The Wizards of Langley

by Jeffrey T Richelson

  80 . Interview; “Seismic Sensors,” Intelligence Newsletter, January 17, 1990, p. 2.

  81 . Hineman interview.

  82 . John O. Koehler, STASI: The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1998), p. 295.

  83 . Hineman interview.

  84 . Ibid.

  85 . Ibid.; CIA document fragment, “Office of Special Projects,” July 22, 1988.

  86 . Interview with Robert Phillips, Rosslyn, Virginia, June 4, 1999.

  87 . Ibid.

  Chapter 9: A New World

  1 . Benjamin B. Fischer (ed.), At Cold War’s End: U.S. Intelligence on the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe 1989–1991 (Washington, D.C.: Central Intelligence Agency, 1999), p. xi.

  2 . Ibid.

  3 . Interview with James V. Hirsch, Fairfax, Virginia, February 12, 1999; remarks of James V. Hirsch, “DS&T 35th Anniversary: Celebrating 50 Years of CIA History,” July 24, 1997, videotape.

  4 . Remarks of James V. Hirsch, “DS&T 35th Anniversary,.”

  5 . Ibid.

  6 . Hirsch interview.

  7 . Ibid.

  8 . Bob Woodward, The Commanders (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991), p. 206.

  9 . Ibid.

  10 . Ibid., p. 207; Michael R. Gordon and Bernard Trainor, The General’s War: The Inside Story of The Conflict in the Gulf (Boston: Little, Brown, 1994), pp. 9–10.

  11 . U.S. News & World Report, Triumph Without Victory: The Unreported History of the Persian Gulf War (New York: Times Books, 1992), pp. 21–22.

  12 . Ibid., p. 32.

  13 . Gordon and Trainor, The General’s War, p. 25.

  14 . Ibid., pp. 24–25; Woodward, The Commanders, pp. 208, 216, 218–219.

  15 . U.S. News & World Report, Triumph Without Victory, pp. 7–9; George Bush, National Security Directive 45, “U.S. Policy in Response to the Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait,” August 20, 1990, p. 2.

  16 . Richard Hallion, Storm over Iraq: Air Power and the Gulf War (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1992), p. 159; George Bush, National Security Directive 54, “Responding to Iraqi Aggression in the Gulf,” January 15, 1991.

  17 . Doug Waller, The Commandos: The Inside Story of America’s Secret Soldiers (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994), p. 243; U.S. News & World Report, Triumph Without Victory, p. 212.

  18 . Bill Gertz, “New Spy Satellite, Needed to Monitor Treaty, Sits on Ground,” Washington Times, October 20, 1987, p. A5; Bob Woodward, Veil: The Secret Wars of the CIA 1981–1987 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1987), p. 221; private information.

  19 . Douglas Isbell and Vincent Kiernan, “Long-Delayed Atlantis Flight Orbits Military Spy Satellite,” Space News, March 5–11, 1990, p. 12; Edward H. Kolcum, “Atlantis Lofts AFP-731 Reconnaissance Satellite,” Aviation Week and Space Technology, March 5, 1990, p. 22; Warren E. Leary, “Problems Are Reported with New Spy Satellite,” New York Times, March 18, 1990, p. 20; Patrick E. Tyler, “Satellite Fails,” Washington Post, March 17, 1990, pp. A1, A11.

  20 . Warren E. Leary, “Debris from Secret U.S. Satellite Is Burning Up in Fall from Space,” New York Times, March 22, 1990, p. A24; “Soviets Claim Reconnaissance Satellite Launched by Atlantis Has Failed,” Aviation Week and Space Technology, March 26, 1990, p. 23; “Shuttle Spy Satellite Has Not Reentered,” Spaceflight, January 1991, p. 4; private information.

  21 . Private information.

  22 . Ibid.

  23 . Ibid.

  24 . Ibid.

  25 . Ibid.

  26 . Douglas G. Armstrong, “The Gulf War’s Patched-Together Air Intelligence,” Naval Institute Proceedings, November 1992, pp. 109–111; Desmond Ball, Intelligence in the Gulf War (Canberra, Australia: SDSC, Australian National University, 1991), pp. 32, 34.

  27 . Craig Covault, “Space Recon of Iraq Taxes CIA Operations,” Aviation Week and Space Technology, September 3, 1990, pp. 30–31.

  28 . Interview with Patrick Eddington, Centerville, Virginia, April 12, 1999.

  29 . Ibid.

  30 . Covault, “Space Recon of Iraq Taxes CIA Operations; U.S. News & World Report, Triumph Without Victory, p. 277; Thomas Christie et al., Desert Storm SCUD Campaign (Arlington, Va.: Institute for Defense Analyses, 1992), p. IV-6.

  31 . Department of Defense, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, Final Report to Congress (Washington, D.C: DOD, April 1992), C-14 to C-15; Rick Atkinson, Crusade: The Untold Story of the Persian Gulf War (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1993), p. 265.

  32 . E. C. Aldridge Jr., Director, NRO, to David L. Boren, Chairman, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, November 21, 1988.

  33 . Ibid.

  34 . Ibid.; Rear Adm. Robert K. Geiger and D. Barry Kelly, NRO Restructure Study, Final Report, Volume II (Washington, D.C.: NRO, 1989).

  35 . Kelly and Geiger, NRO Restructure Study, Final Report, Volume II, p. 16.

  36 . Letter, Secretary of Defense Richard Cheney and Director of Central Intelligence William Webster to Senator David Boren, Chairman, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

  37 . Ibid.

  38 . U.S. Congress, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, NRO Headquarters Project (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1995), p. 37; U.S. Congress, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, NRO Headquarters Facility (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1995), p. 2.

  39 . U.S. Congress, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, NRO Headquarters Facility, p. 19; U.S. Congress, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, NRO Headquarters Project, p. 52; Letter from Mary Jo Kingsley, Chief Information Access and Release Center, NRO, to author, August 9, 1996.

  40 . Martin C. Faga, Memorandum for the Secretary of Defense, Subject: DCI Task Force on the NRO-INFORMATION MEMORANDUM,” May 19, 1992; George Bush, National Security Directive 67, “Intelligence Capabilities, 1992–2005,” March 30, 1992.

  41 . DCI Task Force on the National Reconnaissance Office, Report to the Director of Central Intelligence, DCI Task Force on the National Reconnaissance Office, Final Report, April 1992, p. 2.

  42 . Ibid., p. 6.

  43 . U.S. Congress, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, S. 2198 and S. 421 to Reorganize the United States Intelligence Community (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1993), p. 18.

  44 . Ralph Vartabedian, “Air Force Spy Satellite Unit Leaving California,” Los Angeles Times (Washington ed.), October 16, 1992, pp. A1, A5; Ralph Vartabedian, “Air Force Spy Satellite Unit Leaving Southland,” Los Angeles Times, October 16, 1992, pp. A1, A12; Vincent Kiernan, “NRO Streamlines to Cut Intelligence Bureaucracy,” Space News, December 7–13, 1992, pp. 1, 29.

  45 . Ronald Kessler, Inside the CIA: Revealing the Secrets of the World’s Most Powerful Spy Agency (New York: Pocket Books, 1992), pp. 77–78; CIA document fragment, July 22, 1988.

  46 . Interview with a former CIA official.

  47 . Interview with Robert Phillips, Rosslyn, Virginia, June 4, 1999.

  48 . Hirsch interview.

  49 . Vernon Loeb, “After-Action Report,” Washington Post Magazine, February 27, 2000, pp. 7ff.

  50 . Ibid.

  51 . Ibid.

  52 . Ibid.

  53 . R. Jeffrey Smith, “Tracking Aideed Hampered by Intelligence Failures,” Washington Post, October 8, 1993, p. A19.

  54 . Loeb, “After-Action Report.”

  55 . Ibid.

  56 . Ibid.

  57 . Ibid.

  58 . CIA, “DCI Speech on New Frontiers in Breast Cancer Screening,” October 11, 1994.

  59 . Sam Grant and Peter C. Oleson, “Breast Cancer Detection Research,” Studies in Intelligence, Semiannual Unclassified Edition, No. 1, 1997, pp. 27–34 at pp. 27–28.

  60 . Grant and Oleson, “Breast Cancer Detection Research.”

  61 . Ibid.

  62 . Tom Bowman and Scott Shane, “Espionage from the Front Lines,” Baltimore Sun, December 8, 1995, pp. 1A, 20A–21A.

  63 . Ibid.; Howard
Kurtz, “Pollard: Top Israelis Backed Spy Ring,” Washington Post, February 28, 1987, p. A8.

  64 . Seymour Hersh, “The Wild East,” Atlantic Monthly, June 1994, pp. 61–86.

  65 . Bowman and Shane, “Espionage from the Front Lines.”

  66 . Ibid.

  67 . Ibid.

  68 . Ibid.

  69 . Ibid.; Seymour Hersh, “The Target Is Destroyed”: What Really Happened to Flight 007 and What America Knew About It (New York: Random House, 1986), p. 4.

  70 . Bowman and Shane, “Espionage from the Front Lines.”

  71 . Ibid.

  72 . Ibid.

  73 . Ibid. By mid-1994, individuals from the military services were being seconded to work for the SCS, after cover problems had been overcome. Four Air Intelligence Agency (AIA) candidates were selected to participate in the program, designated SENSOR SILVER. (Joyce M. Hons, Juan R. Jimenez, Gabriell G. Marshall, and Johnny D. Ford, History of the Air Intelligence Agency, 1 January–31 December 1994, Volume I [San Antonio, Tex.: AIA, December 1995], p. 39.)

  74 . R. Jeffrey Smith, “Pentagon Has Spent Millions on Tips from Trio of Psychics,” Washington Post, November 29, 1995, pp. A1, A18; “U.S. Agencies Used Psychics for Years for ‘Remote Viewing,’” Washington Times, November 30, 1995, p. A12; Steven Emerson, Secret Warriors: Inside the Covert Military Operations of the Reagan Era (New York: Putnam, 1988), pp. 65–66.

  75 . Smith, “Pentagon Has Spent Millions on Tips from Trio of Psychics”; R. Jeffrey Smith and Curt Suplee, “‘Psychic Arms Race’ Had Several Funding Channels,” Washington Post, November 30, 1995, pp. A1, A13; “U.S. Agencies Used Psychics for Years for ‘Remote Viewing.’”

  76 . Smith and Suplee, “‘Psychic Arms Race’ Had Several Funding Channels.”

  77 . Douglas Waller, “The Vision Thing,” Time, December 11, 1995, p. 48; Martin Gardner, “Claiborne Pell: The Senator from Outer Space,” Skeptical Inquirer, March/April 1996, pp. 12–15.

  78 . Hirsch interview; Office of Public Affairs, “CIA Statement on ‘Remote Viewing,’” September 6, 1995.

  79 . Information about AIR is accessible from its web site: www.air-dc.org.

  80 . Michael D. Mumford, Andrew M. Rose, and David M. Goslin, An Evaluation of Remote Viewing: Research and Applications (Washington, D.C.: American Institutes for Research, September 29, 1995), pp. 1–3 to 1–4.

  81 . Ibid., pp. 1–4 to 1–5.

  82 . Ibid., p. E-1; Ray Hyman, “Evaluation of the Military’s Twenty-Year Program on Psychic Spying,” Skeptical Inquirer, March/April 1996, pp. 24–26; Ray Hyman, “Parapsychological Research: A Tutorial Review and Critical Appraisal,” Proceedings of the IEEE 74, 6 (June 1986): 823–849; Smith, “Pentagon Has Spent Millions on Tips from Trio of Psychics”; Mumford, Rose, and Goslin, An Evaluation of Remote Viewing, p. E-2.

  83 . Mumford, Rose, and Goslin, An Evaluation of Remote Viewing, p. E-3.

  84 . Ibid., p. E-4.

  85 . Ibid. For a critique of the AIR report’s conclusions as well as claims of bias in its preparation, see Edwin C. May, “The American Institutes for Research Review of the Department of Defense’s STAR GATE Program: A Commentary,” Journal of Scientific Exploration 10, 1 (1996): 89–107.

  86 . Hirsch interview.

  Chapter 10: Agile Intelligence

  1 . Telephone interview with James Hirsch, April 11, 2000.

  2 . Ibid.; interview with Steven Koonin, Pasadena, California, March 22, 2000.

  3 . Vita, Steven E. Koonin, n.d.; Koonin interview.

  4 . Hirsch telephone interview.

  5 . Interview with Ruth David, Arlington, Virginia, February 22, 1999; CIA, Public Affairs, “Ruth A. David, Deputy Director of Science and Technology, Central Intelligence Agency,” n.d.

  6 . CIA, Public Affairs, “Ruth A. David, Deputy Director of Science and Technology, Central Intelligence Agency”; “Meet the CEO,” www.anser.org/aboutanser/meetceo.html; David interview.

  7 . CIA, Public Affairs, “Ruth A. David, Deputy Director for Science and Technology, Central Intelligence Agency.”

  8 . Ibid.; CIA Public Affairs, “DS&T Leadership History,” n.d.; interview with Robert Phillips, Rosslyn, Virginia, June 4, 1999.

  9 . David interview.

  10 . Ibid.; Ruth David, “Prologue,” to Frederick Thomas Martin, Top Secret Intranet: How U.S. Intelligence Built INTELINK-The World’s Largest, Most Secure Network (Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice-Hall PTR, 1998), p. xix.

  11 . David interview.

  12 . David, “Prologue,” to Martin, Top Secret Intranet, p. xx; Ruth David, speech to Armed Forces Communications Electronics Association, January 1998, p. 7.

  13 . David, speech to Armed Forces Communications Electronics Association, p. 8.

  14 . Ibid., pp. 14–15.

  15 . Ibid., pp. 10, 14.

  16 . CIA Office of Public Affairs, “Restructuring in the DS&T,” 1996.

  17 . “Computer Scientists,(AAT),” www.cia.gov/cia/employment/jobpostings/comsciad.htm.

  18 . Clarence A. Robinson, “Intelligence Agency Adjusts as Mission Possible Unfolds,” Signal, October 1998.

  19 . Ibid.

  20 . Ibid.

  21 . David interview; CIA Public Affairs, “Restructuring in the DS&T.”

  22 . Jeffrey T. Richelson, “CIA’s Science and Technology Gurus Get New Look, Roles,” Defense Week, August 19, 1996, p. 6.

  23 . CIA Public Affairs, “Restructuring in the DS&T”; private information.

  24 . Phillips interview.

  25 . Phillips interview; interview with Philip Eckman, Alexandria, Virginia, May 16, 2000; “Public Support Swells for CIA’s FBIS Program,” Secrecy and Government Bulletin, July 1996; “Costly Cuts?” Newsweek, November 25, 1996, p. 6. As of February 1995, FBIS had fourteen foreign bureaus located in Abidjan, Ivory Coast; Amman, Jordan; Asunción, Paraguay; Bangkok, Thailand; Chiva Chiva, Panama; Hong Kong; Islamabad, Pakistan; London, UK; Mbabane, Swaziland; Nicosia, Cyprus; Okinawa, Japan; Seoul, Republic of Korea; Tel Aviv, Israel; and Vienna, Austria. Domestically, in addition to its Reston, Virginia, headquarters, FBIS operated a bureau in Key West.

  26 . FBIS, “Overview for CNC Conference,” n.d.

  27 . Phillips interview.

  28 . Ibid.

  29 . “Public Support Swells for CIA’s FBIS Program.”

  30 . U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1998, Report 105-135, Part 1 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1997), pp. 23–24.

  31 . Stephen Barr, “Monitoring Service Spared in Latest Crisis,” Washington Post, February 6, 1997, p. A21. In 1997, FBIS did complete a transition, started in 1995, from the production of hard-copy reports—including the FBIS Daily Report and the Joint Publications Research Service translations—as a step toward purely electronic transmission. (FBIS, “Overview for CNC Conference, n.d., Slide 5.)

  32 . U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1998, p. 24.

  33 . Ibid.

  34 . Peter Maass, “From His Bed, CIA’s Best Makes His Breakthroughs,” Washington Post, April 21, 1996, pp. A1, A20; CIA, “‘Trailblazers’ and Years of CIA Service,” 1997.

  35 . Maass, “From His Bed, CIA’s Best Makes His Breakthroughs.”

  36 . Ibid.

  37 . Ibid.

  38 . Ibid.

  39 . Ibid.

  40 . Robert M. Gates, Director of Central Intelligence, Statement on Change in CIA and the Intelligence Community, April 1, 1992, p. 28.

  41 . H.R. 4165, “National Security Act of 1992,” 1992; S. 2198, “Intelligence Reorganization Act of 1992,” 1992.

  42 . Robert M. Gates, Director of Central Intelligence, Statement on Change in CIA and the Intelligence Community, April 1, 1992, p. 28; telephone conversation with R. Evans Hineman, February 24, 2000.

  43 . Central Imagery Office, Briefing Slides, 1992.
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  44 . Department of Defense Directive 5105.26, “Central Imagery Office,” May 6, 1992; Central Imagery Office, Briefing Slides, pp. 2–3; Director of Central Intelligence Directive 2/9, “Management of National Imagery Intelligence,” June 1, 1992.

  45 . Central Imagery Office, Briefing Slides, p. 2.

  46 . Statement of John Deutch before Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, April 26, 1995, pp. 8–9.

  47 . “DCI Plans a National Imagery Agency,” Communiqué, August 1995, pp. 1, 8; DCI, “Terms of Reference for National Imagery Agency,” circa May 1995.

  48 . Central Intelligence Agency, “National Imagery and Mapping Agency Proposed to Congress,” November 28, 1995.

  49 . Ibid.

  50 . Interview with John N. McMahon, Los Altos, California, November 17, 1998.

  51 . Interview with James V. Hirsch, Fairfax, Virginia, February 12, 1999; CIA, Office of Public Affairs, “Unclassified Imagery Analysis Presentation,” n.d.

  52 . Hirsch interview.

  53 . Ibid. Until 1994, OIA and NPIC were two distinct organizations. In 1994, NPIC assumed responsibility for staffing and managing OIA. At the same time, a number of OIA managers moved into positions at NPIC. The change, according to Patrick Eddington, was not one that he or others at NPIC felt was beneficial. He noted that NPIC, in the Navy Yard, lived a separate life from the CIA and that there were different cultures. In his view, NPIC was more independent and felt no obligation to support the intelligence directorate’s conclusions, had a more exacting standard in its analysis of imagery, offered more extensive training to its analysts, and had a broader customer base—which included State, Defense, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and Commerce. Whereas OIA never maintained an extensive database, the NPIC’s National Data System was available to the entire intelligence community. The reorganization, according to Eddington, threw NPIC into “a state of turmoil” and made it “a less exciting and rewarding place to work.” (Interview with Patrick Eddington, Centreville, Virginia, April 12, 1999. Also see Patrick Edding-ton, Gassed in the Gulf: The Inside Story of the Pentagon-CIA Cover-Up of Gulf War Syndrome ([Washington, D.C.: Insignia, 1997], p. 25.)

  54 . Interview with R. Evans Hineman, Chantilly, Virginia, February 17, 1999.