4 ms·

I think in the same way that the Congressional Budget Office is generally regarded as pretty neutral and trustworthy, and makes forecasts about legislation prop

by abeppu 3y ago

I think in the same way that the Congressional Budget Office is generally regarded as pretty neutral and trustworthy, and makes forecasts about legislation proposed by both parties in a way that is generally credible, perhaps we need an intelligence branch whose remit is just to gather info and do analysis on issues of geopolitical and security importance -- and _not_ to execute on any particular administration goals, support or undermine foreign governments, detain or transport prisoners, etc. Retrospectively, it's easier to answer "Were they right in predicting X, about which more information has now come to light?" than to evaluate "Were they effective in pursuing administration goal Y with the information reasonably accessible at the time?" which involves a lot of messy counterfactuals.

fakedang 3y ago
Isn't that the DIA? They're in most of the Presidential briefings. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Intelligence_Agency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Intelligence_Agency The issue is that the DIA isn't above the rest of the alphabet soup agencies in the hierarchy, hence it cannot just report on the activities of the other agencies itself.
- abeppu 3y ago
  Is that the DIA? I'm of the understanding that because the DIA reports to the Secretary of Defense, and is a combat support agency, that it is pretty tied to administration goals. An example of serving administration goals and political appointees in a way that erodes trust would be Rumsfeld's DoD asking for novel prisoner interrogation techniques. DIA staff were involved in proposing/developing and then implementing "enhanced interrogation" at Guantanamo and Bagram. I want a non-political intelligence agency, or as close to it as possible. I think it structurally cannot be within or reporting to the executive branch.
  - patmorgan23 3y ago
    Like a congressional intelligence service? I don't know if that would be constitutional. I think the best you could get would be an independent executive agency.
    - abeppu 3y ago
      Why would it be unconstitutional? There's a reason I made a direct comparison to the CBO above -- that reports to the legislature and has a responsibility to gather information and prepare analysis about the likely (fiscal and economic) impacts of legislation. To be able to legislate over matters of economic importance, our article 1 bodies need (and hence it's implied that they are allowed to procure) information related to the economy, trade, etc. Similarly, in order to legislate over matters with diplomatic or military significance, I think it's reasonable to say that to the legislature needs (and hence it's implied that they are allowed to procure) intelligence on those areas.
      - fakedang 3y ago
        Hmm, so from what I gather, something akin to GAO, but it provides all branches of the government insights and intelligence without discrimination?
  - wolverine876 3y ago
    What other branch could it be in? It must ultimately be under the authority of the people of the United States, probably through the elected president.
- wolverine876 3y ago
  The DIA is the military's intellgience agency, presumably reporting on military capabilities, plans, etc. > the DIA isn't above the rest of the alphabet soup agencies in the hierarchy, hence it cannot just report on the activities of the other agencies itself. None of the others are either, afaik. The only intelligence organization above the rest is the Director of National Intelligence, whose job is to ~ oversee and coordinate the intelligence community.
0x38B 3y ago
I know the US Intelligence Community is more than the CIA, but it's been fascinating to read in CIA-veteran Douglas London's "The Recruiter" about how the CIA marketed its "seductive" covert action capabilities after 9/11 and became less about intelligence collection: "[after the debacle of 9/11's intelligence failures], the CIA fundamentally changed its core mission, values, and culture: a metamorphosis designed to earn White House approval and guard itself from the encroachments of the Department of Defense and the FBI, agencies seen as threats that might steal its turf and authorities, and perhaps swallow the CIA whole. A slippery slope of compromises, facelifts, and revised narratives justifying a unique set of capabilities and authorities undertaken to preserve the Agency would instead leave it barely recognizable for the institution it was meant to be. Established in 1947 as a small, elite, independent, civilian, and nonpartisan foreign intelligence service, the CIA's charter was intelligence collection, analysis, and covert action. Freeing the CIA from association with defense, law enforcement, and diplomacy theoretically protected it from grading its own homework as a policy maker, as was the case for the Pentagon, the Department of Justice, and the Department of State. Small, under the radar, and relatively chaste from the political pressures of its larger counterparts, the CIA was intended to speak truth to power.... That was the mindset of the CIA I joined in 1984. Today, the CIA must choose whether to be the elite spy service it was intended, or continue the Agency's post-9/11 leadership's ill-fated path of compromise." (emphasis mine) ---- > an intelligence branch whose remit is just to gather info and do analysis on issues of geopolitical and security importance -- and _not_ to execute on any particular administration goals ... I think this is what the CIA was meant to be and started out as. But in its struggle for survival after 9/11, it reinvented itself as a far more political entity.
- Cheer2171 3y ago
  It is really hard to take that seriously when the CIA was instrumental in overthrowing Leftist governments in Central and South America throughout the 1970s and 1980s. A CIA that was as deep in Operation Condor or the School of the Americas as they were could not be described as a "small, elite, independent, civilian, and nonpartisan foreign intelligence service". This seemed to change long before 9/11.
wolverine876 3y ago
> perhaps we need an intelligence branch whose remit is just to gather info and do analysis on issues of geopolitical and security importance The first part is, afaik, part of the intelligence community's mission. It worked to the extent that when GW Bush wasn't getting the answers he wanted on Iraq, he setup his own intelligence office to create the disinformation they wanted. (On the other hand, CIA head George Tenet, perhaps due to pressure, told Bush that Iraq WMD would be a "slam dunk".) Also, afaik, that happens in a separate branch of the CIA than the covert operations. Is that not separate enough?
dragonwriter 3y ago
The CBO has a good reputation because of transparency of methodology than an intelligence service could not have. The last thing I want is an service with covert ELINT and/or HUMINT capacity, even without notionally an active measures role, that the Congress has even less inclination to constrain abuses by than the existing executive branch ones. HUAC and the McCarthy committee were bad enough without Congress having its own independent spying capacity.

by abeppu 3y ago

fakedang 3y ago

Isn't that the DIA? They're in most of the Presidential briefings. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Intelligence_Agency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Intelligence_Agency The issue is that the DIA isn't above the rest of the alphabet soup agencies in the hierarchy, hence it cannot just report on the activities of the other agencies itself.

abeppu 3y ago
Is that the DIA? I'm of the understanding that because the DIA reports to the Secretary of Defense, and is a combat support agency, that it is pretty tied to administration goals. An example of serving administration goals and political appointees in a way that erodes trust would be Rumsfeld's DoD asking for novel prisoner interrogation techniques. DIA staff were involved in proposing/developing and then implementing "enhanced interrogation" at Guantanamo and Bagram. I want a non-political intelligence agency, or as close to it as possible. I think it structurally cannot be within or reporting to the executive branch.
- patmorgan23 3y ago
  Like a congressional intelligence service? I don't know if that would be constitutional. I think the best you could get would be an independent executive agency.
  - abeppu 3y ago
    Why would it be unconstitutional? There's a reason I made a direct comparison to the CBO above -- that reports to the legislature and has a responsibility to gather information and prepare analysis about the likely (fiscal and economic) impacts of legislation. To be able to legislate over matters of economic importance, our article 1 bodies need (and hence it's implied that they are allowed to procure) information related to the economy, trade, etc. Similarly, in order to legislate over matters with diplomatic or military significance, I think it's reasonable to say that to the legislature needs (and hence it's implied that they are allowed to procure) intelligence on those areas.
    - fakedang 3y ago
      Hmm, so from what I gather, something akin to GAO, but it provides all branches of the government insights and intelligence without discrimination?
- wolverine876 3y ago
  What other branch could it be in? It must ultimately be under the authority of the people of the United States, probably through the elected president.
wolverine876 3y ago
The DIA is the military's intellgience agency, presumably reporting on military capabilities, plans, etc. > the DIA isn't above the rest of the alphabet soup agencies in the hierarchy, hence it cannot just report on the activities of the other agencies itself. None of the others are either, afaik. The only intelligence organization above the rest is the Director of National Intelligence, whose job is to ~ oversee and coordinate the intelligence community.

0x38B 3y ago

I know the US Intelligence Community is more than the CIA, but it's been fascinating to read in CIA-veteran Douglas London's "The Recruiter" about how the CIA marketed its "seductive" covert action capabilities after 9/11 and became less about intelligence collection: "[after the debacle of 9/11's intelligence failures], the CIA fundamentally changed its core mission, values, and culture: a metamorphosis designed to earn White House approval and guard itself from the encroachments of the Department of Defense and the FBI, agencies seen as threats that might steal its turf and authorities, and perhaps swallow the CIA whole. A slippery slope of compromises, facelifts, and revised narratives justifying a unique set of capabilities and authorities undertaken to preserve the Agency would instead leave it barely recognizable for the institution it was meant to be. Established in 1947 as a small, elite, independent, civilian, and nonpartisan foreign intelligence service, the CIA's charter was intelligence collection, analysis, and covert action. Freeing the CIA from association with defense, law enforcement, and diplomacy theoretically protected it from grading its own homework as a policy maker, as was the case for the Pentagon, the Department of Justice, and the Department of State. Small, under the radar, and relatively chaste from the political pressures of its larger counterparts, the CIA was intended to speak truth to power.... That was the mindset of the CIA I joined in 1984. Today, the CIA must choose whether to be the elite spy service it was intended, or continue the Agency's post-9/11 leadership's ill-fated path of compromise." (emphasis mine) ---- > an intelligence branch whose remit is just to gather info and do analysis on issues of geopolitical and security importance -- and _not_ to execute on any particular administration goals ... I think this is what the CIA was meant to be and started out as. But in its struggle for survival after 9/11, it reinvented itself as a far more political entity.

Cheer2171 3y ago
It is really hard to take that seriously when the CIA was instrumental in overthrowing Leftist governments in Central and South America throughout the 1970s and 1980s. A CIA that was as deep in Operation Condor or the School of the Americas as they were could not be described as a "small, elite, independent, civilian, and nonpartisan foreign intelligence service". This seemed to change long before 9/11.

wolverine876 3y ago

> perhaps we need an intelligence branch whose remit is just to gather info and do analysis on issues of geopolitical and security importance The first part is, afaik, part of the intelligence community's mission. It worked to the extent that when GW Bush wasn't getting the answers he wanted on Iraq, he setup his own intelligence office to create the disinformation they wanted. (On the other hand, CIA head George Tenet, perhaps due to pressure, told Bush that Iraq WMD would be a "slam dunk".) Also, afaik, that happens in a separate branch of the CIA than the covert operations. Is that not separate enough?

dragonwriter 3y ago

The CBO has a good reputation because of transparency of methodology than an intelligence service could not have. The last thing I want is an service with covert ELINT and/or HUMINT capacity, even without notionally an active measures role, that the Congress has even less inclination to constrain abuses by than the existing executive branch ones. HUAC and the McCarthy committee were bad enough without Congress having its own independent spying capacity.