30 April 1998
Thanks to DN
Date: Thu, 30 Apr 1998 05:12:26 -0400 Subject: AP: House Intelligence Committee Bill Panel Reviews Espionage Protection Filed at 2:42 a.m. EDT By The Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) -- The House Intelligence Committee wants to modernize eavesdropping programs, revitalize clandestine human intelligence and boost covert action capabilities. ``We see the need for concerted focus on signals intelligence, human intelligence, all-source analysis and our covert action capabilities,'' said Rep. Porter Goss, R-Fla., the committee chairman. The committee in a closed meeting Wednesday approved and sent to the full House the annual intelligence authorization bill, a classified measure that sets policy and spending priorities for the CIA and a host of other U.S. agencies that gather intelligence. The committee was particularly concerned about the explosion in telecommunications and computer technology and the new tools that allow adversaries to foil U.S. interception of communications and signals. This highly secretive area of intelligence involves efforts to tap into high-level government communications, encoded documents and technical emissions such as the telemetry signals put off by missiles and other weaponry. The legislation shifts some funding out of expensive satellite intelligence programs and into this growing technical area, according to an official familiar with it. In addition to code-breaking technology, the bill, which is classified, seeks to increase investment in the type of computer equipment that can sort through vast quantities of encoded messages and focus in on the important ones that U.S. intelligence wants to intercept and interpret. Additional money is also earmarked for human intelligence, which is largely the purview of the CIA's overseas stations in which agency employees manage a variety of human sources, some working for foreign governments, others perhaps placed in defense industry or other commercial posts. The CIA has been focusing its efforts on cracking into terrorist organizations, drug cartels and groups involved in weapons proliferation. But the committee found that this area of intelligence, run by the CIA's Directorate of Operations, has been withering in recent years. ``The funds to conduct espionage have been cut back tremendously,'' said the official familiar with the bill, who spoke only on condition of anonymity. ``We're in the business of trying to rebuild an espionage system.'' The Directorate of Operations also manages CIA-run covert operations, which encompass a wide variety of political, diplomatic and even military programs done under cover and directed at foreign countries. These can include covert support for political opposition groups in places such as Iraq and arms for rebel forces fighting governments hostile to the United States. Some of the funds shifted by the committee from technical programs deemed lower priority go into the account supporting covert action. The bill also provides additional money for intelligence analysis, addressing a persistent problem at the CIA where intelligence collectors bring in a flood of information only to have it sit on shelves waiting for analysts to examine it. Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash., the committee's ranking Democrat, said the bill ``marginally exceeds the president's budget request'' but, overall, closely follows administration priorities. Some of the increases included by the committee go into areas that have been identified by CIA Director George Tenet as top agency priorities. The CIA had no official comment on the bill. But an intelligence official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the areas identified by the committee in its bill ``are vitally important and high on the director of central intelligence's agenda.'' The total amount of spending for intelligence contained in the bill remains classified, but it is believed to be slightly above this year's spending level of $26.7 billion. The bill is expected to be considered on the House floor next week.