The Defense Intelligence Agency - Essay Example

and The Defense Intelligence Agency The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) is an intelligence agency operating under the Department of Defense and is tasked with collecting the country’s foreign military espionage1. Along with the National Security Agency (NSA), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) they form the core of the United States Intelligence Community. Most of these agencies are federal run and depend on the appropriations by the legislative houses for their budget allocations. Since the September 11 attacks, the budgetary allocations had been increasing but of late there have been some serious budget cuts due to the strenuous economic times. There have also been some concerns over the roles of the congressional oversight in military operations and specifically intelligence collecting. This paper explores why the government is cutting the military budget and what are the implications of this step on the functionality of its various bodies and the national security at large. The DIA is considered the mother of all the intelligence; it is an all-source intelligence agency. This is because though it was established to collect military intelligence it has now extended its boundaries to collecting and analyzing intelligence far beyond the combat zones2. It was formed in 1961 and its role is basically to collect sensitive defense-related foreign intelligence. It was initially formed to provide the three departments of the armed forces with intelligence after the efforts by each department to collect its own intelligence proved duplicative, costly and inefficient. It was therefore tasked with collating all that information and then sharing it among the army, navy and air force divisions. After collecting and analyzing the intelligence, DIA synthesizes that information and feeds the same to the national policymakers and other civilian intelligence agencies such as the CIA, the FBI and the Regional Commanders3. The DIA provides useful intelligence to defense planners, policy makers and war fighters so that they can make strategic plans based on informed choices. The CIA, the NSA and the Regional Combatant Commands such as USACOM and others are the main beneficiary of the foreign intelligence collected and analyzed by the DIA. The CIA collects intelligence on foreign governments and corporations, feeds it to policymakers and also oversees some covert operations. The NSA does the cryptography for the government by encrypting foreign intelligence and intercepting and decrypting foreign intelligence. These agencies are different from the DIA in that they collect non-military security related intelligence unlike the DIA4. However, their intelligence capabilities, and to a large extent those of the country, hugely rely on the efficiency of the DIA. The DIA has no law enforcement branch like the others; it relies on the authorities such as the regional commanders to work on the intelligence provided5. It becomes critical to adequately finance the military so that the DIA can have the resources to do its work comprehensively. Intelligence collection importance cannot be overstated since the emphasis is now on taking proactive measures to national security as opposed to reactive. With the terrorists aiming to use weapons of mass destruction, the DIA can prove to be the key to national security, but only if given the independence and autonomy to run its operations and is sufficiently funded. The DIAs functionality has been seriously affected by the harsh and high budgetary cuts by the government. Intelligence expenditures in the USA are usually allocated through three major programs, namely the National Foreign Intelligence Program, the Joint Military Intelligence Program and also the Tactical Intelligence and Related Activities Aggregation6. The DIA, as such, falls under the National Foreign Intelligence Program (NFIP). The Central Intelligence Director approves or disapproves the budgets of the DIA, which is earlier forwarded and the amounts in the budget approved by the Secretary of Defense7. The senate and the house are responsible for authorizing the proposed budget. As seen, the budgetary process is a very long one, which begins in February of every year and comes to a completion in the fall. The DIA’s annual spending varies and depend on the security needs of the nation. However, of late, there have been massive budgetary cuts on the military, which has partly rendered it redundant. Reports indicate that in the year 2013, there was a budgetary cut of $ 41 billion in the military budget, and unfortunately, if things do not change, the cut could escalate to $ 52 billion8. This puts the military, and in particular the DIA in a very compromising situation. Why? The Defense Intelligence Agency has over 16, 000 employees stationed in about 142 countries. A cut in the military budget has translated to a deduction in allowances for the workers, not to mention the ability and resources to be used to collect intelligence are strained9. The DIA puts its employees and people first, and reducing this pay has made it further redundant. It can no longer function as effectively as it should with dissatisfied and unmotivated employees. In addition, as a result of the slash in budgetary allocations, the DIA has been forced to settle for sharing the cloud environment with other intelligent agencies such as the CIA, NSA, FBI and NGA10. This is in an attempt to reduce the running and contractor costs for maintaining different systems. This has further weakened the once independent DIA. The budgetary cuts have come at a very crucial moment where the world’s greatest military power is forced and expected to remain firm. The cut reduces DIA’s ability in counter-terrorism, capability investment, modernization and capitalization, world crises among others11. Some of DIA’s existing employees have had to be reassigned to clandestine spying, a training role that will be undertaken by the CIA, further undermining the supremacy and effectiveness of the DIA. In addition, a great percentage of its employees will not access proper training and others are slowly being laid off from their work. Congressional Oversight has also contributed greatly in the redundancy of the DIA. Congressional Oversight refers to oversight by the congress of the United States on all federal agencies and policies12. This congress reviews, monitors and also supervises the agencies. The Armed Services Committee is the main oversight committee for the Intelligence communities which has two subcommittees, the House Permanent Select Committee Intelligence and the Senate Select committee on Intelligence. These committees are authorization committees and they, especially the SSCI exercise their jurisdiction over the DIA. The oversight Committees require that the DIA and other intelligence surrender any information when required. In addition, they can question the heads over activities of the intelligence teams and evaluate DIA’s programs and performances13. The DIA is supposed to be an independent entity holding highly classified information, and congressional oversight makes it less powerful and more redundant with regards to its duties. References Hosenball, Mike., and Wolffe, Richard. “The CIA and the DIA,” Newsweek 143(16) (2004): 8-9. Ibp Inc. US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Handbook- Strategic Information, Activities and Regulations. Washington: International Business Publications, 2013. Miller, G. DIA sending hundreds more spies overseas. Washington Post, 2013. http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/12/military-intelligence-boundaries-grow-ever-fuzzier. Smith, Thomas. Encyclopedia of the Central Intelligence Agency. New York: Infobase Publishing, 2002. Public Intelligence, Department of Defense Instruction. Public Intelligence, 2013. Online. Available at http://info.publicintelligence.net/DoD-CivilianLawEnforcement.pdf Pellerin, Cheryl. Officials: Cuts, Unstable budget threaten intelligence mission, US Department of Defense, 2013. [online] Available from http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=119404 Chapman, David. DIA Approves $1M budget and resolution to keep $9M funds. Daily Records, 2013. [online] Available from http://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/showstory.php?Story_id=540316 Medici, Andy. DIA: Budget cuts propelling shared cloud environment. Federal Times, 2013. [online] Available from http://www.federaltimes.com/article/20131205/IT/312050012/DIA-Budget-cuts-propelling-shared-cloud-environment FAS. Intelligence Budget Data. Intelligence Resource Program, 2013. [online] Available from http://www.fas.org/irp/budget/ Read More