The CIA and Congress: The Untold Story from Truman to Kennedy

Abstract

David M. Barrett's latest work is a thorough treatment of an important subject in American Cold War history. The challenge of overseeing a secretive intelligence agency in a democracy is the central theme of Barrett's study, which covers the period from the Central Intelligence Agency's (cia) creation through the 1961 Bay of Pigs fiasco. The author spent considerable space tracing the “imperfect solution” adopted by Congress—oversight by legislative committees and subcommittees (p. 5). In practice, that was “an elite model of legislative oversight, since most members of Congress would learn almost nothing of agency activities” (p. 22). In case after case, Barrett showed that cia-congressional relations hinged on frequent informal contacts between agency heads and a small handful of powerful committee chairpersons. Barrett acknowledged that oversight in those years was highly uneven, but he also claimed that Congress was more assertive in its relations with the cia than has been previously acknowledged. On issues ranging from the cost of the agency's new headquarters building to the conduct of covert actions, Congress questioned cia leaders with increasing vigor during the fifteen years covered in this study. In practice, however, most of that scrutiny came in response to specific crises or perceived failures on the part of the agency and failed to translate into a consistently vigilant oversight structure. “Most of the time,” Barrett conceded, “Congress deferred to presidents and leaders of the cia on crucial intelligence issues” (p. 458).