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ABSTRACT
There is an inherent tension between a law enforcement–driven approach and a requirementsdriven approach to intelligence collection. The US experience, with the development of the Federal Bureau of Investigation(FBI), as the primary intelligence service within the domestic environment, suggests that the tension is nearly insurmountable if an organization starts from a reactive, threat-focused posture. As a law-enforcement agency, which US government decision-makers expect to fulfill an intelligence function, the FBI is triply handicapped by the external strictures of the Department of Justice (DoJ); the Bureau’s own policies – which respond to the DoJ parameters; and the FBI’s organizational culture.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Counterterrorism Lessons from the U.S. Failure to Prevent the Fort Hood Attack.
2. 9/11 Review Commission. The FBI: Protecting the Homeland in the 21st Century.
3. General Accounting Office, Domestic Intelligence Operations of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
4. House of Representatives Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, Science, the Departments of State, Justice, and Commerce, and Related Agencies Appropriations for 2006; Federal Bureau of Investigatiom, FY 2012 Authorization and Budget Request to Congress.
5. FBI Charter Act of 1979, S 1612.
6. Intelligence Activities, Senate Resolution 21, Before the Select Committee to Study Governmental
Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities of the United States Senate.
7. US Department of Justice, Attorney General’s Guidelines for Domestic FBI Operations.
8. US Department of Justice, The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Compliance with the Attorney General’s Investigative Guidelines .
9. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, FBI Oversight: Terrorism and Other Topics.
10. Zegart. Spying Blind, 153.
11. Senate Committee on the Judiciary; FBI Oversight: Terrorism and Other Topics. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Report of the Joint Inquiry into the Terrorist Attacks of 11 September 2001
12. Ibid, 153.
13. Ibid.
14. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Oversight of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
15. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide.
16. See note 14.
17. Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities:
Intelligence Activities and the Rights of Americans, Final Report of the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities.
18. Ibid.
19. House of Representatives, Domestic Intelligence Operations for Internal Security Purposes.
20. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Memorandum: R.O. L’Allier to Belmont.
21. Barron, Operation SOLO: The FBI’s Man in the Kremlin, 172.
22. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, National Intelligence Reorganization and Reform Act.
23. House Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations for 1990.
24. House Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations for 2009.
25. US Department of Justice, Attorney General’s Guidelines for Domestic.
26. Ibid.
27. US Department of Justice, The Attorney General’s Guidelines for FBI National Security Investigations and Foreign Intelligence Collection.
28. Executive Order 11905 – United States Foreign Intelligence Activities (1976).
29. Executive Order 12333 – amended by EO 13284 (2003), EO 13355 (2004), and EO 13470 (2008).
30. House Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies appropriations for 2004.
31. Ibid. 2004.
32. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Before the Senate Judiciary Committee 110th Cong. (2007).
33. Ibid.
34. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Reforming the FBI in the 21st Century.
35. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Ten Years after 9/11 – 2011.
36. See note 9.
37. Testimony of Robert S. Mueller III, 2 May 2006.
38. See note 24, 2012.
39. House of Representative Committee of the Committee on Appropriations, Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations for 2005.
40. Testimony of the Honourable Robert S. Mueller III, 6 December 2006.
41. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Statement of Robert S. Mueller III, Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Justice, ‘Oversight of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.’
42. Hoffman, Meese III, and Roemer, The FBI: Protecting the Homeland in the 21st Century.
43. Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, Report on the Surveillance Program Operated Pursuant to Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence.
44. Inspectors General of the Intelligence Community, Central Intelligence Agency, Department of Justice, and the Department of Homeland Security, Unclassified Summary of Information Handling and Sharing Prior to the 15 April 2013 Boston Marathon Bombings.
45. Ibid.
46. Isikoff, “The Informant Who Lived with the Hijackers.”
47. Welch, “Pulse Nighclub Gunman’s Father Was FBI Informant, According to Shooter’s Widow’s Lawyers.”
48. Webster et al, Final Report of the William H. Webster Commission on the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Counterterrorism Intelligence and the Events at Fort Hood, Texas, on 5 November 2009.
49. Ibid.
50. Senate Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2015.
51. Ibid.
52. Government Accountability Office, DHS Intelligence Analysis: Additional Actions Needed to Address Analytic Priorities and Workforce Challenges.
53. Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Intelligence Community Directive Number 204.
54. House of Representatives Committee of the Committee on Appropriations, Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations for 2005.
55. Ibid.
56. Department of Justice, Audit of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Cyber Threat Prioritization.
57. Ibid.
58. Ibid.
59. Inspectors General of the: Intelligence Community Department of Homeland Security, and Department of Justice, Review of Domestic Sharing of Counterterrorism Information.
60. 9/11 Review Commission, 65.
61. See note 56.
62. Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, Foreign and Military Intelligence. Book I; House of Representatives Subcommittee of the Committee on Government Operations, Notification to Victims of Improper Intelligence Agency Activities.
63. Apuzzo and Goldman, Enemies Within: Inside the NYPD’s Secret Spying Unit and Bin
Laden’s Final Plot against America, 30.
64. Crumpton, The Art of Intelligence: Lessons from a Life in the CIA’s Clandestine Service, 289; Richelson, The U.S. Intelligence Community, 6th ed., 21.
65. Richelson, The U.S. Intelligence Community, 6th ed. 22; Crumpton, The Art of Intelligence: Lessons from a Life in the CIA’s Clandestine Service, 285.
66. Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Domestic Approaches to National Intelligence.
67. ibid.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Darren E. Tromblay
Darren E. Tromblay has served the US Intelligence Community, as an Intelligence Analyst, for more than a decade. He is the author of Political Influence Operations: How Foreign Actors Seek to Shape U.S. Policy Making (Rowman & Littlefield, 2018) and co-author of Securing U.S. Innovation (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016). Mr. Tromblay has been published in Lawfare, the Hill, Small Wars Journal, Intelligence and National Security, and the International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence. He holds an MA from the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs, an MS from the National Intelligence University, and a BA from the University of California. Mr Tromblay can be reached at [email protected]. The views expressed in this essay are entirely his own and do not represent those of any U.S. government or other entity.