REMARKS BY W.E. COLBY DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE BEFORE NEW YORK COUNCIL, NAVY LEAGUE OF THE UNITED STATES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00901R000500030005-8
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 28, 2000
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: October 20, 1975
• Content Type: SPEECH

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Office of the
Assistant to the Director
(703) 351-7676
[phone] (night)
20 October 1975
(The following remarks by William E. Colby are
prepared for delivery before the 71st Anniversary
Dinner of the New York Council of The Navy League of
the United States scheduled to convene at 6:00 P.M.
Eastern Daylight Time, October 20, 1975, at the Grand
Ballroom of the New York Hilton. Mr. Colby will
begin speaking at about 9:00 P.M.)
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Remarks
by
W. E. Colby
Director of Central Intelligence
before
New York Council,
Navy League of the United States
October 20, 1975
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Secretary Middendorf, Admiral Moorer, Admiral Anderson,
Mr. Shepley, Admiral Bergen, Mr. Mulcahy, ladies and
gentlemen.
Not a person in this room doubts the need for a strong
United States Navy.
Not a person in this room doubts the need for a strong
United States intelligence service.
I am here to tell you we have both--and both are the best
in the world. You do not need to be told about the excellence
of the U. S. Navy. I would like to tell you about the excel-
lence of our intelligence service. Its technical geniuses,
its dedicated clandestine operators, its objective analysts
have brought whole new dimensions in precision, in scope, and
in forward projections to American intelligence.
Years ago we looked to intelligence to tell us where
an enemy fleet was. Today, we know not only where it is,
but what it can do. And we know more--we know what kind
of fleet to expect in the future. We have followed the
progress of the new Russian carrier presently on sea
trials since its :keel was laid five years ago. We will
not be startled by its appearance as part of the opera-
tional fleet as we might have been in years past.
But will we destroy this great intelligence capability?
Will we have an investigation in 1980 as to why in 1975 we
deprived our nation of its technical and foreign sources
that provide information about the threats we will face in
the years ahead.
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Those threats are there:
in the ballistic missiles cocked and aimed at us;
in the nuclear weapons which can fall into the
hands of reckless despots or paranoiac terrorists;
in the desperate and authoritarian reactions of
poor and overpopulated nations to the increasing
gap they see between themselves and the affluence
of the developed world;
and in the temptation of some nations to look to
racist or radical rather than democratic and
moderate formulas for a better life.
Good intelligence can warn us of these problems. It
is not a crystal ball or an advance edition of the World
Almanac of 1977. But it can identify coming problems and
permit our national leaders to face them, informed and
warned of the forces and factors involved.
Most important, with good intelligence we can not
only defend against or deter such threats, we can negotiate
them away or resolve them before they become critical.
But is our intelligence to become mere theater?
Will it be exposed in successive sensational re-runs for
the amusement, or even amazement, of our people rather
than being preserved and protected for the benefit of us
all?
Will we have publicity or protection? Will we have
sensation or safety?
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Our intelligence missteps and misdeeds are indeed
small in number and in substance. Against the service
our intelligence has rendered the nation over the past
28 years, they are truly few and far between.
But when an operation that involved three agents is
proclaimed as "massive;" when the normal detail of CIA
employees to other Government agencies is called
"infiltration;" when an Army vulnerability study of the
New York subway is ascribed to CIA plotting because
one of our officers read the report; or when conspiracy
theorists mouth CIA complicity in the assassination of
President Kennedy despite flat denials, then the American
people are understandably troubled. They can wonder
whether their intelligence service is more a peril than
a protector.
We are about to have our fifth rerun of the great
mail-reading story. It first appeared in my testimony
before CIA's oversight committees last January and
February. I said we had reviewed and terminated this
activity in 1973. Its second playing was in the
Rockfeller Commission report. This was followed by a
TV spectacular featuring Representative Abzug's indigna-
tion. The Post Office and Civil Service Committee of
the House of Representatives then reviewed it. And this
week, the Senate Select Committee will repeat the perform-
ance in greater detail on live TV.
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I hope our citizens will derive the real message of
this mail-reading affair:
-- that intelligence looked at mail to and from
Communist countries during the threatening days
of the Cold War;
-- that intelligence reviewed the activity and
determined that it was improper in 1973;
-- that intelligence in 1973 set out clear directives
that any activities not in full compliance with
the laws of the United States would stop;
-- and that intelligence itself reported this matter
to the bodies now investigating it.
I hope our citizens will not be misled into perceiving
intelligence as a menace to our nation. I hope rather that
they will see its important role as an essential--and
effective--protector of our safety and democracy against the
threats in the real world outside our borders.
Intelligence is not theater. It is a serious--a
deadly serious business. The dedicated men and women of CIA,
who serve their country in an anonymous and demanding craft,
must not be made national scapegoats for the revision of
our national values and consensus of the past 20 years.
We do not oppose investigation. We welcome it. But
investigation must be responsible, as intelligence must be
responsible.
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No one in this room thinks that there should be public
revelation of the Navy's war plans. The American people
don't think so either. Neither do they think there should
be a public revelation of the names of people who serve
American intelligence in confidential, and often risky,
dealings. We Americans, and we intelligence professionals,
are not going to let this happen.
But damage has already been done by irresponsible
exposure of true intelligence secrets. Intelligence high
in the sky and deep in the ocean can be lost. Such
exposures have concerned our foreign friends and caused
some who wish to help us to think that the risk is too great.
Thus we Americans must call for full responsibility
in our investigations of intelligence, as we do for intel-
ligence itself. We must insist that intelligence not
become theater, so that today's comedy does not become
tomorrow's tragedy. We cannot stand blind and deaf in the
world of the 1980s because we were hypnotized by our review
of the 1950s and 60s.
Everyone in this room knows America has the best Navy
in the world. We all want to keep it that way.
I want you to know that America also has the best
intelligence service in the world. We must keep it that way.
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