Intelligence Appropriations: Will the Senate Reform?

Patrick Doherty — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 19:45:00 -0500

This post was authored by Timothy Little, a Research Intern for The American Strategy Program

A couple months ago I commented on a new attempt by Senator Bond (R-MO) to create a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Intelligence. With the election and the financial crisis dominating much of the conversations in Congress, there has been little movement on this issue. However, recent changes in Senate chairmanships and the new WMD report released could revive this issue.

A commission chaired by Bob Graham and Jim Talent released its report on the prevention of WMD proliferation and terrorism. They concluded what many policy analysts have been saying for some time: "a weapon of mass destruction will be used in a terrorist attack somewhere in the world by the end of 2013." The year is open to debate, but it will likely be within the next decade.

However, the same report called upon Congressional leadership to "establish an Intelligence Subcommittee on the Appropriations Committees in both chambers of Congress with jurisdiction over the National Intelligence Program and Military Intelligence Program budgets."

The new Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Senator Daniel Inouye (D-HI) said in 2004 when he was Ranking Member of the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee:

"Linking Defense and Intelligence is critical. DOD cannot operate without good intelligence. The Defense Subcommittee has ensured that intelligence resources support the needs of the warfighter. Today, the Defense Subcommittee reviews the recommendations of both the Armed Services and Intelligence Committees. The Appropriations Committee can minimize redundancies and make sure that the needs of both Defense and Intelligence are met" (Internal note in a CRS Report)

Sen. Inouye is on the record as being against separating intelligence appropriations into a separate subcommittee arguing that the defense subcommittee should handle defense intelligence appropriations. Sen. Inouye appears to be towing the same line as his predecessor. It is unknown whether his stance has changed since 2004 when that statement was made or what effect his chairmanship of appropriations will have on this issue. However, in a Sept 2008 floor statement, Sen. Inouye was extremely critical of the Bond resolution creating the subcommittee stating, "the proposal made by the Senator from Missouri would not improve congressional oversight of intelligence."

In other congressional changes, Sen. Rockefeller (D-WV), a co-sponsor of the Bond Resolution is relinquishing chairmanship of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) for Chairmanship of the Senate Commerce Committee. The incoming chair of the Intelligence Committee will be Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) who has not signed on as a co-sponsor of the resolution, but has supported efforts to improve the intelligence community's appropriations process. In March 2008, Sen. Feinstein joined with other members of the SSCI in sending a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and then Appropriations Committee Chairman Robert Byrd (D-WV) supporting the creation of a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Intelligence.

The House of Representatives has already made significant progress by creating the House Appropriations Select Intelligence Oversight Panel. This group is comprised of members selected by the Speaker of both the House appropriations and intelligence committees. However, out of the 13 members on the oversight panel, 10 have to be from appropriations and 3 from intelligence. Clearly and uneven distribution this model has its failings. However, the panel is a step in the right direction. Full power should rest in neither the Intelligence Committee nor the Appropriations Committee.

The opportune time to create this new subcommittee is now. The beginning of the 111^th Congress and a new administration should make it their priority to enact a key recommendation of the 9/11 Commission that is long overdue. Intelligence is one of the most vital aspects of our national security program. Proper oversight over appropriations to the intelligence community will have a lasting impact on America's national security environment.

Climate Change Intelligence

Patrick Doherty — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 16:29:00 -0400

My friend Siobahn Gorman over at the Wall Street Journal covered the new National Intelligence Assessment on Global Climate Change today. Here's the article.

In summarizing the NIA for Congress, Tom Fingar, the head of the National Intelligence Council who spoke here at New America a few weeks ago, said global climate change is a very real national security challenge. Here's his summary graf:

We judge global climate change will have wide-ranging implications for US national security interests over the next 20 years. Although the United States will be less affected and is better equipped than most nations to deal with climate change, and may even see a benefit owing to increases in agriculture productivity, infrastructure repair and replacement will be costly. We judge that the most significant impact for the United States will be indirect and result from climate-driven effects on many other countries and their potential to seriously affect US national security interests.

All in all, I think the statement by Fingar is solid first look at the issue by an Intelligence Community that is trying hard to get a handle on a powerful geopolitical force that requires untraditional collection and analysis.

Is there anything new here? Not really. The findings are relatively safe and avoid looking at non-linear climate change dynamics. For an organization that challenged the White House line on Iran and now is taking on climate change, simply getting a consensus assessment is a significant accomplishment.

Of course not looking at non-linear dynamics is a major oversight. The big threat out there is the potential for the shut down of the Gulf Stream, a scenario which a 2003, DoD-sponsored report considered a major strategic concern, even if the likelihood was lower than linear warming.

Jay Gullege, a climate scientist at the Pew Centers for Global Climate Change recently noted, a) non-linear shocks are precisely how climate changes (even if overall change is measured in mean global temperature) and b) the best scientific models have been consistently under-estimating the scale and pace of the change, year after year.

My final thought on the report is that the Assessment is still trapped in an analytical box left over from the Cold War. The NIC, as Tom Fingar said in his talk here at New America a few weeks ago, can only look at specific, well defined questions, like "what are the national security implications of climate change." That's because intelligence assessments and estimates fundamentally asks how a given issue will impact the status quo. That status quo is built up of existing interests, but those interests, like oil and gas supplies, are part of the strategic dysfunction out there.

I believe that climate change combined with the urbanization of China and the economic rise of India, however, demands a major change in the status quo; a major U.S. strategic adaptation, and a shift in our national interests. What Tom Fingar confirmed today is that the consideration of grand strategic alternatives will not emerge even from our most elite intelligence professionals. Grand strategy is an inherently political act, which, ironically, must seek to transcend politics if we have any hope to sustain strategic focus for more than four or eight years.

That's what gets me up in the morning.