Central Intelligence Agency Structure in the United States
Central Intelligence Agency Structure
The CIA is part of the Executive Office of the President of the United States, which means that the president has direct control of the agency. The president appoints the CIA director and deputy director with the consent of the United States Senate, and the two directors are responsible for ensuring that the CIA follows the president’s instructions. The president’s appointees sometimes come into conflict with career (permanent) CIA officials if the president tries to push the CIA in a direction that career officials view as unwise. The CIA also has to work to coordinate its efforts with the strategy established by the NSC. In practice, however, because the CIA’s day-to-day operations and its budget are usually secret, the agency has more discretion to act than nearly all other parts of the U.S. government.
Within the CIA, the director and the deputy director supervise four additional deputy directors. Each of these four deputy directors leads a directorate (branch) of the agency. The Operations Directorate is the best known because it conducts covert action and counterintelligence around the world. The Operations Directorate has specialized divisions for each region of the world. The Science and Technology Directorate interprets data gathered from code-breaking activities; from telephone, radio, and other electronic transmissions; and from detailed photographs taken by spy satellites. The Intelligence Directorate takes the information provided by other parts of the CIA, other agencies in the intelligence community, and from publicly available sources, and produces analyses and estimates for policy makers. The Administration Directorate arranges the agency’s finances, personnel matters, computer facilities, and medical services. It also assumes the critical task of internal security – including detecting spies and potential spies within the agency.
Besides all this work concentrated in the CIA’s headquarters building in Langley, Virginia, the agency undertakes fieldwork in foreign countries. The CIA has an office, or station, in almost every nation, whether friend or potential foe. Each office is headed by a station chief, whose real job is hidden by a fictitious job known as a cover. A station chief’s cover is often as an official within the U.S. Embassy. The station chief must find out what is happening in the host country that may have a bearing on U.S. national security. Station chiefs are officers of the CIA and do not usually conduct actual spying, but they often hire spies to achieve their goals.
To ensure that the CIA meets these various responsibilities in a proper manner, the agency has an inspector general, who audits its secret accounts and investigates malpractice. In an attempt to limit the responsibilities and therefore the power of the director of central intelligence, Congress provided in 1947 that the CIA should not collect intelligence in the United States. The CIA only monitors the domestic activities of U.S. citizens when it believes they may be involved in espionage or international terrorist activities. Since then, Congress has periodically investigated the agency. In the mid-1970s, both the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate set up permanent committees to oversee the CIA, and these committees have established procedures for the monitoring of covert operations. (1)