STUDIES IN INTELLIGENCE - WITH VANDENBERG AS DCI - ARTHUR B. DARLING
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Collection:
Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST):
CIA-RDP83-01034R000200160004-9
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RIPPUB
Original Classification:
C
Document Page Count:
31
Document Creation Date:
December 19, 2016
Document Release Date:
December 20, 2006
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Publication Date:
January 1, 1968
Content Type:
STUDY
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Body:
tudies in Intelligence Vol. 12 No. 3
6/
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Vigorous push, with. still halting prog-
ress, toward a centralized intelligence.
WITH VANDENBERG AS DCI
Arthur B. Darling 1
Lieutenant General Hoyt S. Vandenberg, installed as Director of
Central Intelligence on June 10, 1946, brought to the Central Intelli-
gence Group the prestige of high rank in the Army, prominence before
the public, and forthright determination to take responsibility. He
and his predecessor Admiral Souers agreed that the time had come
when CIG should begin to perform certain operations in the national
system of intelligence. The initial organization and planning had
been done. It was time to develop the power latent in the duties
which the President had assigned to the Director of Central Intelli-
gence.
His experiences of the past six months as Army representative on the
Intelligence Advisory Board2 had convinced General Vandenberg
that to fulfill those duties he must be able to get the necessary person-
nel without having to wait upon the will of the departments to supply
them. He must have operating funds to expend as he chose without
dependence upon or accountability to some other agency. He was
certain that CIG could not meet its primary obligation to produce
strategic intelligence unless it had better arrangements for collecting
the raw materials and had means to conduct the initial research and
analysis necessary for the production of estimates. It should not have
to rely entirely upon contributions from the departments.
DCI and IAB
Vandenberg wished the DCI to be the executive officer of the
National Intelligence Authority.3 While the President kept him in
1 Adapted from a history of the Central Intelligence Agency prepared by the
author in 1953. For preceding installments see Studies VIII 3, p. 55 if, X 2, p.
1 if, and XII 1, p. 55 ff.
8 First predecessor of the USIB.
Predecessor of the National Security Council.
This document has been
approved for release through
the HISTORICAL REVIEW GROGRAM of
the Central Intelligence Agency.
Date 7 9
Op
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Approved
the office, he would have command of .CIG's functions. This was
quite different from thinking of CIG as a "cooperative interdepart-
mental activity." 4 We meet again as in the days of the Office of
Strategic Services the fundamental concept of individual responsibility
in conflict with the principle of collective responsibility. Members of
the Intelligence Advisory Board, representing the intelligence services
of the departments, were immediately aware of the change.
As Vandenberg expressed it, the IAB had the right to give him advice,
either in concurrence or dissent. He would accept such counsel,
listen to argument, and consider new facts; but he would make up his
own mind and determine the DCI position himself. He would not
block a dissenting view, but it could not become the official DCI
position even if it were the unanimous opinion of the IAB. Only his
superiors in the NIA would have a right to prefer the dissent to his
own decision. He was individually responsible, through the NIA,
to the President.
There was solid ground in the President's Directive which had
set up the CIG on the preceding January 22 for this interpretation of
the powers of the DCI. But acceptance of it by the chiefs of intelli-
gence on the IAB was most unlikely. Theirs was the counter-theory of
collective responsibility. The CIG was to them a cooperative inter-
departmental enterprise in which, for all matters of deliberation and
decision, they were the representatives of the departments and there-
fore the equals of the DCI. If he was not merely their executive secre-
tary, he was no more than their chairman.
A memorandum of June 20 in which Vandenberg set forth his pro-
gram created such a stir that it was revised before the IAB meeting
of June 28. The original text with his signature declared that the
DCI "should not be required to rely solely upon evaluated intelligence
from the various departments." He should have authority to under-
take within CIG such basic research and analysis as in his opinion
might be required to produce the necessary strategic and national
policy intelligence. This would require the centralization of activities
that were the concern of more than one agency; existing organizations
of the State, War, and Navy Departments, including their funds, per-
sonnel, and facilities, would be "integrated into the Central Intelligence
Group as a central service." There was no mention of the IAB.
Reactions ranged from insistence that any IAB member should
have virtual veto rights over the DCI's choice of subjects for research
' Cf. Souers' approach, Studies XII 1, pp. 55-56.
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to a demand that he consult the appropriate members of the IAB
whenever he planned central activities of "common, but secondary
interest" to two or more departments. The veto right would have
destroyed the function of the DCI and ruined the IAB itself. Even
the requirement that he consult regarding activities of "common, but
secondary" interest would place him at the mercy of the intelligence
officers in the departments; there would be very few instances where
they thought an activity so secondary that it could be wholly re-
linquished to CIG. We are to hear more of this requirement later.
Fifth NIA Directive: R&A
Vandenberg well understood the meaning of the turmoil over his
proposals. Regretting that the original version had caused it, he
accepted revisions designed to treat CIG's research and analysis as
supplementary to the work of the departments. He discarded al-
together the stipulation that departmental funds, personnel, and
facilities be "integrated" into CIG. His primary purpose, he told the
IAB on June 28, was to get the staff necessary to do the job of assist-
ing the Departments of State, War, and the Navy. He wished tQ
find where their intelligence activities stopped short; he wanted to
meet the deficiencies and fill the gaps. But he did not give, up his
intention to engage in the initial research and analysis requisite to
the production of strategic and national policy intelligence.
William L. Langer, as he spoke for the Department of State, must
have had memories of his old Research and Analysis Branch in the
Office of Strategic Services, where it had been both guide and cus-
tomer of Secret Intelligence. But having succeeded Alfred McCor-
mack as head of State's division of Research and Intelligence, he had
to present the case for that organization. He doubted that it was
necessary for CIG to engage in extensive research and analysis, he
said; only when the departments could not do the work might CIG
be specifically authorized to do it. It should undertake only such
research and analysis as might be necessary to determine what func-
tions were not being performed adequately in the fields of national
security intelligence.
With respect to consultations with individual members about R&A,
Langer saw danger therein to the "solidarity" of the IAB, which must
be maintained to give moral support to the Director. He thought
it difficult, if not useless, to try to distinguish between the primary
and secondary interests of the departments; CIG should be authorized
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to assume what research and analysis might be accomplished better
by a central agency. In the end, he had to defer to the individual
member; the IAB could not act by majority vote. The decision to
undertake R&A would be made by the DCI and the appropriate
member or members of the IAB. This was the provision as it was
finally adopted and included on July 8 in the fifth directive of the
National Intelligence Authority.
There were decided opinions for and against this compromise be-
tween the DCI and the IAB. One extreme view was that he should
have left research and evaluation entirely with the departments. But
if he had done so, any office which he might have created to bring
their products together would have been no more than a stapling
device to put the departmental papers in one bundle. There would
have been no analysis, no synthesis into a national estimate.
Another view was that he should have insisted upon taking over the
whole function from the Department of State and performing it as
a common service for all departments and agencies as well as produc-
ing "strategic and national policy intelligence." But even if State
had been willing to allow this, which was most unlikely, it would have
required a staff and equipment beyond any that CIG could hope
to obtain from the departments for some time to come. Though
possessed of the right, General Vandenberg would not have been
able to use it.
Being a practical man inclined to action, he thus withdrew the pro-
visions in his first draft which seemed so obnoxious that they might
defeat his purpose and accepted changes to mollify the IAB. But
he retained the principle: there was to be within the Central Intelli-
gence Group the research and analysis which it had to have, regard-
less of any duplication or overlapping with the departmental services.
He took what he could get; if that were established, more would come
in time.
Coordination; Espionage; Support
Following this check by the State Department, the representatives
of the Army and Navy also made reservations which were adopted
by the IAB and included in the draft fifth NIA directive. Vanden-
berg had asked that the DCI be authorized to act as the "executive
agent of this Authority in coordinating and supervising all federal
foreign intelligence activities related to the national security." As
r:
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changed by the IAB on June. 28, the directive stipulated merely that
he should act as the agent of the NIA in coordinating such activities.
The two significant omissions were the adjective "executive" agent
and the participle "supervising." Vandenberg's original phrasing had
seemed to infringe upon the responsibility of the IAB members, who
were each supposed to be responsible for executing within their own
departments the recommendations of the NIA. The DCI might en-
gage in coordinating, but not in supervising the intelligence activities
of the departments. His right of inspection was also involved; how
to coordinate departmental activities without inspecting and super-
vising them was a question of dispute between the DCI and IAB for
months. Admiral Hillenkoetter had not yet resolved it in 1949 when
the Dulles report called for leadership without the power to coerce.
Vandenberg's draft provided that all espionage and counterespionage
abroad be conducted by the DCI. But as revised by the IAB on
June 28 it carefully stated that he should conduct only "organized
Federal" operations and only those outside the United States and
its possessions. This change was of course designed to assure that
the military intelligence services might continue incidental operations
for their own purposes and to protect the FBI's jurisdiction within
the United States.
The fifth section of Vandenberg's draft dealt with funds, personnel,
and facilities for CIG. The departments upon his request were to
provide such funds and facilities to the extent of available appropria-
tions and within the limits of their capabilities. He would submit
a supplemental budget at the earliest practicable date. The IAB
revision in this section provided that the departments should continue
to have the decision in regard to such funds apportioned to the CIG.
The proposed directive as thus amended by the IAB went to the
members of the National Intelligence Authority individually on June
29. The Secretaries of State, War, and the Navy approved it without
change. But Admiral Leahy, representing the President, objected to
the description of the DCI as "agent" of the NIA in the paragraph
concerning the coordination of foreign intelligence on the grounds
that it might imply unwarranted freedom for him. General Vanden-
berg agreed that the possibility of such an interpretation was not
desirable, and the paragraph was reworded to authorize the DCI to
"act for" the NIA. With this last change, Vandenberg's proposal
became on July 8 the fifth directive of the National Intelligence Au-
thority and took its place next to the President's Directive of the
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preceding January 22 as the most important of the instructions to the
Director of Central Intelligence,
General Vandenberg had not obtained all that he sought in this
first endeavor to strengthen the CIG. But he did have authority now to
determine what R&A activities were not being performed adequately
and to centralize these in CIG with the consent of the department
concerned. He could act for the NIA in coordinating all departmental
intelligence activities. He could perform two services of common
usefulness-all organized federal espionage and counterespionage
abroad for the collection of foreign intelligence, and all federal monitor-
ing of the press and broadcasts of foreign powers. He had a clearer
statement regarding the allotment of funds from the departments and
the supplemental budget which he desired.
Funding
On July 17, Vandenberg went before the National Intelligence Au-
thority in its first meeting since he had taken office to argue that the
DCI must have independent funds and the right to hire his own people.
Citing the conclusions of Admiral Souers' final report,' he said it was
extremely difficult to secure the necessary personnel by requisition
from the departments. The DCI should have independent hiring
power. Eventually, he knew, this would mean that central intelligence
should become an agency established by act of Congress.
Secretary Byrnes demurred on the ground that the NIA had been
created intentionally to avoid any need for an independent budget.
The statement was historically inaccurate. The governing body com-
posed of the departmental secretaries and the President's representa-
tive had been conceived as a better institution than a single director
reporting to the President as proposed in Donovan's plan. The con-
ception was not concerned with the budget. Nor was the question
of the budget uppermost when the Army and Navy pushed the NIA
concept in order to keep the State Department from taking charge
under McCormack's plan. But Secretary Patterson now agreed with
Byrnes, explaining that the amount of money spent on central intelli-
gence should be concealed for reasons of security.
General Vandenberg interposed that such considerations ought to
be balanced against the administrative difficulties they caused. For
him the important thing was to have an effective and efficient organiza-
tion. At this point Admiral Leahy, representative of the President,
See Studies XII 1, p. 73 f.
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Vandenberg as DCI NTiAL
remarked that it had always been understood that CIG would even-
tually broaden its scope. He was about convinced, he said, that the
NIA should now endeavor to obtain appropriations. They should
be small, of course, as the three departments would continue to furnish
the bulk of the funds.
Patterson still thought that the administrative problems might be
solved under the existing arrangement. Byrnes too thought that the
departments might find a way to give the CIG whatever money it had
to have. There was further discussion, in which Langer endorsed
a suggestion from Admiral Leahy that funds might be separated from
personnel actions. The money might be allotted from the funds of
the departments without an independent appropriation for CIG, but
the DCI, for reasons of security as well as efficiency, be given full
charge of selecting and directing his personnel.
The discussion went on to consider the relationship with Congress
and its eventual legislation. General Vandenberg stressed that CIG
was not an agency authorized to disburse funds. Even if it had suffi-
cient funds from the departments, it would be obliged to maintain
disbursing officers and auditors in all three departments besides the
necessary accounting staff in CIG. Thus four fiscal operations were
required where one really would suffice. All of this pointed to the
necessity for making central intelligence an agency authorized to
control its own purse. Secretary Byrnes undertook to discuss the
matter with officials in the Bureau of the Budget and report back
to the NIA.
General Vandenberg meanwhile made a brief report on his progress
to date. CIG was about to take over the Foreign Broadcast Intelli-
gence Service and all clandestine activities in foreign intelligence. He
had set up an Office of Special Operations to direct them. He
expected soon to have other offices in good working order-Collection,
Dissemination, and Research and Evaluation. CIG was receiv-
ing requests almost daily to assume other functions being performed
by various committees Qf the State, War, and Navy Departments. 'Ift
He was establishing an nterepartmental Coordinat-
ing and Planning Staff.
This significant meeting of the National Intelligence Authority came
to an end with the feeling expressed by Secretary Patterson that all
of General Vandenberg's immediate problems would be solved if the
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O FIDE DTI. Vandenberg as DCI ti
Secretary of State could obtain help from, the Bureau of the Budget.
Vandenberg put it more explicitly: he needed money and the au-
thority to spend it, the authority to hire and fire. But he must have
left the meeting with his mind turning over a remark Admiral Leahy
had made about the intent of the President.
Leahy said he was convinced that CIG should have funds for
which it did not have to account in detail. The President, however,
had authorized him to "make it clear" that the DCI was "not respon-
sible further than to carry out the directives" of the National Intelli-
gence Authority. The President would hold the Cabinet officers in
the NIA "primarily responsible for coordination of intelligence activi-
ties." Were the secretaries then to see to it that their decisions in the
NIA were obeyed in their departments whether or not those decisions
were popular? General Vandenberg, anyhow, was to know that he
should not become another General Donovan seeking an independent
directorate.
In immediate consequence of Vandenberg's urging, a letter of July
30 from the National Intelligence Authority to the Secretary of the
Treasury and the Comptroller General requested the establishment of
a "working fund" for CIG. This fund, containing the allotments from
State, War, and the Navy, was to be subject to the administration of
the DCI or his authorized representative for paying personnel, procur-
ing supplies and equipment, and the certification of vouchers.
The establishment of the fund was approved, and a second letter
to the Comptroller General, signed by each member of the National
Intelligence Authority, gave on September 5 the authorization to
administer it. The DCI now had "full powers" to determine the
"propriety of expenditures" from the working fund under the policies
established by the NIA. He was to arrange with the Comptroller
General the procedures and controls necessary for proper accounting.
Once the allotments from the departments were in the working fund,
Vandenberg had authority and the resources to maintain a staff and
facilities for CIG on his own responsibility as DCI. But he still could
not be sure that his allotment from a department would not be cut.
He protested to congressional committees that CIG should have an
independent budget.
CIG had taken on a military character in spite of Admiral Sowers'
efforts to include State representation in the "cooperative activity."
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Vandenberg as DCl
He had been successful in obtaining some men who had had experi-
ence as civilians before going into uniform during the war, but for
the most part he was obliged to rely upon those who thought of the
Army or Navy as a career. The distinction between regular and
reserve officers, if seldom expressed, was always present. Seven years
later CIA still echoed with talk of the colonels who arrived with
General Vandenberg and took over from others who for one reason
or another did not measure up to his standards.
One must not overstress the military-civilian conflict; there doubt-
less were varied reasons for changing personnel. But neither should it
be ignored altogether. It entered as a fact into the deliberations of
Congress on the legislative provisions for the future of central intelli-
gence, just as it had embittered the argument between the State De-
partment and the armed services prior to the establishment of the CIG.
Colonel Fortier was relieved as Assistant Director and Acting Chief
of Operational Services on July 11, and Colonel Donald 11. Galloway
became Assistant Director for Special Operations. Captain Goggins
was moved from his post at the head of the Central Planning Staff to
be Galloway's deputy. Kingman Douglass, no longer Acting Deputy
Director of Central Intelligence, became "B" Deputy and Chief of
Foreign Commerce under Colonel Galloway. On the understanding
that there should be no one between them, Colonel E. K. Wright had
moved with Vandenberg, as his Executive, from G-2 to CIG. Colonel
John A. Dabney accompanied Wright as his Assistant. There was
no Deputy Director of Central Intelligence until Colonel Wright
was so appointed on January 20, 1947.
Colonel William W. Quinn, who had succeeded General Magruder
as Director of the Strategic Services Unit, was also placed under
Colonel Galloway as Executive for Special Operations, perhaps to
facilitate the liquidation of the SSU. The SSU's Secret Intelligence
and Counterespionage branches had been consolidated in a tempo-
rary organization of the War Department named the Foreign Security
Reports Office, and the head of this office, Stephen B. L. Penrose,
now became "A" Deputy under Galloway to take charge of secret
intelligence and counterespionage in the new Office of Special Op-
erations.
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Vandenberg as DCI
Vandenberg reported to the IAB on October 1 that he had reache
agreement with Director Hoover of the FBI. CIG would not inter-
fere with the Bureau's control over subversive activities in this coun-
try. And so the directive with regard to overt collection of foreign
intelligence within the United States was adopted that day by unani-
mous consent. General Vandenberg, in a change of plan, proceeded
to organize an Office of Operations to carry it out.
Kingman Douglass meanwhile had withdrawn .from the CIG, and
General Sibert was to take charge of all collection, clandestine and
overt. As he arrived to do so, however, Vandenberg listened to the
plea that secret collection should be kept separate under Colonel
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GQ04F Sf'`~~UA-_ Vandenberg as DCI
Galloway in the Office of Special Operations. The staff of his "B"
Deputy and Chief of Foreign Commerce, renamed the Commercial
Contact Branch, was placed in the new Office of Operations to do the
work of collecting foreign intelligence in this country. With it there
was joined a Foreign Broadcast Information Branch to take over that
service from the Army. A Foreign Documents Branch was added
later, in December. General Sibert became Assistant Director for
Operations on October 17, 1946.
By the President's Directive of January 22, 1946, the DCI was to
accomplish the correlation and evaluation of intelligence relating to
the national security, and he was to disseminate the resulting "strategic
and national policy intelligence" within the Government. The first
NIA directive, on February 8, spelled out this function, specifying
that he was to utilize all available intelligence and note in his reports
any substantial dissent by a participating agency. The second NIA
directive, of the same date, stipulated that the departments were to
assign personnel to the CIG, including members of a Central Reports
Staff to assist him in that function. The fifth NIA directive, of July 8,
authorized him to undertake such research and analysis as the de-
partments were not performing adequately and might better be
accomplished centrally.
By this time Vandenberg had the nucleus of his analytic organiza-
tion already at work in the Central Reports Staff, producing current
intelligence in Daily and Weekly Summaries. Its chief, L. L. Mon-
tague, had had wartime experience in strategic intelligence under the
Joint Chiefs of Staff and was prepared to establish a national estimat-
ing board of representatives from the intelligence agencies of the
departments as soon as qualified persons could be obtained to give
their full time. In expanding this staff to a new Office of Research
and Evaluation, however, Vandenberg deferred to the Department of
State's particular interest in producing intelligence for national policy
and asked it to choose a Foreign Service officer to head the activity.
State selected Mr. J. Klahr Huddle to be the Assistant Director in
charge of Research and Evaluation. Huddle's deputy, selected ac-
cording to custom from a different department, was Captain A. H.
McCollum of the Navy.
Montague would remain as Chief of the Intelligence Staff to carry
on the production of estimates, but for the time being would also act
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as Assistant Director to set up the new ORE in accordance with
Vandenberg's order of July 19: He issued an administrative instruc-
tion on August 7 with a program of enlargement as funds and per-
sonnel became available. There were to be added a Library, an
Information Center, and a Plans and Requirements Staff. The latter
would do further organizing in consultation with the other units of the
Office. The Information Center was to receive intelligence materials
for the Office and send out the products of its research and evaluation.
The Library, first established in ORE where its resources would be
handy to the persons with the most use for them, was moved later
to the Office of Collection . and Dissemination. The geographic
branches for Eastern Europe and the Middle East were temporarily
consolidated in one. Montague's administrative order expressly
stated that the Reports Staff, to be renamed the Intelligence Staff,
would direct and coordinate the activities of the regional branches in
producing strategic and national policy intelligence. There was to
be trouble over this disposition.
Vandenberg had no sooner created ORE than he ordered it to pro-
duce its first estimate, a crash assessment of Soviet worldwide inten-
tions and capabilities. Montague received Vandenberg's request on
Friday, with a deadline for the following Tuesday morning.. There
was no staff to produce it; Central Reports had not been able to get
from the departments the personnel to put its Estimates Branch into
operation. There were not enough people available even to assign the
editorial assistants needed by the Defense Project.? Montague him-
self was the only one in ORE with extensive experience in estimating.
Fortunately there was material available in reports and papers from
the joint Intelligence Staff of the Joint Chiefs (on which Montague
had represented the Army during the war) and brought up to date in
connection with the Defense Project.
Montague spent Saturday until 9 P.M. and Sunday into Monday at
3 A.M. studying the reports and papers, reading cables from Am-
bassador Kerman in Moscow, drawing the determinant factors to-
gether, and formulating the conclusions which on Monday afternoon
at two he submitted to representatives of the departments and the
Joint Chiefs of Staff. Following their comments, he spent the rest of
Monday until midnight revising his paper and checking it with the
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report of an ad hoc committee working on the same question for the
JCS. The clerical work was finished and the estimate delivered to
Vandenberg Tuesday afternoon.
Part II, "Coordination in Practice," will
be carried in a future issue.
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k\.F,e~.r,1x e
remarked that it had always been understood that CIG would even-
tually broaden its scope. He was about convinced, he said, that the
NIA should now endeavor to obtain appropriations. They should
be small, of course, as the three departments would continue to furnish
the bulk of the funds.
Patterson still thought that the administrative problems might be
solved under the existing arrangement. Byrnes too thought that the
departments might find a way to give the CIG whatever money it had
to have. There was further discussion, in which Langer endorsed
a suggestion from Admiral Leahy that funds might be separated from
personnel actions. The money might be allotted from the funds of
the departments without an independent appropriation for CIG, but
the DCI, for reasons of security as well as efficiency, be given full
charge of selecting and directing his personnel.
The discussion went on to consider the relationship with Congress
and its eventual legislation. General Vandenberg stressed that CIG
was not an agency authorized to disburse funds. Even if it had suffi-
cient funds from the departments, it would be obliged to maintain
disbursing officers and auditors in all three departments besides the
necessary accounting staff in CIG. Thus four fiscal operations were
required where one really would suffice. All of this pointed to the
necessity for making central intelligence an agency authorized to
control its own purse. Secretary Byrnes undertook to discuss the
matter with officials in the Bureau of the Budget and report back
to the NIA.
General Vandenberg meanwhile made a brief report on his progress
to date. CIG was about to take over the Foreign Broadcast Intelli-
gence Service and all clandestine activities in foreign intelligence. He
had set up an Office of Special Operations to direct them. He
expected soon to have other offices in good working order-Collection,
Dissemination, and Research and Evaluation. CIG was receiv-
ing requests almost daily to assume other functions being perfo ed
by various committees of the State, War, and Navy Departments. For
one, it was asked to consider handling codes and ciphers. Anot er
was the conce of the War Department over exchanging information
with the British. He was establishing an Interdepartmental Coordinat-
ing and Planning Staff,
This significant meeting of the National Intelligence Authority came
to an end with the feeling expressed by Secretary Patterson that all
of General Vandenberg's immediate problems would be solved if the
v ,eM~ rev) P
:,- . o.,
i 1 (Di']1 PS
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Vandenberg as DC! 'CONFIDENTIAL
He had been successful in obtaining some men who had had experi-
ence as civilians before going into uniform during the war, but for
the most part he was obliged to rely upon those who thou ht of th
,}e i+tC%`rx`^, c r Iec)
f-ev rr,crk~ci r
I
Army or Navy as a career, The distinction between regular and S nHt
reserve officers, if seldom expressed, was always present. Seven nears
General Vandenberg and took over from others who for one reason
or another did not measure up to his standards.
One must not overstress the military-civilian conflict; there doubt-
less were varied reasons for changing personnel. But neither should it
be ignored altogether. It entered as a fact into the deliberations of
Congress on the legislative provisions for the future of central intelli-
gence, just as it had embittered the argument between the State De-
partment and the armed services prior to the establishment of the CIG.
Colonel Fortier was relieved as Assistant Director and Acting Chief
of Operational Services on July 11, and Colonel Donald II. Galloway
became Assistant Director for Special Operations. Captain Goggins
was moved from his post at the head of the Central Planning Staff to
be Galloway's deputy. Kingman Douglass, no longer Acting Deputy
Director of Central Intelligence, became "B" Deputy and Chief of
Foreign Commerce under Colonel Galloway. On the understanding
that there should be no one between them, Colonel E. K. Wright had
moved with Vandenberg, as his Executive, from G-2 to CIG. Colonel
, . .
John A. Dabney acco
i `7
n
Wright
no Deputy Director of Central Intelligence until Colonel Wright
was so appointed on January 20, 1947.
Colonel William W. Quinn, who had succeeded General Magruder
as Director of the Strategic Services Unit, was also placed under
Colonel Galloway as Executive for Special Operations, perhaps to
facilitate the liquidation of the SSU. The SSU's Secret Intelligence
and Counterespionage branches had been consolidated in a tempo-
rary organization of the War Department named the Foreign Security
Reports Office, and the head of this office, Stephen B. L. Penrose,
now became "A" Deputy under Galloway to take charge of secret
intelligence and counterespionage in the new Office of Special Op-
erations.
Clandestine Operations
Colonel Galloway admonished his subordinates in OSO that they
were to reduce to the minimum their associations with people from
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- CONFIDENTIAL Vandenberg as DC1
State, War, and the Navy and handle this minimum through a Control
Officer. They were to carry on nothing but official business with other
offices of CIG. Vandenberg, Wright, and Galloway wanted OSO to
be as free as possible from connections which might expose its affairs.
They believed that its operations should be kept apart from the observa-
tion and influence of the departmental chiefs of intelligence in the
IAB; these were different from other "services of common concern"
to the departments. OSO had to keep in touch with agencies which
used its product, and it was authorized on October 25 to receive f
requests for information or action from those agencies through its Con-
trol Officer. But if Vandenberg and his assistants could prevent it, 4
their operation of collecting foreign intelligence by clandestine means]
was not to gain the reputation for free wheeling and self-exposur
which he ascrib
d t
h
e
o t
e Office of Strategic Services.
Schedules were established in July and arrangements made for t
ki
a
n
over SSU staff personnel, agents, and foreign stations during the fal
r a
-a
that as
activities of SSU would end as of October 19
This dat
.
e was nod
met because of delays in security clearances and a shorta
f
ge o
persons
to do the clerical work; but by April 11, 1947, the services of all
civilians had been terminated, military personnel had been reassigned,
and foreign stations had ceased to be SSU installations. There were'
funds adequate to meet outstanding obligations. Some claims and
inquiries would continue, a few indefinitely, but officers on duty with
CIG would be f
ili
am
ar with them.
Colonel Galloway applied himself to European affairs a
th
U
s
e
nited
States and Britain joined economically their zones in Germa
E'
C
ny.
ap_
tain Goggins concentrated on the Far East; he left soon for Tsingtao,
where he arra
d
i
h
nge
w
t
the commander of the Seventh Fleet to
support the old OSS mission known as External Survey Detachment
No. 44. General Vandenberg had been anxious to keep this going
for the Army in China. Its usefulness for both overt and clandestine
intelligence in China, Manchuria, and the hinterland which it could
penetrate was greater now than ever as the Communist Chinese
increased their Manchurian operations in the summer of 1946 and
tension over Korea grew.
Stopping in Tokyo on the way home, Captain Goggins reached tenta-
tive agreement for cooperation between CIG and General MacArthur,
who, we will recall, once had no room in his plans for tho. Off - ,.f
Strategic Services.
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Vandberg as DC1
In- ' CONFIDENTIAL
Captain Goggins had to postpone for discussion with Vandenberg the
issue whether these CIG installations should be under the command
of General MacArthur and Admiral Cooke of the Seventh Fleet. Van-
denberg, when the matter came before him, declined on the grounds
that these were not military activities. He was responsible to the
National Intelligence Authority and could not take orders from Mac-
Arthur and Cooke.
Douglass and Jackson were also to find out if General Edwin L.
Sibert, chief of intelligence on General McNarney's staff, could be
assigned to CIG. The thought was that General Sibert should be-
come Deputy Director under Vandenberg and eventually might suc-
ceed him as DCI. He was to have charge of all collection, both
clandestine and overt.
During the course of his stay he
had conversations which added meanin to the report b Dou lass
and Jackson. F_ I
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Vandenberg s DC1
The full results of the Douglass-Jackson mission of August 1946
did not come until later, when Bedell Smith was DCI. But the report
at the time had value for General Vandenberg. It showed the diffi-
culties SSU had had i1 while it was in competition with
the intelligence services o the Army, Navy, and FBI. There was need
for a single collecting agencyl
Dc)ii(ylns.q and Ticks returned with a careful description of the
I Iwhich had been organized Once Jackson's
1945 report. It has been called the first institution of its kind ac-
tually to administer services of common usefulness to other departments
and governmental agencies, and as such has influenced similar institu-
tions here. ffivided into geographic and functional sections, it was
to engage in economic, political, geographic, and scientific intelligence
research. It would farm some work out to the universities and pro-
fessional organizations. The intention was that ultimately thelI
military organizations should each retain only the intelligence work
related "clearly and almost exclusively" to the particular service.
The collection of intelligence, however, would not be centralized
Military, naval, and air attaches were to be maintained as
before, and secret intelligence handled separately. I Iwould
undertake collection from overt sources business
firms, engineering experts-and would then co ate an clistribute tile
materials to the appropriate users.
at"
b?~a
010
l$
Vol,
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,r.
Vandenberg as DCI
Latin America
As his lieutenants wer-1 negotiating)
General Vandenberg himse undertook to sett e wit gar Hoover
and the FBI the matter of operations in this hemisphere. OSS had
been excluded from operating in the western hemisphere and the
area reserved for the FBI on the grounds that the primary concern
there had been protection of the United States against subversive
artivitinc Tt vync n flFlrl fnr oniinfnrocninnano and security intelligence.
Counterespionage was
thought o as a e ensive measure quite distinct from aggressive positive
intelligence, a safety device rather than a weapon of attack. To those
accustomed to think of it in such terms, counterespionage or security
intelligence should continue to be the business of the FBI, especially
in geographical areas where it already had agents established.
General Vandenberg did not think so. It was his conviction that he
could not do his job as head of the national intelligence agency if other
organizations were engaged in the same work. One was likely to
expose the other. Hitler's system of intelligence had been easy to
penetrate, he believed, because the parts of it so often interfered
with each other. Either he or Hoover should withdraw from the field,
and since the fifth NIA directive had assigned the DCI all organized
federal espionage and counterespionage abroad, the Bureau should
give way.
Mr. Hoover yielded to the request that the Bureau withdraw from
Latin America. It would confine its activities to security intelligence
within the United States and possessions, in line with the fifth direc-
tive of the National Intelligence Authority issued on July 8. In order
to insure continuity in the takeover the NIA, meeting on August
7 with Acting Secretary of State Dean Acheson in the chair, decided
that a letter should be sent to the Attorney General asking him to keep
the personnel of the Bureaun duty in Latin America until replaced
by CIG representatives, annsuch a letter went out over the signatures
of the four NIA members. Hoover complied, insisting only that CIG
could not employ the Bureau's Latin American staff.
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Vandenberg as DCl
Domestic Collection
The value of information about foreign countries in the hands of
American businesses, institutions, and individuals with connections
abroad had long been recognized. The problem of correlating and
reducing the overlapping efforts of government agencies with real
or fancied interests in the information had not been persistently at-
tacked. And not all investigators took the most productive approach
to U.S. citizens seeking to do the government a favor. The attitude of
policing rather than inquiry to obtain help has often characterized
this activity.
General Vandenberg took up a report from the Central Planning
Staff on the subject. His directive as drafted on July 22, five days
after his first meeting with the National Intelligence Authority, pro-
vided that the DCI should maintain a "central contact control regis-
ter" of persons and groups interviewed or to be approached as do-
mestic sources of intelligence regarding other countries. This was
an obvious service of common concern; yet it gave rise to objections.
The word "control" applied to the register already seemed to give
the DCI undue power. Then it was further provided that field offices
of CIG would do the work of collecting this particular kind of for-
eign intelligence information. The Departments of State, War, and
the Navy were to make available whatever persons and facilities the
DCI might require and take with him the steps necessary to carry
out the operations. Through this first draft of the directive ran
the idea that the DCI should supervise as well as direct and coordinate
the activities.
Much in the way the Department of State had restricted Vanden-
berg's direction and control over research and analysis, War and Navy
now insisted upon revising the directive on overt collection. The Navy
had a register of its own. The Army, when Vandenberg had been its
chief of intelligence, had appeared to favor a central control of con-
tacts that would eliminate the confusion, annoyance, and embarrass-
ment resulting when two or more agencies tried to use a source of
information simultaneously. But now the Military Intelligence Divi-
sion opposed the idea that CIG should control such a central register.
:Kingman Douglass summed up the points of contention. for Van-
denberg on August 26 as they prepared to meet the Intelligence Ad-
visory Board. The Army and Navy had not liked the powers of
direction and supervision delegated to the DCI; these were functions
of the secretaries and the Chiefs of Staff. The words "direct," "super-
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Vandenberg as DCI
CONFIDENTIAL
vise," and "control" had therefore been taken from the directive,
leaving "coordination" alone and untrammeled. The services had
to be satisfied too that the DCI would not have final authority in
requisitioning military and naval personnel and facilities; the de-
partments should still determine "availability." The Navy had to be
assured, said Douglass, that there would be no interference with its
own Special Observer Plan.
Douglass expected that the chief opposition in the IAB meeting
would be to the establishment of inter-agency field offices and to the
monopoly on briefing and interrogation of travelers which CIG sought
for reasons of security and coordination. The field offices, with CIG
officers in liaison with local headquarters of the Army, Navy, and
Air Forces, would be objectionable because the participating agencies
would lose control over their personnel to some degree. On the other
hand, Douglass orated out, they were not as well equipped as CIG
to do the work.fHe expected to have a staff of 25 or 30 in New
York "to exploit American business on a full-time basis." Neither
the Army nor the Air Forces could furnish such numbers; the Navy
might be able to supply only oneT
The armed services had more to gain than to lose, Douglass said,
by cooperating in the enterprise, but he was none too hopeful.
He expected "various other unrelated objections for no other reason
than to defeat the general purpose." There were officers in the Army
who had plans for "a G-2 exploitation in this field" which did not
include coordination with any other department.
At the IAB meeting on August 26 there was some discussion of
the central register, now separated into two parts. One was to be
the depository of all foreign intelligence acquired by the government,
a tremendous undertaking even in prospect, and the other a careful
record of the companies and persons interviewed by the intelligence
agencies. An exchange of views on whether the "contacts" should
be registered led to the opinion that they should be unless they
insisted upon secrecy. Then William A. Eddy, Langer's successor,
suggested and the IAB agreed that the briefing of private persons
about to go abroad should not be performed "only by representatives'
of the Central Intelligence Group" but "by the agency making the
contacts." If agreeable to the person interviewed, however, a CIG
representative could be present and, upon request by a participating
agency, CIG technical specialists as well.
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2ONFIDENTIAT
Vandenberg as DC1
Thus the chance of eliminating competition in this field among
he intelligence services was gone for the time being. The de-
)artments were not yet ready to give up their own facilities and rely
in CIG for such a service of common concern. On the other hand,
"IG was not deprived of the right to have a Contact Branch with
field offices for domestic collection. Although the directive as finally
ccepted by the IAB on October 1 did not mention CIG collection, it
+rovided for CIG field representatives to maintain liaison with in-
3lligence officers in local headquarters of the Army, Navy, and Air
'orces "through the medium of local inter-agency offices" and to
ffect for the DCI the coordination of such overt collection.
It was a loose and indirect statement, but it meant that any in-
illigence which the Director's field representatives obtained in liaison
'ith the local officers of the services would be the legitimate by-
roduct of the coordination. All intelligence acquired by the Gov-
rnment was to be deposited in the central register maintained by
!IG. [Vandenberg could proceed with developing the office of Gal-
~way's "B" Deputy and Chief of Foreign Commerce as soon as he
id overcome the more serious objections of the Federal Bureau of
ivestigationn
nvestigations"
Vandenberg. had sent his proposals to Hoover on August 21 and
ceived a reply two days later by special messenger. At the same
ne Hoover expressed his opinions to Admiral Leahy, personal rep-
sentative of the President in the NIA. He called Vandenberg's
`ention to section nine in the President's Directive of January 22
rich specifically withheld "investigations inside the continental lim-
of the United States and its possessions," from the province of
DCI. Hoover would accept uniform procedures established by
DCI and would engage to transmit promptly any foreign intel-
ence gathered by the FBI in the course of its investigations of
ierican businesses; but he would not accept control by the Central
ntact Register. Instead, CIG should obtain clearance from the
reau for its "investigations" within the country.
Co Admiral Leahy, Hoover described Vandenberg's proposal as
"invasion,of domestic intelligence coverage" assigned by law to
"sole responsibility" of the Bureau. If the proposed directive
uld go into effect, he said, it would lead inevitably to "confusion,
dication of effort, and intolerable conditions to the detriment
a1
o so~es~ es S e,c
lea a dos'
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~o o
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Va.nde?rg as DCI
CONFIDENTIAL
of the national well-being." Subsequent negotiation, however,
softened this position.
James S. Lay, Secretary to the CIG, the IAB, and the NIA, sub-
mitted a memorandum to the DCI on September 3 to show the cur-
rent FBI position and provide answers to Hoover's remaining objec-
tions. His representative on the IAB had now indicated that he
would agree to the activities of the CIG domestic field offices if
they confined themselves to "business concerns"; he would still object
to the inclusion of other groups and persons for fear of conflict with
the operations of the Bureau. The answer to Mr. Hoover in all cases,
Lay suggested, was that the "investigations" he had in mind were
for internal security, while what CIG was talking about were normal
methods of collecting intelligence which the Army and Navy had
employed within the country and out of it for years. If Hoover were
assured that CIG would consult with the Bureau on the advisability
of contacts with other than American business concerns any danger
of conflict should be precluded.
The next letter from Hoover to Vandenberg, on September 5, nar-
rowed the anxiety of the Bureau to foreign language groups and
other organizations and persons in whom it was "primarily interested
because of its responsibility in covering Communistic activities within .
the United States." The issue was beginning to clear. Mr. Hoover
would be satisfied if the reference to "other non-governmental groups
and individuals with connections abroad" were eliminated from the
directive. The conflict now rapidly subsided. Mr. Hoover approved
on September 23 the changes which General Vandenberg made at his
request. There was no need even to stipulate that the Bureau had
the primary interest in foreign nationality groups within the United
States; this statement was stricken from the draft.
Vandenberg reported to the IAB on October 1 that he had reached
agreement with Director Hoover of the FBI. CIG would not inter-
fere with the Bureau's control over subversive activities in this coun-
try. And so the directive with regard to overt collection of foreign
intelligence within the United States was adopted that day by unani-
mous consent. General Vandenberg, in a change of plan, proceeded
to organize an Office of Operations to carry it out.
Kingman Douglass meanwhile had withdrawn from the CIG, and
General Sibert was to take charge of all collection, clandestine and
overt. As he arrived to do so, however, Vandenberg listened to the
plea that secret collection should be kept separate under Colonel
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