Central Intelligence Agency

The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was established under the 1947 National Security Act in response to the Japanese surprise attack at Pearl Harbor in 1941. Its statutory functions were to advise the National Security Council (NSC) on intelligence matters, to “correlate and evaluate” intelligence information from across the U.S. government, and to perform unspecified other tasks that the NSC judged could be “more effectively accomplished centrally.” Before the 2004 Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act, the CIA was headed by the director of Central Intelligence (DCI), who was also responsible for coordinating the intelligence community (IC), that is, all of the various departmental intelligence agencies. [Page 100]Under the 2004 Act, which was prompted by the failure of the intelligence community to detect the impending 9/11 terrorist attacks, the “community” role was delegated to a new director of National Intelligence (DNI) and the CIA is now headed by a director, appointed by the president.

The CIA, and its short-lived predecessor, the 1946 Central Intelligence Group (CIG), were originally intended to be administrative and analytical staff organizations. Covert operational capability developed as something of an afterthought when CIG took on the residual elements of the wartime Office of Strategic Services because of a lack of viable alternatives. In 1952, the CIA's covert capability was consolidated as the Directorate of Plans (DP), redesignated the Directorate of Operations (DO) in 1972 and the National Clandestine Service (NCS) in 2005. The analytical components became the Directorate of Intelligence in 1952 and have remained that since.

Despite the DO's improvised origins, the 1976 Church inquiry noted that between 1962 and 1970, the DO alone accounted for 52% of the CIA's budget and 55% of its personnel. Most of this was, however, human intelligence rather than special activities, although public and press attention over the years has typically focused on the latter. After the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961, the CIA placed steadily less emphasis on large covert actions and, as documentary releases clearly show (albeit contrary to conventional wisdom), had no role in the coup that toppled the regime of Salvador Allende in Chile in 1972. During the 1970s, the DO lost about one third of its staff with the end of the Vietnam conflict and an increased emphasis on analysis and technical collection methods, although numbers were partially restored during Ronald Reagan's presidency. After the cold war, the CIA experienced another sharp reduction of approximately 25% in overall funds and humanpower.

Contrary to popular perceptions, the CIA does not produce national intelligence estimates such as that on Iraqi nonconventional weapons in October 2002. These are generated by an interagency body involving all 14 agencies of the U.S. intelligence community called the National Intelligence Council.