STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD BY WILLIAM J. CASEY DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE BEFORE THE HOUSE PERMANENT SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE SUBCOMMITTEE ON LEGISLATION ON APRIL 7, 1981 ON H.R. 4, THE INTELLIGENCE IDENTITIES PROTECTION ACT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85-00003R000200030021-0
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 9
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 18, 2008
• Sequence Number: 21
• Publication Date: April 7, 1981
• Content Type: REPORT

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by
William J. Casey
Director of Central Intelligence
before the
House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
Subcommittee on Legislation
H.R. 4, the "Intelligence Identities Protection Act"
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Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to appear before the Permanent Select
Committee on Intelligence today to testify in favor of enactment of
H.R. 4, the "Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1981."
The Intelligence Community's support for legislation to provide
criminal penalties for the unauthorized disclosure of information
identifying certain individuals engaged or assisting in the foreign
intelligence activities of the United States is well known. I want
to emphasize that this Administration believes that passage of the
"Intelligence Identities Protection Act" is essential to the mainten-
ance of a strong and effective intelligence apparatus. Enactment of
this legislation is an important component of the Administration's
effort to implement President Reagan's determination to enhance the
Nation's intelligence capabilities.
As you pointed out in your recent letter to me, "the unfortunate
events that gave rise to the need for [this] legislation are continu-
ing apace." Mr. Chairman, there exists a coterie of Americans who
have openly proclaimed themselves to be devoted to the destruction of
the Nation's foreign intelligence agencies. This group has engaged in
actions avowedly aimed at undermining the Nation's intelligence
capabilities through the identification and exposure of undercover
intelligence officers. The perpetrators of these disclosures under-
stand correctly that secrecy is the life blood of an intelligence
organization and that disclosures of the identities of individuals
whose intelligence affiliation is deliberately concealed can disrupt,
discredit and--they hope--ultimately destroy an agency such as the
CIA. Some of the persons engaged in this activity have actually
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traveled to foreign countries with the aim of stirring up local
antagonism to U.S. officials through thinly veiled incitements to
violence.
The tragic results of unauthorized disclosures of intelligence
identities are well known. Five years ago, Richard Welch was murdered
in Athens, Greece. Last July, only luck intervened to prevent the
death of the young daughter of a U.S. Embassy officer in Jamaica
whose home was attacked only days after one of the editors of a
publication called Covert Action Infomation Bulletin appeared in
Jamaica, and at a highly publicized news conference gave the names,
addresses, telephone numbers, license plates, and descriptions of the
cars of U.S Government employees whom he alleged to be CIA officers.
Most recently, six Americans were expelled from Mozambique following
charges of engaging in espionage. These expulsions followed visits
to that country by members of the Cuban intelligence service and the
editors of the Covert Action Information Bulletin.
Extensive hearings before this Committee and its Senate counter-
part and before the two Judiciary Committees during the 96th Congress
documented the pernicious effects of these unauthorized disclosures.
Obviously, security considerations preclude my confirming or denying
specific instances of purported identification of U.S. intelligence
personnel. Suffice it to say that a substantial number of these
disclosures have been accurate. Unauthorized disclosures are
undermining the Intelligence Community's human source collection
capabilities and endangering the lives of our intelligence officers
in the field. The destructive effects of these disclosures have
been varied and wide ranging.
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Our relations with foreign sources of intelligence have been
impaired. Sources have evinced increased concern for their own
safety. Some active sources and individuals contemplating coopera-
tion with the United States have terminated or reduced their contact
with us. Sources have questioned how the U.S. Government can expect
its friends to provide information in view of continuing disclosures
of information that may jeopardize their careers, liberty, and very
lives.
Many foreign intelligence services with which we have important
liaison relationships have undertaken reviews of their relations
with us. Some immediately discernible results of continuing disclo-
sures include reduction of contact and reduced passage of information.
In taking these actions, some foreign services have explicitly cited
disclosures of intelligence identities.
We are increasingly being asked to explain how we can guarantee
the safety of individuals who cooperate with us when we cannot
protect our own officers from exposure. You can imagine the chilling
effect it must have on a source to one day discover that the indi-
vidual with whom he has been in contact has been openly identified as
a CIA officer.
The professional effectiveness of officers so compromised is
substantially and sometimes irreparably damaged. They must reduce or
break contact with sensitive covert sources. Continued contact must
be coupled with increased defensive measures that are inevitably
more costly and time consuming.
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Some officers must be removed from their assignments and returned
from overseas at substantial cost. Years of irreplaceable area
experience and linguistic skills are lost. Reassignment mobility of
the compromised officer is impaired.
As a result, the pool of experienced CIA officers available for
specific overseas assignments is being reduced. Such losses are deeply
felt in view of the fact that, in comparison with the intelligence
services of our adversaries, we are not a large organization. Replace-
ment of officers thus compromised is difficult and, in some cases,
impossible.
Once an officer's identity is disclosed, moreover, counterintel-
ligence analysis by adversary services allows the officer's previous
assignments to be scrutinized, producing an expanded pattern of
compromise through association.
Such disclosures also sensitize hostile security services and
foreign populations to CIA presence, making our job far more difficult.
Finally, such disclosures can place intelligence personnel and
their families in physical danger from terrorist or violence-prone
organizations.
It is also essential to bear in mind that the collection of
intelligence is something of an art. The success of our officers
overseas depends to a very large extent on intangible psychological
and human chemistry factors, on feelings of trust and confidence that
human beings engender in each other and on atmosphere and milieu.
Unauthorized disclosure of identities information destroys that
chemistry.
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Mr. Chairman, I do not believe it is necessary or advisable
to go into greater detail about the adverse effects that unauthorized
disclosures of intelligence identities are having on the work of
our nation's intelligence service. The credibility of our country
and its relationships with foreign intelligence services and
individual human sources, the lives of patriotic Americans serving
their country, and the professional effectiveness of our intelligence
officers are all being placed in jeopardy. The underlying basic
issue is our ability to continue to recruit and retain human sources
of intelligence whose information could be crucial to the Nation's
survival in an increasingly dangerous world.
It is important to understand what legislation in this area seeks
to accomplish: It seeks to protect the secrecy of the participation
or cooperation of certain persons in the foreign intelligence
activities of the U.S. Government. These are activities which have
been authorized by the Congress; activities which we, as a Nation,
have determined are essential. No existing statute clearly and
specifically makes the unauthorized disclosure of intelligence identi-
ties a criminal offense. As matters now stand the impunity with
which unauthorized disclosures of intelligence identities can be made
implies a governmental position of neutrality in the matter. It
suggests that U.S. intelligence officers are "fair game" for those
members of their own society who take issue with the existence of CIA
or find other perverse motives for making these unauthorized
disclosures.
Mr. Chairman, I believe it is important to emphasize that the
legislation which you are considering today is not an assault upon
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the First Amendment. The "Intelligence Identities Protection Act"
would not inhibit public discussion and debate about U.S. foreign
policy or intelligence activities, and it would not operate to
prevent the exposure of allegedly illegal activities or abuses of
authority. The legislation is carefully crafted and narrowly
drawn to deal with conduct which serves no useful informing
function whatsoever; does not alert us to alleged abuses; does
not bring clarity to issues of national policy; does not enlighten
public debate; and does not contribute to an educated and informed
electorate.
The Bill creates three categories of the offense of disclosure
of intelligence identities:
a. Disclosure of information identifying a "covert agent"
by persons who have or have had authorized access to classified
information that identifies such a covert agent. This category
covers primarily disclosure by intelligence agency employees
and others who get access.to classified information that
directly identifies "covert agents";
b. Disclosure of information identifying a "covert
agent" by persons who have learned the identity as a result
of authorized access to classified information. This
category covers disclosures by any person who learns the
identity of a covert agent as a result of government service
or other authorized access to classified information that may
not directly identify or name a specific "covert agent"; and
c. Disclosure of information identifying a "covert
agent" by anyone, under certain specified conditions outlined
below.
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There is virtually no serious disagreement over the provisions
of the legislation which provide criminal penalties for the unauthor-
ized disclosure of intelligence identities by individuals who have
had authorized access to classified information. Controversy has
centered around subsections 501(c) of H.R. 4.
Disclosures of intelligence identities by persons who have
not had authorized access to classified information would be punish-
able only under specified conditions, which have been carefully
crafted and narrowly drawn so as to make the Act inapplicable to
anyone not engaged in an effort or pattern of activities designed
to identify and expose intelligence personnel. The proposed legis-
lation also contains defenses and exceptions which reinforce this
narrow construction. It is instructive, in this regard, to look at
the elements of proof that would be required in a prosecution under
subsection 501(c) of H.R. 4. Keeping in mind that the government
would have to prove each of these elements beyond a reasonable doubt.
The government would have to show:
-- That there was an intentional disclosure of infor-
mation which did in fact identify a "covert agent;"
-- That the disclosure was made to an individual not
authorized to receive classified information;
-- That the person who made the disclosure knew that
the information disclosed did in fact identify a covert agent;
-- That the person who made the disclosure knew that the
United States was taking affirmative measures to conceal the
covert agent's classified intelligence affiliation;
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-- That the individual making the disclosure did so
in the course of an effort to identify and expose covert
agents with the intent to impair or impede the foreign
intelligence activities of the United States; and
-- That the disclosure was made with the intent to
impair or impede the foreign intelligence activities of
the United States.
Because of these strict conditions, subsection 501(c) is narrowly
directed at conduct which-Congress has the authority and power to pro-
scribe consistent with the First Amendment.
Mr. Chairman, I sincerely appreciate your genuine concern
about the maintenance of our intelligence capabilities and I whole-
heartedly support your efforts to deal with this very serious prob-
lem. I encourage the Committee to proceed to report this legislation
favorably.
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