Central Intelligence Agency.

CIA is the principal foreign intelligence and counterintelligence agency of the U.S. Government.


In October 1945, the OSS was abolished and its functions transferred to the State and War Departments. But the need for a postwar centralized intelligence system was clearly recognized. Eleven months earlier, Donovan, by then a major general, had submitted to President Roosevelt a proposal calling for the separation of OSS from the Joint Chiefs of Staff with the new organization having direct Presidential supervision. Donovan proposed an "organization which will procure intelligence both by overt and covert methods and will at the same time provide intelligence guidance, determine national intelligence objectives, and correlate the intelligence material collected by all government agencies." Under his plan, a powerful, centralized civilian agency would have coordinated all the intelligence services. He also proposed that this agency have authority to conduct "subversive operations abroad," but "no police or law enforcement functions, either at home or abroad."

Donovan's plan drew heavy fire. The military services generally opposed a complete merger. The State Department thought it should supervise all peacetime operations affecting foreign relations. The FBI supported a system whereby military intelligence worldwide would be handled by the armed services, and all civilian activities would be under FBI's own jurisdiction.

In response to this policy debate, President Harry S. Truman established the Central Intelligence Group in January 1946, directing it to coordinate existing departmental intelligence, supplementing but not supplanting their services. This was all to be done under the direction of a National Intelligence Authority composed of a Presidential representative and the Secretaries of State, War and Navy. Rear Admiral Sidney W. Souers, USNR, who was the Deputy Chief of Naval Intelligence, was appointed the first Director of Central Intelligence. Twenty months later, the National Intelligence Authority and its operating component, the Central Intelligence Group, were disestablished.

Under the provisions of the National Security Act of 1947 (which became effective on 18 September 1947) the National Security Council and the Central Intelligence Agency were established. Most of the National Security Act's specific assignments given the CIA~ as well as the prohibitions on police and internal security functions, closely follow both the original 1944 Donovan plan and the Presidential directive creating the Central Intelligence Group. The 1947 Act charged the CIA with coordinating the nation's intelligence activities and correlating, evaluating and disseminating intelligence which affects national security. In addition, the Agency was to perform such other duties and functions related to intelligence as the NSC might direct. The Act also made the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) responsible for protecting intelligence sources and methods.

In 1949, the Central Intelligence Agency Act was passed supplementing the 1947 Act by permitting the Agency to use confidential fiscal and administrative procedures and exempting CIA from many of the usual limitations on the expenditure of federal funds. It provided that CIA funds could be included in the budgets of other departments and then transferred to the Agency without regard to the restrictions placed on the initial appropriation. This Act is the statutory authority for the secrecy of the Agency's budget. In order to protect intelligence sources and methods from disclosure, the 1949 Act further exempted the CIA from having to disclose its "organization, functions, names? Officials, titles, salaries, or numbers of personnel employed."

The office of Deputy Director of Central Intelligence (DDCI) evolved gradually. Until 1953, Deputy Directors were appointed by the Director, and it was General Walter Bedell Smith, the fourth DCI, who established the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence in the role he has since played in CIA. Congress recognized the importance of the position in April 1953 by amending the National Security Act of 1947 to provide for the appointment of the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate. This amendment also provided that commissioned officers of the armed forces, whether active or retired, could not occupy both DCI and DDCI positions at the same time. The DDCI assists the Director by performing such functions as the DCI assigns or delegates. He acts for and exercises the powers of the Director during his absence or disability, or in the event of a vacancy in the position of the Director.

Under these Statutes, the Director serves as the principal adviser to the President and the National Security Council on all matters of foreign intelligence related to national security. CIA's responsibilities are carried out subject to various directives and controls by the President and the NSC.

Today the CIA reports regularly to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, as required by the Intelligence Oversight Act of 1980 and various Executive Orders. The Agency also reports regularly to the Defense Subcommittees of the Appropriations Committees in both houses of Congress. Moreover, the Agency provides substantive briefings to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, House Committee on Foreign Affairs, and the Armed Services Committees in both bodies as well as other Committees and individual members.Intelligence collection comprises both analysis of open-sources and covert gathering of information. The covert operations often entail the calculated and deliberate violation of foreign or international laws. This extra-legal dimension of intelligence is highlighted by new legislation introduced in the U.S. Senate, which is intended to help preserve it against the encroachment of international law. Within the Central Intelligence Agency, "hundreds of employees on a daily basis are directed to break extremely serious laws in countries around the world in the face of frequently sophisticated efforts by foreign governments to catch them," according to a 1996 House Select Committee on Intelligence report.

"A safe estimate is that several hundred times every day (easily 100,000 times a year) [intelligence] officers engage in highly illegal activities (according to foreign law)...." (IC21: Intelligence Community in the 21st Century, p. 205). Ironically, DCI George Tenet suggested in a May 25 speech to graduates of Johns Hopkins University that U.S. intelligence can serve "to help strengthen the rule of law in countries whose stability is threatened by unfettered crime." But in practice, defying the rule of law is the CIA's modus operandi "in countries around the world."

Black budget

"The CIA has the unique legal ability among all US government departments and agencies to generate funds through appropriations of other federal government agencies and other sources 'without regard to any provisions of law' and without regard to the intent behind Congressional appropriations. Every year, billions of dollars of Congressional appropriations are diverted from their Congressionally sanctioned purposes to the CIA and DoD based intelligence agencies without knowledge of the public and with the collusion of Congressional leaders. The covert world of ‘black programs’ acts with virtual impunity, overseen and regulated by itself, funding itself through secret slush funds, and is free of the limitations that come from Congressional oversight, proper auditing procedures and public scrutiny." The CIA black budget is annually in the vicinity of 1.1 trillion dollars – a truly staggering figure when one considers that the DoD budget for 2004 was approximately 380 billion dollars.