[FPSPACE] Eliminating CIA, reorganizing NRO, NSA, NGIA

[Keith Gottschalk]

Surely one of the reasons for the original founding of the CIA was precisely to act as a Pentagon outsider, which would impartially coordinate all information from the 4 armed forces, plus the FBI, Secret Service, etc. 

   These summaries give the impression of re-inventing the wheel, or of adding yet another bureaucracy onto the existing ones.   -  Keith

>>> Saunders B.Kramer Sr. <sbetk5 at earthlink.net> 08/23/04 18:45 PM >>>
Wow!! That reported 'intelligence shake-up' is more than radical. I bet 
it never flies. The real need is for vastly improved 'immediate 
exchange of intelligence' among all agencies as it is collected 
followed up with analysis on a continuing basis.
Saunders Kramer
On Aug 22, 2004, at 9:43 PM, DwayneDay wrote:

> Republicans in the Senate Intelligence Committee are proposing a 
> sweeping reorganization of the intelligence community.
>  
> Frankly, I don't understand what they're trying to do it.  It looks 
> pretty radical.  And I'm not sure that is a good thing...
>  
> ****************
>  
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A23719-2004Aug22.html
>
> Senate Panel Urges Broad Intelligence Shake-Up
>
>
> By Michael J. Sniffen
> The Associated Press
> Sunday, August 22, 2004; 8:30 PM
>
>  WASHINGTON - Senate Intelligence Committee Republicans proposed 
> removing the nation's largest intelligence gathering operations from 
> the CIA and the Pentagon and putting them directly under a new 
> national intelligence director.
>
> Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., the committee chairman, unveiled on Sunday 
> the most sweeping intelligence reorganization proposal offered by 
> anyone since the Sept. ll commission called for major changes. In an 
> appearance on CBS' "Face the Nation," Roberts acknowledged that full 
> details had yet to be shared with either the White House or with 
> Senate Democrats.
>
> "We didn't pay attention to turf or agencies or boxes" but rather to 
> "what are the national security threats that face this country today," 
> Roberts said of the proposals supported by eight GOP members of the 
> intelligence committee. "I'm trying to build a consensus around 
> something that's very different and very bold."
>
> But he immediately ran into some resistance from a Democrat on his own 
> committee. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., said that before appearing with 
> Roberts on the CBS show neither he nor the committee's ranking 
> Democrat, Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia, had seen the full 
> proposal.
>
> "I think it would be better to start on a bipartisan basis," Levin 
> said. "I think it's a mistake to begin with a partisan bill no matter 
> what is in it."
>
> Rand Beers, national security adviser to Democratic presidential 
> candidate John Kerry, welcomed Roberts' proposal and described it as 
> very similar to Kerry's proposals. But he added that bipartisan 
> support would be needed as well as leadership from President Bush.
>
> "Bush still appears to be dragging his feet and resisting any real 
> changes," Beers said.
>
> The White House was a bit more noncommittal. "We look forward to 
> reviewing the details of Sen. Roberts' proposal," said White House 
> spokesman Brian Besanceney. "We have taken nothing off the table."
>
> The commission that investigated the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks 
> called for a powerful national intelligence director who could force 
> the nation's many agencies to cooperate.
>
> Up to now the debate has focused on how much power to give that 
> official rather than on retooling agencies. Most Democrats have 
> supported the commission's proposal that the new director have 
> authority over hiring and spending by the intelligence agencies. 
> President Bush has endorsed creating the position but has not reached 
> a final decision on what powers the office should have.
>
> Roberts said his aides had spoken with White House officials and would 
> share the details of his proposal with them on Monday.
>
> Roberts' plan would put the CIA's three main directorates - 
> Operations, which runs intelligence collection and covert actions; 
> Intelligence, which analyzes intelligence reports; and Science and 
> Technology - into three new, separate and renamed agencies, each 
> reporting to a separate assistant national intelligence director. It 
> also would remove three of the largest intelligence agencies from the 
> Pentagon.
>
> Although the measure would essentially dismantle the CIA, Roberts said 
> in a paper he released: "We are not abolishing the CIA. We are 
> reordering and renaming its three major elements."
>
> "No one agency, no matter how distinguished its history, is more 
> important than U.S. national security," the paper said.
>
> A congressional aide, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there 
> would be no CIA director, and the agency's parts would have new names 
> under a new management structure.
>
> Despite Roberts' assertion that he wouldn't abolish the CIA, some 
> intelligence officials think that sounds exactly like what he is 
> trying to do.
>
> Some intelligence officials think Roberts' proposal is "unworkable and 
> could hamper the nation's intelligence efforts at a critical time," 
> said one, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the 
> sensitivity of the debate. This official added that rather than 
> eliminating barriers between agencies and bringing functions together, 
> "it smashes them apart."
>
> Last week, acting CIA Director John McLaughlin, a career agency 
> employee, urged Congress to move carefully and argued that there had 
> been dramatic improvement since Sept. 11 in the sharing of information 
> by various intelligence agencies.
>
> Equally drastic changes were proposed at the Pentagon.
>
> The nation's largest spy agency, the National Security Agency, which 
> intercepts electronic signals around the world, and the National 
> Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which analyzes satellite pictures, 
> would be removed from the Pentagon and put under direct control of an 
> assistant national intelligence director for collection.
>
> The Defense Intelligence Agency's human intelligence collection 
> activity would become a separate agency, like the former CIA 
> directorate of operations.
>
> Both would report to the same assistant national intelligence director 
> for collection. This official also would have direct line control over 
> the FBI's counterintelligence and counterterrorism units, although 
> they would continue to operate within the FBI administratively and 
> would still be subject to attorney general guidelines.
>
> The Pentagon's huge National Reconnaissance Office, which operates spy 
> satellites, would work under an assistant national intelligence 
> director for Research, Development and Acquisition. That same 
> assistant would also run the CIA's former directorate of science and 
> technology as an independent agency called the Office of Technical 
> Support.
>
> In a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing last week, Defense 
> Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld advised moving cautiously in 
> restructuring the intelligence community.
>
> "If we move unwisely and get it wrong, the penalty would be great," 
> Rumsfeld said. "We would not want to place new barriers or filters 
> between military combatant commanders and those agencies when they 
> perform as combat-support agencies."
>
> Perhaps mindful of that warning, Roberts' plan would create a separate 
> assistant national intelligence director for military support and a 
> four-star director of military intelligence who would run Defense 
> Department tactical intelligence units and report directly to the 
> defense secretary.
>  
>  
>  
> _______________________________________________
> FPSPACE mailing list
> FPSPACE at friends-partners.org
> http://www.friends-partners.org/mailman/listinfo/fpspace