'CIA BACKGROUND HISTORY, 17 DRAFTS, 372 PP.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP83-01034R000200020001-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 10
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 4, 2005
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: January 1, 1956
• Content Type: FORM

25X4
IDENTIFICATION OF DOCUMENT (author, form, addraaaaa, tJtJ? & !an/th)
"Miscellaneous Draft," Subject: "CIA Background
History, 17 drafts, 372 pp.
DOCUMENT
DATE, 1946
thru
1953
LOCATIONS
HS/HC - 22,
23. 24 V_
ABSTRACT
These drafts deal with the background history of CIA primarily the Smith
period. Titles and dates of drafts: "Vandenberg Stage", 1946; "1946-1950
pe iod; "CIA Experience Before Establishment of 0/NE," 1946-1950; "Main
Stes in Development of ORE", 1947-1950, "The Merger of the Staff and Cur-
ren Intelligence Groups," 1949; "Defense Project, (Report for Mr. Darling
by (WSJ)," 1946-1950; "Development of CRS-ORE," Feb. 1946-July 1947; "Devel-
opine nts During 1948," 1948; "Background 1946-1953," 1946-1953; "Functions,"
196-1950 -1950Production of Estimates and Related Intelligence," 1946-
19~ Z; "Historical Staff Interviews," 1950.1953; "The Central Intelligence
Gup Idea," undated; "Thesis," undated; "Comment on NSA 102 (e) "Dissem-
iga t ion, " uAOI dd FoPRgltg-4kM'2%2i'IAtI 6P83-01034R000200020001-7
*Central Reports Staff
~~ -._ I. a. . of
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I Evolution of the Organization Inherited by General Smith
II The Organizational Changes of 1950-1951
III Organization for the Coordination of Intelligence Activities
IV Organization for the Correlation and Evaluation of Intelligence
Relating to the National Security
V Domestic Collection and Related Services of Common Concern
VI Scientific Intelligence
VII Current Intelligence as an Expanded Service of Common Concern
VIII Collection and Dissemination -- an Agency Service, a Service
of Common Concern, and a Central Intelligence Function
IX Central Research Activities -- the Office of Research and Reports
X Offices of. the Central Intelligence Agency
..41L roc ~[+'/t~ZsN t ve i .; .
the, C e i.ot:el ~. s .z rt ~ LC .
usluC- 24
This is a TEMPORARY DOCUMENT
only, for the use of DCI/HS.
The record copy has been
released to National Archives
under the HISTORICAL REVIEW PROGRAM.
Date //HRP g L ---7-
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 hazNon
t
he ee:.t."`al Tutellig n Agazey.
Date
COP] NENTT ON NSA 102 (e) tt17ISS " IINATION"
(Note: This comment was discussed on November 17, 1955, with
L. R. Houston, CIA General Counsel, who considered it. reasonable
brief statement of the case.)
B84004
The National Security Act of l9L.7 put a. positive duty on
CIA to disseminate to appropriate agencies within the Government
correlated and evaluated intelligence relating to the national
security. This is specific and positive and is the direct result
of the Pearl Harbor investigation which showed that failure to
disseminate intelligence was among the causes of the disaster.
Related to this duty is the clause (section 102 (e)) allowing for
inspection of the intelligence agencies by the ECI; plus the pro-
vision (d-h.) that CIA shall perform "services of common concern".
In order to direct a system under which there would be a
minimum possibility of non-dissemination such as occurred at Pearl
Harbor, the 17CI would need to take full advantage of the "inspection"
clause because otherwise he would. have no way of knowing whether or
riot material requiring dissemination had been received in any given
department. He would also need whatever authority might be granted
by the DISC to assure that such material would be disseminated to
all. appropriate officials. On the other hand, to provide for dis-
semination of intelligence as a "service of common concern", he
would need only to construct machinery, within the central agency,
adequate for the purpose of routing; information.
The ideal of centrally assurred dissemination is in conflict
with certain realities of intelligence. Information classifiable
This is a TEMPORARY DOCUMENT
4-1 only, for tie use of LCI/HS.
HS/H.C_
The record copy has been
released to National Archives
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as intelligence by general standards, may be deemed unavailable for
intelligence purposes by department of the _overmm~ent in which
intelligence is only a supporting function for broader Purposes.
Thus the business of the Department of Defense is to prosecute and
be prepared for war, while that of the Department of State is to
formulate and execute foreign policy. Information directly related
to these purposes may constitute intelligence under ;given definitions
of the term but is not so considered by these departments which will,
therefore, not free it for distribution in intelligence channels.
If this principle were disturbed through insistence upon a prescribed
distribution of such materials, the implications for the operating
departments would be most difficult.
Perhaps in consequence of these facts, the adoption of a
central dissemination system such as may have been intended. by Congress
under the terms of the National Security Act has never been found
feasible. Instead, the actual responsibility for dissemination has
devolved upon the Intelligence Advisory Council (subject of course
to the NSC) where ultimate decisions as to dissemination are -made.
A 'tservice of common concernu+ with respect to dissemination
became a function of the Office of Collection and Dissemination of
CIA which served both as a distribution center within CI. and a.
central clearing house for the routing of intelligence within the
government.
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 This document has been
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the Central 2nteiligance A4enay.
THESIS Date
The story of Central I telligence is generally told in terms of conflict
in which there are villains and heroes. Donovan is seen as a great man outmaneuvered
by little politicians (or as a too ambitious would-be dictator whose removal from
the scene was a victory for Right) Vandenberg charges fearlessly into the ranks
of the enemy and achieves a xtxtaL7 temporary victory (or Vandenberg was an impulsiv(
ariman whose misguided efforts were providentially cabbed.) H llenkoetter was an
able Director whose impulse was to make a workable CIA, but he was knifed in the
back by self-seekers.(or Hillenkoetter was a bumbling idiot whose ineptness brought
Central IHtelli^ence to the brink of disaster.) Smith was Superman who flew to the
scene of disaster and achieved immediate triumph by the use of his magic cape (or
Smith, as the representative of the cutthroats, weilded the knife.)
All this, whatever in it may be true or false, seems irrelevant. It is
true that CIA was born of conflict, that that conflict has not been resloved,
and that quite possibly it never will be. But the conflict is not important. Instea
of giving it such att ention, it might pay to look at the achievements tht have taken
place apart from or in spite of the conflict.
The conflict arose bacause the decision was not made as to whether to create
I I3:S/HC-
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a Central Intelligence AGency or not to create a Central Ibtelligence AGency. The
first agreement---that of January 22, 1946--did not do so. It authorized a co-
ordinating Group which is quite a different thing. Subsequently, however, development
took placd that had the effect of superimposing a Central I~Itelligence A,,ency on
the Group and on the intelligence structure of which it was a part.
It was at this point that the Dir etorts role became dual. He was still.
Director of Central Intelligence---the appointed coordinator of the government intell'_
u
intelligence structure---but he had become Director of an AMency also. But this
Agency was not a Central Intelligence Agency except in name. It was rather the
apparatus through which the, Director performed certain of his legal functions.
Possession of this apparatus made the Director more nearly independent of the
established intelligence structure than he cou d otherwise have been. But it did
not make him wholly independent nor did it give him any direct control over the
established structure.
This may and may not have been an unfortunate situation. I%Nzd
Conflict was unavoibable. The extent depended on the outlook and actions of the
Director
The true measure of Central Intelligence, however, is not in the conflict and
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its consequences. A better measure is in a comparison of US intelligence before,
and after the war,
foreign
Be$th're the war, the US could not pretend to have a}I intelligence service,
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The war quickly proved the fallacy in such a situation. Responsiblity for Pear
Harbor is not the point; there is no proof that the Pearl Harbor disaster would not
have happened if the intelligence system had been stronger. What was shown was that
the sort of intelligence system then in effect, there was no defense against a
Pear Harbor. Whatever may have been right, what was was wrong. The progress of
the war further proved the weakness of pre-war intelli-ence. Maps and basic in-
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telligence on important military objectives did not exist in the US. Target data
for air bombardment, when it became organized, was not avzilable. Whatever the
faults or virtues of OSS, it, or something like it, had to be imrpvised.?s Many of
its weaknesses were obviously a consequence of its improvisation. There is no
telling how much greater those weaknesses might have been if OSS had not aad the
advantage of British experience. 07I became an quasi-intelligence as well as a
propaganda agency, collecting foreign information from xewsxsndxbbaadxa foreign
ndwspapers and broadcasts. The end of the war found numerous agencies independently
col]e cting and exploiting the i telligence left in its wake 'n the form of such
enterprises as document acquixition, bomb surveys, and interrogations.
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