WASHINGTON — President Bush, moving toward embracing a key element of the Sept. 11 commission's recommendat- ions, said Wednesday that a new national intelligence director should have authority over more than half of the U.S. intelligence community's estimated $40-billion annual budget.
Until Wednesday, Bush had declined to take a specific position on who would control intelligence spending, a central and controversial question in the larger debate over how sweeping the overhaul of the intelligence community should be.
By offering a plan to give a national intelligence director budget authority over 12 of the nation's 15 intelligence organizat- ions, Bush appeared to throw the weight of the presidency behind those favoring more rather than less reform.
Important details of a reform blueprint remain unsettled, however, including the critical question of what kind of authority the new national intelligence director would have. A White House fact sheet accompanying Bush's announcement on budget authority said the new director would "coordinate the activities" of the CIA and the FBI, and would oversee the intelligence activities of the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security.
The White House document also indicated that a Cabinet-level council would advise the national intelligence director. Who would sit on the council and what its authority over the director would be were not clear.
The Sept. 11 commission, which investigated the intelligence failures surrounding the 2001 terrorist attacks, recommended that the national director have three deputies who would report to him and manage the CIA, the FBI and the Pentagon's intelligence operations.
As spelled out so far, Bush does not seem to envision such a clear-cut chain of command.
Some in Congress and the government, including the heads of the FBI and the CIA, argue that the new director should not have "operational" authority over the individual agencies, but instead should coordinate overall activities and set broad policy goals and priorities.
Under Bush's budget authority plan, there would be significant exceptions to the consolidation. The National Security Agency, which manages most of the huge system for gathering electronic and satellite intelligence, would remain subject to Pentagon budget control.
So would the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the National Reconnaissance Office, which are also involved in satellite and other forms of technical intelligence.
