WHY I QUIT THE CIA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00587R000100590039-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 8, 2011
• Sequence Number: 39
• Publication Date: January 2, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2011/03/08: CIA-RDP91-00587R000100590039-7
QRTIrjy. -P EA4tED _77
WASHINGTON POST
2 January 1:85
John Horton
shy I Quit the CIA
Earlier this year I resigned as National Intel-
lgence Officer for Latin America because of
the pressure put on me by the Director of Cen-
tn Intelligence to come up with a National In-
tet!igence Estimate on Mexico that would sati-
sfy him. This is not the first time that pressure
has been put on intelligence officers to come up
with what their superiors consider to be the
right answers. A previous director not long ago
remarked that he was considered a "traitor"
because the estimates on Southeast Asia that
were being written under his direction were
not pleasing to the policy-makers at the time-
the estimates didn't say that our policy in Viet-
nam was working. In my own case, it was not
that the policy-makers were putting pressure
on the director, but rather that the pressure on
me and others working on the Mexico estimate
came from the director himself.
Nothing w ll get an intelligence officer's back
up faster than a sniff of that kind of pressure in
his nostrils. It is a matter of principle that he not
slant intelligence judgments to make them more
palatable to his superiors or to shower the glory
of approval on an administration's policies. A Na-
tional Intelligence Estimate is not simply an intel-
ligence report or a bit of analysis, nor should it be
any one man's opinion. It is the product of the
deliberation of representatives of all the intelli-
gence agencies dealing with foreign affairs. As a
member of the National Intelligence Council, the
national intelligence officer chairs the writing of
the estimate. Being in the chair may give him
more influence than one of the representatives
from CIA, from State or Army or Navy or Air
Force or the Marines, or from the Defense Intel-
ligence Agency. It may not. But the result should
reflect the views of all the agencies and differ-
ences in their views. It is not or should not be
blandly unanimous, and it should reflect doubts as
well as disagreements.
In 1976 a distinguished intelligence officer,
in testifying before the Senate, spoke of the
"natural tension" between intelligence officers
and policy-makers and said, "Policy-makers must
assume the integrity of the intelligence provided
and avoid attempts to get materials suited to
their tastes." Much has been said-and no doubt
much more will be said-about the motives of
policy-makers for disputing or disliking the intelli-
gence they receive. The point to understand and
to accept is that this has happened in the past,
and it can be expected in the future.
Strong-minded officials-Republicans, Demo-
crats, career people of no partisan bias-often
think they know better than intelligence officers.
Sometimes they don't care what intelligence says
as long as it doesn't get in their way. Attempts to
squelch displeasing intelligence reports or judg-
ments that don't'back up an administration's poli-
ties have a nonpartisan provenance. William
Casey, the current director, most differs from
previous directors of Central Intelligence in that
he is a part of the policy-making group where
Central America is involved as much as he is the
president's chief intelligence officer.
. His particular case has led to talk of a bid to
ensure the selection of future directors from the
career services to prevent politicians' being put
in the job. That may appeal to us intelligence offi-
cers who have an unhealthy respect for our own
virtue, but no legislation can ensure that a direc-
tor, no matter how experienced in our work, will
not buckle under pressure.
Ambition or the desire to go along with the
gang-to be on the team-can lead us to ig-
nore the warnings of conscience or of col-
leagues. Proposals for dealing with this prob-
lem discussed on a moral plane usually dissolve
in empty righteousness. Legislation inoculates
us against the disease from which we have just
recovered without coping with the next set of
symptoms. We should face the expectation that
even men of good will and integrity my be in-
tolerant of opinions they consider to be wrong
or inconvenient. A taste of power may make us
arrogant. The natural tension will continue.
If we accept this as inevitable, our aim should
be 0 soften the collision. I propose that we do so
through a loose, informal council of elders-a
tribal council-to act as the public conscience,
since intelligence matters cannot by their nature
be thrown open to public scrutiny and since the
early discussion of policy does not benefit from.
speech-making. The council would sit with the di-
rector when he is beleaguered by the politicians,
hold his hand when temptation beckons him from
the path of duty, and talk quietly with other par-
ties to see if the differences be minor or major
and to sound warnings if the risks to be run seem
not worth the candle. The council would be made
up of members of the four different organizations
already charged with the task of examining the,
performance of the intelligence community and
of the CIA in particular.
In the CIA there is an Office of the Inspector
General that inspects the agency and acts as
ombudsman for employee complaints. The
President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory
Board is made up of private citizens appointed
by the president. Two other organizations
charged with oversight of the intelligence com-
munity are the Senate and House intelligence
committees. The informal exchange of infor-
mation and views among these groups would
provide an immense improvement. ?
What would begin as a pragmatic approach
to supporting the integrity of the intelligence
process could benefit from the participation of
officials from State, from Defense. The discus-
sion of other differences in foreign affairs in
discreet, informal settings could accomplish
more than the noisy and.grudge-making spats
that too, often accompany public arguments.
The rhetorical sharpness of incoming adminis-
trations would sooner be honed by the stark-
ness of the confrontation with real problems
and their obdurate nature. The capture of
policy strong points by wrongheaded little ideo-
logical factions would be less likely.
Good intelligence is vital to our security. Our
discussion of foreign and defense policy suffers
grievously from partisan exaggerations and sim-
plifications. A tribal council, talking over intelIi-
gence judgments, could build bridges over petty
chasms, define real differences and increase the
area of consensus that seems so far from our
grasp today.
The writer was a CIA operations officer from 1948
to 1975 and served on the National Intelligence
Council from May 1983 to May 1984.
Approved For Release 2011/03/08: CIA-RDP91-00587R000100590039-7