ON THE PRODUCTION OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91M00696R000900010014-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 11
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 14, 2004
• Sequence Number: 14
• Publication Date: February 24, 1976
• Content Type: PAPER

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MEMORANDUM FOR:
FRM
5O75 IDI EU 01TIONSiOUS
LATEST VERSION (10 pages)
Distribution:
ADDA (McMahon)
ADDO (Blee)
ADDS&T (Stevens)
Deputy General Counsel
Deputy Legislative Counsel
Inspector General (Chamberlain)
Deputy Comptroller (Taylor)
Mr. Lehman
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Mr. Lehman
Attached is the production paper
revised per, the comments at our meetin-a
sanis morning.
ST,
ST)
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24 February 1976
On the Production of National Intelligence
I. Who Has the Responsibility?
The National Security Act of 1947 as clarified in Executive
Order 11905 gives to the DCI the personal responsibility for
supervising the production and dissemination of national
intelligence [Sec 3 (d) (1) (iv)] and to CIA the responsibility
for the production and dissemination of foreign intelligence
relating to national security to meet the needs of the. President,
NSC, and other elements of the Government [Sec 4 (b)].
II. What is National Intelligence?
Traditionally, national intelligence has been considered
to be the findings and judgments of the DCI that also:'
(1) Includes an input from each member of the
Community to the extent that it is able to contribute
to the question at hand.
'This discussion focuses on the National Intelligence Estimate as the
personal product of the DCI and includes other art-forms such as National
Intelligence Analytic Memoranda and inter-agency memoranda prepared
by the Community under DCI auspices. It excludes national current
intelligence publications which are prepared by CIA under separate
institutional arrangements.
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(2) Reflects the agreed judgment or consensus
of all members of the Intelligence Community.
(3) Contains the dissenting view of any member
of the Community who cannot share in the consensus.
III. The Mechanics of Producing National Intelligence
A. Whatever the arrangements for the production of
national intelligence, it is clear that a USIB or something
like it is needed. To reflect the changes created by. E. 0. 11905
a recreated USIB should properly bear a title reflecting its
fundamental concern--the production of national intelligence.
Let's call it the National Intelligence Board (NIB).
B. Under the auspices of the NIB, there are, of course,
alternative approaches to the production of national intelligence.
The viable options would seem to be three:
Option 1--
The present system whereby national intelligence
is produced under the auspices of the NIOs.
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Option 2--
A return to the system whereby national intelligence
is produced by an Office of National Estimates under the
general guidance of a Board of National Estimates
subordinate to the DCI and independent of all production
components of the CIA or the Community.
Option 3 - -
A system whereby national intelligence is produced
by a Board of National Estimates integrated with the
intelligence production organization of CIA but involving
the full participation of the Community.
Option 1
The NIO system was instituted to fulfill two main
objectives:
-- To provide a group of senior experts on foreign
and military affairs at the DCI level each of
whom would serve as the focal point of the
Community's activities (collection, production
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and customer relations) on major substantive
problems and as personal briefing officers for
the Director.
To replace the Board of National Estimates, a
mechanism which had become generally recognized
as relatively ineffective and unresponsive to the
needs of senior national security officials.
The track record of the NIO system is mixed.
On the plus side:
-- It served well the personal needs of and accom-
modated to the management style of the previous
DCI.
-- It helped to rationalize the proper subject matters
for national intelligence by reducing the number
of estimates on subjects of marginal interest
to national security officials.
- It facilitated the identification of critical national
intelligence problems and helped to focus the
productive effort on these questions.
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-- It improved the Community's procedures for
identifying potential crisis situations and imple-
menting necessary action programs.
On the negative side:
-- The NIO system failed to achieve fuller participation
of the Community in the production of national
intelligence. Most of the production under NIO
auspices was and is drafted by the line production
offices of CIA.
-- The NIO system was not designed to develop a
collegial process for the production and review
of its products. In most cases they are managed
by one or another regional or functional specialist
who may lack the breadth of study and experience
that are critical to the estimative function.
-- The reliance of the NIO system on CIA line
components created a bureaucratic anomaly which
diluted the authority of the DDI as the primary
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producer of finished intelligence and the principal
substantive intelligence advisor to the DCI.
some important instances the NIO system usurped
inordinate amounts of the time of analysts and
supervisors simply to manage the production of
NIEs. The NIO system, in effect, created an
important center for the production of national
intelligence which used the production assets of the
Agency but was outside the supervisory control of
senior Agency officials.
-- In much of the Community, the NIO system is
regarded as a mechanism which fails to
adequately consider the interests of other
agencies and interferes with their management
prerogatives.
Option 2
Under this option the responsibility for the production of
national intelligence would revert to a system resembling the former
Board of National Estimates (BNE) and its supporting staff, the
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Office of National Estimates (ONE), which were directly sub-
ordinate to the DCI. This system, originally commendable
because of the quality of its people and its collegial process,
came ultimately to have few admirers and many critics.
-- The BNE had a reputation for its inability to
adjust to change quickly.
It was composed, for the most part, of individuals
of narrow substantive or area specialties, often
of an age or intellectual bias that preempted free
exchange and objective examination of the situations
under study.
-- It developed a "raison d'etre" which promoted its
collegial views but preempted free exchange of the
views of other members of the Community.
-- As an independent bureaucratic entity, it created an
adversary relationship between itself and the other
production components of the Agency.
-- Its weak procedures for contact with the customers
of intelligence were generally ineffective.
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In sum, there are few seasoned observers in the Intelligence
Community, or among the primary consumers of intelligence, who
would regard a return to the BNE/ONE as anything but regressive.
Option 3
Under this option national intelligence would be produced with
full Community participation, including the right of dissent, but
under the aegis of a Board of National Estimates operating under
the direct supervision and control of the DCI's Deputy for CIA.
If the operative conditions of Option 3 included the following,
it would appear to be a viable and effective approach.to the production
of national intelligence:
A small and elite collegial board, the majority
of whose members would be from outside CIA and
preferably from outside Government.
-- Representation by the primary intelligence
producers of the Community--CIA, DLA,
INR--on the board.
,There are, of course, variants to Option 3. The Board of National
Estimates could, for example, be immediately subordinate to the
DCI or to the Deputy Director for Intelligence provided that the drafting
and production of national intelligence remained the responsibility of
the line components of CIA.
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Membership of fixed terms so that the independence
and objectivity of board members would not be
influenced by concerns of job security or career
advancement.
The adoption of Option 3 would present several advantages:
-- It would give to the CIA, the principal substantive
resource of the DCI, full control of and responsibility
for all aspects of the national intelligence provided
to the DCI and senior national security officials.
-- It would create a buffer to protect both the DCI and
the Board of National Estimates from the departmental
and political pressures generated when estimative
judgments are at odds with the budgetary or policy
positions of other departments and agencies of the
US Government.
-- It would enable better integration of the effort of
those intelligence officials charged with the estimative
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function and the line components which produce
the primary research and current intelligence
inputs for national intelligence.
-- It would preclude the bureaucratic rivalries
characteristic of all previous systems which
separated the estimative and analytic functions.
-- The integration of the estimative and analytic
components would enable a significant reduction
in the resources used for the present system.
-- It would provide an integrated production effort
to support those elements of the Community
concerned with the contribution of collection
programs to the production process.
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