[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 86 (Wednesday, June 20, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6511-S6512]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SPECIAL AGENT TIMOTHY F. DEERR, FORMER EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, AIR FORCE
OFFICE OF SPECIAL INVESTIGATIONS
Mr. THURMOND. Mr. President, I rise today to honor a dedicated and
innovative public servant, Timothy F. Deerr, the former Executive
Director of the Air Force Office of Special Investigations, who
recently retired after more than 26 years of loyal and selfless
service.
As any citizen of the United States should know, two major powers
emerged from the ashes and ruins of World War II--the United States of
America and the now defunct Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The
ideologies and interests of these two nations were diametrically
opposed and the aspirations of Soviet communists for global control
made it imperative that America's foot soldiers and leaders in national
security affairs exercise vigilance and sacrifice in defense of
freedom. For almost fifty years, these two superpowers engaged in a
``cold war,'' where conflict was waged through proxies, brinksmanship,
espionage, and counterespionage. It was in this environment in 1975
that Timothy Deerr joined the battle as a civilian Special Agent of the
Air Force Office of Special Investigations.
By the time he completed his career earlier this year, Timothy Deerr
had spent most of his professional life as a cold warrior and spy
catcher. But, before he entered what has alternately been called the
``world's second oldest profession'' and the ``wilderness of mirrors,''
he started out as a criminal investigator in Dayton, Ohio. It was here,
at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, that Special Agent Deerr learned
and
[[Page S6512]]
honed his skills as an investigator, gaining invaluable experience in
how to read people, analyze facts, and test hypotheses.
After 6 years of working criminal cases in Ohio, Special Agent Deerr
swapped the Buckeye State for the divided city of Berlin. Since renamed
as the Capital of a united Germany, Berlin was then a city carved into
sectors of control--a virtual battleground of espionage and counter-
espionage activities. Intelligence operatives from the east and west
worked feverishly against one another, both to steal secrets and to
protect secrets from being compromised. For two years, Special Agent
Deerr conducted critical and successful counterintelligence operations
defending against foreign intelligence services stationed in the
communist sector of Berlin. As a demonstration of the sensitivity of
the operations he conducted, his experiences and cases in Berlin remain
classified to this day, twenty years after he initially reported for
duty there and ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
From 1987, when he left Berlin, until 1994, Special Agent Deerr
earned and held positions of increasing responsibility and importance
within the Office of Special Investigations, including those of Chief,
Central European Counterintelligence Operations, Wiesbaden, West
Germany. Later, as the OSI Director of Counterintelligence, he managed
OSI counterintelligence investigations and operations around the world
and represented OSI and the Air Force on a number of senior policy
boards that crafted our national counterintelligence strategy and
policies.
While freedom loving people in the United States and throughout the
world heralded and celebrated the implosion of communism in the early
1990s, an ironic byproduct of the end of the Soviet Union ensured
America's Cold Warriors would enjoy little respite. While the USSR was
a threat to peace and security for almost fifty years, it was a threat
that we were able to identify and engage. After the Cold War, the world
became, in many regards, a puzzling patchwork of active and potential
adversaries of the United States and American citizens. Not only were
foreign governments targeting our secrets and threatening our security,
so were criminal and terrorist organizations. In recognition of this
new dynamic, in 1994, the President of the United States directed a re-
examination of the U.S. Counterintelligence Program, including ways to
improve coordination, integration and accountability of American
counterintelligence efforts. As a result, Presidential Decision
Directive 24 was issued in May 1994. The directive, in part, mandated
the establishment of the National Counterintelligence Center, and
Special Agent Deerr was tapped as the Deputy Director of the new
National Counterintelligence Center, an impressive distinction and a
testament to his reputation and success as one of America's premier spy
catchers.
In 1996, Special Agent Deerr returned to Air Force OSI as its
Executive Director--the senior civilian Special Agent in the United
States Air Force. During his five-year tenure in the top civilian
position within OSI, Mr. Deerr earned a reputation for innovation and
excellence in leadership. He took the helm at an interesting and
challenging time in the history of OSI. As a result of the end of the
Cold War, diminishing budgets, and retirements of personnel who entered
government service at the height of the Cold War, he faced personnel
upheaval and institutional reorganization. America and our Armed Forces
were faced with new and daunting challenges that required institutional
agility, professional creativity, and cutting-edge technical skills.
Under Executive Director Deerr's steady stewardship, OSI ``re-
invented'' itself as a model for the 21st Century in the fields of
counterintelligence, anti-terrorism, and crime fighting.
OSI built DoD's Computer Forensics Laboratory--America's premier
electronic media forensics lab dedicated to ferreting out evidence of
computer crime, network intrusions, and felony tampering with DoD
computer systems. OSI started and still manages the Defense Computer
Investigations Training Program--DoD's ``graduate school'' for those
tasked with investigating cyber-related crimes. Furthermore, Executive
Director Deerr emerged as a visionary leader of the Defense Criminal
Investigative Organizations, DCIO, Enterprise-Wide Working Group, the
DEW Group. Mr. Deerr and the DEW Group devised innovative enterprise-
wide pilot programs to leverage scarce DoD resources, improve training
and deployment of America's front line investigators, and save taxpayer
dollars.
Executive Director Deerr's influence and innovations extended far
beyond DoD. Through his active membership in the International
Association of Chiefs of Police and the IACP International Policy
Committee, Tim Deerr was instrumental in proliferating enduring
principles of policing professionalism, integrity, civil liberties, and
selfless service to the international policing executive community
across the globe.
After 26 years of service, Executive Director Timothy Deerr left Air
Force OSI an even better agency than the one he joined in 1975. His
career ran the gamut from criminal investigations to catching spies,
and from being a rookie agent to the top civilian on the payroll.
During his almost three decades of service, the world changed
dramatically from a bipolar one where there was a constant threat of
nuclear war to one where the United States must be prepared to counter
threats on a multitude of new fronts. Through his uncommon dedication
and selfless devotion to duty he has left an indelible mark on the face
of counterintelligence within the U.S. Government. I am certain that
all my colleagues will want to join me in commending Mr. Deerr on a
successful career and a job well done as well as wishing him, his wife
Terri, and their daughter Alexandra, great health, happiness, and
prosperity in the years to come.
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