C.I.A.'S WORK UNIMPEDED BY INQUIRIES AND REPORTS, OFFICIALS OF AGENCY ASSERT

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CIA-RDP77-00512R000100040169-8
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RIFPUB
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K
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3
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December 12, 2016
Document Release Date: 
January 17, 2002
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169
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Publication Date: 
November 10, 1975
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NSPR
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THE Ned YOLK TIMES Approvedirdr Release 29?24?I1,t: IAh P77-O 12R00 C.T A's Work Unimpeded By Inquiries. and ' Reports, Officials of Agency Assert - Sp Ja to The N!w Yori Times WASHINGTON, Nov. 9--Offi-aides took sharp exception to cials of the Central Intelligence; these views. They said that Agency, despite repeated publiclmuch of the= committee's most avowals of diminished prestigeimportant work was' proceed- and operational ability becauseiing. now. in executive hearings ,of the various inquiries into in-and would,.if consistent with telligence operations, are con- vinced that the agency will suf ter no serious loss of authority and no erosion of its' ability to produce professional intelli- Igence estimates and reports. national security' requirements, be- wade public after the i'nves ligation ends. next: February All the;;agency offidials in- terviewed agreed";-that : the public .` criticism and official Key agency oficials do noti investigations following '- the! ,expect either the Senate oripublished reports last December (House Select. Committee on In lof widespread domestic spying on clandestine intelligenceactiv-!hamper seriously its main func- lities. Instead, they believe: the tionr-the cglieetion of -worth= committees will seek to impose while intelligence. . --- more stringent controls on such = "At. one 'point' last -Febrl operations, a compromise theyiWilliam.E. Cotly,_the,recently agency, (telligence, testified that what In. a series of recent inter-'hecalled "exag-era ted"-char-es views, a number of. agency of-[of '' improper . conduct had ficials also expressed 'surprise at what they said was the in- ability of the, Senate commit tee, :headed by Senator Frank in danger." . "Vizebe. been looking for .ap- !Church, Democrat of Idaho, tolinteli'igencec'official said last) t f it gene ate Yumac suppor o s !inquiry.. "Frank Church was the first TV show to close this fall," one senior agency aide said. Mr . Church and his' senior Approved parent,' observable effects," one! week. "There are none.", Hey added,, however, thatt agency officials were concerned! about "the intangibles, that you don't know what you're miss- ing-the- defector who doesn't defect, someone who doesn't tell you a wonderful story." t U- 'Thin gs Are Toujher' "Things are tougher, that's true," one official said. "But I; haven't seen any evidence that! things are compromised in, terms of being able to func- tion," . One high-leel intelligence of- ficial staid that the United States. and. other intelligence serices occasionally- held back things from each other, but, that that was was nothing new.i One senior Ford Administra- tion official, asked for his as- sessment of potential damage to intelligence operations, com- plained' about the oontinued disclosure to Congress of. in- ternai documents relating to agency plots to assassinate foreign leaders- and ' ocher clan- destine operations. The official said he was concerned that fu- ture Presidents and intelligence chiefs might be restricted be- cause of the fear that succes- sors would make certain data public. Aside, from that,- however;. the official said he knew of no instance in which the agen- cy's ability to produce intelli- gence had been advers?ly af- fected by, the Congressional hearings.' One high-level agency source did say that one European ,politician had recently turned down covert financing of a, political campaign The official refused to supply further in-+ formation, and it was impos-i sible to gauge how widespread' such refusals of secret aid were.' A Frequent Question One agency official conceded.; -that a factor in the dispute over) how much, if any, damage had. been done to C.I.A. operations' in the last 10 months was that; Congress had repeatedly asked' the same question in recent; hearings. ! Last Wednesday, William! Nelson, the C.I.A.'s director of! operations, was asked for his! views on the matter by Repre- sentative David- C- Treen, Re- 1 publican of Louisiana, during.`; House hearings. _ -- { . Mr. Nelson said that some; American citizens and agentsi abroad had refused to cooperate: for fear of being exposed. He, said that "there has been a! good deal of apprehension" inj foreign intelligence servicesi about continuing their relation ships with the C,LA. "I don't want to cnvetexag gerate this, however," Mr Nei?. son added. "The agency is still! functioning abroad, and I thinla. 04~0fla9 8ng rather effectively.''] "But it's hard to say that, we've lost much because of chat," the official said. Sources cited the followingi areas in which there has been! some impairment of operations: . gSome American' companies that provided cover jobs for agents in : the'..United , States have, curtailed their. coopera- tion . , i, 9A small number of the large American z corporations' that permitted the C.I.A. to use for- eign offices" and branches for cover jobs have become less enthusiastic . about permitting the, agency to have direct ac- cess to employees overseas. The companies have requested that the-agency conduct all its busi- ness. with employees through a designated contact man.; ;; 9Some of the agency's per. sonnel. still on ? clandestine as signments. overseas "have suf. feted from lowered morale and a confusion about what is per- missible. in the field. Everyone now has to check back home with his field officer, and this, is taking away operational in- itiative in spot developments,, one source said. Some agency officials said, however, that they did not think it was a bad idea to have men in the field checking in with superiors in such cases. gThere has been some re- luctance by various officials and operatives- in foreign in- telligence services to cooperate. "Some of our old-line contacts don't want to show up in our hearings or in our press," one source said. "But it just means that it's a little bit more diffi- cult to undertake an operation with friendly. operatives." He. added 'that such operations, were still feasible. 9There have been scattered! instances of less cooperation at' high-level government-to-gov- ernment interchanges of infor- mation. One high-level Ford Administration official said that some British intelligence offi- cials "no longer tell us where they got information so' we can evaluate the source, but only pass on the information. The Boston ? Globe . ;reported ' last month that American officials were treating top-secret British information as being. "on loan" to avoid the.posst.bility of its being subpgenaedby Congress of or the courts.as "property" the C-I A ;. i But all 'the sources agree'.. that intelligences information; m ludin d the most, sensitive For Release 2002/02/11 flowing in ." lro7ltinuQ Approved For Releases 002/02/11: CIA=RDP77-00512R000100040169-8 A number. of agencybffitials! said chat a major concern-did develop over the publication .earher this.year'of "Inside they Company," 'a. book by Philtpl Agee, a . former agency opera-1 tive, describing clandestine] agency activity in Latin. Amer-1 ica and naming C.I.A. covert; agents and their undercover; contacts. - The book led to serious prob-i lems for some operatives, Intel-} 'inence officials said. They. added, however, that no similar information had leaked from the Congressional intelligence committees If a central complaint did emerge during the interviews, which were initiated before the ouster of Mr. -Colby last week- end it-was repeated concern about a loss ofmoral within the agency because of the widesperad public criticism of its domestic spying and some of its clandestine overseas ac- tiVity.. . Some officials, though, dis- counted the- . significance of morale inside any bureaucracy. One high - level Administra- tion official said. that morale had been bad inside the State Department for 25 years) "but they still do their jab-" Put those officials who were ibothered. by a loss of morale said that President Forts sum- mary dismissal of Mr. Colby, who had been Director of Cen- tral Intelligence since 1973, had created a uniting surge of sympathy for Mr. Colby in the agency. One Colby associate said that the director initially planned to leave the post last 'Wednesday he later agreed -to' stay =through the end of the year - after signing 70 supergrade pro- motions that had been author- officials gathered Wednesday five minutes, with Colby trying that Colby died for; our sins.',' Colby ;praised Mr. Colby has been ".widely praised for his consistent .?ef- ;forts to coorperate with the various investigating commit- tees that were set up this year, although his approach is known to have angered. many associ- ates ad fiedsf nrn o Richard Helms, who was director of the If- T A .. . L-- i One mild demurral to-1-:the general praise for Mr. Colby's tive Otis G. Pike, Democrat mittee Mr. Pike told Mr 'Colby:. au-: - z_ - tmy own experience' that sir you. e- ar asked the right question; you will give an honest answer; You do not-make it easy for us to ask the right question." When - the House,,and .Senate committees, began.:sumrronin= making.ofa potentially, disas- I the',, agencyw has finally. 'come +doing must be turned over to ~praisec:.Mitchell Rogovin?>a Nr Colby to., aid the- age c ny Sources said that Mr. Rogovin urged Mr;, Colby. and .others , to turn over voluntarily evidence ol':ti wrongdoingas, a ; . means of keeping the Congres sional investigations- on the de- fensive.' '.Part of the_problem !of being in our culture," one middle-lev- el agency official said in ex- plaining why many in the agen- cy were reluctant to make: any information public, "is ':that compartmentalization is one of the fundamental. disciplines- .the idea is to limit the damage in case the. K.G.B. [the.S'oviet secret . intelligence service], pe- netrates the agency. This be- comes part of the- ritual, and some of the things we thought would be abhorrent to the American public" [upon disclo- sure] .are things the people have to put up with day after (day" Raw Files Provided One official said in an inter- view two weeks ago that Jus- tice Department officials were being provided with direct ac- cess to the agency's raw files. At least one Justice Depart- ment inquiry, into allegations that Mr. Helms commiettd per- jury while testifying More Congress, is,known to still be under review. - Other agency officials also expressed the view that the relatively few new issues raised thus far by the . Congressional committees were based entirely on documents rand evidence supplied by the agency. Nothing has been unearthed! by the committee that hasn't been-discovered by the agency' and stopped," one source said -Senator Church. said today) in a televised interview that his committee's -report would contain "some new inform about. the agency's assassina- tion plot. The official" added that the basic working document uti=j lized by the blue-ribbon com-1 mission set up. by President Ford and headed by Vice Pres-1 ident Rockefeller for its investi- gation and report in June was the internal C.I.A. dossier on domestic abuses assembled in May 1973 at the request of James R. Schlesinger, then the C.I.A. director, who was dis- missed last week as Secretary of Defense. Some agency officials specu- lated that the Schlesisger re- port -did not include. all the agency's domestic wrongdoing, but they doubted that tje intel- ligence committees would be able to develop ..significant new, material. Aw- Say ... x I (tine operatives, the Schlesinger ,repor t-has been denounced as the "vomit report," a reference to the fact-that agency em- ployees volunteered much of the, information about the doestic ',violations - to Mrr :Sehlesinger's: office; There, are still some men'in the agency; a' highly -reliable source said who,pride themselves on "hav} ing stronger stomachs." . == ,There is. no evidence that Mr. Colby or any other official has authorized further inquiries into domestic wrongdoing, al- though the existence of such attitudes is reported to be wide throughout the agency.! Two middle-level C.I.A. offi- cials who are now serving in key managerial positions in the agency expressed disappoint- ment in the public' proceedings of the Church committee. Some Basic Questions. "A lot of basic questionsI about intelligence and its need haven't been aired, and that's too bad," one said. The other complained that the Church' committee had not begun tot examine publicly the "fun damental" issue of covert oper- ations. A more senior intelligence official wondered whether what he felt: was the failure of the Congressional investigations to deal ? with the more. substantial issues; would not provoke' 'yet another inquiry into intel- ligence in some future Con- gress. . "The Senate had the staff," one- agency source said, "but it , got too bogged down in the assassinations." He said that thus far, the. Church---committee had yet 'to fix: firmly a schedule for public, hearings on the agency's covert actiVities.in 'Chile, where at least $8--million. was.spent'`to prevent: the election-pt salva= dor".f dleiide; .Gossens? in,;.'197O and, failing that, 'to.-attempt, to make it more difficult for Mr. Allende'sregime. to govern. Mr.; Allende was overthrown by a.military junta in ' Soptenn !ber '1973 and was either' killed, , or committed suicide A number :of ..agency, me' believe that the House' intel- ligence committee 'has publicly examined more basic questions dealing with the capability of the C.I.A. to make accurate intelligence assessments.:. - One_~ former. agency official- said, ."The-"House,: goes after- the- arteries, while:--the Senate goes after the capillaries.'.' The Senate committee was known to, be .engaged in an intense dispute over Senator Church's desire to -stage exten- sI?ve public `hearings on the C.I.A.'s role-in Chile..; ?' ., . e0fTn"uecj Approved For Release 2002/02/11 : CIA-RDP77-00512R000100040169-8 Approved Ftx'Release 2002/02/11 : CIA-RDP77-00542ROO0100040169-8 Opposition on Panel Sources close to the commit- tee said that opposition from Republicans and, some Demo- crats on the nine-member panel had prevented Mr. Church from going forward this week with full-scale public hearings. As of last Friday, the sources said, the Senators had -been unable to agree how long the hearings, if public, should last and which witnesses should be summoned. Defenders of the Senate cont. mittee, including Mr. Church, concede that the public hear- ings have failed . to arouse strong public interest, but they insist that the committee should not.be judged until it completes its work A number of sources said that the assassination `report, scheduled to be. released ' in two weeks, reaches no-definite conclusions about who author- ized what in Cuba, Chile,.the Congo and the Dominican Re- public. The report, howaever is said to contain the most detailed information ever as= sembled outside the C.LA: on how covert operations are ini- tiated and carried out:' - . > Mr. Church is known to be sensitive to the charges that he sought to obtain -persona publicity by publicly investigat- ing such seemingly dramatic but less significant issues as the failure of some low-level; vi ties of its needed intelligence agency official to destroy lethal I agencies. toxin stocks after a direct Pres- '.`We'retrying to put intel- 1969.ia1 order to do so in late1ligence'within:the constitution- I al framework," he said. "That's The -Senator said in a recent. telephone interview -? that such accusations. were "groundless" and added: "The assassination matter would have been unpre- cedented box office: It would have been the most sensational hearings held in this' century. I was against bringing this out because I thought it would have caused damage" to the nation. 'Headline-Grabbing' Denied "Its just unconscionable, to (turn around and, say that the committee is headline - grab- bing," Mr..Church added. Similarly, William G.. Miller, staff _ director. of. the Church committee inquiry, said in. a telephone interview that 30 in- vestigators : and attorneys had been working since. early this year on what he..said was one of the central issues..;'In the ,investigation: Are you ' going to have coyest operations and under what conditions and what controls? Thus far, Mr.. Miller. said, the staff dealing with that issue has been meeting privately and may -be forced Act conclude its the major....work of the. commit- tee, and it won't be seen until February. - Differing Views Voiced Other Senate staffmen, in- cluding some senior member of Mr. Church's committee, ex. rressed differing views. "The committee has not been willing to hang tough and fight the :Administration" on. access to documentation, one commit- tee . said. . "It's frittered away leverage "you-journalists gave! them [early this year]-when' everyone was afraid of a cover-' Another committee source complained that Senator Church and Mr. Miller "have the'notion that if you go quiet- ly, in the end you'll come up with some worthwhile reme- dies" for the intelligence com- munity. - ' "People will say you're ter- ribly reasonable, but that's only because you haven't found out anything," the source said.;. :,Whenever there was a?1 real work with relatively 'little m_kcrunch?iii the area'of domestic' formation made public t, ..abuses, the source said,: the -cauuJ ; iii u:lbuu _UL SCGC(_y 'JUL eUL LLLS Uet.LeJ 011,, uec;ause versus national; security' ,'. xevryotie- wily thin ings -He descrtbed the' committee's have been, dug ip and tf}vesti-. major goal as ensuring ` that