TURNER PLIES ROUGH SEAS AT CIA HELM

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000300030031-5
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 28, 2007
• Sequence Number: 31
• Publication Date: October 9, 1977
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

The CIA's ways are subtle, mdlreci, .
secretive and often devious. Turner s,-
ways are direct,.crisp and military.;? t''
said
"I don't like briefings;".Turner
in describing his daily routine. " I" cari .
read faster. than anybody, can; talk.
Besides, anyone .can be more precise
if he puts it in writing."
The CIA, on the. other hand, has a'
tradition of euphemism, and: under-
statement: and. .a practice of:not put-,
ting it in -writing An ?organization
that once referred toassassination'"as'
"executive; 'action and sometimes:
conveyed instructions to. agents with;
an arched. eyebrow' or. a winked eye
has a natural aversion to concise me-
mos that, might later.' prove trouble
some :; a , ? k '.'
Richard Bissell, ;.once 'the CIA's
chief of. operations; -!told the- Senate
Intelligence Committee.. two' years. ago
that he had' informed.. Allen TDulles,
then the CIA director, in.guarded lan
guage about a plot to kill Cuban Pres.
Castr
:. ;dent r idea
?~?... f , -.~[ifs~. . 'Tt3
341.- Words 'such: as "murder's 'and "as
sassinate"' were never spoken.;
ill When asked by, a'senator why, the:
=;?agency. officials talked`"in: riddles to.
one another, . Bissell ', responded,j,"?,1;
think there was a . `reluctance to
spread even on an oral record some of
the aspects of this operation ? - .,
Turner has no patience with such
considerations.; V,
"I'm not one for .tie plausible dens
'bility thing," Turner. snapped
to know, what goes on.here..''.`":'
tend
` A;forme'r CIA official, whose tenure
overlapped Turner's,lsaid that the ad-
miral's.demands to know':what? was
going on had been taken, a? a sign' of
distrust by, some agency.?,;profession=
sals.
community was ready for that. But he couldn't come in
with a feeling of distrust of.the people who were there,'>'.
the former official said. "That is what Turner. did. Turner
see.'things only in terms of black and white in a business,,"
thatlis entirely shades of gray.';.
Afi intelligence official in ? another agency said ;that;
Turner had irritated many CIA professionals by clinging to
the avy way of doing things t c r
" ne got the impression that there was no great urge to
helphim," the official said. F
Then there is the matter of Turner's personal back- z
gro d and style.
Although there,are some exceptions to the rule, the CIA -
Sin a 1966, every, CIA director has been a graduate ofan
elit Eastern college ;
I a way,-Turner fits that pattern,, but in other ways, he
doe not. Turner went to Amherst, College: in Massa
chu etts for two years, but then he shifted to -Annapolis"
duriig the war year of '1943. After graduation from the
?
Nav l Academy, Turner was a Rhodes scholar at Oxford
But after more than 30 years in the. Navy, his .impecca=
ble }glue pin-striped suits do not entirely fit in with thee;
tweed suits and beards that contribute to the image of the :
CIA(
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11,
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T).rner is the fourth military officer. among. the 10 men-'
whq have headed the CIA since it was created in 1947. But
bettveen the appointment of Allen Dulles as the agency's.
thud director in 1953 and Turner's succession last March 9,
the )CIA director had been a civilian for all but 14 months. i
1P1 like the other admirals and generals who, have led the
CIA, Turner has never.been involved directly in collecting .
military intelligence. Before his appointment, his only con-
nection with intelligence had been to read the reports pre-
pargd for him as a,high-ranking naval officer.
In the mercantile jargon of intelligence, hewas a "con
suniee' rather than a "producer
Sipping ,a glass of iced tea recently in his spacious office
on.the seventh floor of the CIA building, Turner conceded
that he knew more about the substance of intelligence
thaii he did about the methods of obtaining it...
"i can tell a bad: estimate from a good one a lot quicker
than I can tella-bad collection plan from a good one,". he
President-Carter. chose Turner to be CIA chief after his
first choice, Theodore C. Sorensen, withdrew when it be-
came clear that his Senate confirmation was unlikely. At-.
the;time,. Turner was commander-in-chief of NATO forces
in southern Europe, with headquarters in Naples, Italy.
~ong before, his NATO assignment,' however, Turner
ha established a reputation in the Navy as an intellectual-
an an innovator Few naval colleagues, it seems, have
neural opinions about him.
He is either respected for his intellect or disdained for
his;ego
Much of the Turner. legend was made on a late summer
morning in 1972, when Turner, then a vice admiral, ad--
drossed his first convocation as president of. the Naval `Var
Colege at Newport, R.I. - ;- :- l 1
Tu'ner told the students mostly Navy commanders, with .'
a tew -lieutenant colonels' from the other services-that
tinjes were changing at the' college, which had offered oc-
casional lectures to break up the rounds of golf and after-
noins of sailing.
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port, recalls that Turner said he wasinstituting tests,
grades and serious classroom :work
Turner concluded the speech, White said, by noting that
:.it was then about noon. He suggested that the .students
have a good lunch because. at 1:30 p.in-. classes would begin
on the Peloponnesian War, the Athens-Sparta conflict be-
tween -431 and 404 BC in which naval power ,. was'used in
??.:"'You could have heard a pin drop," . White said. "All you
heard was the breeze flapping off the bay. In the beginning
there was a lot of grumbling at the, cocktail hour.,.But by
the end of the year,.I would say that 95% of the class was
;'thoroughly in favor of Stan's ideas.".
.tures. A veteran middle-level CIA bureaucrat recalls -that.'
..,Turner recently clapped him on the arm and called him by,
'
;
name during' a>chance meeting in front;'of the : agency's
,t directors he had worked for ever did that.
Similarly, during his assignment toil a NATO post in
Naples, Turner learned enough . Italian' to-make speeches in
done so.
:.; ?A _ former..Navy colleague'.,said thaV.-Turner:.. layed,
(bureaucratic politics like'a grand master. played chess, al-.
,,",ways thinking several moves ahead
"Stan has never been inclined to accept with open arms
?'anything that he , inherits," . the retired admiral said.;" He
ceives. He has a disruptive way of getting. where he wants
But a former top-level CIA official suggested that in the
Navy Turner always moved on to a new assignment before.
his innovations had a chance to mature.-
to.
-This .official was skeptical about Turner's' ability
maintain his momentum over the long'run:Turner has said-
;' Turner may have more Dower at the CIA. both:real and:
theoretical, than did any of his'predecessors,,however.As
;a classmate of Carter at the Naval Academy, Turner ,en;
;,joys what may be. the closest relationship between a CIA
ti director and a President since Allen Dulles served Dwight-,D. Eisenhower in the 1950s. Even Turner's detractors
concede that his access to Carter makes him a formidable'
individual within the Administration.
On paper, at least, Turner has a broader mandate. than
I. ecutive order giving the CIA director a measure of control.
i: community,"a semiformal grouping that includes the Na
`
tional Security Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency
'
-The CIA director has always been considered the titular
3 ,.head of the intelligence community. But before Carter's
executive order, the director had little leverage in -dealing
.with the other agencies, all part of the Defense Depart-
ment. 'r.
Turner had sought; much. more control over the other
'-agencies than he eventually received-but even the com-
promise Carter imposed gave Turner an extraordinarily
For. the future, Turner said that his CIA would concen-.
trate on collecting information and would deemphasize the
secrecy that always had characterized intelligence opera-
He said the agency would declassify and publish itsre=
ports whenever that could be done without damaging the
national interest. In that way, Turner said, the CIA can
give: the public a greater return on the money the govern-
ment'spends for intelligence.