerks and secretaries with access to classified information
(code clerks are, of course, top priority) and Marine guards who can
be most useful in safe-opening operations or installing concealed microphones.
Some two to three hundred cases of direct approach by a
Soviet officer are reported each year. Upon occasion an American who
is approached may be encouraged to continue the contract if he is
agreeable.
To what extent the KGB has been succ~&'>ful in penetrating federal
agencies is bound to ,be a matter of conjecture. Unfortunately, in
eounterespiona~'e operwt.ions what one can be sure about, what one
lmows about, may be insignificant compared to what one doo..'m"t know
about: the parameters of ignorance are limitless. Only if the' AIS
should secure the cooperation of the American desk chief of the KGB
in Moscow could we say wi,th assurance that there is not a Soviet
agent in X or Y installation in Washington.
If there is such an agent, it is most unlikely that he is being handled
out of the Soviet Embassy in Washington. The principal operational
resource of the Soviet services abroad is not their official re.c;idents
under diplomatic cover, but the "illegals" who have been dispatched
to the West in increasing numbers during the past 15 years. These
illegals, normally well-trained Soviet citizens with false Western
documents and a carefully build-up legendary past, live and act as
normal citizens in their country of residence, and have their own
separate communications with Moscow. They are almost impossible
to uncover by the usual investigative methods. Unless they make a
mistake. or give themselves up (as his assistant resident did to implicate
Colonel Abel), they are as safe as any secret agent in an open
democratic society can be. The search for illegals continues to be a
frustrating priority for both the European and American services.
Meanwhile, the role of some Soviet intelligence officers under diplomatic
cover ("legals") is changing. The highly touteo percentages of
intelligence officials in any overseas Soviet installation-50 percent,
60 percent, 70 percent--ean no longer be equated with the volume of
Soviet espionage or other clandestine activities. More and more, experienced
KGB officials have been assigned in recent years to duties
other than running spies and working secretly with student and labor
leaders.
Soviet diplomatic requirements in politi.cal, economic. trade and
propaganda matters have grown dramatically since Khrushrhl'v's day..
and have outstripped the capaeity of the Soviet Forpign Office. Experienced
KGB officers are now often assigned to work as di.plomats
devoted to making friends in the Soviet interest without breaking the
law. They are now, both in New York and in the great cities of Europe,
hard at work developing friendly contacts with persons of influence
539
across the spectrum of pubHc and private eHtps: politicians of the
Center and the Right as well as the Left, labor leaders of all political
complexions, key editors and journalists of all hues, and prominent
members of the business and hanking communities.
These Soviet contacts can be loosely called agl'nts, but not spies.
They are "agents of influence," persons who can sway national decisions
on truck-assembly plants, loan terms, or Siberian investment
projects in the Soviet interest. The new Soviet "diplomats," knowledgeable,
sophisticated, linguisticnlly competent. are earning their
ke€p far better than by running a handful of spies in military establishments
that have few secrets left. The KGB has become for Washington
a diplomatic service to comppte with as well as an espionage
service to counter.
The Soviet services remain a formidable adversary on the espionage
front. Their overall investment in secret work abroad has not declined
since the days of "capitalist encirclement," and even today their operational
personnel, both legals and iIlegals, number at least five times
those of the American and European services combined. Ironically, as
more and more military, technical and industrial information in the
'Western world has become freely available to Moscow, Soviet recruitment
efforts against American and Enropean targets have increased.
IV
No chapter in the history of the CIA is as public or controversial
as its covert action program. When, in 1948. spurred by the Communist
takeover in Czechoslovakia and the Italian political crisis. the
National Security Council gave the CIA the responsibility for "politicaL
ps:v('holo~ical, economic, and unconventional warfare operations,"
the straightforward espionag-e mission of the AIS was enormously
broadened. if not distorted. Known within the Service as "the PP
mission," and originally carried out by a separate operating component
within the CIA (the Offiee of Policy Coordination), these action
operations and the new personnel responsible for them were soon integrated
into the espionatre and counterespiona~eservice. This merger
hRd a significant and enduring effect on the conduct and public image
of Ameriean secret operations.
The cold war rationale for the covert. aetion mission was simple:
help stop the Russians. With Soviet troops poised to overrun Western
Europe and "intrrnRtional communism" threate.ning the "free world"
in Francp and Italy, GrePee, Iran, Vietnam and China, with the militarv
est.ahlishment severely reduced and State's diplomatic initiative
stalemated, the White House gave its own new "secret arm" the offensive
mission to fight the Russians with their own weapons.
H the size of Soviet intelligence operations can be estimated as
rOllghly five times the size of their "TestPrn counterpRrts. the comparative
scale of Soviet clandestine political operations has been even
more disproportionate. The use for front organizations, an old Soviet
staph>. rosp to n('w heights in th(' lat!' Stalin period, and throug-h
thpm. as well as b~T direct subsidies to Communist parties and labor
unions. the Soviets poured vast resources into the attempt to install
('nmmllnist or fripndlv leftist governments in Europe. in Asia and in
Llltin Ameril'a. An importnnt llfiiunet WllS tlw 118e of wiiler prov
540
aganda-type organization to sell the Soviet line and to denounce
the West, especially the United States. The danger posed by these activities
in the 1950s was not an illusion, and "covert action" became a
popular expedient for taking American initiatives in the cold war
without obvious official involvement. Presidents from Truman to
Nixon were not reluctant to use it.
The secret offensive was three-pronged:
(1) To attack the enemy of his own terrain by supporting interIUlI
resistance movements (in the Ukraine, the Baltic States, Poland, and
Albania) ; by supporting anti-Soviet or anti-Russian emigres abroad,
especially in Europe; by weakening the morale of the Soviet citizenry
through propaganda delivered over the air (Radio Free Europe, Radio
Liberty) , by balloons, or through rumor campaigns.
(2) To contain, or roll back, "communism" in the ",free world" by
subverting Communist, crypto-Communist, or radical leftist governments
(the labels were attached by the National Security Council)
in Iran, in Guatemala, and, finally, in Cuba; by supporting nonCommunist
governments threatened by Communists in the Third
World, culminating in Laos and South Vietnam; and by supporting
"democratic" parties, labor unions, and intellectuals mainly in Europe
during the shaky 1950s, and in Latin America during the 19608. The
case of Chile exemplifies the full range of political action operations
from all-out support of a "friendly" Frei government to covert, as well
as overt, actions designed to weaken an "unfriendly" Allende regime.
(3) To counter Soviet propaganda and international Communist
fronts on the global scene bv founding and :funding publications, supporting
anti-Communist editors and journalists. and orchestrating international
propaganda campaigns; by building up "democratic"
front organizations to counter the Communist fronts among students,
youth. teachers, labor, etc. ; by subsidizing American student and labor
organizations to fight the Communist fronts abroad; by penetrating
and upstaging Communist-organized Wrorld Peace meetings, youth
rallies, and assemblies.
This broad assortment of propaganda, political and paramilitary
operations WAS !tssigned to the i"ecret intelligence service in order to
hide their official sponsorship. The operations themselves. of couri"e,
from radios to invasions, were public events. The task was to cut the
line from sponsor to actor, or at least to obscure it enough to place
Washington in a position to deny official participation with a straight
face.
("Plausible denial" wac; an oft-used phrase in the 19508. and much
ingenuit.y went into the planning of cover-stories or alternate explanations
for proposed operations. Yet it was. even then. a hollow
phrase, for it was impossible to dpny ope.rations that were exposed.
In some, mainly large-scale naramilitary operations (thp, Guatemalan
and Cuhan inyasions), denial was incredible. In others (the fllndin,C! of
Radio Free Europe). denial was implausible or pointless. Still others
(support of the National Studpnt Association) were undeniable when
blown by particinants. It is rlifficnlt to say in each case for whose
bpnefit tI1P operations were to he denied. The Rnssians? Our allies?
TIl{' AmPrican public? World opinion?
It is simnle enon~h to say now that what was worth doing in the
1950s (and early 1960s) should have been done openly-we conld
541
have invaded Cuba as we did the Dominican Republic, subsidized antiCommunist
radios and publications openly as we do now, ,and so on.
Yet the arguments against such a course at the time were not trivial
or without merit. With the Soviets managing to conceal their hand on
many occasions, a public American response would have led to the
application, to America's grave disadvantage, of the double standard
that many in the world have all along been inclined to apply to Soviet
and American actions. And, for a time, the anti-Communist
sentiment of the Congress and public was so undiscriminating that
would have been impossible to conduct, under the open eye of both,
the kind of reasonably sophisticated operations needed to appeal to
important forces abroad that would not accept the full range of
American views or practices, yet were determined to resist being taken
over by Communist forces.
As the years passed, these initial reasons largely lost their force,
and it was a cardinal mistake not to have reacted to the change in
circumstances before exposure finally forced the government's hand in
the mid-sixties. Thus, the NSC assignment of the charter for covert
action operations to the CIA has served to bring both the AIS and
the CIA as a whole into the public disrepute it now enjoys. There is
little point in arguing whether the White House was right. or wrong
in using the CIA as the "third leg" of our foreign policy mechanism.
The cold war Presidents who allowed the Departments of State and
Defense to shunt distasteful operations off on the "secret arm"- and
the CIA Directors who, eagerly or reluctantly, accepted these incompatible
tasks-felt. the stakes requiring action were high, As time
went by, however, they ignored not only the need for change but the
drastic impact of lumping "noisy" action missions with secret intelligence
operations. What was always an uneasy pairing became in
time a self-defeating amalgam of disparate missions, and the damage
not only to the reputation of the CIA but to the conduct of secret
inteUigence became progressively more serious.
v
In assessing the present and future state of the AIS, its action
responsibilities provide the crucial matter for debate and decision.
Covert action operations have declined steadily since the early 19608
outside of Indochina. Under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, the
use of covert methods to support particular candidates for office, or
a.spirants for power, in nations' abroad became the rare exception, and
today the practice has virtually died out-so that the· ratio of charge
to reality, in this area at least, is now extremely high. Yet the CIA
charter remains in force and AIS action capabilities still exist. It
is covert action psychololrical, paramilitary and political-that raises
not only pragmatic but political and moral issues.
PsvchololricaI warfare operations not only do not belong in a secret
service, but they are an anachronism in today's world. They should
be discontinued.
Paramilitary operations pose a more serious question. That the
United States must keep a paramilitarv capibility in being for wartime
use will probably not be questioned by most observers. What has
542
become clear, however. is that a secret intelligence service is not the
mos~ suita:b~e v('hicle fur running paramilitary operations. "With the
specIal prIvIlegE's granted it by Congress, the CIA has been able to
develop a highly efficient logistics machinery for moving personneL
equipment and funds rapidly and secretly around the world. It has
therefore been called upon to cany out even large-scale paramilitary
programs that would more logically fall to the Department of Defense.
There is little reason why the paramilitary charter should not be
transferred to Defense, where all three services have appropriate
specialized peI"Sl"ilJlel, equipment and training facilities in being. All
that is needed to make Defense effective in covert operations is to
convert a small sec"tion of its command structure into a special operating
unit which can he given cOll!!ressional authority to move funds,
pforsonnd and eqmpment outsiJe the bureaucratic system. This 1'1'assignlnfnt
of responsibility would also bring future paramilital'y
olwrations \liJdd' estaLlislwd congres~iollal oversight and revie\v..
If the AIS \\\:'1'1' to be s( rippe,d of Its psychological and paramilitary
ope rations, it could agaiu bet:ome a truly secret service even if it
l'pLl1Tled a mor:lJfied l"espolbihility for political act ir,n.
Here, in the sphere of scuet political action, the moral-political
'{l~.,~U';lI <tPl)Cill,; to out\\(,jgh the pj:agmatic. How far :"hould one
nat (eHl Inlerfere in the internal affairs of another nat j,jll?
In practice every major nation interferes daily in the affairs of
nth]' !latiow;: by military and economic aid (or its denial), diploInatie
arguments, short -\Va\e broadca~is,fellolVships and 'travel grants,
etc. In slwrt, vVashington, like :YIosco\V, is in this broad sense interfering
all over the world all the time.
The more realistic way to phrase the issue is perhaps: to illterfere
w:i'f'efly. And here no clear line can be drawn, for much of our official
interf('reIH:e is secret: for example, the ~\Illbassador's or military
attache's private com-crsa.tion w:t It a local politician, labor leader,
or gell('rat Perhaps the issue should be even 1I10lY narmwly phrased:
to inteden: with money, Yet money is invulved in Illany acceptable
forms of inu>rnational dealings--travel grants, say, or Ameriean fello\\"
ships. Perhaps the issue finally becomes; to interfere \Yith 8tG'f'et
mOllcy. Put in its most loaded form: should vYashington bribe a foreil-'
ll politician or labor leader to act in the American interest?
IIer~\ tlw line between "rig'ht" a.nd "wrong" becomes doudy indeed.
1Vhen do privat<~ understandings with a chief of strrtfll)('(,oll1e sinister?
'Vhen d()~s the passage of money or air tickets become bribery? It is
at this 1"v(>] that tlJC moral issue ha.s to be settled if it ever \Yill be-for
noninterferenee is one of the vaguer terms in the ,-ocabulary of corxistence.
It \l'as proposed in a recent issue of this journal that the government
"should abandon publicly all covrrt onerations dpsigned to inf1llf'nC(\
political results in forei,s..'1l cOllntries" and restore the American
Senice to its orig-inal intelligence rnission.2 I would as.<;ent to this
proposition with one exception and with one caveat.
The caveat first. If the Presldent announces rmblic]y that thr CIA
will no longer carry out secret political opentions, no one will be-
':\i<'1;"la~ deB, KatzenlJ11Ch, "F"n·ih'll Polky Puhlit' Opinion alld ::;ea('cy."
Foreign Affairs, October 1973,
543
]icw him~'l1otthe Russians. not om friends and foes around Hw globe.
nott he .\ nWl'ic:1ll ])ublic or press. "CIA~' has lwcome as much a symbol
of American imperialism abrofld and of sec-ret §.(()\'ernnlPn:t at llOrne
as the KGB h:1S become, with AlllPric:lll assistance, the symbol of
Sovjpt imrwrialism and domestic rl'])ressio11. It is far too uselnl a symhoI
for anyone to gin' 11T'. :md no 01\" ~\Yi11. A p11hlic statement that the
U.S. government has now returned to the path of pristine dpmocratic
practicps would hl' a ql1ixotic~ if not a slightly hamiliating~ gesture.
The exception is marl' controversial. Propagnnda and paramil1tary
operations do not belong ,in a secret service-even if they are worth
<laing-nor, un<ler today's conditions, do secret opemtions de,<;igned to
sway elections or to overturn governments. Yet the kind of clandestine
cont~3('ts that are still requirpd, simply to keep on top of complex and
important situations, cannot on occasion avoid having political overtones.
The justification is, as it has been, to combat what remains the
WIry large politic~d -activity ofth() S,),'iets and their allies Their largeS('
ale support for polit5cal elements in many countries of the world
often leaves opposing non-Communist pol iticlll figures naked and without
arl~qunte eupport. For tlw Fnitcd Sta,tes to stay in close touch with
such el€ments is an elementary prf;'~aution, and there will continue to
be occasions when support of a few individuals for intelligence purposes
cartnot (and should not) be separated frQm a measure of support
for their political end!';. There is little reason to rob the President-or
the local Ambassador-of the chance to provide confidential support
to a politician or labor J'eader who cannot afford to accept American
largesse publicly.
Nor can we avoid the occ'<lsional political impli~tionsof intelligence
liltison relationships with the secret services of other countries, the
great bulk of whieh are wit h friendly nations whose services are under
proper democratic control. In some cases such liaison has bee,n eondueted
with governments whose independence has seemed, as a matter
of national policy, to outweigh their failure to live up to democratic
norms. It is inevitable that on occasion such governments will turn, by
our standards, very sour indeed, as in the case of the Greek colonels,
and it is a regrettable fact that an intelligence liaison aimed at external
targets can then place the United States in the position of 'being attacked
for an unintended degree of support for the local government.
The key point here, however, is that intelligence liaison, like military
or economic aid, is part of overall nationa.l policy, and reflects that
policy: it does not normally operate in a vacuum. Indeed, in a few
ca-ses thisservice-to-service relationship has become the sale channel
of communi<'lLtion with 'Washington for t\ g'Owrnment that h'lS- cut
off diplomatic relations.
Two fundamental questions face the AIS today: can it remain
a professional service and can it become a truly secret service ~ Neither
question can be isolated from a consideration of its structure and
its mission.
Relatively modest and independent in its beginnings (as the Office
of Special 0Pf'rations), the AIS donblpd. then tripled in size with
the creation of a parallel action office (Policy Coordination) and in
thp oYerall post-Korean expansion. It went the way of the entire intelligence
communit~·: a large hureaucracy with large staffs, interminable
coordination, and conntless echelons of df'.cision·making.
544
The lethargy and timidity normal to a civil service bureaucracy
exact a particularly heavy cost in an intelligence service where taking
chances based on personal judgment is its main business. A Service
is as good as its agents, and its agents are as good as the competence and
initiative of the case-officer on the spot. Faced with a hypercautious,
if not anxious, headquarters, the case-officer soon learns not to take
chances. He plays it safe by keeping the bread-and-butter agents he
has and not invading dangerous new ground-like the local foreign
office or security service. The Service suffers.
As the AIS grew in size, it also became more and more closelv integrated
into the large-scale civil service bureaucracy that is the Central
Intelligence Agency. Relatively independent at its inception, with
its own administrative support structure, the AIS gradually became
dependent on the CIA for its logistics, staff recruitment and training,
personnel and accounting procedures, etc. Its integration into the
Agency was capped by the move of all CIA components into a single
headquarters building in Langley, Virginia, a move strongly opposed
by many senior AIS personnel on security grounds. This objection was
overruled with the assurance that the larger overt Agency elements
would provide useful cover for the secret operators. Too many people
inevitably came to know more than they needed to know about agent
sources as compartmentalization broke down in the togetherness of
researchers, administrators, and operators.
These and other considerations have led some AIS officers over the
years to raise the notion of a separate truly &',cret intelligence service.
The aim is a small elite professional service devoted exclusively to recruiting
high-level agents against carefully selected long-term strategic
targets. There would be no pressures for current production, no wholesale
reporting requirements, no leaks to analyst-s, journalists or Soviet
officials, no bureaucracy to hold up recruitment, no vast intelligence
community to "service." Its foreign operatives would live under private,
mainly commercial cover, reporting by unofficial communications
to a small head office in, say, New York, whose anonymous chief would
be directly responsible to the Director of Central Intelligence in his
capacity as the President's head of the intelligence community.
The present Operations Directorate of the CIA would remain the
integral part of the intelligence community it has becomp-. It. cannot,
be extracted from its present structure--as, for example, it would
be administratively simple to extract the Federal Bureau of Investigation
from the Department of .Justice. Nor should it be. Although the
Operations Directorate would no longer be depended upon to provide
agent coverage of strategic intelligence targets, it would continue
to function abroad on a reduced scale and with a more innocuous mission:
to maintain liaison with local security and intelligence services,
to protect the Embassy from hostile penetration, to handle agent or
defector walk-ins. It would also serve as a channel for confidential
communications between the Ambassador and the President or between
the host government and the State Department, and supplv 101"1\1 Rllnport
for other elements of the intelligence community, inc1udin2: the
National Security A2:ency. the military services and the FBI. Wherever
feasihle, and with deference to the sensitivitip-s of the local situation,
the CIA station chief might be overtly accredited as the CIA rep545
resentative. He would, in any event, act as the Ambassador's overall
assistant for intelligence matters.
However quixotic on the surface, a small American secret service
separate from the federal bureaucracy is not at all impracticalgiven
the will in high places. The concept of such a service is not too
far removed from the Soviet system of illegals: carefully selected
personnel, hand-tailored communications, small-scale operations, select
priority targets. It would remain professional and secret.
(The present Central Intelligence Agency, shorn of its strategic
espionage mission, wOllld not be affected in its structure or main
functions. It would continue to carry out its overt and technical collection
operations, to provide its extensive services of common concern
to the entire intelligence community, and to do current and in-depth
analysis and research. It would, above all, continue to focus on its
main central function-to give the White House intelligence estimates
on situations and trends abroad that are as objective as men can make
them. Only an agency exclusively concerned with intelligence can
avoid the intrusion of bias into honest judgments that comes from
the pressure in the Departments of State or Defense to support a specific
diplomatic tack or a larger military budget.)
This proposal would simplify the vexing issue of congressional
oversight. With overt and unexceptionable covert activities more
clearly separted from truly covert ones, the supervision of the CIA
itself would be substantially freed of the fear of exposing those operations
that almost all members of Congress agree should remain
secret. Present committees could thus operate more effectively. The
truly secret operations of the AIS might best be reviewed by an ad
hoc group of the top majority and minority members of the key committees
who would weigh the policy implications, not the operating
details, of the secret program.
Setting up a separate espionage service is only one side, and the
simpler side, of the problem. What would be its mission? What targets
would it be directecl to cover that would justify its cost?
Sensibly limiting information requirements could halve the size of
the intelligence community devoted to collection. Only against a clearcut
yardstick of essential information can a congressional oversight
group or a presidential advisory group measure the effectiveness of
our intelligence effort. (With covert psychological warfare a relic of
the past, with paramilitary operations (if any) handled by the Pentagon
and subject to the usual con~ressional scrutiny, with secret political
actions carried out onlv at the express direction of the National
Security Council, there would remain only the espionage and counterespionage
operations of the new AIS for the Con~rl'ss to "oversee."
And here the task should be to test performance by the product: raw
agent reports measured against the government's requirements.)
Requirements properly come from outside the intelligence community.
Intelli~ence exists to serve the decision-makers, and agent
reports (ideally) fill the rraps in other coverage. For a small strate~c
AIS to carry out operations of real value requires that the policymakers
project with some concreteness their foreign policy objectives
well into the eighties. Only then can they articulate, by countries or
categories of information, their priority intelligence targets. As the
546
simple confrontations of the cold war giye way to the more complex
alignments of today, as economic and fiscal questions replace military
hardware as topics of major interest, the intelligence needs of the
·White House are bound to shift. Is the Tokyo-Moscow axis a top
priority? Are the Swiss bankers--or the German industrialists-a
more important target than the Chinese General Staff?
Who will answer these questions?
It is possible, in a sanguine moment. to see a select joint congressional
committR,e sitting down with the National Security Council and
talking about the problems America faces in the decades ahead. They
should confer until they CDme up with a clear statement in simple
English of our long-term national objectives and a concretB list of
specific areas and countries vital tD our ~lation's interest.
In an even more sangnine moment one can envisage a broader, more
representative body sitting down every two or three years and examining
the perjormance of 011r foreign affairs and intelligence activities
abroad. Such a llJ"Oup. chaired by the Vice President and supported
by the National Security Council's administrative machinery,
would ideally include not only Congressmen, hut security-cleared
citizens from business. labor, the media, academia. Their report to the
American people might add a weleorne breath of fresh air to the stale
words from Washington.
Any decisions on our purposes in this fal(:€ring world can come
only from the top and not out of the bowels of our foreign affairs
bureaucracies, And those decisions cannot come by two-year or fouryear
cxecuti"e fiat. They should be reached with 'the w[dest possible
participation. The new President with his dose ties to Congress is
the ideal man tD broaden the base for executive dl'cisions in foreign
policy. He should take the initiative in inviting the Congress to share
his "awesome" rrsponsibility for foreign affairs-perhaps even go so
far as to first invite a svstematic national debate. He can raise the
level of that debate by ·being morl' open with the public on nowclassified
intelligence available within the execut;ve branch. There
is much to be gained. and-properly screened--little to be lost by
publishing some of our excellent satellite photographs, or select national
estimates on strategic situations as the,v arise, or current intelli~
ence reports on significant events abroad..
The system of American democracy Heed not be exhflUst~d by i~
pre.'3ent institutions, nor should the citizen sit on his hands as the complex
pressures of an industrial societv force the cancerous growth of
the executive. No President in the future should be allowed to say
on his own that the Dominican Republic or Cuba or Vietnam is vital
to the American interest.
Onee set. and amended. long-term national objectives leaa to strategic
intelligen:,e as well as dinlomatic targets. to a c.lean-eut mission
for the nC'w AlS. It is likely that thesE' targrts may lip in Zurich and
Tokyo as well as Moscow or Bucharest or ('airo 'and COl)Cern themselves
as mueh with goods ancl currencies as with war and politics. It
is even possible that the ,AIS might on occasion. like the KGB in the
recent Soviet grain deal, pay for its o'''n budget by saving the taxpayer
money.
H. 'WHAT'S 1VROXG 'WITH THE CIA?
By Tom Braden
[Frvn: Sllturda~' Review, Apr. 5, 1975]
We are gathered, four of 11S CIA division chiefs and.deputies, in t~e
office of our agency's dirpetor, an urbane, and charmmg man. He IS
seated at his desk, puffing nervously on his pipe and asking us questions.
Allen W. Dulles i!' fretting on this morning in the early fifties, as.
indeed, he has fretted most mornings. You can't be in the middle of
building an enormous spy house, running agents into Russia and elsewhere,
worrying about ,Joseph McCarthy. planning to overthrow a
government in Guatemala, and helping to elect another in Italy, without
fretting.
But on this particular morning, Dulles is dne for an appearance before
Sen. Richard B. Russell's Armed Services Committee. and the
question he is pondering- as he puffs on his pipe is whether to tell the
senators what is making- him fret, He has just spent a lot of money on
buying an intelligence network. and the network has turned out to be
worthlp-ss. In fact. it's a little WOl'SP than worthless. All that money.
Dulles now suspects, went to thp KGB.
Therefore, the questions are somber, and so are the answers. At
last, Dulles rises. "Wen." he says, "I guess I'll have to fudge the truth
a little."
His eyes twinkle at the word ftuige, then suddenly turn serious. He
twists his slightly stooped shoulders into the old tweed topcoat and
heads for the door. But he turns back. "I'll tell the truth to Dick rRussellJ,"
hp says. "I always do." Then the twinkle returns, and he adds,
with a chuckle, "That is. if Dick wants to know."
The reason I recall the above scene in detail is that lately I have been
asking myself what's wrong with the CIA. Two committees of Cong-
ress and one from the executive hranch are asking- the question, too.
Rut they are asking out of a concern for national policy. I am asking
for a different reaRon. I onee worked for the CIA. I regard the time
I spent there as worthwhile duty. I look back upon the men with whom
I worked as able and honorable. So for me. the question "What's wrong
with the CIA~" is both personal find poignant.
Old friends of mine havp been cflught in evasions or worse. People
I worked with have violated thp law. Mpn whose ability I respected
hflve planned operations that eneled in embarrassment or disaster.
l,Yhat's wrong with these people? 1Vhat's wrong- with the CIA?
Ask yourself a quest.ion often enough. and sometimps the mind will
respond with a memorv. Tlw memory mv minrt reportpd back is that
srene in Allen Dulles' office. It seemed. at flrst blush. a commonplace,
inconsequential episorle. Rut the more it fixed itself in mv mind. the
marr it ,,?eHl!:r1 to niP thnt it helped to nn"wer my qnestion abont what's
\\TOlla 'nth t)1(\ ag'f'l1cy. I ~t me explain.
(.'\47:
548
The first thing this scene reveals is the sheer power that Dulles and
his agency had. Only a man with extraordina,ry power could make a
mistake involving a great many of the taxpayers' dollars and not have
to explain it. Allen Dulles had extraordinary power.
Power flowed to him and, through him, to the CIA, partly because
his brother was Secretary of State, partly because his reputation as
the master spy of World War II hung over him like a mysterious
halo, partly because his senior partnership in the prestigious New
York law firm of Sullivan and Cromwell impressed the small-town
lawyers of Congress.
Moreover, events helped keep power flowing. The country was
fighting a shooting war in Kon~a and a Cold War in Western Europe,
and the CIA was sole authority on the plans and potential of the real
enemy. To argue against the CIA was to a,rgue against knowledge.
Only Joseph McCarthy would run such a risk.
Indeed, McCarthy unwittingly added to the power of the CIA. H;e
attacked the agency and when, in the showdown, Dulles won, hIS
victory vastly increased the respectability of what people then called
"the cause" of anti-communism. "Don't join the book burners," Eisenhower
had said. That was the bad way to fight communism. The good
way was the CIA.
Power was the first thing that went wrong with the CIA. There
was too much of it, and it was too easy to bring to bear-on the State
Department, on other government agencies, on the patriotic businessmen
of New York, and on the foundations whose directorships they
occupied. The agency's power overwhelmed the Congress, the press,
and therefore the people.
I'm not saying that this power didn't help to win the Cold War,
and I believe the Cold War was a good war to win. But the power
enabled the CIA to continue Cold War operations 10 and 15 years
after the Cold War was won. Under Allen Dulles the power was unquestioned,
and after he left, the habit of not questioning remained.
I remember the time I walked over to the State Department to get
formal approval for some CIA project involving a few hundred
thousand dollars and a publication in Europe. The desk man at the
State Department balked. Imagine. He balked-and at an operation
designed to combat what I knew for certain was a similar Soviet operation.
I was astonished. But I didn't argue. I knew what would happen.
I would report to the director, who would get his brother on the
phone: "Foster, one of your people seems to be a little less than cooperative."
That is power.
The second thing that's wrong with the CIA is arrogance, and the
scene I've mentioned above shows that, too. Allen Dulles's private joke
about "fudging" was arrogant, and so was the suggestion that "Dick"
might not want to know. An organization that does not hnve to answer
for mistakes is certain to become arrogant.
It is not a cardinal sin, this fault, and sometimes it squints toward
virtue. It might be argued, for example, that only arrogant men would
insist on building the U-2 spy plane within a time frame which military
experts said could not be met. Yet in the days before satellite
surveillance, the U-2 spy plane was the most useful means of keeping
the peace. It assured this country's leaders that Russia was not plan549
ning an attack. But if arrogance built the plane quickly, it also destroyed
it. For surely it ,vas arrogant tD keep it flying through Soviet
airspace after it was suspected that the Russians were literally zeroing
in on overflyingU-2s.
I wonder whether the arrogance of the CIA may not have been
battlefield-related-a holdover from World War II machismo and
derring-do. The leaders of the agency were, almost to a man, veterans
of OSS, the CIA's wartime predecessor. Take. for example, the men
whose faces I now recall, standing there in the director's office.
One had run a spy-and-operations network into Germany from
German-occupied territory. Another had volunteered to parachute
into Field Marshall Kesselring's headquarters grounds with terms
for his surrender. A third had crash-landed in Norway and, having lost
half his men, came up, nevertheless, blowing up bridges.
OSS men who became CIA men were unusual people who had volunteered
to carry out unusual orders and to take unusual risks. Moreover,
they were Impressed, more than most soldiers can be impressed,
with the absolute necessity for secrecy and the certain penalty that
awaited the breach of it.
But they had another quality that set them apart. For some reason
that psycl;lologists could perhaps explain, a man who volunteers to go
on an extremely dangerous mission, alone or with one or two helpers,
is likely to be not only brave and resourceful but also somewhat vain.
Relatively few men volunteered to jump into German or Japanese
territory during World War II. Those who did volunteer were conscious
that they were, in a word, "different."
Once these men had landed behind the lines, the difference took on
outward symbols. They were alone, Americans in a country full of
French or Greek or Italians or Chinese. Often they were treate~ with
great respect. Sometimes, a3 mere lieutenants, they commanded thousands
of men. At a word from them, American or British planes came
over to drop supplies to these men. They earned the love and respect
that conquered people felt for the great democracy called America.
Inevitably, they began to think of themselves individually a;nd collectively
as representing the national honor.
Is it not possible that men who have learned to do everything in
secrecy, who are accustomed to strange assignments, and who think of
themselves as embodying their country. are peculiarly susceptible to
imperial Presidencies such as those of Lyndon Johnson and Richard
Nixon? Have they not in fact trained themselves to behave as a power
elite?
To power and to arrogance add the mystique of the inside-outside
syndrome. That scene in the director's office defines the problem.
Dulles was leveling with his assistants, and they were leveling with
him. An agent or a station chief or an official of the CIA who didn't
level-who departed in the slightest degree from a faithful account
of what he knew or what he had done-was a danger to operations and
to lives. Such a man couldn't last a day in the CIA.
But truth was reserved for the inside. To the outsider, CIA men
learned to lie, to lie consciously and deliberately without the slightest
twinge of the guilt that most men feel when they tell a deliberate lie.
The inside-outside syndrome is unavoidable in a secret intelligence
550
agency. You bring a group of people together, bind them with an
oath, test their loyalty periodically with machines, spy on them to
make sure they're not meeting secretly with someone from the Czech
Embassy, cushion them from the rest of the world with a false cover
story, teach them to lie because lying is i.n the national interest, and
they do not behave like other men.
They do not come home from work and answer truthfully the question,
"What did you do today, darling?" When they chat with their
neighbors, they lie about their jobs. In their compartmentalized, needto-
know jobs, it is perfectly excusable for one CIA man to lie to another
if the other doesn't need to know.
Thus it was ritual for Allen Dulles to "fudge," and often he didn't
have to. Senator Russell might say, "The chairman has conferred with
the director about this question, which touches a very sensitive matter."
The question would be withdrawn.
Another technique for dealing WIth an outsider was the truthful
non-response. Consider the following exchange between Sen. Claiborn!'
Pel! (D.. R.I.) and Richard Helms. I The exchange was concerned
Witll spying on AmericaIl:3, an iliega1 act under theh~rms of the law
that created the CIA.)
Senator Fell (referring to spying on all1 iwar demonstrations) :
"But those all o(.:curred witl1m the continent!'l shores of the 17nited
States and for that reason you had the justifiable reason to decline [to]
move in thEre be~~u~e the events were outshie your ambit.~'
Mr. Helmx: "Ab~lute]y, l:Lnd 1 have never'been lacking in clarity
in my mind since 11lave been din~ctor, that thIS is simply not acceptable
not only to Congrebli but to the public of the Fnited States."
No doubt that answer was truthful. lo\o doubt HelInS did dunk that
domestic spying was not acC€ptabl<:>. But he was doing it, and he didn't
say he wasn't.
'Finallv, of course, there i~ the direct lie. Here 18 another excerpt
from 1973 testimony by Helms:
Senator Syminqt01i (D., JIo.) . ;'1)1(1 YOll trv. in the C'elltral Intelligence
Agency, to overthrow the government of Chile '?"
JIelm8: "No, Sir."
Symington: "Did you have any mon~y passed to the opponents of
Allende?"
HelJrns: "No, Sir."
Helms was under oath. Therefore, he must ha.e con8idered hi~
answer carefully. Obviously, he came to the insider's conclusion: that
his duty to protect the inside outweighed his ontsider's oath. Or to
put it another way, the law of the inside comes first.
Allen Dulles once remarked that if necessary, he would lie to anybody
about the CIA except the President. "I never had the slightest
Qualms about lying to an outsider," a CIA veteran remarked reC€ntly.
"Why does an outsider need to know?"
So much for the lessons of memory. Power, arrogance, and the
inside-outside syndrome are what's wrong with the CIA, and to some
extent, the faults are occupational and even necessary tools for the job.
But the events of the Cold "Yar and the coincidence of Allen Dulles'
having such enormous discretionary powers enlarged occupational
risks until they became faults, and the faults created a monstrosity.
551
Pov;'er built a vast hureaw.'racy and a ridi'~\1Jou" monument in Lang~('
y, Va. Arrogance fostered the hdief that u fe,Y hundred exiles could
land on a heach and hold off Cn;;:tro\ nrmy.
The inside-outside syndrome withheld the truth from Adlai Steyenson
so that 111' was forced to make a spectacle of himself on the floor
of tht'.11nited Nations by denying that the Pnited Stntes had anything
to do with the inv3«ion of Cuba. The same syndrome has made a sad
and worried man of Richard Helms. .
It's a shame what happened to the CIA. It C"Ould have consisted of
a few hundred scholars to analyze intelligence, a few hundred spies in
key positions, and a few hundrerl operators rl'ady to earry out rare·
tasks of derring-do.
Instead, it bec:une a gargantuan monster, owning property all over
the world, running Rirplanes ftnd npw<:papl?rs and radio stations and
banks and armips ;lnd l1:n';rs, offf'ring trmptntion to successive Secretarips
of State, and e-iving at h'f\.st onf> President a bl'illiant idea.: Since
the machinp,ry for deceit ('xisted, why not use it?
Richard Helms should have said no to Richard Nixon. But as a victim
of the inside-outside syndrome, Helms could only ask 'Vatergate's
most plaintive question: "vVhowould have thought that it would someday
be judged a cri~ to carry out the orders of th~ President of the
United States 1"
A shame-and a peeuliarly ...tmerican shame. For this is the only
country in the world which doesn't recognize the fact that some things
are better if they are small.
'Ve'll need intelligence in the future. And once in a while, once in a
great while~ we may need covert action, too. But, at the moment, we
haye nothing. The revelations ofWatergate and the iny~stigationsthat
have followed have done their work. The CIA's po\ver is gone. Its
arrogance has turned to fear. The 'inside-outside syndrome has been
hroken. Former agents write books naming other agents. Director
"Vi1liam Colby goes to the .Justice Department with eyidence that his
prl'decessor violated the l::tw_ The house that .Allen DnlJes built is
divided and torn.
The end is not in sight. Various committees now investigating the
agl'ncy will doubtless find error. They will recommend ('hange, they
will reshuffle, they will adjust. But they will leave the monster intact,
and even if the monster never makes another mistake, never again overreaches
it~elf-even, indeed, if like some other govf'rnment agencies, it
never does anything at all-it will, by existing, go right on creating
and perpetuating the myth~ tha.t always aeoompanied thp- presence of
the monster.
vVe know the myths. Thl'S circulate throughout the land wherever
there are bars and bowling alleys: that the CIA killed .Tohn Kennedy;
that the CIA cripplpd George 'ValJacl'; that an unexplained airplane
crash, a big gold heist, were all the work of the CIA.
These myths are ridiculous, but they will exist as long as the monster
rxists. The fact that millions believe the myths raises once again the
old question which OSS men used to argue after the war: Can a free
and open society engage in covert operations?
Aftrr nearly 30 years of trial, the evidence oug-ht to be in. Thl' evidencp
demonstrfltE"s. it S('Pn1S to me. that a frer flnrl aprn society cannot
552
engage in covert operations-not, at any rate, in the kind of large,
intricate covert operations of which the CIA has been capable.
I don't argue solely from the box score. But let's look at the box
score. It reveals many famous failures. Too easily, they prove the point.
Consider what the CIA deems its known successes: Does anybody remember
Arbenz in Guatemala? What good was achieved by the overthrow
of Arbenz? Would it really have made any difference to this
country if we hadn't overthrown Arbenz ?
And Allende? How much good did it do the American people to
overthrow Allende? How much bad?
Was it essential-even granted the sticky question of succession-to
keep those Greek colonels in power for so long?
We used to think that it was a great triumph that the CIA kept
the Shah of Iran on his throne against the onslaught of Mossadegh.
Are we grateful still ?
The uprisings during the last phase of the Cold War, and those dead
bodies in the streets of Poland, East Germany, and Hungary: to what
avail ?
But the box score does not tell the whole story. We paid a high price
for that box score. Shame and embarrassment is a high price? Doubt,
mistrust, and fear is a high price. The public myths are a high price,
and so is the guilty knowledge that we own an establishment devoted
to opposing the ideals we profess.
In our midst, we have maintained a secret instrument erected in
contradiction to James Madison's injunction: "A popular government
without the means to popular information is a farce or a tragedy,
perhap~both."
As I say, the investigating committees will prop the monster up. I
would suggest more radical action. I would shut it down. I would turn
the overt intelligence function over to the State Department. Scholars
and scientists and people who understand how the railroads run in
Sri Lanka don't need to belong to the CIA in order to do their valuable
work well.
I would turn the paratroopers over to the army. If, at some time, it
becomes essential to our survival to mount a secret attack upon a foe.
the army is capable of doing it, and, with some changes in command
structure in order to bypass bureaucracy, the army could do it as
swiftly and secretly as the CIA. Under the command structure of the
Department of Defense, congressional oversight would be possible.
Then, if the army got caught fielding a secret division in Laos, and
if the American people did not want a secret division in Laos, the
American people would know where to turn.
I would turn the psychological warriors and propagandists over to
the Voice of America. Psychological warriors and propagandists
probably never did belong in a secret agency.
And, last, I would choose a very few men to run spies and such
covert operations as the passage of money to those in other lands who
cannot afford to accept American support openly. But I would limit
covert operations to passing money to "friendlies."
I would house these spy masters and money-passers in some obscure
tool shed, and I would forbid, by law, any of them from ever calling
553
himself "director." They would not work for the CIA. Because I would
abolish the name CIA.
As their chief, the President should choose for a term of six years
some civilian who has demonstrated staunchness of character and
independence of mind. I would make him responsible to a joint committee
of Congress, as well as to the President, and I would not permit
him to serve more than one term.
Thus, we might get rid of power. 'Vithout power, arrogance would
not be dangerous. Thus, too, we could prevent the inside-outside syndrome,
so essential to secrecy, from making a mockery of representative
government.
As for the house that Allen Dulles built at Langley, we might leave it
standing empty, our only national monument to the value that democracy
places upon the recognition and correction of a mistake. ,
207-932 0 - 76 - 36
l. RE(''':\l:l',fE~DAT1n:"H OJ<' 'THE CO\r:\fbiiIr/:-; ON THE ORCA~iZATlON OF
THI': GOn:H)';\IF.':T FI)H TTi.~ Coxm:CI' iJF FOREIGX POLICY CInE
MURPHY CO~nnSS!I)"I) (~ONGER~l~GC'OHHT ACTION
Covert Action: ..:1Speriu,l Pl'oUern. To this point we have. addressed
only the intelligencr aetirities of the intelligence community. But, jn
addition to those endeavors, the e0ll1111unity--speeiiically CIA-has
also been responsible for another activity which poses special problems
nf ovprsight ,Lnd contrcll. TlJi.~ is covett action, activity abroad
intended nor. to gather inf(,rmation but to influence events, an activity
midway betwepll diplomacy and. war. It has taken many forms, from
the financial fnppOlt 0f friendly puhlications to the mounting of sigIficant
paramihtary etf'Jrr~.
The Commission has considered whether covert action should any
longer be Huthorized al all. It recognizes that there are many risks and
dangers associated 'with em"ert action. Partly for these reasons the
use of covert action in recpnt years has markedly declined.
But Wf\ must lin' in the world we fiml, not the wodd we might wish.
Our adversaries deny themseh-es no forms of action which might
ndvance their interests or undercut ours, as quite recent as wen as past
events demonstrate. In many pa, t'5 of the world a prohibition on our
use of covert action would put the U.S. and those who rely on it ata
rlangerous disadvantage. \Ye eondude, therefore, that
r01..'('i't rt.cfl:on r-7/n10( b,o (7DJnrloned. 7nJf that it xhould be employed
only where clearly eS8ential to vital U.S. purposes and
then only after (I ("1'rj111 rrorx,~8 of high 7ere7 ,."vie?!:.
The current proces::' for approval of covert, action involves the submission
of proposals to thl' 40 Comwittee. The Comrnitte.c, approves
or Jisapproves, and its chairman. the A.ssi.stant to the President, for
~8tional Security Alfairs, issue", appropriate instt1lctions. In recent
years, howl.'ver, as authorizations lUlTe derrl.'ased in number, the procedures
of the Committee han~ become quite informal, and it has met
infrequently.
We believe present prl1rtices f\.re inudequatl.'. The sensitivity and
risks of covert action require appropriate review and consultation
The Committee therefore propose~that.
--OO'l)(:,rt action shou7d only be autllOrized after c07leeti'lie consideration
of its benefits and risks by all available 4D Committee
member8. wnd that
-Besides granting initial approvals, the 4D Committee should
regularly re1 ,i(11) the c07!tinlli1'lp oprn'opriations of adi1·it?·es
still being pUl'sued.
In addition to requiring careful review within the executive branch,
t he Commission believes that covert action should be reported to the
(554)
655
.J oint Committee of the Congn;,;,; Oil .N dlOllal S('curity pr"r"i;',"r1. i I>
Chapter 14. lYe abo belllwe that tlw \,urrellt requirement of law that
the Pn,,,iJelll lJd',.;owtlly ,ertit\ to the ClJl1gTb5 llte necessity for ail
CO\ (,n actiollt> (the IIughe" AlfIeJl\!lIlelll t() the Foreign A,;;sist,all('('
_\(;[ uf Lj74. P.L. H;~--:);\P) i,.; lwnllfld ill a:""octatill:.r thl', head of Stah'
,,0 fOrJilUlly \\'llh "Ud, ucti nlle". \\ l', propose. lIa·retore. that:
P.T., .9'J·55() J'e l!fri:I/{!>r/',; r'l',:r, "i'(;: '.'r,y 0/ "JI'e/'T 11, {,OrM
to 7)(1 lJr'op08{'rl -!nild ('0IJ?fi17f,f,-, 0/, Yllfio/lld :.,Y" ,,("ity_ '1/1(1 to
n/1lit 'II'y 1"']eI7I'(,'/IU'llt /or (/It jltl'!'!ui!(f7 ('(('{ itu:ion oj the
!)/'p.r;;,ir{f'"f fIR to flier,. !/('{'(sx.:'fy.

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