June 28 the NYT and Wash Post reported on a new report on intelligence: In From the Cold: The Report of the Twentieth Century Fund Task Force on the Future of U.S. Intelligence. This report supplements and differs somewhat from the three released earlier this year by the Brown Commission, Representative Combest's Committee and the Council on Foreign Relations. It recommends greater emphasis on economic intelligence and less on military support as well as reduction of covert operations. Here's an excerpt from the Foreword: The Task Force discerned basic problems that merit far greater attention. Foremost among them is the intelligence community's increasing preoccupation with military priorities since the Soviet Union's collapse, which has coincided with a decline in the usefulness of intelligence to civilian policymakers. To help strike a more equitable balance between the military and civilian needs of the government, the Task Force proposes specific recommendations for strengthening what it perceives to be four pervasive shortcomings: 1) the atrophying analytic capabilities of the intelligence community and U.S. foreign policy agencies; 2) the lack of productive and effective interactions between the intelligence community and civilian officials who make foreign policy decisions; 3) a clandestine service whose costs have too often exceeded its benefits; and 4) poorly organized, unfocused, and often mediocre economic intelligence efforts. The full volume is 275 pages, composed of introductions, the main 21-page report and three extensive and detailed background papers of 248 pages. The introductions and main report are at: http://pwp.usa.pipeline.com/~jya/infrom.txt (60 kb) INF_rom ---------- In From The Cold: The Report of the Twentieth Century Fund Task Force on the Future of U.S. Intelligence. With Background papers by Allan E. Goodman, Gregory F. Treverton and Philip Zelikow The Twentieth Century Fund Press, New York, 1996. $5.95 ISBN 0-87078-392-0 To order by telephone: 1-800-552-5450