The intelligence community has remained overly focused on military priorities at the expense of other important foreign policy needs, according to a report released today called "IN FROM THE COLD: The Report of the Twentieth Century Fund Task Force on the Future of U.S. Intelligence." The task force is chaired by Ambassador Stephen Bosworth, executive director of the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization and, formerly, the ambassador to the Philippines and Tunisia.

The report's goal? To start where other reports on the intelligence community left off.

"We wanted to go beyond criticisms that responded to embarrassing news events like the Aldrich Ames debacle and the disappearance of several billion dollars in the National Security Agency budget to answer more fundamental, if less sensational, questions about the intelligence community," says Ambassador Bosworth. "How has the mission changed since the end of the cold war? What will be required to meet the changing needs of our nation and its leaders?"

"The militarization of intelligence since the collapse of the Soviet Union has edged out countless issues of national importance -- understanding Russia's future, anticipating the collapse of North Korea, integrating China into global trade -- that beg our serious attention," says Gregory Treverton, director of the International Security and Defense Policy Center at the RAND Corporation and one of the authors of the Task Force report's background papers.

The report proposes specific recommendations for achieving a more equitable balance between the civilian and military needs of the government, including:

• Reinvigorating the atrophying analytic capabilities of the intelligence community and foreign policy agencies by increasing its analysis budget by at least double.

• Enhancing communication between the intelligence community and foreign policy officials by rebuilding the State Department and better integrating intelligence into the policymaking process.

• Improving the clandestine service to serve our true national security needs by streamlining its secret operations and enhancing the quality of its personnel.

• Upgrading economic intelligence so that it can effectively respond to significant political and social developments around the world that are vital to our national security.

The report concludes that because of the proliferation of information through television and computers, the $28 billion spent on collection is no longer necessary. "What we need is higher quality analysis to separate out the mass of fact, fiction and disinformation that comes with this age of information technology," Treverton points out.

IN FROM THE COLD also explores how a changing technology and a more open world create new opportunities for the intelligence community to cooperate with specialists outside of intelligence and government.

"We're hoping this report and its recommendations go a long way to making intelligence more relevant to the American public and our national security interests," concludes Twentieth Century Fund's president, Richard C. Leone.

To arrange to interview Task Force members or authors of "IN FROM THE COLD: The Report of the Twentieth Century Fund Task Force on the Future of U.S. Intelligence, "please contact Marsha Zeesman at 212/245-0510 or Jon Shure at 212/452-7723.

Contact: Marsha Zeesman, 212/245-0510
or Jon Shure, 212/452-7723

The Twentieth Century Fund is a research foundation which undertakes timely, critical and analytical studies of major economic, political and social institutions and issues. Nonprofit and nonpartisan, the Fund was founded in 1919 and endowed by Edward A.Filene.