DCI BRIEFING CONCERNING DOMESTIC ACTIVITIES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 27
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 13, 2006
• Sequence Number: 15
• Publication Date: January 2, 1975
• Content Type: MF

Approved For, Release 2{338113:'ZT-DPOM5R000100050015-3
DDj%W 75-0009
2 January 1975
MEMORANDUM FOR: %Aeputy Director, for Intelligence
Deputy. Director. for Operations
Deputy. Director. for Science and Technology
Deputy to the'DCI.'for National Intelligence Officers
Deputy to. the DCI,for the Intelligence Community
General-Counsel
Legislative Counsel
Inspector-General-
SUBJECT. . DCI Briefing Concerning Domestic Activities
Attached,for your information and retention is a copy
of the transcript of the DCI presentation in the :auditorium
on 30~.December 1974,. concerning the allegations that the Agency
has been involved.in domestic activities. Although the report
is stamped "Administrative Internal Use Only", you may wish
to exercise some :reasonable 'Precaution in the handling of
this material until and unless the Director authorizes. further
dissemination.
Executive Officer
Deputy Director for Administration
Attachment
Transcript
1--- "1 LaZA
:r
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
DCI SPEECH - 30 December 1974
DCI: Well I'm sorry, for a variety of reasons,
to disrupt your morning. Mostly I'm sorry for the
amount of hullabaloo that we're in for again I see.
The Agency has had this kind of problem before, as many
of you will remember, from the Bay of Pigs to the Ramparts
case and, most recently, Chile and now another.
What I thought I would do today is give you a rough
outline of where we stand, of where I think we're going
to go and answer various specific questions that I know
you have in your minds, and then be prepared to answer
any others that I can.
Where we stand. We obviously were accused in the
New York Times of conducting a massive domestic intelli-
gence operation. That's not so. And I indicated that
that's an inaccurate characterization of what this Agency
has been doing. What the Agency has done pursuant to its
law, which says that it shall not have any law enforcement,
police, subpoena powers or internal security functions,
has been to work on foreign intelligence and foreign
counterintelligence. Now, in the course of that, there
were a few things where we probably stepped a little over
the edge. For example, in following a foreign intelligence
or foreign counterintelligence case, we quite naturally
TT,,,t
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
run across the names of Americans sometimes. If those
deal with internal security we pass those to the FBI.
Now there's nothing wrong with that. It fits within our
Charter. All of us have taken an oath to support and
and defend the Constitution of the United States against
all enemies, foreign and domestic. We are obliged under
our law to conduct foreign intelligence and so include
foreign counterintelligence activities, and we are entitled
to help our country to defend itself against foreign and
domestic enemies.
Now where we may have slipped over the edge, in a few
cases, is in setting up an operation. We sometimes would
put somebody into a radical movement here as a way of
developing their credentials for work abroad. Again,
no problems. That's just part of the foreign intelligence
operation. But in the course of working into that group
and developing those credentials sometimes they reported
material while they were in that operation. Now that,
if it were substantial we would pass it onto the FBI.
We would probably, make a record of it, and in that way
we built up a file of names of Americans and some know-
ledge of American activities. But the activity was not
aimed at the domestic groups. The activity was aimed at
preparing somebody to go abroad to work in the things that
2
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
are quite proper in our Charter.
There is another area, however. If you look into
both the article and the history of this Agency, you will
all remember last year when Director Schlesinger sent out
a memorandum which said that he knew that there were some
questionable activities in the Agency's past history, and
he wanted reports of those accumulated. We did accumulate
anything that people thought were questionable, and in the
course of that we built up a little collection. I went
and briefed the Chairmen of the House and the Senate
Armed Services Committees on those activities. And you'll
also recall that in the succeeding months, we sent out a
memorandum to the different Deputy Directorates and specifi-
cally referred to each of those cases that was brought up in
that exercise. And, we made it very clear as to the proper
limits of that activity and the things that we would not do
that would be improper.
Now, I think that, in other words, that exercise, both
of briefing the Chairmen and of sending out the Directives,
has essentially put the Agency in a position where I can say
with good conscience that I don't know of any improper
activity going on now, and I don't think there is any
improper activity going on now.
- ---T-T T- TT=E ONLY
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
I
As to the past. As to the past, there were a few
things running back as far as 1950, the early 150s, and
you have to realize, and I think most Americans, sensible
Americans, realize that we're talking about a different
atmosphere and a different political climate and a
different feeling of what this Agency was for and what it
was about, and that at that time, in those succeeding
years between then and this post-Vietnam, post-Watergate
atmosphere, there have been a lot of changes in basic
attitudes and climate. And some of the things that really
looked reasonable at that time don't look reasonable now.
We've found a few of those, we found a few things where if
you take the statute which says that the Director is
responsible for the protection of intelligence sources
and methods, some of our security.activities, some of our
protection of our sources and methods and protection of
the Agency, certainly went over the edge of what we should.
have been doing. There are a few cases of that, and I
have reported those to the President and they were reported
to the Chairmen of the two Committees a year or so ago.
So these I have referred to in various situations as skeletons
in the family closet which, hopefully, should remain there.
Obviously they didn't.
4
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
*0001 VWV
What happened, I think, was that Mr. Hersh talked
to various ex-employees, and he got an edge on the
first program, the counterintelligence program, and then
he got a few hints of some of the other activities that
had been brought together last year. It's my estimate that
he probably got those hints from people who contributed to
that collection rather than from having seen the collection
itself or gotten it from anyone who had access to the
collection itself. And this is a normal journalistic
practice. It's obviously part of the muckraking or
exposure school of journalism. But once, with a little
hint or two, any reasonably intelligent reporter can get
enormous additional amounts of information by going to
people who in perfectly good faith are horrified by the
allegation and then proceed to try to clarify the real
facts and the real justification for that reporter. And
if you do that to enough people, you can collect the
whole story without too much trouble.
And in this case what Mr. Hersh did, I am convinced--
and, frankly, I told him so -- he put two or three totally
disconnected elements together to make his story. He put
the fact of the counterintelligence program and the fact
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
that it was aimed at foreign links to American dissidents
and he took some of the individual wrong things that
CIA did in the past, added them together and created a
massive domestic intelligence activity.
I'm reminded a little bit of Macy's parade where
you take a thin film of fact, fill it with hot air, and
create an illusion that captures the gaze of the entire
population. I think in a way we are facing that problem
and, as you know, we have in the past faced somewhat
similar problems.
Now those are essentially the facts of the case. I'm
not going to go into detail here. I did go into detail
with the President. And, I want to leave with'the
President, as I think is proper, the decision as to what to
do for the next step. I think he will be back here, as
you've seen in the papers, this week and will probably
have a session, and then he'll announce just exactly what
he's going to do with this report and what he's going to
do as further steps.
But I think that I want to reassure those of you who
may have suspected that our counterintelligence activity
was indeed a massive domestic intelligence activity, that
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
it wasn't, that it was within the proper Charter of
the Agency, that there were some. individual errors made
in it and wrong things done in it, that separately the
Agency in the last 25 years has done a few wrong things
but they weren't connected with that domestic intelligence
activity, and that they were very exceptional to the basic
thrust of the Agency's activity. And they were, I think,
the kind of thing that can be expected if you run a large
institution for 25 years, be that institution a Government
agency, a corporation, an academic institution or maybe
even a publication affair. You will have some things that
are done wrong in that size an operation over that many
years.
Now, unfortunately, we are in this post-Vietnam and
post-Watergate mentality and with the strong stress on
morality and a little bit of revisionist history and all
this, and so we are going to take a few brickbats and a
few pies in the face over things that were done at
previous times. This we are a little bit used to, as we
have done it before and I wouldn't be surprised in the
future if certain things change, certain atmospheres
change, that some of the things that we do now will either
be thought of as too much or too little in later years.
7
mT .-r
Approved For Release 2006/11113: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
rr".rs ' 'IZ - I --"_L USE ONLY
So that is part of the post audit way in which we run
a lot of our democratic surveillance of our Government
in this society and I think that we have to expect it.
Now, let me go to a couple of the other things.
The first is the question of are we purging the CI Staff,
are we going through a massive clean-up campaign, and
so forth. The answer is no. As I think I've indicated,
I'm reasonably confident that with some small edges of the
problem that their functions were proper and that there is
no question of any massive illegal activity in that.
Mr. Angleton -- I did meet Mr. Angleton before this
article appeared -- I have not seen him since then -- and
at that time I did inform him that I thought it was time
for some successor leadership to take over those functions.
I did not ask him to retire or resign, but I pointed out
the very substantial financial benefits that you're all
aware of for people who do retire. But I assured him that
if he elected not to, that I would find another job for him,
and I outlined what I thought it was, so that I left the
option up to him to stay in the Agency and do something
different, not do what he's been doing, but to go ahead
and either to retire or not to retire as he chose.
Approved For'Release 2006/11/13 CIA=RAF58dBV~`495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
r :~ ONLY
On the other three gentlemen mentioned in this
morning's paper, they were not asked to resign or retire.
They were told that they would not succeed as the Chief
of the CI Staff, and I think that led them to make the
same decision to retire under the benefits of the Retire-
ment Legislation that they face. So I don't think they
were pushed out. They were not given the succession --
that was going to go somewhere else -- but they were told
that the leadership of the CI Staff was going to change
and if they remained after the change, why that was a
matter of their choice. But I stress -- and I do want to
stress this for their benefit -- they were not being purged
for any wrongdoing; this is not any clean-up campaign aimed
at them. It's been my feeling for a number of months -- and
I have discussed this with various people over the past
number of months -- that some change in the organizational
structure and the management of CI Staff was appropriate, and,
unfortunately, it all came to a head here at the same
time. But I won't say that it's totally disconnected
with all this, because I don't think anybody would believe
me if I did, whether it was true or not. But the
fact is that this has coincided, certainly, with
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
vow O JLY
this development but that it does not represent any
indication of illegal activity, improper activity, or
any effort to cleanup some terrible place in the Agency.
Now I'd like to mention the question of illegal
activities. I indicated that some of the things that
we found by dredging through the Agency's skeletons were
technically illegal. Now there are two levels of this.
There are some things that are proper, but they're not
within the Charter of this Agency to do, and in that sense
they're actions which we are not authorized to do but they
not things that are a crime. Y
Those things I think
we've cleaned up. There are really a very few things which
technically, in a technical sense, might be carried as an
actual violation of some criminal statute of the United
States. Now I do not propose, I do not believe that there
are any of these which are the subject of real prosecution
and of conviction of the people involved, because there was
too much of an atmosphere in which this was reasonable;
there is too much of a command structure involved. You
could not prove intent, I don't think, the criminal intent
necessary for an actual conviction.
t ONLY
~
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
%mole
A -TTT;n - T,7,----7 A.L USE ONLY
However, that is my opinion. I have certain
obligations under a very clear statute, and so do you,
that if any Government employee knows of an actual crime
and does not take proper steps to point it out to the
Department of Justice, then he in turn commits a crime.
Now, as I say, I don't think these are actually
that certain. But on the other hand, I do not believe
that this Agency by itself has the right to suppress any
such activity. Now there was over the 25 years of
our history a legal opinion by which we did have - do have
the right to refuse to go to prosecution if intelligence
sources and methods would thereby be revealed. And there
have been a number of cases over the years in which crimes
have been committed, which we have said no we will not -
we cannot reveal these intelligence sources and methods,
and thus the prosecution has failed to take place. Now
that's fine, and that's the position I would take in any
one of those cases. But I do think that I do not have the
right unilaterally to make that decision with respect to
anything done by the Agency and by the Agency command
structure, or we et
g into a situation in which the Agency
controls itself and is subject to no outside control; and
L'-E 0 iL5
1-=
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
1r
USE ONLY
I think that is not within the spirit of our law and
our Constitution. And therefore I am -- I have
talked with the Acting Attorney General. I've told
him my opinions that there's nothing that serious here.
But I'm going to talk with him and give him the specifics
and I think he'll agree with me on the answers. But that
makes it that it is not this Agency alone that's determining
the propriety or impropriety of its activities.
I might add that the fact that these were gathered
together and briefed to our Congressional Committees a year
and a half ago suggests that maybe they didn't think they
were subject to prosecution either.
Well those are, I think, the main points I'd like to
make for you today. We are going to have a tough time.
I don't know whether there's going to be a public panel
put together, a blue ribbon panel of some sort. I do know
that something like eight Congressional Committees have
already indicated their intention to investigate us, and I
think that the month of January, on my part, will largely
be spent on the Hill. But I think that we may actually,
in a kind of a funny way, come out a little bit ahead on
this overall experience, because it will become quite clear,
I think, that this is a grossly exaggerated set of allegations
T ~gg
Approved For Release 2006/11/13-': CIA=RDFBOb8l 9Wt 00100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
iif T - .~ - I _ L USE O"TT
against our Agency and it raises the question as to how
and consequently whether we can conduct an intelligence
service in this country. When it gets down to that kind
of a question, I think the Congress, as it has in its
votes to date, and the Executive and the people will agree
that we need an intelligence service and that that existence
requires certain groundrules for its supervision but also
a protection of the secrecy which is necessary to it.
Now, I think this may bring to a head the various
discontents about our activities which have been expressed
in various places; it may bring to head the problem of
getting some better legislation for our sources and to
protect our sources and methods. And it may bring to a head
the question as to exactly how we're going to be supervised
by the Congress and our decisions reviewed by the bodies
that are responsible for looking us over.
.I've tried in the past year or so to explain our functions.
I've tried to put the stress on the fact that intelligence
is a changed process from what it was. It is not just the
spy business any more. It is a technical profession, it is
an intellectual profession in its analysis functions, and
yes, we do have some clandestine activities as well. But
TIT T C'M- 7" V" -T
Approved For helease 2006111/13: CIA RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
17, IT- TT--
the entire intelligence process has been carried to a
very high art by you and your predecessors and your
associates in this building and by the other people who
participate in the intelligence business in our country.
I think that we have made available to quite a lot of
people the product of our intelligence. I think it has
very high ratings among our customers, and I think it
has - the intelligence business is gradually becoming
understood better by a larger percentage of our people.
At the same time we really have not solved the problem of
how we keep secrets, those secrets which have to be kept,
in order to carry this function out. We haven't solved it
yet, and each one of these secrets that comes out to our
American attitude is quite exciting and it becomes a
source of a great deal of public comment and press comment.
But I have enough confidence in"the good sense of the
American people and of its leaders that I think that an
institution which contributes as much toour national well-
being as this one does and the people in it, will get the
respect and'the appreciation that they both deserve.
With that, I'd be very happy to answer questions.
Yeah?
Approved For R41ease'2006111/13 : CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
Q: I saw in the paper that Mr. Harrington is suing you and
Dr. Kissinger, and I wondered if you thought that there might be legal
consequences to that suit which are different from the publicity that it
would create?
DCI: Well, Congressman Harrington is suing -- I just read the
complaint here 15 minutes ago -- to get a declaratory judgment
that -- It's sort of a collection of everything that anybody's ever
complained about the Agency for. He is suing to say we aren't allowed
to do covert action activities, that we have to give our budget figures
to the Congress, that we have to report to various Congressmen various
things and so forth. I think, quite frankly, that he is raising as a
legal question, a question which is basically a political question,
because -- As for our legal justification, I think we have enough legal
justification for what we've been doing. It does fall under that section
of our law. The Congress has been aware through methods the Congress
has set up. They appropriate our money every year. The/ know the
various things that are going on. And I think the precedent over these
years of how we've handled our affairs will cause that suit to fall,
really, in the legal sense. I think that it's not apt to get very
far in that sense. It will be a publicity thing, but I don't think
will go very far on the legal question.
Yeah?
T~ T'!T
Approved For Re ease--2006t1rt[i LCTA RDP8000 t4&5R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
I did send him a cable a couple of weeks ago when I knew
1= _' USE ONLY
Mr. Helms is going to be in for some rough sledding in the
next month, however, so I wondered was he aware of the testimony that
you gave to the Chairmen of our Subcommittees ..... -
DCI: He was in Iran; so, no, he wasn't.
Q: And will he be allowed access to your reports prior to his
testimony in Congress .... .
DCI: That's a good question. I was thinking about it on the way
in this morning. Because obviously we do respect him. I personally
respect him a great deal for his leadership of this Agency. I think he did
it very well and I think he did it in good conscience at the time of those
various activities. He certainly stood up very well on the Watergate
thing and kept us out of an enormous amount of trouble there I think.
I'd have to ask the lawyers, frankly, to tell me the degree
to which an ex-Director can be given access to material such as this.
And you get into a tricky thing there as to responsibilities on each side
for these things. And I repeat that I do not think that there's anything
in the record that would subject him to any legal criminal action. But
nonetheless I would rather not answer that one way or the other until I
get some good advice.
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13 CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
that Seymour Hersh was rooting around, and I just assured him that
whatever happened it wasn't generated in this Agency by any intent to
put any opprobrium on him at all.
Yes?
Q: Sir, could you comment specifically on the issue of the
10, 000 files -- what was involved, what ...... how many were there?
DCI: There are --
In that neighborhood there are 10, 000
names in the register in connection with this program, the counter-
intelligence program. About two-thirds of the names were . names which
were - either came up as a by-product of our intelligence work or our
counterintelligence work abroad or were specifically asked - we were
specifically asked by the FBI to find out whether there were any foreign
connections with them while they were abroad. Now that built up about
two-thirds of the files. And in those two categories there are some that
you might wonder as to whether we should have, those if they came from
this business of having people in a movement here, who, were preparing
to use that as credentials to go abroad and meantime reporting something,
they did report some facts on Americans here. And I think that's probably
wrong. We don't allow it any more. But it was in the framework of that
time, I think, not all that unreasonable.
Approved For Release 200611 1 71 3 : CIA RDP80B0i49~P,000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11
13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
-IT P
03TT.t
The remaining third is one of those things that we bureaucrats
understand very well, that the FBI sent over copies of their reports on
various things to us, and we busily filed them and carded them. We didn't
do anything more with them. They were just raw FBI reports on various
people. But they did build up in this file. We've been going through this
file, I understand, for the last several months and scraping out of it any-
thing that's not appropriate under our proper guidelines today. But the
fact is that we had various names of various people.
On the Congressmen question, which was one of the things
covered -- As you know, the Legislative Counsel has lots of records
of Congressmen, obviously, including our services to them. But on the
Congressmen, we found some Congressional names in our files. They
were either -- I think most of them predated their election to Congress
and were caused by that individual's willingness. to work with us,
collaborate with us. After all, there is one Congressman who was a
former staff_ employee here. Obviously we have a file on him. But they
were before they were Congressmen, or in some cases their names did
come up in connection with this by-product of something abroad. But
I can say with great confidence that we have never, to my knowledge,
conducted any kind of a surveillance of a Congressman and, frankly, we'd
Approved For'Release 20b5711/?I3???EIAIf M$ $ 4 58000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
,nor
1 --ryn ONLY
X~a ONLY
be out of our minds if we did so.
Yeah?
Q: Mr. Colby, are you aware of any more surprises that the
press might pull on you? ...Sunday's New York Times, they quoted
a former CIA employee, supposedly --
DCI: Yeah. I can't make any sense out of that at all.
Frankly, I told Mr. Hersh that didn't make sense to me, but he ran
it anyway.
Q: Does the press normally indicate to you that they are
going to spring something like this --
DCI: Yeah. They usually call me up about five-thirty on a
Friday night and it's just the right time to conduct a file search.
And they did; Time Magazine called me up on this story about the three
Congressmen and Justice Douglas. And I denied that we spied'on them,
but they ran the story anyway. And then one of the Congressmen called
me from Miami because the Miami Herald had across the top of the head-
line that he was spied on by CIA.
And just to
give you a little sense
that the world is not all that unfriendly out there., his concern was
there was something wrong with him. So, there are people in this
country who think that we're doing a useful service. I assured him
that he was not -- we had found no record of his name, we never
spied on him in any way, and I assured him of that, and he issued a
statement on that.
that this was interpreted by a number of his constituents as meaning
19
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
But frankly, this New York Times case, it is completely
off the reservation. Really, I can't connect it. I think frankly
what is going on there is that Mr. Hersh is on to some fellow who
had a tenuous connection wit it, who has given him a lot of, what
we used to call in Vietnam, war stories -- third, fourth, fifth
hand statements saying things that happened without any knowledge
about whether it was happening, or whether it really happened or
not. Then, of course, there it is; he runs it.
But the Domestic Operations Division, which is the ancestor
of the Foreign Resources Division, was not engaged in this
counterintelligence program, for instance, and rather carefully
kept out of it. Its targets are foreigners, in America, and we've
taken the position that -- and I've taken the position publicly in
my confirmation hearing and had no flak -- that the collection of
foreign intelligence from foreigners in the United States is within
our responsibilities. And, I think that's perfectly proper, and
that's the function of that Division.
I would say that -- and I particularly appeal to this audience,
T..7 '-1 .,
,.. _ ... TTI- .,err ,r
20
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
A T.eT~T f'?-~ f J , - T- 1-j l .: ,.. Y?1 :~ ~/"1'.e}
because that question of surprises ..... that five-thirty Friday. night
when they call you up and ask you about, you know, what you knew about
some horrendous event; if you have some kind of a feel of anything that
might relate to it, you can sometimes interpret the problem and bring
it into shape. And if you'll read the original New York Times article,
you'll see that I did make the point, very strongly, that these foreign
intelligence operations were - or our counterintelligence activities
involving American dissidents were foreign counterintelligence activities
even though there's a little edging over in certain places as I've indicated.
But what really, I think, can hurt the Agency badly and that is if its
management doesn't know things that went on, because you can get into
a situation where you have no record of a certain event, the allegation
is made, you deny it and then you're proven to be wrong. And that can
destroy the Agency. And therefore I appeal to all of you to once again
look in your consciences and in your records, and if you know of anything
that you know of or have heard of that is outside of our Charter, either
bring it to me personally or bring it to the IG, who now has a nice
procedure for handling this collection of skeletons. But if I know about
the skeleton I can handle it. If I don't know about it, I really am walking
on very thin ice. And you remember we went through this problem after
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
the Watergate thing, and it did cause us quite a lot of trouble. And
I think we're in good shape now. I'm convinced that we have a
collection, but if anybody knows of anything that he thinks is wrong,
let's hear about it, because a) we want to stop it; and b) we want to
be aware of it so we can handle the question.
And some of these things undoubtedly will be forced into the
public print in the next few months, because in some of these things
there are no intelligence sources and methods involved, and we will
be unable to keep them in Executive session in the atmosphere of today.
But if we know about them, if we can present them in the context in
which they appeared at that time, I think we can protect the Agency,
which is what we're interested in, from the adverse effect. But if we
have these things thrown at us in the middle of nowhere, after having
made statements to the contrary, we're in very serious shape for our
future.
Yes?
Q: Forgetting about the past for a moment and concentrate
instead on what's coming up, apart from an injunction... that we
should be aware and report to you. Are you satisfied that at this
point your own guidelines are firm enough anti that your own - how shall
I say it? - tentacles out into the organization are broad enough that you
ris
Approved For Release 2006/11/'13: Cl 'F f3F 8f B` 1-495RO00100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
will in fact be aware of what's going on and ..... -- Because I think
there's been a concern what happened was not the result of a top-level
decision but rather ..... say middle-level activities, of which
there was no check until .....
DCI: I think the guidelines are clear enough. And you know
this folder we read every October, I think it is, has a section in there
that says if you have any feeling that anything is outside the Charter of
the Agency that you're obliged to bring it up to me. I think the control
of what the different Directorates are doing and the activities of the
different offices and so forth that I'm reasonably content tla t the Deputy
Directors and the various office chiefs are well enough aware of the
limits of propriety and, certainly, in this atmosphere, are well enough
aware of the dangers of ignoring those limits to themselves as well as
to the Agency. Though I don't think there's that much of a problem. I
do not run a whole separate counterintelligence activity within the Agency
to find out about things like that. I stress the command structure, because
I believe that the various leaders of the various units are responsible
people, and I want them to feel responsible and not to feel that it's up to
me to find out something. The responsibility's up to them, and I mean
you, to tell me about anything that you're doing that is of any question at
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
all. And we have procedures to do that. And I'm, frankly, reasonably
content that it works. I have total confidence in our Deputies. They
tell me I'm wrong every now and again very forcefully so I expect they'll
tell us if anything is going on in their shop that's wrong occasionally.
Yes?
Q: Mr. Colby, is all of this going to impair the effectiveness
of the Domestic Contact Division to contact .....
DCI: I don't think this will so much. It will give it some problem.
The thing I'm worried about that Division is the - that we have developed
a reputation over the years of being able to keep our mouths shut about the
various people we've dealt with; and if we deal with the XYZ company and
they tell us something, that they don't read it in the paper the next day.
I think there are a lot of people who are not overly convinced at our ability
to keep a secret right now. And that's hurting us. And to some extent
you have to admit that they're right from the leaks that we've had and from
the problems that we have of handling our legal responsibilities. We're
going to try to protect them, but I think there is an unease in the context
I
of our domestic contacts people as to the wisdom of working with us. On
the other hand, there are an awful lot of Americans who are very friendly
to us and are very sympathetic with us in these times. You. know, we get
24
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11113: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
t T_ _._ ._ .. ~.. TT?
a certain amount of crank letters up there, and it's been rather amusing
the last week we've gotten quite a few that are very supportive -- you know,
that, darn it, you ought to have been doing that. I don't agree with that,
but it's an interesting reflection that there is a body of opinion that is very
supportive of this Agency and its work. And while we may have a few
ex-employees who may say too much or who may be cleverly manipulated
to say too much, I think the great mass of our employees and a great mass of
of our ex-employees are very loyal to the Agency and that we do have the
ability to keep secrets except for that smallpercentage. It's that small
percentage that hurts us. And I think that's something we're just going to
have to figure out how to live with until we get some assumption of
responsibility by our leadership and by our-Congress that we really do
want to run an intelligence service and it requires that we have some tools
to keep the necessary secrets and to supervise us in a necessary way.
And with that I think we'll be all right. But it's going to be a bouncy spring,
and I can't tell how many other little surprises are downstream.
Well, this is a family meeting. Obviously I didn't say any-
thing that was all that highly classified, but if I went back through every
individual. sentence I could make a headline out of several of them I'm sure.
So I do beseech you to pass along your impressions of this meeting to
25
Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80BO1495R000100050015-3
 Approved For Release 2006/11/13: CIA-RDP80B'01495R000100050015-3
your associates in the Agency; but please do not reveal the specifics
of what we've been talking about outside the Agency. I really don't _
want the President's hands to be tied by a premature leak of this report
from this Agency. And I've taken some steps to try to hold on. to it,
because I think the President has both the right, and I have the respect
for him, that he should have a free hand as to decide what he's going
to do and not have the newspapers shoving him around just because of
something that leaked out of here.
I do take you into our confidence to the degree I have but --
and I didn't cover a lot of specifics, as you know, because I know you're
as concerned about this as we are in the front office, and your families
are concerned and your associates are concerned. So I don't want to
send you away feeling happy and relaxed, but at the same time I don't
want you to feel that the Agency record is bad, nor that the Agency has
no future. I think it has a future. It may have a bouncy few months
before it gets there, but it will have a good future thanks to the talents
that are in it.
i
Thanks very much. [Applause. ]
Approved For Release 2006/113: CIA-RDP80B01495R000100050015-3