The DDCI was second in command of the intelligence community (IC) until 2005 and was appointed by the director of central intelligence (DCI) and confirmed by the Senate. Under the terms of the National Security Act of 1947 and various other enabling legislation, both the DCI and DDCI could be civilians, but only one could be a serving military officer. See also Appendix B.
DESERT ONE. Desert One was the U. S. government designation for that part of the Iranian desert that was to be used by the U. S. military to rescue the American hostages in Tehran in 1980. See also EAGLE CLAW (OPERATION).
DEUTCH, JOHN MARK (1938- ). Seventeenth director of central intelligence (DCI) between 10 May 1995 and 15 December 1996. John M. Deutch has served in significant government and academic posts throughout his career. Prior to becoming DCI, he was deputy secretary of defense from March 1994 until March 1995 and undersecretary of defense for acquisitions and technology from March 1993 until March 1994.
In addition, John Deutch served in a number of positions in the Department of Energy (DOE) from 1977 until 1980 and on many commissions during several presidential administrations: the President’s Nuclear Safety Oversight Committee (1980-1981); the President’s Commission on Strategic Forces (1983); the White House Science Council (1985-1989); the President’s Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology (1997-2001); the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board (1990-1993); the President’s Commission on Aviation Safety and Security (1996); the Commission on Reducing and Protecting Government Secrecy (1996); and the Commission to Assess the Organization of the Federal Government to Combat the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (chairman, 1998-1999). After leaving his DCI post in 1996, Deutch became embroiled in a controversy over his alleged cavalier attitude toward security by keeping classified information on a nonsecure computer at home. After an investigation, George J. Tenet, Deutch’s successor as DCI, revoked his security clearances.
DIPLOMATIC BAG. A diplomatic bag is a term used to describe shipping containers that have diplomatic immunity from search or seizure. The diplomatic bag need not be an actual bag. The Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations (1961) ensures that diplomats and their official belongings are given safe passage in transit or in the host country.
DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY. Diplomatic immunity, as defined by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations (1961), allows designated diplomats to engage in their official duties without interference from the host government to which they are accredited. The home country can waive immunity if it so desires, but this tends only to happen when the individual has committed a serious crime, unconnected with the diplomatic role, or has witnessed such a crime. Alternatively, the home country may decide to prosecute the individual. Even though diplomats are exempt from host country laws, they may be expelled for “actions inconsistent with their diplomatic status” (spying), smuggling, child custody law violations, and even murder in a few cases.
DIPLOMATIC SECURITY. Security within the Department of State was formally established in 1916 under Secretary of State Robert Lansing. In 1918, Congress passed legislation requiring passports for Americans traveling abroad and visas for aliens wishing to enter the United States, and responsibility for enforcing the new law fell on the State Department’s security office. At this time, diplomatic security also protected distinguished visitors to the United States. During World War I, the State Department also acquired responsibility for incarcerating and exchanging diplomatic officials of enemy powers and assisting in screening people repatriated from enemy-controlled areas, a job it also undertook during World War II.
After the war, reorganization enabled the State Department’s security office to maintain bureaus and to station U. S. Marines at U. S. embassies abroad. With the rise of the terrorist threat against U. S. interests in the 1980s, the State Department established the Bureau of Diplomatic Security (DS) and the Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) on 4 November 1985. The Diplomatic Courier Service joined the new Bureau at this time. The DS acquired the Rewards for Justice Program in 1992, in which the State Department pays for information to resolve acts of international terrorism against Americans. The DS also conducts criminal and personnel security investigations and provides protective services to distinguished dignitaries visiting the United States.
DIRECTORATE OF INTELLIGENCE (DI). The DI is the analytic arm of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), processing and analyzing intelligence information and producing intelligence assessments and other products for policymakers. Successor to the Office of Research and Analysis (ORA), the DI was renamed National Foreign Assessment Center (NFAC) in 1978, but Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) William J. Casey in 1981 reverted to using its original designation.
The DI’s analytic functions are organized along both functional and regional lines. Analysts receive intelligence information from all available sources in the intelligence community (IC) and draft intelligence assessments and estimates that correspond to the requirements set by national decision makers. The DI’s products include current intelligence items, such as the senior executive intelligence brief (SEIB) and the president’s daily brief (PDB), and long-term intelligence, such as intelligence memorandums. DI analysts also participate in the estimative process under the guidance and direction of the National Intelligence Council (NIC).
DIRECTORATE OF OPERATIONS (DO). The clandestine arm of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the DO’s mission is to collect human intelligence (HUMINT), conduct counterintelligence
(CI) abroad, and carry out covert actions as authorized by the president. Formerly known as the Directorate of Plans (DP), the DO came into existence in 1973 when James Schlesinger, the director of central intelligence (DCI), renamed the organization in order to make the CIA appear more open about its activities.
The DO’s case officers as well as its covert operatives in the past have had an almost fanatical zeal in carrying out their missions. Because of the DO’s specialized and politically sensitive work, the DO has also tended toward insularity, cutting itself off from outsiders, including from other components of the CIA. These twin cultural precepts at times have prompted DO officers to overstep the bounds of propriety and legality, culminating in sensational revelations and embarrassing scandals, such as rogue operations involving assassination attempts and overthrow of governments. See also DIRECTORATE OF INTELLIGENCE; OFFICE OF POLICY COORDINATION.
DIRECTORATE OF PLANS (DP). The Central Intelligence Agency
(CIA) in August 1952 consolidated the activities of the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC) and the Office of Secret Operations (OSO) by establishing the Directorate of Plans. The DP’s mission was to engage in espionage, counterintelligence, and covert actions. The DP was renamed the Directorate of Operations (DO) in 1973.
DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE (DCI). Until 2005, the nominal head of the intelligence community (IC), the position of the DCI was established in January 1946 for coordinating—not direct-ing—American intelligence activities. This thrust did not change much over the years, although the White House and Congress occasionally bolstered the DCI’s authorities in coordinating U. S. intelligence.
The DCI’s responsibilities evolved over the years to include three functions. First, he put together, submitted, and controlled the National Foreign Intelligence Program (NFIP) budget—the IC budget—although a substantial portion of it went to Department of Defense (DOD) intelligence elements. Second, the DCI had authority to coordinate counterintelligence programs of all intelligence community agencies. Third, the DCI had the responsibility to ensure the protection of sources and methods, which enabled him to establish standard rules and regulations governing access to intelligence installations, personnel, and information.
These three responsibilities — submitting a community budget, conducting counterintelligence, and protecting sources and methods— were the only ones the DCI exercises in his statutory role as head of the intelligence community. Even in these tasks, the DCI was only able to exercise soft power techniques like persuasion and influence. To overcome this deficiency, the typical DCI had to bring to his office attributes that would enable him better to manage the community—a personal relationship and access to the president, the skills of an excellent negotiator, and the patience of a mediator.
Some DCIs, such as Allen W. Dulles, brought such qualities to their job to great effect. Most, however, lacked in these qualities and therefore were less successful in wielding their community hat. Because the heads of IC agencies — except the CIA—reported directly to their policy principals, the DCI’s relative position in the White House pecking order also came into play in the bureaucratic politics of the intelligence community. This was especially so regarding the Pentagon’s intelligence units, over which the secretary of defense retained complete control. From time to time, a particular secretary of defense would give lip service to allowing the DCI greater authority over the defense-related intelligence organizations, but no defense secretary to date has relinquished any significant amount of power to the DCI. Under the terms of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, the DCI is now only the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). See also Appendix A; BUSH, GEORGE H. W.; CASEY, WILLIAM J.; COLBY, WILLIAM E.; DEUTCH, JOHN M.; GATES, ROBERT M.; GOSS, PORTER; HELMS, RICHARD M.; HILLENKOETTER, ROSCOE; McCONE, JOHN A.; RABORN, WILLIAM F., JR.; SCHLESINGER, JAMES R.; SMITH, WALTER BEDELL; SOUERS, SIDNEY; TENET, GEORGE J.; TURNER, STANSFIELD; VANDENBERG, HOYT; WEBSTER, WILLIAM H.; WOOLSEY, R. JAMES, JR.
DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE DIRECTIVES (DCIDs). DCIDs are instructions to the intelligence community
(IC) agencies on implementing the decisions of the president and the National Security Council (NSC). The DCI’s staff transforms presidential directives (PDs) emanating from the NSC to DCIDs, providing guidance on myriad issues ranging from security classification and handling of classified information to personnel issues governing hiring, firing, retention, and retirement. DCIDs remain in force until supplanted by other DCIDs.
DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE (DNI). A position long considered essential for overcoming the parochial interests and the turf wars of the intelligence agencies in the intelligence community (IC), the office of the DNI was established by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of December 2004. The 9/11 Commission report, issued in July 2004, and the families of the victims of the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 considered a strong DNI the central ingredient in reforming American intelligence to respond to future terrorist attacks. Legislation creating the DNI as chief of the National Intelligence Authority (NIA) and providing for antiterror immigration and law enforcement measures quickly wound through the congressional process in the fall of 2004 but bogged down in conference committee. Ensuing recalcitrance by congressional defenders of the Department of Defense’s (DOD’s) intelligence prerogatives produced a compromise that made the DNI substantially weaker than that sought by the 9/11 Commission report.
For example, under the new law, the DNI will have a say in hiring the heads of the intelligence agencies but will have no authority to fire them. The DNI can move money from one agency to another to meet needs, but always within strict limits. Under the law, the DNI has only limited authority to reprogram funds and transfer personnel from the Defense Department, while the department still keeps control over its massive intelligence agencies as well as 30 percent of intelligence moneys. While the legislation puts the new national intelligence chief in the position of commanding the attention of agency heads — the DNI, under the law, is supposed to develop and determine their budgets, although he is only empowered to monitor the implementation and execution of intelligence spending—greater intelligence coherence and effectiveness certainly are not assured by this legislation. Instead, the new position constitutes an additional bureaucratic layer, now separating the titular head of U. S. intelligence from collectors and analysts who reside within the agencies. The director of central intelligence (DCI) remains the head of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
DISINFORMATION. See PROPAGANDA.
DONOVAN, WILLIAM JOSEPH (1883-1959). William Donovan was the legendary chief of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II. Donovan had been a New York City lawyer and a classmate of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who appointed Donovan as coordinator of information (COI) in 1941 and, subsequently, as OSS chief in 1942.
Donovan made a name for himself as early as 1912 when he formed and led a troop of cavalry of the New York State Militia (a forerunner of the National Guard) that in 1916 served on the Mexican border in the Pancho Villa campaign. During World War I, he distinguished himself on the battlefield in France, and by the end of the war, he had received three Purple Hearts and the Distinguished Service Cross.
After the war, he resumed his law practice, becoming the U. S. attorney for the western district of New York, and became famous for his energetic enforcement of prohibition. He also ran for public office several times, all unsuccessfully, but he served in the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division until the beginning of World War II.
At the start of the war, President Roosevelt sent Donovan to Europe to collect information, and, in 1941, named him COI. This made Donovan the first overall chief of the United States intelligence community (IC), which at the time was fragmented into army, navy, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Department of State, and other interests. The FBI retained its independence and control of intelligence in South America, at the insistence of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover.
The COI organization became the OSS in 1942, and Donovan returned to active duty in his former rank of colonel, being promoted to major general by the end of the war. OSS responsibility included espionage and sabotage operations in Europe and in parts in Asia, but not in Latin America or the Philippines.
Roosevelt’s death weakened Donovan’s position, which depended on his personal connection to the president. President Harry S. Truman, who distrusted intelligence generally, dissolved the OSS at the end of the war. For his service in the war, Donovan received the Distinguished Service Medal and reverted to his lifelong role as a lawyer by becoming special assistant to the chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg Tribunal. At the conclusion of the Nuremberg trials, Donovan returned to his Wall Street law firm.
DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION (DEA). The Premier U. S. government antidrug law enforcement agency, the DEA was established in 1973 as successor to the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs (BNDD). BNDD’s operations were largely ineffective due to intense rivalry with several other bureaus in the Department of Justice focusing on drug issues as well as with the U. S. Customs Service. The DEA’s mission now includes the enforcement of controlled substances laws and regulations and investigating and preparing criminal prosecutions of those who violate laws on controlled substances at both national and international levels. The purpose of the DEA, moreover, is to provide a focal point for coordinating federal drug enforcement efforts with those of the state and local authorities, as well as with international police entities.
The DEA is not a member of the intelligence community (IC) but clearly has intelligence responsibilities in the counterdrug effort. Therefore, the DEA relies heavily on the IC agencies for its strategic intelligence needs and exchanges appropriate intelligence information with its intelligence community counterparts.
DULLES, ALLEN WELSH (1893-1969). The fifth director of central intelligence (DCI) from 1953 until 1961 and the first civilian DCI since the establishment of the U. S. intelligence apparatus in 1947. As such, Dulles presided over many of America’s early covert actions, some of which were later to haunt United States foreign policy.
A scion of a politically connected family, Allen Dulles entered the foreign service in 1916. During World War I, he was stationed in Berne, Switzerland, where the Russian revolutionary Vladimir I. Lenin supposedly tried to approach him to elicit American help. Dulles reportedly put off Lenin’s request for a meeting, an incident that Dulles often recounted in his later years. At the end of World War I, Allen Dulles served on the staff of the American delegation to the Paris Peace Conference and then was posted to the Department of State in Washington, D. C. In 1926, he left the government for a law practice but joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) when World War II broke out. He returned to Berne, Switzerland, from where he operated a spy ring inside Nazi Germany. After the war, Dulles returned to his law practice but remained active in intelligence matters by helping draft the National Security Act of 1947. DCI Walter Bedell Smith recruited Allen Dulles in 1951 to be deputy director of central intelligence (DDCI), and, in 1953, Dulles succeeded Smith as DCI.
Dulles’s accomplishments during his tenure included the overthrow of President Jacobo Arbenz Guzman in Guatemala, the building of the Berlin Tunnel to eavesdrop on Soviet military communications, the development of the U-2 spy airplane, and the acquisition of Soviet Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev’s secret speech to the Twentieth Party Congress. Dulles resigned in 1961 in the wake of the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba. However, during his eight years as the head of U. S. intelligence, Allen Dulles and his brother, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, exerted enormous influence over U. S. foreign policy, helping shape America’s approach to the rest of the Cold War.
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EAGLE CLAW (OPERATION). Operation Eagle Claw was a military operation to rescue the American hostages from the U. S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran, on 24 April 1980. Planned as Operation Rice Bowl, the covert action was designed as a complex two-night mission with a small staging site established inside Iran, called Desert One, that provided a base for the transport planes and helicopters for the actual rescue operation. The plan called for using helicopters to evacuate the hostages, who would then be brought to an air base outside of Tehran and flown out of the country. The role of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was primarily in support, as former Air America specialists provided logistics. In addition, the CIA’s paramilitary staff furnished and installed navigational devices at Desert One.
The action aborted when a helicopter collided with an air force plane at Desert One. Postmortem evaluations showed that the operation failed because the various services worked independently of each other and did not coordinate their actions. As a result of this failure, the Pentagon established the U. S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) in 1988 to overcome fragmentation and get the military services to work closer together by inducing them to engage in joint operations, an effort that was mandated by the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986. The hostages were released after 444 days of captivity on 20 January 1981, the day that President Jimmy Carter left office.
ECONOMIC ESPIONAGE ACT OF 1996. Signed by President William J. Clinton on 11 October 1996, this amendment to the National Security Act of 1947 makes it a crime to wrongfully copy or otherwise control trade secrets, if done with the intent either to benefit a foreign government, instrumentality, or agent or to disadvantage the rightful owner of the trade secret and for the purpose of benefiting another person. Congress passed the law because economic espionage conducted against the United States had become a national priority after the end of the Cold War, and various sectors of the American business community believed the law regarding corporate trade secrets was inadequate and did not address new economic realities. In studying the matter, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) found that in the early 1990s, over 100 countries had financed operations to acquire U. S. technology, and 57 of them had used covert methods against U. S. corporations. To counter the threat, the FBI listed a roster of countries spying against American companies on its National Security Threat List (NSTL). To bolster the effort against industrial espionage, the Clinton administration also established the National Counterintelligence Executive (NCIX), intended to coordinate intelligence, counterintelligence, and law enforcement agencies in their attempts to prevent foreign economic espionage.
ECONOMIC INTELLIGENCE. Economic intelligence refers to basic information about a country’s economic output, trade relations, and infrastructure. See also ECONOMIC ESPIONAGE ACT OF 1996; INDUSTRIAL ESPIONAGE.
EDMONDS, EMMA (1841-1898). Purported to be a Union spy during the American Civil War, Emma Edmonds masqueraded as a male, with the alias Frank Thompson, to enlist in the Union army in 1861. She subsequently claimed to have been recruited by General George B. McClellan to conduct espionage against the Confederacy. However, Allan Pinkerton, McClellan’s espionage chief, does not mention her at all in his writings, thereby casting doubt on Emma Edmonds’s claims to have spied for McClellan. That she was also Private Frank Thompson, however, is substantiated by the fact that Congress awarded her a pension in 1886, and she was admitted to a Civil War veterans association as its only female member.
EISENHOWER, DWIGHT D. (1890-1969). Thirty-fourth president of the United States between 1953 and 1961. President Eisenhower came to office with vast experience in military affairs and enormous public support. A former president of Columbia University, Eisenhower’s foreign policy focused on easing the strains of the Cold War while keeping the country militarily strong. He argued strongly for proliferating nuclear energy in his “atoms for peace” initiative and providing a semblance of transparency in Soviet-American relations in his “open skies” proposal.
In conjunction with his moderate policies, President Eisenhower presided over the dramatic expansion of the U. S. intelligence community (IC). During his tenure as president, the Central Intelligence
Agency (CIA) overthrew Iranian prime minister Mohammad Mossadegh in 1953 and President Jacobo Arbenz Guzman of Guatemala in 1954. The CIA also launched a series of daring covert operations in the 1950s, such as Operation Gold and Operation Genetrix, which embroiled the United States in international controversy. President Eisenhower gave permission for the development and deployment of the U-2 spy plane, one of which was shot down over the Soviet Union on 1 May 1960, effectively canceling a planned summit with Soviet leader Nikita S. Khrushchev. In addition, President Eisenhower authorized covert operations against Fidel Castro of Cuba, who came to power in 1959. Finally, President Eisenhower approved expedited plans for the space race by establishing the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and gave the green light for the development and deployment of America’s first spy satellite, CORONA.
ELECTRONIC INTELLIGENCE (ELINT). See SIGNALS INTELLIGENCE.
EL PASO INTELLIGENCE CENTER (EPIC). The El Paso Intelligence Center, so named for its location in El Paso, Texas, is a clearinghouse for tactical intelligence and the collection, analysis, and dissemination of information related to worldwide drug movement and alien smuggling. In 1973, with increasing drug activity along the Southwest border, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) found that the DEA, the Customs Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) collected intelligence information, but that there was no central coordination of this information. The DEA and Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) were also collecting information on the smuggling of aliens and guns. In 1974, the Department of Justice recommended establishing a regional intelligence center to collect and disseminate information relating to drug, illegal alien, and weapons smuggling and to support field enforcement agencies throughout the country. As a result, the El Paso Intelligence Center was established in 1974 to provide tactical intelligence to federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies on a national scale. Staffed by representatives of the DEA and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) professionals, EPIC has since expanded into a national drug intelligence center supporting U. S. law enforcement entities that focus on worldwide drug smuggling.
ENIGMA. Enigma was a cipher machine used by Nazi Germany in the interwar years and during World War II. Originally designed by Dr. Arthur Scherbius to protect business secrets, the Nazi government employed it in military and diplomatic communications. The Polish government initially broke the German cipher in 1932, but the Germans redesigned the machine to produce a large number of combinations (around 150 million million million) and, therefore, considered it unbreakable. The British navy acquired an Enigma machine during the early stages of the war and was able to break its secrets. The intercepts derived from Enigma were given the code name ULTRA. Experts credit turning the tide of the war against Germany to breaking the secrets of the Enigma machine.
ESPIONAGE. See HUMAN INTELLIGENCE.
ESTIMATIVE INTELLIGENCE. Estimative intelligence is a category of intelligence analysis that attempts to project probable future developments and their implications for U. S. interests. In essence, estimative intelligence comprises judgments about a region, country, or issue covering the near future, perhaps up to a year. The national intelligence estimates (NIEs) produced by the National Intelligence Council (NIC) are the principal, but not the only, estimative products of American intelligence.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 11905. Issued on 18 February 1976, EO 11905 enhanced the position of the director of central intelligence (DCI) in the White House hierarchy and named the DCI chair of the Committee on Foreign Intelligence of the National Security Council (NSC). It also replaced the Forty (40) Committee with an Operations Advisory Group composed of cabinet-level officials to review and approve covert actions. Finally, EO 11905 created the Intelligence Oversight Board (IOB), composed of three private individuals, to review the propriety and legality of intelligence activities. See also PRESIDENT’S FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE ADVISORY BOARD.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 12036. Issued by President Jimmy Carter on 24 January 1978, Executive Order 12036 attempted to give greater coherence to American intelligence activities. In addition to establishing coordinating mechanisms for U. S. counterintelligence, EO 12036 redefined special activities—covert actions—and expanded the prohibition against assassination to include all parts of the U. S. government. Moreover, the order gave the director of central intelligence (DCI) full responsibility for the national intelligence effort and made the president, cabinet officers, and other senior officials accountable for U. S. covert actions. EO 12036 was superceded by Executive Order 12333 in 1981.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 12331. Issued on 20 October 1981 by President Ronald Reagan, EO 12331 reestablished the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB), which President Jimmy Carter abolished in 1977. See also EXECUTIVE ORDER 12537.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 12333. Issued by President Ronald Reagan on 4 December 1981, the order identifies the individual agencies of the U. S. intelligence community (IC), specifies their authorities and specific responsibilities, and codifies the constraints imposed on U. S. intelligence activities, including covert actions. EO 12333 is still in force and, together with the National Security Act of 1947 (as amended), constitutes the legal basis for U. S. intelligence activities.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 12356. Issued on 2 April 1982, Executive Order 12356 provides for a uniform system of classifying, declassifying, and safeguarding national security information. According to the order, information may not be classified unless its disclosure reasonably could be expected to cause damage to the national security.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 12537. Issued by President Ronald Reagan on 28 October 1985, EO 12537 superceded Executive Order 12331, which had reestablished the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB) after President Jimmy Carter disbanded it in 1977. EO 12537 streamlined the PFIAB within the Executive Office of the President of the White House. Under the terms of the order, the PFIAB was to consist of no more than 14 members chosen from among trustworthy and distinguished citizens outside the government who qualified based on achievement, experience, and independence. The board was empowered to assess the quality, quantity, and adequacy of intelligence collection, of analysis and estimates, of counterintelligence, and other intelligence activities. In addition, the executive order authorized the board to review, on a continual basis, the performance of all agencies of the Federal government engaged in the collection, evaluation, or production of intelligence or the execution of intelligence policy. Furthermore, the order empowered the board to assess the adequacy of management, personnel, and organization in the intelligence agencies and report its findings to the president and advise him concerning the objectives, conduct, management, and coordination of the various activities of the agencies of the intelligence community (IC). Finally, the executive order gave PFIAB the authority to advise and make recommendations to the director of central intelligence (DCI) and the intelligence community on ways to achieve increased effectiveness in meeting national intelligence needs. See also EXECUTIVE ORDER 12863.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 12863. Issued by President William J.
Clinton on 13 September 1993, EO 12863 superceded EO 12537 by reaffirming the role of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB) in U. S. intelligence; increased its membership from 14 to 16 renowned and influential experts; and made the heretofore independent Intelligence Oversight Board (IOB) a standing committee of the PFIAB. See also EXECUTIVE ORDER 12331.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 12958. Issued by President William J.
Clinton on 17 April 1995, EO 12958 prescribed a uniform system for classifying, safeguarding, and declassifying national security information. The executive order established the Information Security Oversight Office to regulate the government’s security classification system. It also instructed all federal agencies to release records that were 25 years old or older. See also EXECUTIVE ORDER 13292.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 13292. Issued by President George W. Bush on 25 March 2003, EO 13292 amends Executive Order 12958
By exempting some types of information, such as that on international terrorism and weapons of mass destruction, from the provisions of EO 12958, in effect tightening up security classification.
EXECUTIVE ORDER (EO) 13376. Issued by President George W. Bush on 18 April 2005, EO 13376 replaced the director of central intelligence (DCI) with the director of national intelligence (DNI) on the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB). The DNI, whose position was established by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, oversees the intelligence community (IC), a responsibility that had belonged to the DCI since 1946.
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FAMILY JEWELS. “Family Jewels” refers to a compilation of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) illegal activities, first commissioned by Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) James Schlesinger in 1973 and made public by his successor, DCI William Colby, later that year. There is reason to believe that by making public the compendium of CIA misdeeds, Colby felt he would be helping to forestall any damaging congressional action against the CIA—an agency in which he had spent most of his adult life—and reinvigorate American intelligence by “coming clean.” The revelations, however, sparked public outcry against the intelligence establishment and ushered in a period of intense scrutiny, culminating in the investigations of the Rockefeller Commission and the Church and Pike Committees in Congress.
FEATURE (OPERATION). Feature was a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) covert action, ordered by Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger in late 1975 to provide material assistance to Angolan rebels fighting against the Soviet and Cuban-backed government. Although approving lethal assistance in the form of weapons, the 40 Committee forbade the CIA from sending advisors to Angola. Congress voted in 1976 to terminate the operation.
FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION (FBI). The FBI is the
Premier federal law enforcement agency of the U. S. government and, as such, is legally prohibited from engaging in foreign intelligence activities. However, its counterintelligence unit is a formal member of the intelligence community (IC).
The FBI originated from a force of special agents created in 1908 during the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt. Initially called the Bureau of Investigation, it primarily investigated violations of laws involving national banking, bankruptcy, naturalization, antitrust, espionage, and land fraud. The Mann Act of June 1910 expanded the Bureau’s jurisdiction into investigating transportation of women across state lines for immoral purposes. At the same time, the Bureau of Investigation established field offices around the country, each with a special agent in charge who was responsible to headquarters in Washington.
With U. S. entry into World War I in April 1917, the Bureau acquired new counterespionage responsibilities as well as jurisdiction in selective service, sabotage, and enemy alien cases. In July 1919, with the passage of the National Motor Vehicle Theft Act, the Bureau received additional responsibilities for investigating thefts of motor vehicles across state lines.
The Bureau’s specific jurisdictions prevented it from taking the lead in antigangster and prohibition actions during the gangster era of 1921-1933. Yet, its stature continued to increase as it employed creative legal means against such groups as the Ku Klux Klan and some gangsters.
On 10 May 1924, J. Edgar Hoover assumed the directorship of the Bureau, a position he occupied for the next 50 years. Hoover immediately set about imposing professional standards for the organization and initiated a rigorous public relations program that kept the Bureau, and later the FBI, in the public limelight as battling evil forces. He also established an identification unit that encouraged state and local law enforcement officials to contribute to a nationwide fingerprint and identification data bank.
On 1 July 1931, the Bureau was renamed the United States Bureau of Investigation, which in 1935 was changed to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. In the run-up to World War II, the FBI assumed expanded responsibilities in investigating sabotage, subversion, and espionage, as well as collecting intelligence in Latin America. With the establishment of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in 1947, a move that FBI Director Hoover vehemently opposed, the FBI lost its intelligence collection responsibilities in Latin America but retained its jurisdiction over counterintelligence within the United States. In this context, the FBI engaged in covert activities against domestic dissident groups during the Vietnam War, as in Operation COIN-TELPRO, and became embroiled in the Watergate scandal as well as the congressional investigations of the mid-1970s. J. Edgar Hoover died on 2 May 1972, ushering in a period of instability for the FBI.
In 1982, FBI Director William H. Webster expanded FBI jurisdiction over terrorism, the illicit narcotics trade, and white-collar crime. With the end of the Cold War in 1991, the FBI established the National Security Threat List (NSTL), changing its approach from defending against hostile intelligence services to protecting U. S. information technologies. The list included a compendium of new threats, including proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the loss of critical technologies, and the improper collection of trade secrets and proprietary information. Counterterrorism jumped to the forefront of the list with the first terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 and the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. Internal crime also rose high on the list as a national security threat.
The terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 called into question the strict separation of intelligence and law enforcement functions that had existed since 1947. The USA PATRIOT Act and similar antiterror tools enacted in the aftermath of 9/11 now blur the separation between intelligence and law enforcement by promoting cooperation between foreign intelligence agencies and the law enforcement community, including the state and local levels. Indeed, the FBI now contains the National Security Service, established by Executive Order in 2005, to strengthen the bureau’s intelligence capabilities. See also SPECIAL INTELLIGENCE SERVICE.
FEDORA. Fedora was the code name given to a Soviet citizen, Aleksei Isidorovich Kulak, who spied for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) during the 1960s. Fedora actually was a KGB case officer in New York with the cover of consultant to the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation. In March 1962, Fedora offered his services to the FBI, and the Bureau so prized and so jealously protected Fedora’s information that it hid Fedora’s, as well as another FBI informant, Top Hat’s, existence from the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA) for much of 1962. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover bypassed CIA counterintelligence chief James J. Angleton
And sent reports straight to President John F. Kennedy.
However, the FBI brought the CIA into the loop by 1963, especially because the FBI had to provide Fedora and Top Hat “feed material,” doctored or low-grade intelligence, to keep their KGB handlers satisfied. But the very nature of Fedora’s approach to the FBI had caused suspicion, and the double agents failed to receive the full trust of the FBI and CIA, so much so that Angleton to the end of his life believed Fedora to be a Soviet disinformation agent.
FINANCIAL CRIMES ENFORCEMENT NETWORK (FinCEN).
As reflected in its name, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network is a network bringing people and information together to fight the complex problem of money laundering. Since its creation in 1990, FinCEN has worked to maximize information sharing among law enforcement agencies and its other partners in the regulatory and financial communities.
FinCEN’s mission is to support law enforcement investigative efforts and foster interagency and global cooperation against domestic and international financial crimes and to provide U. S. policymakers with strategic analyses of domestic and worldwide money laundering developments, trends, and patterns. To accomplish this, FinCEN collects, analyzes, and shares information and implements the Bank Secrecy Act and other Treasury authorities through technological assistance. The organization consists of approximately 200 employees, the majority of whom are intelligence professionals, specialists from the financial industry, and technology experts. In addition, there are approximately 40 long-term detailers from 20 different law enforcement and regulatory agencies.
FINDING. A finding is a presidential authorization for a covert action. First mandated by the 1974 Hughes-Ryan Amendment, findings are now an essential part of the intelligence landscape. A typical finding originates in the policy channels of the National Security Council (NSC) or the Department of Defense (DOD) and winds its way through the planning and review process in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). A covert action proposal may be modified or scrapped at any time in the process, including at the level of the director of central intelligence (DCI), who must ultimately sign off on any such proposal. Once approved by all relevant parties, the president signs the finding. The Intelligence Authorization Act of 1991 legislated that findings must be approved prior to the commencement of a covert operation and must be in writing. In addition, various other legal instruments, such as the Intelligence Oversight Act of 1980, stipulate that the CIA-responsible for all aspects of covert actions—must notify the congressional oversight committees of a finding in “a timely manner,” understood to mean in advance of the covert action, unless the president directs the CIA not to do so for identifiable national security reasons. See also INTELLIGENCE OVERSIGHT.
5412 SPECIAL GROUP. The group was a committee of the National Security Council (NSC) that reviewed and authorized covert actions during the administrations of Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy. The establishment of the committee was the result of a series of National Security Council directives (NSCDs). On 15 March 1954, the NSC issued NSC Directive 5412— hence the “5412” Special Group designation-reaffirming the responsibility of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to conduct covert actions, defining the nature of such covert operations, and describing the process of coordinating the proposals. NSC Directive 5412/1, dated 12 March 1955, designated the CIA’s Planning Coordination Group as the body responsible for coordinating covert operations. NSC Directive 5412/2, dated 28 December 1955, established the 5412 Special Group as the executive body to review and approve covert action programs. The committee normally was composed of the national security advisor, representatives of the secretary of defense and secretary of state, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), and others. See also40 COMMITTEE; 303 COMMITTEE.
FLYING TIGERS. Officially known as the American Volunteer Group (AVG), the Flying Tigers were a small group of American airmen who, at the beginning of World War II, flew missions against Japanese forces under the flag of nationalist China. The formation of the volunteer group was at the behest of President Franklin D. Roosevelt who, in March 1941, decided secretly to assist the struggling Chinese government against invading Japanese forces. President
Roosevelt approved $25 million for China to purchase Tomahawk aircraft and signed a secret order in April 1941 allowing military personnel to resign from the services to join the AVG. The AVG flyers were said to be so ferocious that Chinese newspapers began calling them the “Flying Tigers,” after the teeth markings on the noses of the Tomahawk aircraft. The AVG disbanded on 4 July 1942 so that its flyers could rejoin the military services for the American war effort.
FORD, GERALD RUDOLPH (1913- ). Thirty-eighth president of the United States between 1974 and 1977. Vice President Ford assumed the presidency when President Richard Nixon resigned on 9 August 1974 in the aftermath of the Watergate scandal. A long-term congressman from Michigan, Ford was elected to the U. S. House of Representatives in 1949 and stayed there until he was named vice president on 6 December 1973. With a reputation for openness, integrity, and loyalty to the Republican Party, Ford set a record of supporting large defense expenditures and led the opposition to President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society social programs.
Upon President Nixon’s resignation, newly inaugurated President Ford pledged to follow the Nixon foreign policy and pardoned the former president. During his administration, Ford largely focused on domestic issues, seeking to address inflation arising from spikes in oil prices in the aftermath of the 1973 OPEC oil embargo and to curb the ensuing recession by proposing tax cuts, reduced social spending, and heavy taxation of imported oil.
Watergate and other events raised many questions regarding the intelligence activities carried out by federal agencies such as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Both houses of Congress investigated the agencies. In February 1976, President Ford proposed a sweeping reform of intelligence-gathering activities built around three components: limitations on the domestic activities of U. S. agencies engaged in foreign intelligence; an organizational restructuring of various agencies to bring them into compliance with new restrictions; and better procedures to protect classified information dealing with intelligence sources and methods. Most of President Ford’s recommendations were put into effect by executive order. In May 1976, the Senate created a new Senate Select Intelligence Committee (SSCI) to have broad legislative authority over the CIA, the FBI, and other components of the federal intelligence community. President Ford ran for reelection in 1976 but lost to challenger Jimmy Carter.
World History
