QUESTION & ANSWER DCI ADDRESS BEFORE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF NEWSPAPER EDITORS 9 APRIL 1986 WASHINGTON, D.C.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88G01117R001004060001-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 31, 2011
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: April 9, 1986
• Content Type: MISC

Approved For Release 2011/01/31: CIA-RDP88GO1 1 17RO01 004060001-9
Y
Question & Answer
DCI Address Before
American Society of Newspaper Editors
9 April 1986
Washington, D.C.
(Question from the audience)
John Dilley: COULD NOT HEAR QUESTION ON TAPE
CASEY: We have a process which enables the intelligence committees of
Congress, the House and the Senate to get such information as they require,
and a member of Congress who has that kind of a question, the usual way to do
it is to go to the committees, the committees will ask us about them, and we
will tell them. Now there are some things where lives, sources, and methods
are involved where we will only tell a limited number of people. But there is
a process which we cooperate with fully to which we devote some of our best
people and quite a lot of resources to keep the Congress informed about our
activities, to legitimate them in that way, to brief them, and to respond to
inquiries.
Moderator: Mr. Casey do you have any questions to Mr. Simon?
Casey: Well, I don't have any questions. I don't have very much to disagree
with what Mr. Simon had to say.
SIMON: I may rewrite the speech. (Much audience laughter)
CASEY: He raked up a lot of things for which, unfortunately, the Agency has
been criticized. I assure you that all of the things we have done have been
fully authorized by the Executive Branch, by laws, and by reporting and
briefing the Congress. Now there have been times when maybe something
somebody thought should have been reported, we thought something was
authorized--and already authorized--and we have had disagreements of that
kind, but they are very rare. Sometimes somebody out there in a large
organization will make a mistake, and it will reflect on us and embarrass us,
but I think that on the whole the Intelligence Community operates in a very
careful manner authorized under the law and under the scrutiny of both the
Executive and the Congress.
PAO
Approved For Release 2011/01/31: CIA-RDP88GO1 1 17RO01 004060001-9
 Approved For Release 2011/01/31: CIA-RDP88GO1 1 17RO01 004060001-9
QUESTION TO MR. CASEY--FROM NARRATOR?: Mr. Casey you mentioned the question
of satellites. On April 27, Spot Image, a French-launched satellite will
start operating, and they are offering to any person in the world, news
organizations and others, telemetry with a 10 millimeter resolution. I am
told that this is the Model T of what is coming in the next couple three
years. In other words, you can photograph anything on earth from out there
and that means literally anything. What is the CIA going to do about that?
CASEY: Well, I don't think there is anything we can do about it. Anybody can
go out and get whatever information they can get, the press and anybody else,
any other country. I expect that large news organizations will have one of
those satellites themselves one of these days. They do have long-range
cameras. We don't try to stop that. We are not resisting the most energetic
effort on your part to get information. All we are saying, and all I am
saying here, is that when information is put out, particularly when it is put
out illegally by people in the government, it is our responsibility to stop
that, but when it does get out, we think there is some responsibility on the
part of the media and we think that cooperation in the interest of our
security and our country should allow for a dialogue in which we can say to
you, and I am not talking about waste or corruption--I have no objection to
disclosing waste, inefficiency, or any of the kinds of things Mr. Simon
dwelled on--but I do think when I can prove--when I can show that public
disclosure of this which means sending it to our adversaries whether they are
terrorists or whoever they are can jeopardize lives, jeopardize our interests,
or deprive us of important capabilities critical to our national security, I
think, and I have had a good experience as I said, that the press has a
responsibility and should listen, consider, and take whatever steps can be
done to eliminate or mitigate the damage.
Ted Nat
DAILY NEWS
Long View, Washington
QUESTION TO MR. CASEY: I wonder, sir, if you could help us out with what
appears to me to be a problem in the Intelligence Community, insofar as
terrorism is concerned. It seems, at least out on the West Coast, that the
United States is a good bit like a three hundred pound gorilla in terms of
being able to track down some of these fellows who hijack airplanes and
capture ships and things like that. How is it that our allies seem to be so
much better at ferreting out where terrorists are hiding and who they are
while we have this vast apparatus that you head and we don't seem to be able
to run on the same kind of a track as they do. Is that a misperception, are
we better at it than it appears?
CASEY: I think it is a misperception. I think your analogy of the gorilla,
other than that, is a pretty good one. The terrorists are very difficult
targets, very difficult to penetrate. They behave as small groups and in a
secret manner. I will say that some of our allies are better at it because
they have had more experience at it and that particularly some intelligence
Approved For Release 2011/01/31: CIA-RDP88GO1 1 17RO01 004060001-9
 Approved For Release 2011/01/31: CIA-RDP88GO1 1 17RO01 004060001-9
services in the Middle East, the Israelis and others, and they have had more
experience in Europe too. But the fact is that we are the leaders in this
fight--it is a global fight--we are the leaders because we are the only
country that has a global organization. Nobody else operates around the
world. This terrorist phenomenon, one of the difficulties is that people
cross borders, they are moving all around the world, and we don't have the
resources, despite our huge apparatus as you call it, to cover all that
territory and to watch what may be happening in France, Germany, wherever.
The work on the ground has to be done by the local police and the local
security and intelligence services, but because it is a moving
operation--apparatus--because we have the data banks and the
nationwide--worldwide--organization, we are very important in training,
helping, and supporting them, providing them new capabilities and kind of
exchanging and moving around the intelligence that each acquires and getting
it where it needs to be. I think we have made vast improvements. We are not
perfect and we have a long way to go. But to say that we can't fight our way
out of a paper bag isn't quite true.
Approved For Release 2011/01/31: CIA-RDP88GO1 1 17RO01 004060001-9