U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office

Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800

Fax: (202) 512–2250 Mail: Stop SSOP, Washington, DC 20402–0001

78–230 PDF 2002

IS THE CIA’S REFUSAL TO COOPERATE WITH

CONGRESSIONAL INQUIRIES A THREAT TO EFFECTIVE OVERSIGHT OF THE OPERATIONS OF

THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT?

JOINT HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT EFFICIENCY,

FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT AND

INTERGOVERNMENTAL RELATIONS

AND THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY,

VETERANS AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

JULY 18, 2001

Serial No. 107–59

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman

BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York

CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

STEPHEN HORN, California

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

BOB BARR, Georgia

DAN MILLER, Florida

DOUG OSE, California

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

DAVE WELDON, Florida

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, Idaho

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

JOHN J. DUNCAN, Tennessee

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,

DC

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

JIM TURNER, Texas

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

——— ———

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

KEVIN BINGER, Staff Director

DANIEL R. MOLL, Deputy Staff Director

JAMES C. WILSON, Chief Counsel

ROBERT A. BRIGGS, Chief Clerk

PHIL SCHILIRO, Minority Staff Director

SUBCOMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT EFFICIENCY, FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT AND

INTERGOVERNMENTAL RELATIONS

STEPHEN HORN, California, Chairman

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

DAN MILLER, Florida

DOUG OSE, California

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

EX OFFICIO

DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

J. RUSSELL GEORGE, Staff Director and Chief Counsel

DARIN CHIDSEY, Professional Staff Member

SCOTT FAGAN, Clerk

DAVID RAPALLO, Minority Professional Staff Member

(III)

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, VETERANS AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut, Chairman

ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida

BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

RON LEWIS, Kentucky

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

DAVE WELDON, Florida

C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, Idaho

EDWARD L. SCHROCK, Virginia

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine

TOM LANTOS, California

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

——— ———

——— ———

EX OFFICIO

DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

LAWRENCE J. HALLORAN, Staff Director and Counsel

NICHOLAS PALARINO, Professional Staff Member

JASON CHUNG, Clerk

DAVID MCMILLEN, Minority Professional Staff Member

(V)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on July 18, 2001 ............................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Eland, Ivan, director of Defense Policy Studies, Cato Institute ................... 45

Hamilton, Lee H., director, Woodrow Wilson International Center for

Scholars; director, Center on Congress at Indiana University, and

former Member of Congress from the State of Indiana ............................. 24

Hinton, Henry L., Jr., Managing Director, Defense Capabilities and Management, General Accounting Office ........................................................... 31

Smith, Colonel Daniel M., USA (Ret.), chief of research, Center for Defense Information .......................................................................................... 61

Woolsey, R. James, partner, Shea & Gardner, and former Director, Central Intelligence Agency ................................................................................ 27

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Eland, Ivan, director of Defense Policy Studies, Cato Institute, prepared

statement of ................................................................................................... 48

Hinton, Henry L., Jr., Managing Director, Defense Capabilities and Management, General Accounting Office, prepared statement of .................... 33

Horn, Hon. Stephen, a Representative in Congress from the State of

California:

Letter dated July 7, 1994 ......................................................................... 11

Letter dated July 17, 2001 ....................................................................... 21

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 4

Shays, Hon. Christopher, a Representative in Congress from the State

of Connecticut, prepared statement of ........................................................ 8

Smith, Colonel Daniel M., USA (Ret.), chief of research, Center for Defense Information, prepared statement of ................................................... 63

(1)

IS THE CIA’S REFUSAL TO COOPERATE WITH

CONGRESSIONAL INQUIRIES A THREAT TO

EFFECTIVE OVERSIGHT OF THE OPERATIONS OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT?

WEDNESDAY, JULY 18, 2001

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT EFFICIENCY, FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT AND

INTERGOVERNMENTAL RELATIONS, JOINT WITH THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, VETERANS AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The subcommittees met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Stephen Horn and Hon.

Christopher Shays (chairmen of the subcommittees) presiding.

Present for the Subcommittee on Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental Relations: Representatives Horn and Schakowsky.

Present for the Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs and International Relations: Representatives Gilman, Shays,

Otter, Kucinich, Tierney, and Clay.

Staff present for the Subcommittee on Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental Relations: J. Russell

George, staff director and chief counsel; Henry Wray, senior counsel; Bonnie Heald, director of communications; Darin Chidsey, professional staff member; Scott Fagan, assistant to the committee;

Fred Ephraim, Davidson Hulfish, Fariha Khaliz, and Christopher

Armato, interns.

Staff present for the Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs and International Relations: R. Nicholas Palarino, senior policy analyst; and Jason Chung, clerk.

Staff present for the minority: Michelle Ash and David Rapallo,

counsels; David McMillen, professional staff member; and Jean

Gosa and Earley Green, assistant clerks.

Mr. HORN. This subcommittee hearing will come to order.

James Madison once wrote, ‘‘A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it is but a prologue to

a farce or a tragedy or perhaps both.’’ President Madison was correct in his belief that the Government’s ability to gather and provide reliable information to its people is vital to the health and

well-being of our Nation.

Today’s hearing should not be necessary. However, it is taking

place because the Central Intelligence Agency has refused to comVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:01 May 01, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\78230.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
2

ply with the oversight efforts of the Committee on Government Reform and its several subcommittees. In so doing, the agency is assaulting Congress’ constitutional responsibility to oversee executive

branch activities. The CIA apparently believes that it is above that

basic principle in our Constitution. We don’t agree.

This hearing stems from a recent and contemptuous act by the

Central Intelligence Agency during the Subcommittee on Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental Relations’ examination of security plans and policies to protect the

Government’s classified computer systems. As part of that oversight effort, the subcommittee requested the General Accounting

Office to conduct a survey of computer security policies at all executive branch departments and agencies that maintain classified

systems.

Every Federal agency except the Central Intelligence Agency responded to the survey. Those responding included the National Security Agency and the National Reconnaissance Office.

Initially, the CIA expressed concern about providing sensitive information in a public forum. In an attempt to accommodate that

concern, the subcommittee agreed to allow the agency to present

that information in a classified executive session. The CIA agreed

and provided the subcommittee with the name of an individual who

would be able to testify at the classified session. Then, only days

before the session was to take place, the CIA informed the subcommittee that it would not participate regardless of the closed nature of the meeting.

In addition, members of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Legislative Affairs Office called representatives of the National Security

Agency and other witnesses who had agreed to participate, suggesting that they were under no obligation to testify before this subcommittee.

The CIA points to a recent change in the House rules as the

basis for not cooperating with congressional inquiries other than

those received from the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. The rule adopted by the 107th Congress provides that the

Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence shall review and

study on a continuing basis the laws, programs and activities of the

intelligence community. In addition, the rule provides that the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence shall review and study,

on an exclusive basis, the sources and methods of entities involved

in intelligence gathering, including the CIA, its Director, and the

national foreign intelligence program.

The rule is clear in stating that congressional oversight of the

CIA’s, ‘‘sources and methods,’’ falls exclusively to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. However, the rule also provides that congressional oversight in the areas other than, ‘‘sources

and methods,’’ is not to be limited to the Intelligence Committee.

The Subcommittee on Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental Relations, which I chair, is charged

with overseeing the efficiency and financial management of Federal

agencies. It is also charged with the responsibility of overseeing

governmentwide computer security efforts. We’re not interested in

pursuing issues that involve the CIA’s sources or methods of operVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:01 May 01, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\78230.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
3

ation. We do not want to jeopardize the security of this Nation or

the safety of its intelligence agents and operatives.

To the contrary, our examination of computer security issues is

part of the subcommittee’s attempt to ensure that this and other

information is being adequately protected. Surely, the CIA should

not be exempted from such a governmentwide effort.

Today, we want to examine how the agency’s lack of cooperation

affects Congress’ ability to oversee the activities of the executive

branch departments and agencies. In addition, we want to examine

whether the Central Intelligence Agency is thwarting the Government’s separation of powers between legislative and executive

branches by its attempted interpretation of a rule of the House of

Representatives. Finally, we want to examine the Central Intelligence Agency’s arrogant attempt here to undermine congressional

oversight activities involving other agencies within the intelligence

community.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Stephen Horn follows:]

4

5

6

Mr. HORN. We now will swear in the witnesses, and we have Mr.

Shays and we have Mr. Gilman—Mr. Gilman for an opening statement.

Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Chairman Horn. I appreciate the opportunity to appear today, and I want to thank the committee for conducting this important review. I’m disappointed for the need to

hold these kinds of hearings. The CIA and other elements of our

Government’s intelligence community hold a very important place

in our overall defense planning needs and security needs. By their

very nature elements of the intelligence community occupy places

of unusual trust on behalf of our entire Nation. They have a special

responsibility both to properly safeguard the information that they

handle and to provide sufficient and appropriate information for

oversight to the Congress.

While I acknowledge that this is a difficult balancing act, it is

important that we protect the freedom and the openness of our Nation, symbolically and literally the leader of the Free World. That

kind of responsibility requires accountability, largely achieved

through the checks and balances of our three distinct and sometimes competing branches of government.

We look forward to hearing the testimony of our witnesses who

are here today. As needed, I want to work for an effective system

of oversight that both fully supports the principle of free and open

society and yet simultaneously fully protects the elements of information from disclosure that would damage our Nation’s safety and

security.

And I want particularly to welcome the former chairman of our

International Relations Committee, Congressman Lee Hamilton,

now Director of the Woodrow Wilson Center, and James Woolsey,

the former Director of the CIA, as well as our other distinguished

witnesses who are here today.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HORN. Well, we thank you.

And now I’ll turn to our cochairman for this hearing, Mr. Shays,

the gentleman from Connecticut, who is the chairman of the Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs and International

Relations of the Government Reform Committee.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Chairman Horn.

Like you, the members of the National Security, Veterans Affairs

and International Relations Subcommittee would much rather conduct a hearing about constructive oversight findings than about obstructions to our oversight process. But when faced with persistent,

institutionalized agency resistance to legitimate inquiries, we’re

compelled to reassert our authority, under the Rules of the House,

to review the operation of government activities at all levels.

In 1994, the Central Intelligence Agency [CIA], adopted a self-described ‘‘hard-line’’ approach to congressional oversight inquiries,

particularly General Accounting Office [GAO], reviews not initiated

by the Select Intelligence Committees. The policy attempted to

draw a bright-line between sharing intelligence products with congressional committees and submitting to any oversight which the

agency believes will compromise the sources and methods of intelligence gathering.

7

Based on that dated, distorted concept of oversight, CIA refuses

to discuss its approaches to governmentwide management reforms

and fiscal accountability practices. Other intelligence agencies

share information freely. Blinded by its own bright-line, the CIA

often stands alone in refusing routine congressional requests for

data, even going so far as attempting to persuade other agencies

to resist as well.

The CIA position that congressional oversight jurisdiction is limited to the Select Intelligence Committees is not supported by the

law, is not supported by House Rules and is not supported by

sound public policy. National security will be enhanced, not undermined, by the full exercise of congressional oversight authority.

We have no interest in examining the sources and methods of intelligence gathering and analysis. But we do have a keen interest

in how effectively and efficiently the CIA and other intelligence

agencies manage human capital, manage fiscal resources and meet

statutory program objectives. The bottom line: The source of all

CIA funding is the American taxpayer and the methods of management efficiency and accountability must be within the purview of

this and other committees of Congress.

Symptomatic of the CIA’s misguided perception of its responsibilities to Congress, the agency would not even cooperate this morning by providing a witness to discuss why they won’t cooperate. I

find that outrageous.

But we do welcome a panel of most distinguished witnesses to

discuss the indispensability of broad-based and far-reaching oversight of the intelligence community. Every one of our witnesses is

very qualified to speak on this subject, and I, as the chairman of

the National Security, Veterans Affairs and International Relations

Subcommittee, am grateful to each and every one of you for being

here and regret deeply the lack of cooperation of the CIA in even

responding to basic questions about cooperation.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Christopher Shays follows:]

8

9

10

Mr. HORN. I thank the gentleman. And I put in, following his remarks, two documents from the Central Intelligence Agency. The

first is dated July 7, 1994, a memorandum for the Director of Central Intelligence. It’s from Stanley M. Moskowitz, the Director of

Congressional Affairs, and the subject is the Director of Central Intelligence Affirmation of Policy for Dealing With the General Accounting Office.

Now, as we know, they are the arm of Congress for investigations, programmatic auditing; and they act for Congress, they act

for these committees and other subcommittees.

[The information referred to follows:]

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

Mr. HORN. The next document is from George A. Tenet, Director

of Central Intelligence, to Stephen Horn, chairman, Subcommittee

on Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental Relations, and that’s dated July 17, 2001.

[The letter referred to follows:]

21

22

23

24

Mr. HORN. We will now swear in the witnesses, and I share Mr.

Shays’ and Mr. Gilman’s feeling that we have an excellent panel

here today, and we’re thankful that you know a lot of the history

of the CIA and both of you have shown great expertise in serving

our Nation and also to working with Congress. So if you will stand

and raise your right hands, and the staff behind for GAO.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. HORN. The clerk will note that all have affirmed, or said yes;

and now we will start with—first one, a friend certainly of everybody in the Congress and that’s the Honorable Lee Hamilton, who

was for very many years chairman of the International Relations

Committee, is now Director of the Woodrow Wilson Center, and

was former chairman, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

Mr. Hamilton.

STATEMENT OF LEE H. HAMILTON, DIRECTOR, WOODROW

WILSON INTERNATIONAL CENTER FOR SCHOLARS; DIRECTOR, CENTER ON CONGRESS AT INDIANA UNIVERSITY, AND

FORMER MEMBER OF CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF INDIANA

Mr. HAMILTON. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Shays, Mr.

Gilman. It’s a pleasure to be with you.

I always thought it was a little easier to sit up there and ask the

questions than it is to sit down here and answer them, and I’m

quite confident of that this morning, but I’m very pleased to be

with you. Let me make a few opening comments about the way I

approach the question that the chairman has raised, and Mr. Gilman and Mr. Shays.

First of all, I think we all agree that good intelligence is essential

for the security of the country. U.S. policy has to be based on the

most accurate information available, and on correct prediction insofar as that is possible. Good intelligence does not guarantee good

policy, but bad or poor intelligence almost certainly guarantees bad

policy.

A Nation without intelligence is like a person without eyes and

ears. Good intelligence is essential.

Second, the tasks that we assign to the intelligence community

today are simply overwhelming—enormous, varied, expanding. The

old proverb says that only a fool would make a prediction, especially about the future. But the problem, of course, is that we ask

the CIA to make not just one, but hundreds of predictions, every

week; and we want them to be as accurate as possible. And the

toughest thing in the world to predict is intentions, and we ask the

CIA to predict that all of the time.

I believe that our intelligence capabilities are very good—always

room for improvement. I believe that the people who work at our

intelligence agencies are highly talented and dedicated people. Jim

Woolsey was an outstanding Director of the CIA, but he represents

many hundreds, thousands of others who do marvelous work for

the country.

I support the greater openness on the part of the intelligence

community. I think the intelligence community should be forthcomVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:01 May 01, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00030 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\78230.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
25

ing in making available information on its work and the role that

it plays in shaping U.S. policy.

Let me just say a word about the importance of oversight by the

Congress of the intelligence community. My view, I gather your

view, is that the intelligence community needs very strong, very

vigorous, independent oversight; and the Congress is the only body

that can really give independent oversight of the executive branch

under our current laws, structures and practices.

The intelligence community is enormously large. It’s very complicated and it is hugely expensive. In this town, information is

power and the intelligence community has tremendous power to influence policy.

Intelligence is an area of great temptation for a President. Presidents can be tempted, I should say, to manipulate intelligence to

influence the policy debate. I think oftentimes the executive sees

intelligence as a tool to make policy look good, rather than a tool

for making good policy. Presidents often resort to the intelligence

information they have, to the CIA, for covert actions when they’re

frustrated by obstacles to their policies. So Congress, in a sense,

stands between the President and the misuse of intelligence by the

intelligence community and by the executive branch.

The congressional role in oversight—I’ll get down to that more

specifically—is limited, but extremely important for some of the

reasons I have suggested. Unlike other Federal issues, Federal

agencies, the intelligence community does not receive the kind of

close scrutiny independent of the President that almost every other

policy does.

There’s very little media coverage of the intelligence community.

There are very few academic studies of the intelligence community.

There are no, or at least not a large number of lobbying groups for

the intelligence community. Most of the meetings they have occur

in secret, without public input and isolated from most Members of

Congress.

There is an Inspector General of the CIA. There is a Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. Those are appointed by the President,

not independent of the President.

And intelligence is a very arcane business.

So I think oversight is very important. If the Congress fails to

identify the problems in intelligence, they may go unspotted. And

while they have been a very good agency in many respects, the CIA

over a period of years has also been a very troubled agency.

At one point, not long ago I think, they had five Directors in 7

years. You can’t possibly manage that shop over there with five Directors in 7 years. It’s just too big and too complicated.

The intelligence community has not, I can assure you, come easily to the idea of congressional oversight, but I believe they have

come to that; and that’s an important fact.

Now, as I understand the law today—and it’s quite extraordinary

really that you have this massive intelligence community and yet

you do not have any fundamental charter or law. We’ve tried to

draft a charter for the intelligence community several times and

never succeeded, but there are a number of pieces of legislation.

There are a lot of rules and practices that have been put into place

26

over the period of the last few decades that set the framework, if

you would, for oversight of the intelligence community.

The law provides that the executive keep the House and Senate

intelligence community committees fully and currently informed of

intelligence activities, and that judgment, as to whether it’s fully

informed or currently informed, is a judgment the Congress has to

make, not the intelligence community. The law provides that illegal

and failed activity be reported in a timely way and, of course, it

has a special provision with regard to covert actions.

It’s an extremely difficult problem of oversight because the intelligence committees are given legislative, investigative, and authorization authority over the intelligence community. They have exclusive jurisdiction of the CIA, but they share jurisdiction with other

agencies, for example, the Department of Defense and NSA, DIA,

State, Energy. So it’s a very complex pattern that you have over

oversight of the intelligence community.

There are a lot of benefits from oversight. I don’t think I need

to go into that, because I know very well the chairman’s position

on that. The Congress conducts that oversight, of course, through

the budget process. I think the great task is to strike a balance between the need to ensure accountability and the intelligence community’s need to gather and protect information.

It’s the balance between oversight and secrecy. It is not an easy

task. You will never get it right completely, but you have to keep

working at it. And sometimes the Congress is a partner of the intelligence community, sometimes it’s a critic, sometimes it’s an advocate for the intelligence community, sometimes it’s a watchdog;

and those roles are very hard to keep in balance.

My view—and I’ll conclude with this, Mr. Chairman—is that the

Congress has to get information it needs from the intelligence community. Congress should be the judge of that. We have in place

today a structure that has been developed over a period of decades

really, where the information from the CIA is provided to the intelligence committees. Then the intelligence committees must decide

how that information is made available to other Members of the

Congress.

This system doesn’t work perfectly, but my judgment is, it works

reasonably well. And I do feel it is possible there may be a better

way to do it, but we ought not to go to another way in an ad hoc

manner by this subcommittee or that subcommittee or this committee or that committee demanding information from the CIA.

If you really want to change the way you do oversight of the intelligence community, then it has to be approached, it seems to me,

in a very coherent, comprehensive way to change the structure that

was put in place over the past few decades—a structure of law, a

structure of precedent, a structure of practice.

And the question of sharing intelligence information outside of

the intelligence committees to other members is always a very sensitive question in this institution and one that has created tensions

as long as I can recall.

So the bottom line is that I think the system that we have certainly calls out for improvement. It’s working reasonably well, but

be careful not to throw it out unless you have something to put in

27

its place that has been carefully, comprehensively, coherently

thought about.

Mr. HORN. Thank you very much. We appreciate the wisdom you

had during the Congress and after Congress.

We now have the Honorable James Woolsey, who was a former

Director of the CIA from 1993 to 1996 and was, again, highly respected here in both parties for his openness and his willingness

to relate to people. Thank you very much.

STATEMENT OF R. JAMES WOOLSEY, PARTNER, SHEA & GARDNER, AND FORMER DIRECTOR, CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE

AGENCY

Mr. WOOLSEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for inviting me today.

I was Director of Central Intelligence for 2 years early in the

Clinton administration. I also, however, in an earlier incarnation,

was General Counsel of the Senate Armed Services Committee for

3 years. So I have seen this issue from both Capitol Hill and the

executive branch; and the views, obviously, that I express today are

only those of a private citizen and lawyer who got out the rule book

and looked at it and tried to decide what he thought. And I thank

you for inviting me.

This current issue apparently arose from the question of how this

committee could investigate and assess and conduct oversight in

connection with the cyberthreat to our government computers; and

I would say, first of all, that I can think of no overall issue that

is more substantively important to the Government right now than

this. It is something that is of absolutely vital importance.

It’s an area that I’ve been working on for some time as a private

lawyer. I think such issues as whether fire walls, for example, can

effectively protect computers is of extraordinary importance. I don’t

believe they’re very effective, and I think that this committee’s assessment of the best ways for government computers and government networks to be protected would be extremely important.

This procedural question of exactly how and under what circumstances what information should be provided to committees of

the Congress other than the House and Senate Select Committees—the Permanent Select Committee and the Select Committee

and the two Appropriations Committees is also an important and

rather difficult one.

First of all, let me say, when I was Director of Central Intelligence, I certainly did not neglect the Congress; and I don’t know

any Director, really, who can or should. Congress was in session

185 days in calendar 1993, my first year as Director, and I had 195

appointments on the Hill that year, 10 more than the days Congress was in session, so on average, I was up here more than once

a day. At one point, for example, I sat beside one of my analysts

for 29 hours, before a number of different committees, because his

judgment about Haiti had been called into question; and we answered questions from a large number of individual Congressmen,

mainly Senators, on precisely what type of judgments we had made

about President Aristide and why.

Any Director of Central Intelligence should spend a good deal of

time on the Hill, and he owes not just his two oversight committees

28

and two appropriations committees, but the Congress as a whole,

I think, what information he can provide and what help he can provide from the intelligence community.

Now, it’s my understanding that a few weeks ago Larry

Gershwin, an extraordinarily able national intelligence officer, testified on cyberthreat trends and U.S. network security before, I believe it was, the Joint Economic Committee. Now, this is, of course,

the principal way in which the CIA provides information to the

Congress; it provides intelligence product. And it is an issue, it

seems to me, what the words of the House rules mean with respect

to what other information is provided to congressional committees.

Rule 10, and in it clause 11, does say, as the chairman noted at

the beginning, that nothing in this clause, clause 11, restricts other

committees such as this one from reviewing intelligence activities

or intelligence products. But I think one has to note that this right

is circumscribed, at least as I read the rules, by a provision in

clause 3, not clause 11, which limits exclusively to the House Permanent Select Committee the right to oversee sources and methods.

The way I read those two clauses is that the exclusive right to

oversee sources and methods essentially trumps the right of other

committees to review intelligence activities or products. So, in my

mind, this whole issue comes down to the question of what is a

‘‘method of the CIA’’ in clause 3, it is a method of the entity, the

CIA, that is at issue.

Now, some of my colleagues this morning have read this limitation, this word ‘‘method’’ in a quite limited way. Mr. Eland, in his

prepared testimony, on pages 8 and 9, says that the CIA’s method

of protecting its own computers should be regarded no differently

by the Congress than its assessment of the foreign threat. And

Colonel Smith limits methods to collection methods, that is, whether one is taking photographs or reading lips, for example.

I don’t read ‘‘methods of the CIA’’ that narrowly. I must say, it

seems to me that the method by which the CIA protects its computers from intrusion is a method of the CIA.

Now, I fully agree it is up to the House to decide how to interpret

its own rules, but I understand the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence has a different view than this committee

with respect to the breadth, or lack thereof, of the meaning of the

word ‘‘method.’’

Now, let me say why I believe briefing on the foreign threat, as

Mr. Gershwin did before the Joint Economic Committee, rather

than reviewing the CIA’s method of maintaining its own computer

security, is an understandable way for the Congress to operate. If

one takes the members of the House Permanent Select Committee

and the Senate Select Committee and of the two Appropriations

Subcommittees for Defense, which cover intelligence, one has 72

Members of the Congress and 80 staff members, that’s 152 people

on the Hill who today are charged with intelligence oversight.

Those 72 Members constitute 13 percent of the entire membership

of the Congress.

If one adds this committee’s and its parallel committee in the

other body, Senate Governmental Affairs members and staff, one

adds 58 Members and 193 staff members to the total that would

29

be engaged in overseeing the CIA. That’s now a total of 403 people

on Capitol Hill, and would constitute 24 percent of the Members

of the House and Senate.

There are at least two other committees that have an understandable interest in overseeing some aspect of what the CIA does,

House International Relations and Senate Foreign Relations and

House and Senate Armed Services. If one adds the 149 members

of those committees and the 219 staff members, one gets an added

368 individuals who would be involved in overseeing the CIA.

That would be a total of some 760–770 individuals on Capitol

Hill, and if you deduct the Members who are on more than one of

those committees, the way my numbers came out is that you would

end up with 49.5 percent of the Members of Congress, one-half of

the Members of Congress involved in overseeing the CIA if the

Government Reform, Government Affairs, International Relations,

Armed Services, as well as the Intelligence Committees and Appropriations Committees were involved.

Now, there may be some way, there may be some structure

whereby a change in the process could be worked out and whereby,

as former Chairman Hamilton said, a reform, a systematic reform

of the whole process should be undertaken. I don’t write off that

possibility, but I must say that if one goes at this piecemeal and

looks to just each individual committee or subcommittee in Government Reform, Government Affairs, International Relations, Foreign

Relations, Armed Services that may have some understandable interest, and if one interprets the word ‘‘method’’ quite narrowly, so

that pretty much anything that the CIA does other than a collection source or a collection method is subject to oversight from the

other committees of the Congress, you are on a track to having half

of the Members of the Congress and some 760 people on Capitol

Hill engaged in CIA oversight.

I do not think that would be wise.

So I would identify myself with Chairman Hamilton’s closing

words, that I believe the current system works reasonably well and

that it should only be reformed if it is reformed in some systematic

and thorough and overall way, rather than piecemeal.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Members.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you Mr. Woolsey.

Mr. Hinton, I think what we’ll do is wait for Mr. Horn to come

back. He left early so we could continue the flow, but I think what

we’ll do is, we’ll go and vote.

So we’ll recess for a second, but as soon as he gets back he’ll

start with you. Thank you. So we stand in recess.

[Recess.]

Mr. HORN. The recess is over. If you don’t mind Mr. Woolsey, I

heard you put a few details in the record here and I may be, I’d

just like it for my benefit to get a repeat on that.

Mr. WOOLSEY. Surely. Do you mean now?

Mr. HORN. Sure.

Mr. WOOLSEY. I said several things but let me focus on two. One

was that although this is a difficult and complicated issue, and I

fully understand the substantive reasons behind the committee’s

interest in this very important area, I think we come down to a

reading of the House rules.

30

And as I read them, and as I said, this is nothing more than a

private citizen’s reading. The authority for other committees to review intelligence activities and products are the words in clause 11

of rule 10; and nothing in this clause, i.e., clause 11, as the rule

states, restricts nonintelligence committees from reviewing intelligence activities and products.

But the exclusive basis for the House Permanent Select Committee’s jurisdiction over reviewing sources and methods of the CIA occurs in clause 3, not clause 11, and the way I read that interaction

is that their exclusive basis with respect to sources and methods

essentially trumps the provisions in clause 11.

So the question comes, what is a ‘‘method?’’ If an intelligence

method is relatively limited, if it is as limited as Colonel Smith

says in his testimony that he limits it essentially to collection

methods, that is, whether you are learning something through photographs or through lip reading; and Mr. Eland says on pages 8

and 9 of his testimony that there should be no difference between

the CIA’s way or method of protecting its own computers, then the

threat—that is, both of those—should be fully reviewable by other

committees.

I must say, I read the word ‘‘method’’ more broadly. I believe that

it is entirely plausible to contend that a ‘‘method of the CIA’’ includes its method of protecting its data; and under that reading,

the way I would read it is that the House Permanent Select Committee’s jurisdiction is exclusive with respect to the agency’s methods.

Now, I agreed with Chairman Hamilton with respect to any reform needing to be—of the process or the oversight process needing

to be an overall, systematic reform rather than something that is

done piecemeal; and my illustration on that was the following: If

one takes the House Permanent Select Committee and the House

Appropriations Subcommittee that deals with intelligence together

with the sister committees in the other body, you have 72 Members

and 80 staff members who are involved in intelligence oversight,

now 152 people, and those 72 Members are 13 percent of the membership of the Congress.

If one adds the members and the staff of the House Government

Reform Committee and Senate Governmental Affairs, you get up to

403 people and 24 percent of the Members of the Congress; and if

one adds in the members and staff of House International Relations and Senate Foreign Relations and House and Senate Armed

Services, which I think have a plausible claim to being interested

in perhaps some oversight responsibility for the intelligence community, under a broad reading you get up to right at 50 percent

of the Members of the Congress and about 760 individuals, not

counting the GAO if it gets into the business, who are involved in

overseeing the CIA.

And I think those numbers suggest that one should move toward

an oversight role for other committees only as part of some overall

evaluation rather than a piecemeal step, because, I for one, don’t

see a way to draw a line between this subcommittee’s responsibilities and other committees of Government Reform or Senate Governmental Affairs, or for that matter, many of the interests of

31

House International Relations, Senate Foreign Relations and the

Armed Services Committees.

So, anyway, those were the main points, I think, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HORN. Well, thank you very much.

We’ll now proceed with the third witness, Mr. Hinton. Henry

Hinton is the Managing Director of Defense Capabilities and Management of the General Accounting Office. The General Accounting

Office works for the Congress of the United States and is a creature of the Congress, and we give a lot of assignments to them on

many aspects in the executive branch.

And we welcome you here today.

STATEMENT OF HENRY L. HINTON, JR., MANAGING DIRECTOR,

DEFENSE CAPABILITIES AND MANAGEMENT, GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE

Mr. HINTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m pleased to be here

to discuss the subject of GAO access to information at the CIA. I

will focus my comments this morning on our authority to review

CIA programs and the status of our access to CIA information.

On the subject of authority, as with all Federal programs, Congress has given us broad authority to evaluate CIA programs. In

reality, however, we face both legal and practical limitations on our

ability to review these programs. For example, we have no access

to certain CIA unvouchered accounts, that is, expenditures of a

confidential or emergency nature that are accounted for solely on

the certification of the Director.

We cannot compel our access to foreign intel and counterintelligence information. In addition, as a practical matter, we are limited by the CIA’s level of cooperation, which has varied throughout

the years. We have not actively audited the CIA since the early

1960’s, when we discontinued such work because the CIA was not

providing us with sufficient access to information to perform our

mission. The issue has arisen since then, from time to time, as our

work has required some level of access to CIA programs and information.

Most recently, in 1994, the CIA Director sought to further limit

our audit work of intelligence programs, including those at DOD.

In doing so, the CIA has maintained that the Congress intended

the Select Intelligence Committees to be the exclusive means of

oversight of the CIA. This action by the CIA Director has effectively precluded oversight by us. Given a lack of requests from the

Congress for us to do work in this area and with our limited resources, we have made a conscious decision not to pursue this

issue.

On the subject of the status of our current access, today, our

dealings with the CIA are mostly limited to requesting information

that relates to governmentwide reviews or analyses of threats to

the U.S. national security on which the CIA might have some information. The CIA either provides us with the requested information,

provides the information with some restrictions or does not provide

the information at all.

In general, we are most successful at getting access to CIA information when we request threat assessments, and the CIA does not

perceive our audits or evaluations as oversight of its activities. For

32

example, in our review of chemical and biological terrorist threats

that we did for Chairman Shays, we requested, and the CIA provided us, access into formation on their threat assessments and access to the analysts that prepared them.

On the other hand, for our review of classified computer systems

in the Federal Government, we requested basic information on the

number and nature of such systems. In this case, and as you referred to in your opening statement, Mr. Chairman, the CIA did

not provide us the requested information, claiming that they would

not be able to participate in the review because the type of information is under the purview of the congressional entities charged

with overseeing the intelligence community.

My written statement has other examples in it.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, our access to CIA information and

programs has been limited by both legal and practical factors.

Today, our access is generally limited to obtaining information on

threat assessments when the CIA does not perceive our audits as

oversight of its activities. We foresee no major change in our current access without substantial support from Congress.

Congressional impetus for change would have to include the support of the Intelligence Committees, who have generally not requested GAO reviews or evaluations of CIA activities. With such

support, we could evaluate some of the basic management functions at CIA that we now evaluate throughout the Government.

That concludes my statement Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HORN. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hinton follows:]

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

Mr. HORN. Our next witness is Ivan Eland, director of defense

policy studies at the Cato Institute.

STATEMENT OF IVAN ELAND, DIRECTOR OF DEFENSE POLICY

STUDIES, CATO INSTITUTE

Mr. ELAND. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and other members of the

committee. It’s a pleasure to appear before the committee to give

my remarks on this vital topic.

As important as safeguarding sensitive intelligence information

is to the CIA, the intelligence community and the executive branch,

more paramount concerns exist in a constitutional republic. Reacting to European monarchs who ran foreign and military policy,

often disastrously and with few constraints imposed by their subjects, the founders of the American Nation enshrined in the U.S.

Constitution a vital role for Congress, the arm of the people in foreign and national security policy.

James Madison noted that experience showed that checks and

balances within the Government were needed to guard against the

Founders’ greatest fear, the risky accumulation of power in one

branch of government. In short, Madison wrote, ‘‘Ambition must be

made to counteract ambition.’’ The checks and balances written into the Constitution, which go

to the heart of a constitutional republican form of government, ensure that no branch of government can dominate U.S. foreign and

defense policy. Thus, Congress has vital oversight responsibilities

for executive branch agencies involved in foreign affairs and national security, including CIA and the intelligence community.

Even in a constitutional republic, however, some secrecy in foreign affairs and defense is needed, obviously; but when secrecy and

accountability clash, which the presumption should be with accountability, accountability should be especially preferred in the

lower external threat environment of a postcold war world.

Unlike most other government entities, the intelligence agencies

get only limited scrutiny from the media, the public, conflicting interest groups and the courts. Also, U.S. Government secrets are not

the exclusive property of the executive branch. Congressional committees are entitled to, and also have a duty to examine them to

ensure that the secretive intelligence community is acting in the

interests of the people it is supposed to be defending. Of course, we

have well-known instances where the intelligence agency did not

act in this fashion. For those reasons, congressional oversight by

more than just the small and too easily co-opted, in my opinion, intelligence committees is especially vital.

However, in most cases accountability does not run afoul of secrecy. In fact, in this case, the Government Reform Committee is

trying to ensure that the CIA’s computer systems adequately secure the sensitive information. In fact, in recent decades, the trend

has been to expand the circle of those responsible for overseeing intelligence activities. The expansion of oversight is even more appropriate now that the worldwide Communist menace has collapsed.

To help guide the House committees in performing oversight, the

Rules of the House delineate special oversight functions for various

committees. In that part of the Rules, clause (3)(1), the Permanent

Select Committee on Intelligence, ‘‘shall review and study on a conVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:01 May 01, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00051 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\78230.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
46

tinuing basis laws, programs and activities of the intelligence community and shall review and study on an exclusive basis the

sources and methods,’’ of agencies of the intelligence community,

including CIA.

The phrase ‘‘on an exclusive basis’’ is very telling because the exclusive purview of the House Intelligence Committees is restricted

to examining sources and methods. By implication, the other committees can study laws, programs and activities of the intelligence

community, for example, CIA cybersecurity. If ‘‘sources and methods’’ is broadly read as Mr. Woolsey states, then why is the ‘‘on an

exclusive basis’’ clause needed at all? The other committees can’t

review anything under this interpretation anyway, because the CIA

method is all-encompassing.

My interpretation fits well with another passage in the House

Rules that specifically governs the Permanent Select Committee on

Intelligence, clause 11(b)3. It says, ‘‘Nothing in this clause shall be

construed as prohibiting or otherwise restricting authority of any

other committee to study and review an intelligence or intelligencerelated activity to the extent that such activity directly affects a

matter otherwise within the jurisdiction of that committee.’’ Once again, ‘‘sources and methods’’ is normally taken to mean ‘‘collection.’’ If ‘‘method’’ is read broadly, as Mr. Woolsey states, why

even put this clause in at all? Everything is a method, and so other

committees besides the Intelligence Committees cannot review anything.

Those same House Rules give the Government Reform Committee broad oversight over the operation of the executive branch

agencies. Clause 3(e) states, ‘‘The Committee on Government Reform shall review and study on a continuing basis the operation of

government activities at all levels with a view to determining their

economy and efficiency.’’ That’s a pretty broad purview.

So it’s been very clear from the time of the creation of the Intelligence Committees in the late 1970’s that they did not have exclusive jurisdiction over intelligence and intelligence-related activities

or access to intelligence products; the mere name, Select Committee, indicates that. The House Rules seem very clear on that point.

But if any dispute over internal House jurisdictions occurs, it

should be between the intelligence community and another committee, not between the CIA and the other committee. The CIA should

allow congressional committees to interpret rules made by their

own Chamber, and in fact, maybe outside experts ought to let the

committees work this out as well.

In short, the CIA appears to have no basis for its refusal to testify before the Government Reform Committee. The Government

Reform Committee’s effort to investigate CIA’s cybersecurity seems

to be well within its constitutional responsibilities and its jurisdiction under the House Rules to review government economy and efficiency.

Furthermore, as long as the committee refrains from directly examining the CIA ‘‘sources and methods of intelligence’’—and I read

this to be ‘‘collection,’’ which is unlikely in an investigation of the

CIA’s cybersecurity, the committee seems to have a compelling case

under the Rules for examining the agency’s intelligence activities

and products during its investigation.

47

That concludes my verbal statement. I’ll be happy to answer

questions at the appropriate time.

Mr. HORN. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Eland follows:]

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

60

61

Mr. HORN. Our last presenter before the Chair is Colonel Daniel

M. Smith, a West Point cadet who spent a lot of his time in the

Army on intelligence assignments. So we welcome you here, Colonel Smith, and would appreciate any advice you wish to give the

committee.

STATEMENT OF COLONEL DANIEL M. SMITH, USA (RET.),

CHIEF OF RESEARCH, CENTER FOR DEFENSE INFORMATION

Colonel SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My remarks are going

to come from the perspective of an information gatherer, a user of

finished intelligence, and last but not least important, as an ordinary citizen.

As a career military intelligence officer, I retain a bias in favor

of the need for the U.S. Government to keep secret information

that it deems might be helpful to an adversary or competitor if that

information became known. The Government also has an interest

in collecting information about other nations and foreign individuals with a view toward understanding, and if possible, influencing

behavior of these nations and individuals. How and on what basis

these decisions are made also is information that needs to be protected.

On the other hand, as a career citizen of the United States, a

status that preceded and postdated my military service, I have a

bias in favor of maximum openness in government, including justification of actions taken or not taken on behalf of myself and

other citizens. Although there are legitimate security reasons to

withhold information from the general public, such as sources and

methods used to acquire information on which decisions are based,

the threshold for withholding information from the elected representatives of the people must be significantly higher than for the

general public. Otherwise, the Congress can never know for sure

whether it is carrying out its sworn duty to protect the public’s

general welfare against potential government intrusion into areas

protected by the Constitution, and to properly allocate resources

among the various legitimate requirements of the Nation in general and the intelligence agencies in particular.

This subcommittee can, I believe, exercise oversight in intelligence activities from the standpoint of efficiency and fiscal management without increasing the possibility that sensitive information inadvertently will be revealed. Considering the size of the intelligence community itself, I am not overwhelmed by the possible

numbers cited by Director Woolsey of those with an interest in

oversight of intelligence activities.

While there is a legitimate security requirement to limit the dissemination of sensitive information and material on a need-to-know

basis, such need-to-know restrictions must be carefully evaluated to

ensure they do not become an excuse to withhold information arbitrarily or to conceal failures or even misdeeds. Making information

usable to different levels of Government, and even to the public, by

blending in as many sources and methods as possible and screening out information that could only come from restricted sources is

a job of professional intelligence analysts.

Judging how well they are doing and whether priorities and expenditures are in line with the perceived threats is the job of ConVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:01 May 01, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00067 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\78230.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
62

gress, and for that, Congress needs to have access and to hear

from—in executive session if necessary—knowledgeable representatives of U.S. intelligence agencies.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HORN. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Colonel Smith follows:]

63

64

65

66

67

Mr. HORN. We’ll now have the opening statement of my colleague, the ranking minority member of the Subcommittee on Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental

Relations, Ms. Schakowsky.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate you

and Mr. Shays for convening today’s hearing to highlight some of

the examples of roadblocks that the CIA has put up to necessary

and effective congressional oversight. It’s really an honor for me to

be here with this expert panel, and I wanted to say, particularly

to Mr. Hamilton, somebody I’ve admired for a very long time, I appreciated all of your informed testimony.

I am sure for each member here there’s at least one story of frustration with the CIA and its unwillingness to cooperate. In the

wake of the April 20th shoot-down of an American missionary

plane over Peru and the killing of American citizens on board,

members on both sides of the aisle were shocked when the CIA did

not show up for a hearing of the Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and

Human Resources Subcommittee to review circumstances that were

leading to that tragedy.

Having a particular concern with the fact that private military

personnel, under contract with the CIA, were responsible for providing the information that led to the shoot-down, I called the CIA

to ask some questions. After numerous calls that I made personally, as well as my staff, someone from the agency finally called to

inform me that I would not be provided with any information and

that the agency would neither confirm nor deny any involvement.

As a Member of Congress with responsibility for voting on

whether to allow such programs to exist and a member of the

House’s oversight committee, I was mystified and outraged. An

American citizen and her infant daughter were killed, the United

States played a prominent role, and now we have an agency telling

Congress to mind its own business. This is our business, and I

think we need to demand some answers.

So I share your frustration, Mr. Chairman, and urge you to work

with Chairman Burton to subpoena the information you have requested. I’m still waiting to hear from the CIA about the details

of the shoot-down over Peru and believe the committee should also

subpoena all audio- and videotapes, transcripts and other materials

pertaining to the shoot-down of the missionary plane.

The need for greater CIA compliance with inquiries and investigations is exemplified by their failure to even follow the most

basic principles of law. Not only does the CIA refuse to recognize

the rights of Congress, the agency often does not comply with laws

that protect the public. In 1998, Amnesty International filed a

Freedom of Information Act request with the CIA, seeking information about possible U.S. links to the Colombian military group, Los

Pepes.

The FOIA request was not answered until a little over a month

ago—1998 till a month ago—after Amnesty International had

found no other alternative but to file suit. Under the terms of the

FOIA law, every U.S. agency has an obligation to respond within

10 days. It took the CIA 3 years, numerous press reports and a

hugely successful book on the subject, and a lawsuit to say they

could neither, ‘‘confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of

68

records.’’ Incidentally, what Amnesty International is trying to uncover, information about drug trafficking terrorists that may have

colluded with U.S. agencies to carry out an assassination, should

be at the forefront of every Member’s concern.

In the fall of last year, I circulated a letter that was sent to

President Clinton, asking for an investigation into these disturbing

allegations. I realize it sounds more like a movie plot than real life,

but unfortunately, this story line has come to characterize the way

the agency is perceived by the public and the Congress.

It is difficult to stand behind an agency that refuses to cooperate

and seems to thrive on the practice of stonewalling, so I appreciate

very much the suggestions that you’ve made of more comprehensive approaches and look forward to working with the chairman,

both chairmen, to resolve some of the concerns that we have.

Thank you.

Mr. HORN. I thank the lady from Illinois.

Now I am going to start in with some questions with Mr. Hamilton. You mentioned independent oversight, and it’s my understanding that the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence

staff includes a number of current and former CIA personnel. I understand how this can be important to certain aspects of the committee’s duties, but could this close relationship hinder the committee’s ability to conduct independent oversight?

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Chairman, I think there is always a great

deal of suspicion toward the Central Intelligence Agency, certainly

by the American public, but also Members of the House who are

not members of the committee. And I think it’s the responsibility

of the House Permanent Select Committee to, No. 1, do everything

they can to conduct extremely rigorous, vigorous oversight of the

Central Intelligence Agency, hold their feet to the fire, make them

report on incidents like the Peru airplane incident, in very great

detail.

Now, the problem has always been to what extent does the select

committee share information with other members, and, quite frankly, that’s a part of oversight that has never been worked out very

well; and it’s an internal matter, it seems to me, that has to be

worked on and resolved. I think the Intelligence Committee needs

to be responsive to Members of Congress who are not members of

the Intelligence Committee. You raised the question kind of an incestuous relationship, I guess, between staff and the Intelligence

Community. To some extent that may exist, but I think there also

are a good many staffers there that are quite independent of it.

Let me emphasize again how important I think that independence is, because the President has the Foreign Intelligence Board.

He appoints all those members. Very rarely in my experience will

that Board step forward and say, Mr. President, the CIA, or some

other aspects of our Intelligence Community, is out of bounds. The

only independent oversight that this massive Intelligence Community gets is the Congress, and so it is important that oversight be

done very rigorously and that it not fall prey to what the chairman

is asking here, that it become co-opted by the Intelligence Community. You have to keep working at that. I mean it’s something you

just have to keep working at.

69

Incidentally, that’s one reason you have a limitation on the terms

of the members of the House Select Committee, the argument

being that if you have a permanent membership, that relationship

becomes too cozy.

Mr. HORN. Mr. Woolsey, during your tenure, did the CIA provide

detailees to the congressional Intelligence Committees, and what

was their role?

Mr. WOOLSEY. I remember one to the Senate committee that was

requested by the Senate, but I don’t remember any others. I’d have

to go back and look, Mr. Chairman, but I don’t recall more than

one at this point.

Mr. HORN. Do you recall any other Directors before your position

that did that?

Mr. WOOLSEY. I don’t know. I got the impression that it was done

from time to time but wasn’t all that common. I don’t remember

retired CIA members, officers who were on the committees when

I was Director, except, again, one. There might have been more,

but certainly most of the staffers were not either detailees or

former CIA.

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Chairman, if I may just observe, an awful lot

of the work of the Intelligence Committee is highly technical, and

you do need on the staff of that committee people who have detailed knowledge of satellites and all kinds of technological miracles. You don’t pick that up on the street. You get it from people

that have worked in that area. And so the problem that you raise,

I think, is a real one. The flip side of it is that the committee has

to have staff that can go head to head with the Intelligence Community experts on all of their technology.

Mr. HORN. Would that be your policy also, Mr. Woolsey?

Mr. WOOLSEY. Yes, Mr. Chairman. It’s up to the committee chairman who he picks. I’ve been out of the CIA for 61⁄2 years. I’ve testified before both committees, and my experience has been that the

occasional staff member who has background in the Intelligence

Community, whether it’s CIA or otherwise, his loyalty is owed to

the chairman of the committee. Also they have always been vigorous in their questioning and the like.

Mr. HORN. And you believe you had close relationships with the

detailees? Did either your staff director or you sort of keep track

of them?

Mr. WOOLSEY. You mean when I was Director?

Mr. HORN. Right.

Mr. WOOLSEY. I don’t remember who they were, and I certainly

didn’t keep close track of them. My relations were with the chairman, the members, and occasionally with staff. And I had with my

two House committee chairmen, Congressman Glickman and Appropriations Subcommittee chairman, Congressman Murtha, excellent relations with them and the staff. That didn’t mean that they

didn’t question me vigorously, but we got along fine.

On the Senate side I got along fine with my appropriations chairman, Senator Inouye. The Senate Select Committee chairman, Senator DeConcini, and I were another matter. But what gave an overall cast to my relations with the four committees I dealt with was

not the former status of any of the staff members, but it was dealings with the chairman and the ranking member.

70

Mr. HORN. Did either one of you use the General Accounting Office to conduct reviews in terms of the work of the committee?

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Chairman, my recollection is we did not use

the General Accounting Office for reasons that I think Mr. Hinton

made pretty clear. They just don’t feel they have the authority to

examine it in great detail; so it was not a useful arm for us.

Mr. WOOLSEY. And back in the days when I was general counsel

of Senate Armed Services, Mr. Chairman, which was the early seventies, which was pre-Intelligence Committee days, there were only

probably three or four staff members in the Senate who were

cleared into the CIA and National Reconnaissance Office programs,

and we did not use the GAO at all on those programs.

Mr. HORN. Mr. Hinton, is there any record that GAO has contributed to a lot of these oversight groups in terms of CIA? Has it been

solely fiscal or——

Mr. HINTON. Well, back in the late fifties and early sixties, Mr.

Chairman, we were looking at financial matters, and then we

began to expand into some program areas; however, we were not

able to get sufficient access to complete our mission, and as we had

discussions with the CIA, and at that time it was the chairman of

the House Armed Services Committee, we stopped doing work, and

with the concurrence of the chairman of the House Armed Services

Committee, who at that time had jurisdiction over the Intelligence

area.

Mr. HORN. When did CIA have an Inspector General as part of

its——

Mr. HINTON. My recollection is that it was in 1989 when the statute was passed, I believe, 1989.

Mr. WOOLSEY. I think the CIA had an Inspector General before

then but after 1989 it was subject to the statutory requirement of

all these various independent reporting obligations to the Congress

and the like.

Mr. HORN. Did you find that was a useful office when you were

Director?

Mr. WOOLSEY. Sometimes.

Mr. HORN. In terms of what they did, did they look at management processes or just fiscal matters?

Mr. WOOLSEY. Both. I even had them review my own office’s operation.

Mr. HORN. And you felt they did a good job or——

Mr. WOOLSEY. Sometimes.

Mr. HORN. Sometimes. You’re being very cautious here.

Mr. WOOLSEY. Yeah. I have a ‘‘on the one hand’’ this other and

that view of my Inspector General during those years, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HORN. And that’s the Truman thing about economists.

Mr. WOOLSEY. Yes.

Mr. HORN. On the other hand, on the other hand, so forth.

Do you think that the current organization has other experts

that can look at management? And of course that is what our interest is. We are not interested in methods and Intelligence people.

We are interested simply in ‘‘is the place put together so it can

achieve its mission?’’ In the case of computers that have been clasVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:01 May 01, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00076 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\78230.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
71

sified, we had that whole problem in the Y2K thing, and we finally

got some of the information.

Mr. WOOLSEY. First of all, the Inspector General’s Office does

now do this sort of thing routinely, look at management practices

for different parts of the Agency. And I think from what I’ve heard

from Mr. Tenet, he’s quite pleased with the operation of his Inspector General’s Office now.

Second, the President has, I believe, asked Mr. Tenet and also

the White House, I think, operating through the President’s Foreign intelligence Advisory Board which I believe will be headed by

General Skowcroft, to do two management reviews of the Intelligence Community as a whole, including the CIA, and I think

those are underway.

And finally, the current No. 3 official at the CIA, who actually

manages in a day-to-day sense the Agency, Buzzy Krongard, formerly the chief executive officer of Alex Brown and a very experienced executive, is someone that I think Mr. Tenet looks to for

management advice about the operation of the Agency.

So my judgment from the outside, and I’m not in this in any detail, would be that currently they are, from both the outside and

the inside, reasonably well equipped to look at management issues.

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Chairman, my view is that the question you

raise on efficiency, it’s an area that the Intelligence Committees

over a period of time have not paid very much attention to. The

whole question of cost effectiveness, we spend billions and billions

of dollars on Intelligence—we all know the figure roughly, I don’t

know whether it’s public or classified so I won’t use it—but billions

of dollars, and there’s very little attention given to cost effectiveness.

The real key in Intelligence is are the right people getting the

right information at the right time? That’s the key. It doesn’t matter how much intelligence you’ve got. If the commander on the

ground is threatened with a car bomb, if he doesn’t have the information he needs, your Intelligence is not worth a thing. And I

think sometimes we get so captivated with the technology of the

collection of intelligence that we take the position, the more the

better.

The real question is not necessarily the amount of data that

you’ve got. You’ve got to analyze that data, and then you’ve got to

get it to the right people at the right time for it to be effective. I

don’t think the Intelligence Committees, and I don’t mean in any

way to criticize the President’s Intelligence Committees because I

don’t know that much, but over a period of years we simply have

not spent enough time on efficiency and cost effectiveness, and to

that point I very much concur with your view.

Mr. HORN. Mr. Woolsey, any comments on that?

Mr. WOOLSEY. Well, the Director of Central Intelligence really is

charged with doing this on a day-to-day basis, and one major aspect of what I call the needs process which—because I hate the

word ‘‘requirements.’’ I think it has a lot of the wrong connotations

for what one should request and appropriate funds for. Part of the

needs process that I instituted had a lot to do with making and trying to institutionalize some of the kinds of judgments that Chairman Hamilton suggested.

72

One of the types of things it tends to point out when you do an

end-to-end look on a lot of intelligence product, from collection to

its getting to the consumer, is that there are roadblocks of the sort

he discussed. One very well-known one is translators. It doesn’t do

a great deal of good to accumulate a huge amount of data and material in Arabic if you’re not willing to hire and train the number

of Arabic speakers and readers necessary to make sure you’re going

through it on a reasonable and timely basis, and some of those

types of things do jump out at one if one does a review of the needs

during the budget process systematically, and that’s the way I tried

to do it. I don’t know how it’s been done since.

Mr. HORN. To your knowledge, are CIA’s employees able to report allegations of mismanagement or crimes of authorities outside

of the CIA, or is there a process inside the CIA where a Director

can depend on either a certain group or whatever to see that these

things are taken care of?

Mr. WOOLSEY. Inside the CIA they have access, of course, to the

Inspector General. They would have access if he’s running the

place right, to the Director himself. And they certainly have access

to the Oversight Committees of the House and Senate. I think that

from the point of view of being able to report malfeasance or nonfeasance or just to complain about one’s job, that system at least

as of early 1995, from my point of view, worked reasonably well.

Mr. HORN. Now, did you use GAO for help on any of this?

Mr. WOOLSEY. No, Mr. Chairman, we did not. We operated with

our own Inspector General. And with respect to the audit function,

the Senate staff has a separate staff that does audit, and in the

House it’s my understanding they have several members of the

staff that do it, although they don’t call it a separate section of the

committee.

Mr. HORN. I see my co-chairman, Mr. Shays and others. I do

want you to have some question time here. OK, go ahead, Ms.

Schakowsky.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to state

first that I’m a rookie when it comes to these intelligence questions, and probably the questions that I will ask reflect those that

perhaps ordinary citizens would be asking more than someone who

has an expertise in this area of intelligence gathering and the rules

of the game.

I’m wondering, Mr. Chairman, if I could ask you a question first.

I feel that our committee has been disrespected to some degree by

the CIA in ignoring your request to appear and in ignoring your

questions; and while I think we have certainly heard helpful testimony, I’m just wondering why you made a decision, or if you did,

to not subpoena the CIA to come. Could you have and, if so, can

we maybe in the future?

Mr. HORN. Well, we leave that to Chairman Burton. He has that

authority as chairman of the full committee.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. I see. There’s a threshold question on this

issue of secrecy. Who and how are decisions made about what will

be classified and what will not, what is important for the public to

understand and what is not? It seems to me that questions about

computer security certainly are public policy questions, and I don’t

73

know—Mr. Woolsey or others may disagree, that seems to me an

obviously appropriate thing.

When we asked questions about the incident in Peru, not sources

and methods but other kinds of questions, these seem appropriate

for our committee and for the American people to hear. Chairman

Burton said, ‘‘why is this information about whether or not the CIA

hired private contractors classified?’’ Why shouldn’t everybody understand what their taxpayer dollars are going for?

So, how are those decisions made, and then in what way can we

appropriately question that threshold decision? Anyone can answer.

Mr. HAMILTON. Those decisions are made on the basis of officials

of government that the Congress has given the power to classify information. You have given power to the Secretary of Defense or the

Secretary of State to classify information. The Secretary of State

and the Secretary of Defense do not sit there daily going through

stacks of paper marking ‘‘Secret’’ on them. What do they do? They

delegate that power. And they delegate it to literally hundreds and

hundreds of people in this town, who have the authority derived

from the secretaries to classify information. And we classify, in my

judgment, way more information than we should, and it becomes

almost impossible to declassify the information.

But it is a power that is derivative, of course, from the President,

but the secretaries have the power to classify information, and

many of them have it, many of them delegate it to hundreds of people. There are scores and scores of people in a Department of Defense and the Department of State who classify information. And

the whole system operates so that the incentive for the person

classifying, the safe incentive, is to classify it ‘‘Secret’’ because you

won’t get into any trouble. The problem becomes if you don’t classify something you should have, then you can get into trouble.

So the incentives are to classify. As a result we have warehouses

of secret information today, huge volumes of secrecy.

Mr. WOOLSEY. Could I add a second to that?

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Absolutely.

Mr. WOOLSEY. The question of classification is a separate question from whether something is a CIA method or not. Presumably,

if I am wrong, for example, and Mr. Eland is right, ‘‘method’’ should be read as narrowly as he and Colonel Smith say and it

only refers to collection, and that therefore the way the CIA protects its data is not a method and therefore this committee would

have jurisdiction to hold hearings on it, I would certainly hope that

this committee, if it held such hearings, it would hold executive

session hearings, because even though this is a matter of important

public policy, I trust we don’t want to let Saddam Hussein or Russian hackers know how the CIA protects its data.

So this committee I would assume on something of that sensitivity would, if it dealt with those issues, would deal with them in a

classified way. There are many very important matters of public

policy that are classified—whether to buy one type of satellite or

another—that the Government and indeed the Congress deal with

routinely.

But I just wanted to say that I think there’s a difference between

whether something is classified or not, on the one hand, and I

agree with former Congressman Hamilton that in a lot of cases

74

things are overclassified. But that’s a separate question from the

one that is before us here about which committee has jurisdiction

over understanding for the Congress how the CIA protects its data

and its computers.

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Yes, Mr. Eland.

Mr. ELAND. Yeah. I’d like to make a couple comments on this.

I agree with the other two speakers that we have much too much

classified information, and I think that has several ill effects. The

first one is it undermines the whole system and then you get people saying, well, this is classified; but, you know, it’s not really

classified, so I can leak it to the press or whatever. So if we only

hold the things that we need to hold secret, then I think everybody

recognizes that is—you know, I’m saying Secret, Classified, you

know, whatever level.

The other thing is I think a lot of times the executive branch

uses classification to limit access to various programs. The Reagan

administration put a lot of defense programs in the special access

category which requires special compartments to limit the congressional inquiry that could be done on them.

Also, I think throughout this whole hearing there’s been this assumption, and I think on the part of the CIA and maybe even some

people in Congress, that the Congress is a bigger leak than the executive branch, and I don’t think historically that is true. I think

the biggest leaks have come out of the executive branch. Officials,

for one political purpose or another, leak information. So I really

don’t think that the implication is if more congressional committees

get involved in this that we’re going to have secrets all over the

place, as Mr. Woolsey was saying. It’s just not true. I mean the—— Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. That’s kind of a second question: What’s a secret and what isn’t a secret in general? And then once something

is legitimately a secret, who gets access to that information, what

you’re referring to now, and that there may be more in Congress

who are entitled to that information.

But you also brought up a question of the press. My short experience—I’m in my second term of Congress—has been that I have

learned more information from reading the New York Times or the

Washington Post than I have in any classified briefings, and certainly more information in regards to this Peruvian incident and

the use of private contractors.

Does anybody feel that there is a certain responsibility of the

CIA or others to explain to Members of Congress information that

has appeared in the press about activities which——

Mr. HAMILTON. I think under the present regime the way it

would operate is an incident occurs, you want to know more about

that, you’re entitled to know more about it. The CIA has the information or maybe the DOD has the information. The way it would

operate today is that they would give that information to the House

Select Committee on Intelligence. That’s their responsibility. They

are fulfilling their obligation under the law when they report to the

Intelligence Committees fully and currently on any inquiry.

Now, the question of how the Intelligence Committee shares that

information with nonmembers of the Intelligence Committee is an

internal question that you have to resolve. As a member, you have

the right to go to the Intelligence Committee and say I want to

75

know what you know about that information. My recollection is—

and this procedure may have been changed—is that the committee

then votes on whether or not that information is made available to

you. I don’t recall, frankly, very often it coming to a vote. I can recall some instances of it.

In other words, in most every instance, an arrangement is

worked out so that the Member seeking the information can get it.

Now, that’s only part of the problem. The other part of the problem is once you get it, what can you do with it? You cannot go public with it if it is classified information, unless you do it on the floor

of the House; and you can say anything you want to on the floor

of the House and you’re protected. But there are very strong practical constraints against you from doing that.

So the question becomes how you get this flow of information

from the Intelligence Committee to the other Members of the

House, and it’s been very difficult to work out over a period of time.

In the end, if a Member is insistent, he or she can get that information but cannot necessarily use it publicly.

Mr. HORN. Mr. Tierney.

Mr. TIERNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the members

of the panel for your testimony and enlightenment today.

Mr. Hinton, reading your testimony and listening to you, I have

to tell you I was going to say ‘‘annoyed,’’ but I will say ‘‘concerned,’’

for lack of a better word, because of the CIA’s actions. You raised

two examples, both involving national intelligence estimates, and

they are, I think to everybody’s understanding, the Intelligence

Community’s best analysis of the likelihood of different kinds of

threats; right?

The first example, you said the CIA was cooperative when it

came to discussing the national intelligence estimates involving

chemical and biological threats. On the national—in the NIE for

missile threats, however, you said that the CIA refused even to

meet with you. Can you explain the difference in their attitude between those two?

Mr. HINTON. I think a lot of that has to do with the issue and

what the questions were that we were asking and how they saw

the oversight process play out. On the latter, we were seeking information about process, and they saw that falling in within their

determination that this was subject to the exclusive oversight of

the select committees. Therefore, they did not share the information with us.

Mr. TIERNEY. Did you only ask questions about process, or did

you also——

Mr. HINTON. In that case, that was objectives that we were trying to look at on that job.

Mr. TIERNEY. Now, we’re all aware that the President proposed

huge new missile defense programs. Apparently the more we read,

we find out he wants to talk about land, sea, air, and now even

space systems. It can cost who knows how many hundreds of billions of dollars by the time he gets through this adventure. I think

we risk alienating our allies, we risk some instability issues internationally, and this is a threat that many prominent critics claim

does not exist at all or certainly is being greatly exaggerated.

76

If you can’t even get a meeting with the CIA to discuss this

threat assessment on this issue, how is Congress going to be expected to analyze the President’s proposal with respect to national

issues of defense and to determine whether or not it properly addresses that threat?

Mr. HINTON. I think that’s going to have to be a shared responsibility among the Armed Services, the Appropriations, and the Intelligence Committees to pursue that.

Mr. TIERNEY. It is your feeling that this committee, particularly

the Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs and

International Relations, the Government Reform Committee,

doesn’t have any ability under its responsibilities to look at the

economy and efficiency of weapon systems?

Mr. HINTON. I think that this committee will probably have to

work closely with these other committees in seeking that information.

Mr. TIERNEY. You raised an issue in your testimony also about

the CIA actually not only failing or refusing to meet with you, but

actually actively encouraging other agencies not to cooperate with

you; is that right?

Mr. HINTON. Yes.

Mr. TIERNEY. What other agencies were you trying to receive

comment from that the CIA interfered with?

Mr. HINTON. I think in that case, it was DIA and NSA that we

were told that the CIA had asked them not to cooperate with us,

and State.

Mr. TIERNEY. I find that a little bit appalling, very much appalling. Given the history of the missile defense debate and the way

its gone in this country and the huge waste of money up until this

point in time, I don’t think that this is the way we ought to proceed.

Mr. Chairman, I would strongly urge that the committee investigate this matter further; that we ask Mr. Hinton, if he can, to

please provide us with the names of the CIA employees that refused to discuss the missile threat with his office. Could you do

that, Mr. Hinton?

Mr. HINTON. We have the information of who we asked it of.

Mr. HORN. If I might just interject a minute, and I’ll go back because, before Mr. Hamilton has to leave, I wanted to have my cochair ask any questions he has.

Mr. TIERNEY. I just want to wrap-up two questions and he can

go all he wants on this. The second thing I want to ask is the

names of the employees that tried to tell agencies not to cooperate

with you. Do you have those, Mr. Hinton?

Mr. HINTON. I don’t know that we do, but we’ll check, sir. I’ll give

you what we have. Generally when we have requests, we go

through their Office of Congressional Affairs to get things lined up,

and they are generally the messenger coming back. I don’t know

who they got their direction from, but I can give you whatever details our documents have.

Mr. TIERNEY. If we could also have notes or interview summaries

from your office regarding both of those issues, I would appreciate

that. And, Mr. Chairman, I would just ask that those materials be

made a part of the record.

77

Mr. HORN. Without objection, it will be part of the record at this

point.

The gentleman from Connecticut and the co-chairman of this

hearing.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. It’s nice to have all of you here.

Mr. Woolsey, I do want to say, with no disrespect, you commented on the statements of other people in your opening statement, but they didn’t have the—I don’t think had your opening

statement to be able to comment on it.

Mr. WOOLSEY. I did not—I was not asked to submit a written

opening statement, Mr. Shays, and I talked from notes that I put

together this morning.

Mr. SHAYS. I’m just trying to make the point to you. It’s a small

point.

Mr. WOOLSEY. Well, Mr. Eland has twice mischaracterized what

I said, and if we want to get into this, I’d be delighted to—— Mr. SHAYS. I’m just making a point that in your opening statement you commented on the opening statements of others, and

they didn’t get the opportunity to comment on the opening statement of yours because they didn’t see it, and you’ve explained why.

Mr. WOOLSEY. Well, but Mr. Eland did comment on my opening

statement in his remarks, and he mischaracterized twice what I

said. So I’ll be glad to get into this if it’s important.

Mr. SHAYS. No. After you made the opening statement, he didn’t

have your opening statement to look at. I’m just making a

point—— Mr. WOOLSEY. That’s correct, because I didn’t write one out. I

wasn’t asked to by—— Mr. SHAYS. I have a sense that you want the last word. I have

just made a point and you’ve made a point. I’m just making a point

that the other gentlemen introduced an opening statement and

they did not have the ability to see an opening statement of yours,

and you did have an opportunity to comment on the opening statement of theirs, and that’s the only point I made.

I’d like to know, Mr. Woolsey, why I shouldn’t be outraged or at

least unhappy that the CIA wouldn’t at least come here to explain

why they believe on merit they shouldn’t have to respond to this

committee on other issues? I mean we have you here, and I’m

grateful you’re here, because otherwise their argument wouldn’t be

made except in a tangential way. So under what basis—if you were

Director, under what basis would you not at least allow someone

to explain the logic of why they don’t think they should cooperate

with these two committees?

Mr. WOOLSEY. Well, I would think generally, Mr. Chairman, that

it would be a good idea to show up and explain. I must say, however, I wrote yesterday or 2 days ago to the chairman because I

hadn’t seen a formal invitation. I’d only spoken with the staff on

one occasion until 2 days ago; and then when I got it, the subject

of the hearing, quote, The effect of the CIA’s unwillingness to Cooperate with most congressional inquiries on Congress’ ability to

conduct oversight, is, if I may say so, from my perspective a somewhat argumentative statement of the issue. And were I George

Tenet, I think I might come back and say we do not refuse to cooperate with most congressional inquiries. We, as the CIA, submit

78

a lot of information to the Congress: briefings, daily; several briefings daily on our product, on the substance, on the output of the

Intelligence Community.

What is at issue here is oversight of what I believe is reasonably

characterized as a CIA method. And Mr. Eland and others say no,

it’s not a method, it’s an activity. But that’s——

Mr. SHAYS. If you weren’t here—I am just making the point that

if you weren’t here, the position wouldn’t even be presented to

Members of the Congress as to why they shouldn’t participate, and

I just think——

Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Shays——

Mr. SHAYS. And I want to get right to you, Mr. Hamilton. I just

think it is an affirmation of almost sticking their finger in our eye.

I mean the least they could have done was to be here, and it seems

dumb to me.

Mr. Hamilton.

Mr. HAMILTON. I can appreciate your point, but you have to see

the Director of Central Intelligence’s problem. His problem is that

the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence has told him not to come. The chairman of this subcommittee has told him to come. Now he’s got to make a choice.

Mr. SHAYS. And the question I——

Mr. HAMILTON. His responsibility under the law is to keep the

House and Senate Intelligence Committees currently and fully informed. I’m not——

Mr. SHAYS. Let me just explain another part of that story,

though. You’re not certain, nor am I, that he didn’t request that

the chairman tell him not to come. You don’t know, nor do I. But

we do know this: We do know the CIA tells other intelligence committees not to cooperate, which leads to my next question. Why is

it OK for other intelligence committees to cooperate but not the

Agency?

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, I’m not here to defend the Central Intelligence Director. He can do that himself. But I think it’s important

for you to see that he’s caught in a bind that the Congress has created. You’ve created this problem for him.

Mr. SHAYS. No, that’s not true.

Mr. HAMILTON. That is true.

Mr. SHAYS. No. No. In general terms we might have that argument. Whether or not to explain why it’s important for him not to

only cooperate with the Intelligence Committee, it could be something that he could explain. And I make the point to you, because

I know for a fact that the Agency has told other intelligence committees not to cooperate.

Mr. WOOLSEY. Other intelligence agencies of the executive

branch?

Mr. SHAYS. Of the executive branch, and told them not to come

and testify before our committees, and they have. They’ve cooperated. And it gets to my point, and I want to know why the CIA

shouldn’t cooperate and why others do cooperate. And I throw it

open to you, to either of you. Tell me why.

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, I don’t want to try to speak for the Director. I can certainly understand your frustration, and it just exemVerDate 11-MAY-2000 10:01 May 01, 2002 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00084 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\78230.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
79

plifies the problem that exists between the Congress and the Intelligence Community.

Mr. SHAYS. Let’s get to my real question. My real question is

simply to understand if we are talking about sources and methods,

and we respect sources and methods with other intelligence agencies, there are 13 of them, and we don’t have cooperation with 1.

We have cooperation with 12. Why do the others accept that we

can recognize that sources and methods—it shouldn’t be the issue,

but on other things they should cooperate. Why is the CIA separate?

Mr. HAMILTON. Well, your original question was why did the Director choose not to appear.

Mr. SHAYS. And—— Mr. HAMILTON. I can’t answer for the Director, obviously, but I

think I do see his problem.

Mr. SHAYS. I understand that. You see his problem, but now I’m

on to the next question.

Why is it that of 13 intelligence agencies, 1 basically doesn’t cooperate, the other 12 recognize that we respect the sources and

methods as an issue that shouldn’t be discussed, but there are

other issues.

And the reason why I am here today, I will tell you, if there is

any person that the Intelligence Community should respect, it’s

Mr. Horn and his efforts to deal with efficiencies. It’s one of the

most boring darn subjects in the world, and he’s made more headway than anyone else. And so I just want to understand that question.

Mr. Hamilton, I know you have to leave, so I—— Mr. HAMILTON. I do. I apologize. Mr. Chairman, may I just make

a concluding comment, if I may? I think the questions have

brought out the difficulties of this relationship. I’ve been a little

uneasy here this morning because the approach taken to this question, in my judgment, has become too legalistic. This is not a question that can be resolved by the interpretation of section 11(b)(4),

section 11(a)(1), or (3)(a). If you want to get yourself into a position

of not solving the problem, that’s the way to do it in my view.

This is a huge, hugely difficult matter. On the one hand, how do

you have a strong Intelligence Community that, by definition, has

to operate secretly and confidentially or they cannot do their job?

On the other hand, in a representative democracy, how do you get

accountability of that kind of an operation? That’s the overall problem here. I think it’s hugely difficult.

The questions that Mr. Shays and others have operating simply

bring out some of these difficulties, and I don’t think there’s a simple answer to that. My testimony was that the arrangement that

we have today is far from perfect, but it works reasonably well. But

it’s quite obvious from your questions, it doesn’t work, there are

plenty of problems with it.

Thank you for looking into this. Thank you for letting me come

for a few minutes to be with you.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Hamilton.

Mr. HAMILTON. I appreciate what you’re doing.

Mr. SHAYS. I would love to ask Mr. Hinton a question. Thank you

very much.

80

Mr. HORN. I would just like to make a comment on the way I’ve

been thinking. Why, with such a friendly group as this, the Director hasn’t taken his wooden chair here that says ‘‘Director of CIA’’ at the table. And I think maybe we need a better ergonomic chair

to give the Director, and I’m weighing those two facts there. So,

since I was one of the few that voted for ergonomics around

this——

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Hamilton, I have tremendous respect for you,

and I appreciate you being here. I do want to ask Mr. Hinton the

question. You work with other intelligence agencies, do you get cooperation from other intelligence agencies?

Mr. HINTON. Yes, sir. And it’s varied over the years. We did significant work up through the 1980’s and the early 1990’s. In 1994,

the door started closing on us, and it was a memo that the Director

of the CIA signed in July 1994 which in effect shut us out of most

all of the intelligence work, related work, that we had been doing

through the years, and also for some of the key clients up on the

Hill, and also that work that we were doing without discretionary

resources.

Now, this wasn’t directly looking at the CIA. I mentioned that in

1962 we stopped the work that we were actively doing at the CIA,

but we were working in the other aspects of the Intelligence Community, looking at the national foreign intelligence program, tactical intelligence, some of the systems that were being procured.

Our work in that area has essentially dried up.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me ask you this. We found that the intelligence

agencies have been cooperative with our committee, National Security, Veterans Affairs and International Relations. Are you saying

that none of the agencies now are cooperating with GAO?

Mr. HINTON. No, I’m not saying that, sir. Where I am on that,

it depends on what we are asking to do. You know, if we go out

and seek out information around intelligence product like threat

assessments, we find that we enjoy very good access.

Mr. SHAYS. Right.

Mr. HINTON. However, when we get into looking at particular

programs to do the typical evaluations that we do elsewhere in the

government, we are being challenged considerably now, given the

guidance that came about in 1994 under that directive.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Eland or Colonel Smith, do you care to make any

comments on these questions?

Mr. ELAND. Well, I used to work for GAO in the late 1980’s, and

I was monitoring on the frontlines, intelligence agencies, and my

knowledge is dated—excuse me—pre-1984, but I found that the

CIA was the only agency that we didn’t actually get to go to. We

had a site out at NSA. They gave us access. We looked at some

even more sensitive intelligence-collecting entities of the U.S. Government which gave us much more access than the CIA.

The CIA has always been a problem, and I think we need to separate this discussion from the Intelligence Community and the intelligence information from the CIA. The CIA is the problem here,

in my view.

Mr. SHAYS. I thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HORN. Let me just say again. Perhaps you weren’t here

when I put this memorandum in the record. It’s a memorandum for

81

Director of Central Intelligence, dated July 7, 1994, via Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, the Executive Director, the Executive

Director for Intelligence Community Affairs, from Stanley M.

Moskowitz, Director of Congressional Affairs.

And here’s the blow. Subject: Director of Central Intelligence Affirmation of Policy for Dealing With the General Accounting Office.

And it’s a clear plan on, you know, you guys are just wasting your

time and you’re wasting our time and so forth. I regard that as arrogant. And what you noted there, the word was ‘‘pipe down’’ and

‘‘sat on’’ and everything else. They just didn’t want to see what you

were looking at.

And all we care about, in fact, is computer security which is a

major problem in the free world. I’ve talked to four Prime Ministers

about it, and they know right now that they’ve got a problem in

their economy where people are going and lousing up their computers, which means people could be out of work and everything else.

So——

Mr. HINTON. Mr. Chairman——

Mr. HORN [continuing]. I want to put this, again without objection, in the record.

Mr. HINTON. Mr. Chairman, one thing I’d add to that, without

sustained congressional support for us to do work today and to include that on behalf of the select committees, we are essentially not

doing any of the work that we used to do.

Mr. HORN. Do you want to comment, Ms. Schakowsky?

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. I just wanted to comment on the fact that I

think the problem is not entirely unique to the CIA. Congressman

Tierney led an effort to pry loose a report from the Pentagon regarding the critical report by Phillip Coyle on the missile defense

program, and it was promised in this very room that it would be

turned over, and it wasn’t. And finally after a lot of work it finally

happened.

But let me just ask one question of Mr. Woolsey, if you would

indulge me, Mr. Chairman. If you broadly define a method, and

looking back on the laws that govern the release of this kind of information, the dissemination of it, what would you define as appropriate? Is there any reason why the CIA Director would come here

and talk to us about anything?

Mr. WOOLSEY. Absolutely, Congresswoman. Certainly a product.

The two areas at issue here are product and activities. The product

of the Intelligence Community is not a method. Sources and methods are used in putting together an intelligence product such as a

national intelligence estimate or any other estimate. And as long

as sources and methods are effectively dealt with at the appropriate level of classification, intelligence products are provided to

the Congress all the time, several times a day, a lot of committees

of the Congress.

I testified before the Science Committee, I testified before Senate

Governmental Affairs, I testified before International Relations,

Senate Foreign Relations, sometimes in classified settings, sometimes in unclassified. And I’m sure that intelligence briefings products are provided to individual members of this committee and as

far as I know, if the—Mr. Gershwin’s briefing, for example, on the

82

cyberthreat that he gave to the Joint Economic Committee—I can’t

speak for him—I’m sure that would be available, too.

So products are not at issue. What is at issue is activities; is essentially, if I read the rule right, and I think I am reading it correctly with respect to the exclusive authority of the House Permanent Select Committee over methods, the question is when is an activity not a method? Are there some activities of the Intelligence

Community that are not exclusively methods under the jurisdiction

of the House Permanent Select Committee?

To me, a method is something that has a certain regularity and

procedure to it, and I think there’s room here for this committee

and the House Permanent Select Committee to have a dialog and

work out some areas in which some things might be able to be provided here. I’m not saying that would not be the case. But certainly

intelligence products, whether about ballistic missile threats or

anything else, are available to all Members of the Congress, and

briefings occur at committees in both bodies all the time from the

CIA.

Mr. HORN. I just have one last question, Mr. Woolsey. During

your recent appearance on C-Span you stated the number of the

employees of the CIA is classified. Why is this information so important to keep secret?

Mr. WOOLSEY. Well, the overall total for the Intelligence Community was declassified for a couple of years, back several years ago,

and now it’s become classified again. The subordinate parts of that

budget can relatively easily, not completely, but relatively easily,

be calculated from manpower count. And so people generally have

avoided declassifying not only the subordinate parts of the intelligence budget, but also the head counts of the agencies, because

you can crosswalk relatively easily from one to the other.

I might say this is not a very well kept secret, Mr. Chairman,

and it’s not something that I think any government official ought

to fall on his sword over. But the overall intelligence budget was

declassified and the reason I was concerned about that when I was

Director was I was afraid we would end up having smaller and

smaller chunks of the overall intelligence budget made public and

CIA head count would be one further step along that path.

Mr. HORN. Well, let me thank you, all of you, for the testimony

you’ve given, and we appreciate it. And I want to thank the staff

on both the majority and the minority: J. Russell George, staff director/chief counsel, behind me; and Henry Wray, senior counsel;

and then Bonnie Heald is director of communications down there;

and then the professional staff member for this particular hearing

is Darin Chidsey, who is to my left; and Scott Fagan, assistant to

the committee.

And then we have a wealth of interns: Fred Ephraim; Davidson

Hulfish; Fariha Khaliq; Christopher Armato; Samantha Archey.

And from the National Security, Veterans Affairs and International

Relations Subcommittee, Nicholas Palarino, senior policy analyst;

and Jason Chung, clerk; and Lawrence Halloran, staff director. Minority staff, David McMillan, professional staff; and Jean Gosa,

clerk.

83

Our court reporters today are Melinda Walker and Lori

Chetakian. And with that, we’re adjourned. Thank you.

[Whereupon, at 11:59 a.m., the joint subcommittee was adjourned.]

Æ