SECRECY NEWS
from the FAS Project on Government Secrecy
Volume 2016, Issue No. 26
March 22, 2016

Secrecy News Blog: http://fas.org/blogs/secrecy/

DNI REPRESENTATIVES FORM A GLOBAL NETWORK

The Director of National Intelligence exercises authority and maintains global awareness through a network of DNI Representatives deployed across the intelligence community and around the world.

"DNI Representatives serve as the principal advisors to their assigned organizations for IC matters, as a conduit between the DNI and their assigned organizations, and as the DNI's personal representatives to a variety of U.S. and foreign partners and international organizations," according to a declassified December 2009 Intelligence Community Directive that was made public last week. See DNI Representatives, ICD 402, 23 December 2009, amended 06 September 2012:

DNI Representatives help to execute DNI policies and to collect information for reporting back to the DNI.

That is, they both "facilitate and monitor the implementation of DNI direction, policies, and procedures" and they "promptly inform the DNI or his designee of significant issues, operations, or incidents."

And in language that recalls the broadly permissive statutory provision for CIA covert action, the Directive says that DNI Representatives will also "Perform other duties as the DNI determines."

"Organizations and locations to be considered for DNI Representatives include U.S. Diplomatic Missions; military organizations; organizations where there is a large IC presence, diverse mission requirements, significant interaction with foreign intelligence and security services or international organizations; and other places deemed appropriate," the Directive says.

A prior version of Intelligence Community Directive 402 (dated May 19, 2009) generated friction between then-DNI Dennis C. Blair and the Central Intelligence Agency because it asserted that the DNI could appoint his own Representatives in foreign countries to serve alongside the CIA station chiefs in those countries. CIA resisted that assertion and reportedly prevailed.

The revised directive now states that "In all cases the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Chief of Station shall serve as the DNI Representative [classified phrase deleted]."

However, "In instances where the DNI believes that a Chief of Station is not performing effectively his essential functions as a DNI Representative, the DNI shall convey his concerns directly to the Director of the CIA, and may recommend that the individual be removed if those concerns have not been resolved to the satisfaction of the DNI within a period of six months."

GAO OVERSIGHT OF INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY CONTRACTORS

"We do not have the full picture of who is working for the Intelligence Community as contractors, or why," said Senator Thomas Carper at a June 2014 hearing, the record of which was just published last week.

See The Intelligence Community: Keeping Watch Over Its Contractor Workforce, Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, June 18, 2014, published March 18, 2016:

The hearing record is of particular interest as a reflection of the revived intelligence oversight role assumed by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) following the issuance of 2014 Intelligence Community Directive 114, which authorized GAO access to intelligence information under certain circumstances.

"That new Intelligence Community Directive, I think that did establish a good framework for us to move forward," said GAO's Timothy J. DiNapoli at the hearing. "It gave us an approach for a presumption of cooperation. It prevented the categorical denial of information, and access to much of the information on a more formal basis."

And the Intelligence Community apparently responded to the GAO engagement constructively.

"We thought the responses to the draft report and the recommendations were solid," Mr. DiNapoli said. "I actually thought that the Director [of National Intelligence] provided cogent responses saying here are some specific steps we are going to take with regard to improving information on the methodology; we are going to ask for that information so we will have a better handle on it."

For her part, ODNI Principal Deputy Director Stephanie O'Sullivan also testified in support of the GAO role in intelligence oversight.

"The only way to really approach this--and this is what I tell my management organization--is by looking at this as an opportunity to see that which you are missing. It is that old adage of when you are in college and you typed a term paper, you could read that paper 50 times and read right over the typo every time. You just simply cannot see that which is the norm to you."

"You need outside eyes to help you find problems," Ms. O'Sullivan said, "and that is about the basic credo of IGs and GAO, to make the function of government more efficient and effective."

A series of Questions for the Record appended to the newly published hearing volume addressed the issue of "Why have the number of contractors and the cost of contracts been classified?"

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Secrecy News is written by Steven Aftergood and published by the Federation of American Scientists.

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