SIGNIFICANT DEVELOPMENTS REGARDING THE CIA PERIODIC REQUIREMENTS LIST (PRL)

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP62-00680R000100090004-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 6
• Document Creation Date: November 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 8, 1998
• Sequence Number: 4
• Publication Date: May 22, 1959
• Content Type: REPORT

/ COLZ V
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22 May 1959
SUBJECT: Significant ]Developments Regarding the CIA Periodic
Requirements List (PRL)
Since the AD/CI briefed his 16 June 1958 staff meeting regarding
the CIA Periodic Requirements List (PRL), considerable progress has
been made as to its wider use, dissemination, and effectiveness.
Because analysts in CIA and in the Department of State are devoting
substantial efforts in revising and improving the. List, some of these
major developments should be noted'.
1. Why the PRL?
The objective of the PRL is to keep collectors at home and
abroad alerted to current intelligence needs so that information
coming in from the field will improve both in quality and quantity
and thereby help strengthen the production of current intelligence.
Accordingly, each PRL on the major world areas--USSR, European
Satellites and Yugoslavia, Western Europe, Latin America, Near East/
Africa, and Far East--is designed to point up the information required
for current intelligence coverage of significant developments during
the PRL's 4-month time period. Prepared for, and used by, members
of the intelligence community, the PRL fills a major intelligence
need which has not been met by the longer term, basic requirements
guides of various governmental agencies.
25X1X7
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III.' State Department Participation in the PRL
As of April 1959,.. coordination between OCI and the Department
of State in revising the area PRL's became a fact on a world-wide
basis. This coordination, which began informally and on a limited
scale at the end of 1957, was steadily extended during the past year
to cover each area on the following schedule: Latin America PRL,
beginning with the April 1958 issue; USSR/EE, with the May 1958
edition; Far East, with the June 1958 issue; Near East/Africa, with
the July 1958 edition; and Western Europe, with the April 1959 PRLO
State's use of the PRL has increased since the coordinated
OCI-State effort was initiated Copies are being sent, not only
to the Embassies, but also to the Consulates and Consulates General.
Moreover, additional copies have been made available to State De-
partment headquarters personnel.
Though still too early to measure the overall effectiveness
of CIA-State coordination on the PRL, certain values have become
apparent. The preparation of each PRL now receives constructive
comments from both the Intelligence Research Offices and the
Regional Policy Bureaus of the State Department, Thanks to the
fine efforts of State analysts, liaison and requirements personnel,
the contributions regularly submitted by OCI, ORR, and OSI in CIA
are being substantively supplemented and strengthened.
To varying degrees, all of the area PRL's have been the subject
of replies from Embassies and Consulates abroad. State's coordi-
nation with OCI has been an important factor in this response.
Detailed answers, question by question, were received, for example,
on one or more sections of the country Lists from: the Embassy
25X1X4 in Tehran, the Embassy in Caracas, the
Consulate in Aden, the Embassies in Port-au-Prince and in Lima.
Examples of specific reports in response to PRL questions are:
"Kurds of Iran" (from Tabriz), "Soviet Bloc Activities in Yemen"
(from Aden), Economic questions and-Communist data (from Bogota),
5X1X4
and the importance of the Uruguayan President (from Montevideo).
These reports, of course, are examples only'of those in which
the PRL was specifically referenced; they do not include unreferenced
field reports initiated as a result of PRL requirements.
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IV. Attitudes of US Officials and Missions
From Western Europe a State official recently wrote the
Department in Washington that " ..in some cases Political Sections
(of the Embassies) have considered the List the best reporting guide
available to them. The reason is that.-the List deals with specific
problems in a specific country..."
Last fall a State official who returned to Washington from
Latin America reported that "with respect to the PRL's, most of the
officers in Brazil and Uruguay regard them as currently or potentially
useful."
In February 1959 the US Consul General.who had just returned
from Dacca in East Pakistan expressed satisfaction with the PRL
because it informed him of both State and CIA current intelligence
needs.
Some comments from individual Embassies and Consultates follow:
(Bonn)
(San Jose)
"...most useful as a reporting guide..."
"The Embassy finds the guide extremely useful in
providing perspective for the purpose of establishing
future reporting programs and filling in gaps in areas
previously partially covered by spot reports.
number of subjects for reporting have been developed
by the various sections of the Embassy on the basis
of the new List."
(Phnom Penh) "The List provides an excellent check-list for
reporting from Cambodia."
(Kuwait) "-finds the Lists of great usefulness..."
(Belgrade) "...generally useful to reporting officers in this
Embassy ...the detailed nature of the questions.... is
particularly helpful."
(Asuncion) "It is the Embassy's opinion, concurred in by CAS,
that these lists have a decided value as indicators of
the needs of the Department and the Washington
Intelligence Community with respect to developments
in Paraguay."
(Rome)
..can serve a useful purpose in Rome-somewhat
wider distribution might yield more results..."
(Mexico City), "The Periodic Requirements. List has value to the
Mission, signalizing the specific types of infor-
mation desired by the Department and the Central
Intelligence Agency."
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IV. Attitudes of US Officials and Missions (Continued)
(Munich)
The Consulate General, in requesting copies of the
USSR/EE PRL, stated that its Eastern Affairs Section
"neds.:~., current list of requirements for Eastern
25X 1 X4YYYYYYyyyyy y w"Yyyyyy
V. Contributions to the PRL
In the past year definite efforts have been made to obtain from
analysts in CIA -- in OCX, ORR, and OSI -- as well as in the State
Department, contributions to the PRL that are as up-to-date, specific
and as helpful as possible to field collectors. The Department of
the Army's ACSI has begun to contribute on an informal basis, and the
Navy Department has also expressed an interest in contributing.
Of additional help to field collectors, the PRL's now include
major intelligence deficiencies noted in the Post-Mortems of
appropriate National Intelligence Estimates (NIE's) approved by
the US Intelligence Board (USIB)--the principal governing body for
US intelligence agencies under the chairmanship of the DCI.
VI, Wider Dissemination of the PRL
The growing interest of the USIB community in the PRL has
resulted in an increase over previous demands for the latest copies
of the PRL, amounting to some 100 to 200 additional copies. At
the present time the number of copies disseminated to interested
collectors and consumers is: 518 copies for the USSR PRL, 515 for
the European Satellites and Yugoslavia, 488 for Near. East/Africa,
384 for Western Europe, 341 for the Far East, and 339 copies for
the Latin America issue.
Those receiving the latest copies of the PRL on a regular
basis are:
25X1A8a
00/C (Headquarters and Field Stations), as well as FBID and FDD;
25X1A6a DD/P (Headquarters and Field Stations),
ONE, OCI, ORR, OSI, OCR, and OTR
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VI. Wider Dissemination of the PRL (Continued)
Department of State Hea quarters and Embassies, Consulates
General, and Consulates Abroad)
Defense Department (Army, Navy, and Air Departments)
NSA, USIA, NIC (National Indications Center), USIB Secretariat
VII. Current Problems
Despite the continued improvement in the PRL and the favorable
reaction of collectors to the List, two major problems are still
evident in its preparation-
A. Updating the PRL,.
Many analysts in the production offices submit
well-revised drafts for the new PRL's, but there are still a sub-
stantial number who fail to give adequate time for reviewing the
major intelligence deficiencies and for updating requirements for the
use of the field collectors. Since the revision of each area PRL
comes up.only once every 4 months, failure to make a careful updating
of the Country Lists in effect ignores a valuable opportunity to
guide the various field collectors in providing certain types of
information especially wanted by the substantive analysts.
Several times analysts have re-submitted country
requirements from the old PRL's almost without change--in some cases
where significant political and economic changes were actually taking
place at the time of revision. Such unrevised requirements, since
they are at the very least four months' old, are of little value to
the various collectors in the field; they do not put sufficient
emphasis on current or future trends, and they fail to recognize
questions that have been answered, all or in part, during the time
since the previous PRL was written.
In an effort to help analysts update'their country
requirements, on the other hand, one area branch chief advised his
analysts to keep a file of information gaps, complaints about
inadequate field reporting and other current problems that need
to be covered by the embassies and field stations. Then, when the
PRL comes up for review at the end of the four-month time period,
these notes are available for alerting the field as to headquarter's
current intelligence interests.
B. Overcrowding the PRL,.
In reviewing the PRL's, there is a need for
analysts, not only to submit new significant requirements, but
also to revise or eliminate out-dated or even purely basic require-
ments. Unless this is done, there is the danger that the new, most
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VII. Current Problems (Continued)
significant questions will be buried in an unnecessarily lengthy
list of requirements and that field collectors will, in effect,
be asked to spend valuable time and effort on problems of little,
or out-dated, importance.
In this connection, one Embassy which recently answered,
question by question, one of the sections of a current country
PRL and which also promised forthcoming despatches on two other
major sections, expressed the hope that ''all of these despatches
will help clear the decks and point up more briefly and definitely
the really important items on which information is required." It
is true that the necessary lag between the time when the require-
ments are prepared and the time when the questions reach the field
means that some requirements will be outdated through no fault of
the originating analysts. It is still also true, however, that
many of the revised country drafts would prove more helpful to the
field if a careful "look-see" were made at the old PRL questions,
either to revise or to eliminate outdated and unimportant questions.
VIII. Conclusion
If all contributing production offices in CIA, as well as in
State, continue in their present efforts to improve the quality
of the PRL's and as analysts and other headquarters personnel
concerned realize the value of keeping field collectors alerted
to headquarters needs, the purpose of the PRL's will be adequately
attained. This objective is to provide the field collectors at
home and abroad with specific, up-to-date intelligence requirements,
so that the field, in turn, may better fill current intelligence
gaps wherever possible and forward to headquarters a steadily improving
quality of current information for use by our intelligence production
offices.
25X1A9a
Chief, equ rements Branch,
OCI/CIA
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