Intelligence_ From Secrets to Policy - Mark M. Lowenthal [150]
Another oversight issue relating to covert action has to do with broad presidential findings, sometimes called global findings, versus narrow ones. Global findings tend to be drafted to deal with transnational issues, such as terrorism or narcotics. The broader the finding, and thus the less specificity it contains, the greater is the scope for the intelligence community to define the operations involved. Although not suggesting that the president should precisely define covert actions, a broad finding does run a greater risk of disconnecting policy preferences from operations.
Policy makers must also be concerned about the objectivity of the intelligence community when it is asked to assess or draw up a covert action. Once again, intelligence officers who feel a need to demonstrate their capabilities may not be able to assess in a cold-eyed manner the feasibility or utility of a proposed action.
Similar concerns may arise when assessing the relative success of an ongoing covert action. Have policy makers and intelligence officials agreed on the signs of success? Are these signs evident? If not, what are the accepted timelines for terminating the action? What are the plans for terminating it?
Finally, can intelligence analysts offer objective assessments of the situation in a country where their colleagues are carrying out a major covert action, particularly a paramilitary one? This issue may be of heightened concern in view of the closer partnership forged between the then-DO and Directorate of Intelligence in the mid-1990s.
The propriety of intelligence activities is also an aspect of oversight. Are the actions being conducted in accordance with law and executive orders (EOs)? All intelligence agencies have inspectors general and general counsels. In addition, the President’s Intelligence Oversight Board (PIOB), a subset of PFIAB, can investigate. However, the PIOB is a reactive body, with no power to initiate probes or to subpoena. It is dependent on referrals from executive branch officials. Nonetheless, the PIOB has carried out some useful classified investigations. However, the PIOB fell into disuse during the George W. Bush administration. Members were not appointed until 2003, two years after the administration took office. According to press accounts, the PIOB did not take any actions on various potential violations that were reported to it—mostly in connection with the war on terrorism—until 2006. The PIOB is supposed to forward such reports to the attorney general.
A recent addition to executive oversight has been the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, which had been recommended by the 9/11 Commission report and was created legislatively in 2004. The board, more popularly known as the Civil Liberties Protection Board, is chartered to ensure that concerns about privacy and civil liberties are considered when laws, regulations, and policies to combat terrorism are developed. The board has both an advisory and oversight function. The board is part of the executive office of the president, who selects its members. The chairman and vice chairman are subject to Senate approval. The Bush administration’s commitment to the board came into question because members were not selected until March 2006. Once it was appointed, the board spent most of its first year getting organized and acquainting itself with the agencies with which it needs to deal. According to the board’s first annual report, it will emphasize issues concerning U.S. persons, a legal term meaning U.S. citizens or legal permanent resident aliens, or issues occurring on U.S. soil. The specific areas of concentration include intelligence information sharing, terrorist surveillance, and watch lists and data mining.
The controversies that engulfed intelligence after 2001, primarily the September 11 attacks and Iraq’s alleged possession