William E. Odom. Fixing Intelligence: For a More Secure America. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003. xli + 229 pp. $24.95, cloth, ISBN 978-0-300-09976-8.
Reviewed by T. C. Wales
Published on H-Diplo (November, 2003)
Marching Orders: General William Odom lished more than a decade later to probe the Iran- Takes On the U.S. Intelligence Community Contra afair, both failed to precipitate fundamen‐ In the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, tal change. With the entrenched Congressional attacks on New York and Washington there was a backing of a tenured bureaucracy, the American strong consensus among American politicians, intelligence community has sometimes seemed as academics, and pundits that something was seri‐ lawless and invulnerable as John Gotti, the late ously wrong with the U.S. intelligence system. "Tefon Don" of the New York underworld. Richard C. Shelby (R-Alabama), Vice-Chairman of This sorry state of afairs explains, in part, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said why William E. Odom's clarion call for reform, that "our inability to detect and prevent the ... at‐ Fixing Intelligence: For a More Secure America, is tacks was ... a failure of unprecedented magni‐ so important. The author, a retired three-star U.S. tude" and placed the notion of serious reform Army General and former Director of the National back on the national legislative agenda.[1] Over Security Agency (NSA), is a consummate insider. time, however, this vitally important issue has While Odom's status blinkers his outlook in cer‐ slipped back into obscurity, subsumed by the om‐ tain respects and leaves him prone to some of nipresent military campaigns in Afghanistan and NSA's institutional biases, in the end it is what Iraq, and continued wrangling over the authority makes his book so remarkable. For Fixing Intelli‐ of the new Department of Homeland Security. gence is a wholesale attack on the U.S. intelligence This cycle--disaster, calls for reform, and in‐ community. It alleges that the current system is evitable return to inertia--is depressingly familiar dangerously dysfunctional due to serious man‐ to intelligence historians. The Church Committee, agement problems, and proposes a radical re‐ which investigated the Central Intelligence Agen‐ structuring. In short, Odom's book is the frst cy's (CIA) involvement in various unsavory activi‐ wholesale attempt to centralize and reengineer ties in 1975, and the Boren Commission, estab‐ the American clandestine services since their H-Net Reviews modern conception at the hands of William Dono‐ the CIA. Odom's plan would invest the ofce with van and Sir William Stephenson sixty-two years real statutory power over the entire U.S. clandes‐ ago. tine world. Moreover, the NIA system would not Odom's frst task is to explain why the exist‐ be just another layer of bureaucracy larded atop ing system does not work, which he accomplishes the present intelligence community--the new with distressing ease. After briefy outlining some structure would replace it entirely. of its most notorious recent failures--the Ames/ This wholesale reorganization, which would Hansson mole debacles, General Norman eviscerate or completely eliminate several major Schwarzkopf's complaints about the lack of timely agencies, is what separates Odom's plan from intelligence during the First Gulf War, the Septem‐ those of his reform-minded contemporaries. The ber 11 disaster, and the CIA's misadventures in latter group--from President Bush to former CIA Afghanistan--he shows how poor management ofcer-turned-author Robert Baer[2]--emphasizes and agency parochialism were contributing fac‐ legal and administrative changes that might make tors in each case. For most readers, however, the system work better. These uninspired propos‐ Odom's chart detailing the cat's cradle of overlap‐ als run the gamut from improving interagency li‐ ping lines of authority between the sundry agen‐ aison to "turning loose" the CIA (i.e., eliminating cies that comprise the "community" will be suf‐ the legal bans on assassinating foreign leaders cient evidence that something is seriously amiss and recruiting agents with criminal back‐ (p. 197). In a society that sees itself as a model of grounds). Odom maintains that such incremental free-market efciency, America's intelligence ap‐ steps have been tried before without success. paratus is disappointingly bureaucratic--even So‐ Therefore, he believes the CIA should be broken viet. Odom's main concern, however, is more spe‐ up to accommodate the new NIA-based structure, cifc: this maze of staid government apparatchiks the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) must makes it impossible for the United States to per‐ cede its domestic counterintelligence function, form "corrective feedback" from "performance to and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) must resource allocation" (pp. 12-14). In other words, answer to the new DCI. Freed from his impossible the President and Congress have no way to deter‐ dual role as both CIA chief and ostensible head of mine what works, and what does not. In a world the entire intelligence community, Odom's super- where Al-Qaeda exists, this is a recipe for disaster. DCI could serve as unchallenged chief executive The solution, in Odom's view, is to radically of the new system. restructure and simplify the system. As a former In ordinary times the prospects for radical re‐ military man he likes the idea of a clear chain-of- form along the lines proposed by General Odom command where the Director of Central Intelli‐ would be bleak. But these are not ordinary times, gence (DCI) serves as the unquestioned leader. In and two new factors ofer fresh hope for change. place of the present witch's brew of agencies with First, the sheer scale of the September 11 atrocity overlapping authority, he proposes establishing a and the intelligence failure it represents will quartet of National Intelligence Authorities (NIAs) eventually demand a comprehensive accounting. with clearly delineated areas of responsibility: sig‐ Second, the lapses of certain agencies were so nals intelligence, human intelligence, satellite egregious that maintaining the status quo is unac‐ imaging, and counterintelligence. The DCI would ceptable: a fact that is recognized by all concerned have direct responsibility for each NIA's perfor‐ parties, including the culpable organizations. mance and budget. Until now the DCI has enjoyed This is particularly true at the FBI, where only nominal authority outside the precincts of poor communication between its Washington
2 H-Net Reviews headquarters and bureaus in Phoenix and Minne‐ running" (of the type that might have uncovered apolis may have given Al-Qaeda a fatal chance. In‐ the September 11 plot) is traceable to Donovan's formed observers of the clandestine world have sometimes inspired, frequently disorganized ap‐ long understood that the FBI's statutory responsi‐ proach during World War II. Allan Dulles, the bilities constitute a dangerous anomaly: counter‐ CIA's legendary DCI during the 1950s, once told intelligence and law enforcement demand radi‐ his then-protege Richard Helms that quiet, tradi‐ cally diferent approaches. Efective counterintel‐ tional human intelligence work would never com‐ ligence requires the patient detection, observa‐ mand respect in Congress because "it doesn't cost tion, and penetration of enemy cells. Public atten‐ very much."[5] Even within the Agency, in the tion of any kind is most undesirable. Yet the FBI post-September 11 environment that attitude is has always measured success according to the seen as a dangerous relic of the past. Odom's plan public acclaim that follows high-profle law-en‐ to insulate the DCI from such antediluvian im‐ forcement actions: namely arrests, indictments, pulses would help promote cultural change at the and prosecutions. Odom argues that, consequent‐ CIA. ly, the FBI's counterintelligence record has been To capitalize on the new reformist sentiment deplorable (p. 172); his proposal for an autono‐ emanating from within the intelligence communi‐ mous national authority in this area (subordinate ty, U.S. policymakers need a comprehensive, unbi‐ to the DCI) would efectively expel the bureau ased assessment of what is wrong and how to fx from the guild of spies. Recently, a group of re‐ it. The author's occasional bouts of institutional tired intelligence ofcers published an essay in favoritism are therefore unfortunate, and consti‐ The Economist that echoed Odom's criticism of tute the only serious faws in an otherwise superb the FBI approach to counterintelligence. The co- book. While many of the policy prescriptions in authors, who include two former high-ranking Fixing Intelligence are inspired, and Odom does FBI ofcials, demand that, if a serious attempt to an excellent job puncturing the self-generated change the counterintelligence culture is not mystique surrounding the FBI and CIA, his critical forthcoming, "it should be made clear to both the analysis of the Defense intelligence agencies--in‐ FBI and the American public that the president cluding NSA--is much less trenchant. will separate this responsibility from the bu‐ Some of these problems are not due to any di‐ reau."[3] rect bias on Odom's part, per se, and are simply There has also been an unprecedented attributable to a mistaken view of intelligence his‐ amount of public soul-searching at the CIA. Odom tory. For instance, Odom denigrates the perfor‐ maintains that like the FBI, there is an entrenched mance of the ex-military personnel and contract culture at the Agency that inhibits its efective‐ agents that the CIA uses in covert operations, and ness. In this case he points the fnger at the "con- claims, justifably, that uniformed U.S. military artist" persona rife among the career civil ser‐ Special Forces would be much more efective. The vants at Langley. While such skills may be neces‐ problem is that as long as American policymakers sary--even desirable--in covert operations, they choose to make secret peacetime interventions have created a tendency to over-hype the Agen‐ abroad, using uniformed Special Forces is impos‐ cy's successes and practice bureaucratic empire sible. American presidents have always endeav‐ building through Congressional appropriations (p. ored to maintain the appearance of "plausible de‐ 152). This is far from a new observation, but that niability"; no one in the U.S. government would does not make Odom's critique any less telling.[4] want to employ regular service personnel in these Indeed, the CIA's propensity to favor big, famboy‐ situations.[6] Blaming the CIA for every debacle ant special operations projects over "classic spy-
3 H-Net Reviews created by peacetime covert operations is hardly Fixing Intelligence has something to ofer ev‐ constructive, or fair. ery reader. Journalists and political scientists Odom's kid-glove treatment of NSA is both un‐ should appreciate Odom's detailed portrait of the derstandable and regrettable. The NSA is hardly existing U.S. intelligence apparatus. Policymakers above criticism: it consumes enormous resources, and members of the clandestine world, in Ameri‐ employs tens of thousands, and still cannot efec‐ ca and abroad, will fnd his prescriptions for tively sift "electronic chatter" for terrorist threats. change stimulating, albeit controversial. The tar‐ Yet while Odom has no trouble tossing brickbats get audience, however, is clearly the voting public at the self-mythologizing ethos of other intelli‐ in the United States. For them, Fixing Intelligence gence organizations, he swallows NSA's own hero‐ will be both reassuring and deeply shocking. ic pantheon hook, line, and sinker. In particular, Americans can take comfort in the expertise of he lauds the example of H. O. Yardley, founder of the men and women who constitute their intelli‐ the code-breaking enterprise known as the "Black gence community, many of whom are extremely Chamber" and America's signals intelligence competent at their jobs. They will be disquieted to supremo during World War I and the 1920s (p. learn that, in its current form, their clandestine 128). Odom hails Yardley's successes--which fa‐ services are handicapped when dealing with a mously include identifying the Japanese delega‐ powerful non-state terrorist organization like Al- tion's bottom-line negotiating position at the Qaeda. The American intelligence system is bloat‐ Washington Naval Conference of 1921--portraying ed, bureaucratic, and poorly managed. General him as the unappreciated Cassandra-fgure of the Odom has challenged Americans to demand "sigint" world. In fact, Yardley was also the basest change and crafted a bold plan to guide reform. sort of traitor, who sold America's cryptographic Notes secrets to the Japanese in 1928 for $7,000.[7] Even [1]. Shelby quoted in "Press Release: Indepen‐ accounting for infation, Yardley's honor went for dent Commission to Investigate Events Leading a much cheaper price than that of Robert Hans‐ Up to September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks, State‐ son or Aldrich Ames. It is a bit rich to criticize ment by Sen. Richard C. Shelby," http://shel‐ William Donovan, who for all his foibles was un‐ by.senate.gov/news/record.cfm?id=187264. questionably an American hero, when your own [2]. See Robert Baer, See No Evil: The True icon is a traitorous reprobate with a gambling ad‐ Story of a Ground Soldier in the CIA's War on Ter‐ diction. rorism (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2003). Odom's inability to adopt an objective ap‐ [3]. Robert Bryant, John Hamre, John Lawn, proach toward NSA is a serious weakness. Apolo‐ John MacGafn, Howard Shapiro, and Jefrey gists for the FBI and CIA may attempt to portray Smith, "America Needs More Spies," The Econo‐ Fixing Intelligence as yet another attempt by the mist 368:8332 (12-18 July 2003): pp. 30-31. Defense Department to undermine or wrest con‐ trol of the civilian intelligence agencies.[8] This [4]. It is the main theme of an excellent new charge may contain a sliver of truth: the idea for revisionist history of the U.S. intelligence commu‐ the book was, after all, the product of a Defense nity: Rhodri Jefreys-Jones, Cloak and Dollar: A and NSA-dominated study for the Institute of Pub‐ History of American Secret Intelligence (New lic Policy in 1997. Ultimately, however, Odom's in‐ Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2002), stitutional biases constitute only a small blot on pp. 6-9. an otherwise fne efort. [5]. Thomas Powers, "From the Grave, Helms Tells How, Not What," review of A Look Over My
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Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency by Richard Helms with William Hood, New York Times, May 14, 2003, p. 10. Available at http:// www.nytimes.com/2003/05/14/books/ 14POWE.html. [6]. It is, however, entirely legitimate to ques‐ tion the efcacy and legitimacy of peacetime covert operations. The "Bay of Pigs" fasco of April 1961 is an archetypical case. CIA Inspector Gener‐ al Lyman Kirkpatrick's operational post-mortem is now available in Peter Kornbluh, ed., Bay of Pigs Declassifed: The Secret CIA Report on the In‐ vasion of Cuba (New York: The New Press, 1998). [7]. Jefreys-Jones, Cloak and Dollar, pp. 109-110. [8]. There is certainly a long history of mili‐ tary-civilian infghting within the intelligence world. The frst and most serious example was the attempt by the head of the Military Intelligence Division (MID), Brig. Gen. George V. Strong, to wrest control of the Ofce of Strategic Services (OSS) from Donovan in early 1943. See Thomas F. Troy, Donovan and the CIA (New York: Aletheia Books, 1981), p. 169.
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Citation: T. C. Wales. Review of Odom, William E. Fixing Intelligence: For a More Secure America. H- Diplo, H-Net Reviews. November, 2003.
URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=8411
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