    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book II)]
    [July 14, 1995]
    [Pages 1093-1096]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks at the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Virginia
    July 14, 1995

        Thank you so much. Director Deutch and Mrs. Deutch, Deputy Director
    and Mrs. Tenet, Members of Congress, members of the Aspin Commission who
    are here, men and women of the intelligence community: I can't help
    thinking here at the Central Intelligence Agency that if we were giving
    intelligence awards today they would go to the people back there under
    the trees. [Laughter] Congratulations to all of you for your adaptation
    of the natural environment to the task at hand.
        Before I begin my remarks today I'd like to take care of an
    important piece of business. Just a month ago it was with regret but
    great gratitude for his 32 years of service to our country that I
    accepted the resignation of Admiral Bill Studeman as the Deputy Director
    of Central Intelligence. Today it is with great pleasure that I award
    him the President's National Security Medal. Admiral Studeman, Mrs.
    Studeman, please come up.
        This is the highest award a member of our intelligence community,
    military or civilian, can receive. And no one deserves it more and the
    honor it represents. Most of you are well aware of Bill's extraordinary
    and exemplary career in the Navy, at the National Security Agency, and
    then here at the CIA. Let me say that as Deputy Director of Central
    Intelligence, he served two Presidents and three DCI's. For two extended
    periods he took on the responsibilities of Acting Director. He provided
    continuity and leadership to this community at a time of change and
    great challenge. Here, in Congress, and throughout the executive branch,
    he earned a reputation for integrity, competence, and reliability of the
    highest order. He has dedicated his professional life to making the
    American people safer and more secure. And today it is only fitting
    among those who know best the contributions he has made to our country
    to award him this medal as a small measure of thanks for a job well done
    and a life well lived.
        Thank you, Admiral.
        You know, as the Studemans make their way back to their chairs, I
    have to tell you that even though I have a lot of important things to
    say, I am loathe to make this speech in this heat. Once in the middle of
    a campaign for Governor I went up to a place in northeast Arkansas to
    make a speech for a county judge who was determined that I had to come
    to celebrate this road that he had built with funds that I gave him. He
    neglected to tell me that the road ended in the middle of a rice field.
    [Laughter] The only people that are laughing are the people that
    understand what this means. In the summertime in a rice field, there is
    nothing but heat and mosquitos. And a swarm of mosquitos came up in the
    middle of his introduction, literally hundreds of thousands of
    mosquitos. It was so bad that people were slapping at their cheeks and
    their legs and blood was streaming down people's faces and cheeks. And

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    this judge was one of the rare people that mosquitoes would never bite.
    I had been Governor for 10 years; these people knew me better than he
    did. He took 6 minutes to introduce me. It seemed like it was 6 years.
    [Laughter] And I finally was introduced, and I gave the following
    speech: Folks, I have a good speech, if you want to hear it, come to the
    air-conditioned building down there. If we don't get out of here, we'll
    all die. If you reelect me, I'll kill every mosquito in the county.
    [Laughter] I have to tell you that after that I never received less than
    two-thirds of the vote in that county. [Laughter]
        So I'm loath to give this speech. But I will cut it down and say
    what I have to say to you because it's very important that I say these
    things and very important that America know that you're here and what
    you're doing.
        Fifty-four years ago, in the weeks that led up to Pearl Harbor,
    there was a wide range of intelligence suggesting a Japanese attack that
    made its way to Washington. But there was no clear clearinghouse to
    collect the information and to get it to the decisionmakers. That is
    what led President Truman to establish a central intelligence
    organization.
        In the years since, the men and women of the CIA and its sister
    agencies have done more than most Americans will or can ever know to
    keep our Nation strong and secure and to advance the cause of democracy
    and freedom around the world.
        Today, because the cold war is over, some say that we should and can
    step back from the world and that we don't need intelligence as much as
    we used to, that we ought to severely cut the intelligence budget. A few
    have even urged us to scrap the central intelligence service. I think
    these views are profoundly wrong. I believe making deep cuts in
    intelligence during peacetime is comparable to canceling your health
    insurance when you're feeling fine.
        We are living at a moment of hope. Our Nation is at peace; our
    economy is growing all right. All around the world, democracy and free
    markets are on the march. But none of these developments are inevitable
    or irreversible, and every single study of human psychology or the human
    spirit, every single religious tract tells us that there will be
    troubles, wars, and rumors of war until the end of time.
        Now instead of a single enemy, we face a host of scattered and
    dangerous challenges, but they are quite profound and difficult to
    understand. There are ethnic and regional tensions that threaten to
    flare into full-scale war in more than 30 nations. Two dozen countries
    are trying to get their hands on nuclear, chemical, and biological
    weapons. As these terrible tools of destruction spread, so too spreads
    the potential for terrorism and for criminals to acquire them. And drug
    trafficking, organized crime, and environmental decay threaten the
    stability of new and emerging democracies and threaten our well-being
    here at home.
        In the struggle against these forces, you, the men and women of our
    intelligence community, serve on the front lines. By necessity, a lot of
    your work is hidden from the headlines. But in recent months alone, you
    warned us when Iraq massed its troops against the Kuwaiti border. You
    provided vital support to our peacekeeping and humanitarian missions in
    Haiti and Rwanda. You helped to strike a blow at a Colombian drug
    cartel. You uncovered bribes that would have cheated American companies
    out of billions of dollars. Your work has saved lives and promoted
    America's prosperity. I am here today first and foremost to thank you
    and your families for the work and sacrifices you have made for the
    security of the United States of America.
        I want to work with you to maintain the information and the
    intelligence advantage we have and to meet the demands of a new era.
    Today our Government is deluged with more and more information from more
    and more sources. What once was secret can now be available to anybody
    with cable TV or access to the Internet. It moves around the world at
    record speed. And in order to justify spending billions of dollars in
    this kind of environment on intelligence and to maintain our edge, you
    have to deliver timely, unique information that focuses on real threats
    to the security of our people on the basis of information not otherwise
    available.
        That means we have to rethink what we collect and how we organize
    the intelligence community to collect it. We must be selective. We can't
    possibly have in a world with so many diverse threats and tight budgets
    the resources to collect everything. You need and deserve clear
    priorities from me and our national security team.
        Earlier this year I set out in a Presidential decision directive
    what we most want you to focus on, priorities that will remain under
    con-

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    stant review but still are clear enough at the present time. First, the
    intelligence needs of our military during an operation. If we have to
    stand down Iraqi aggression in the Gulf or stand for democracy in Haiti,
    our military commanders must have prompt, thorough intelligence to fully
    inform their decisions and maximize the security of our troops. Second,
    political, economic, and military intelligence about countries hostile
    to the United States. We must also compile all source information on
    major political and economic powers with weapons of mass destruction who
    are potentially hostile to us. Third, intelligence about specific
    transnational threats to our security, such as weapons proliferation,
    terrorism, drug trafficking, organized crime, illicit trade practices,
    and environmental issues of great gravity.
        This work must be done today, and it is vital to our security. But
    it cannot be immune to the tough budget climate in which we are all
    living. That's why I'm pleased that more than every before, our
    intelligence agencies are cooperating to work efficiently and to
    eliminate duplication. You are already implementing on or ahead of
    schedule 33 streamlining recommendations set out by Vice President Gore
    and former DCI Woolsey as well as changes proposed by Director Deutch.
    Acting apart, our agencies waste resources and squander opportunities to
    make our country more secure. But acting together, they bring a powerful
    force to bear on threats to our security.
        Let me also say that I believe there is no zero sum choice to be
    made between the technological and human dimensions of intelligence. We
    need both, and we will have both. We've used satellites and signals to
    identify troop movements, to point agents in the right direction, to tap
    into secret important conversations. Today, some of your extraordinary
    in-house innovations are available for broader use, and I am interested
    in learning more about them: imagery technology, developed for the cold
    war, now being used in aid to natural disaster relief; imagery
    technology with great hope for the fight against breast cancer. We have
    to keep moving on this kind of technological frontier.
        But no matter how good our technology, we'll always rely on human
    intelligence to tell us what an adversary has in mind. We'll always need
    gifted, motivated case officers at the heart of the clandestine service.
    We'll always need good analysts to make a clean and clear picture out of
    the fragments of what our spies and satellites put on the table.
        And if we're going to continue to attract and keep the best people,
    we have to do a better job of rewarding work. I think the best way to do
    that is for the community leadership to demonstrate to you that
    excellence of performance, equal opportunity, and personal
    accountability are the only standards that will count when it comes to
    promotion. And that is what Director Deutch has pledged to do.
        Let me say that I know the Ames scandal has colored a lot of what is
    the current debate over the future of the CIA. I imagine most of you who
    work here think that the Ames scandal has colored what the average
    American thinks about the CIA, although my guess is that you're probably
    overestimating that and underestimating the common sense and balance of
    an average American citizen. It's important that we don't minimize the
    damage that Ames did or the changes that need to be made to prevent
    future scandals. But Aldridge Ames was a terrible exception to a proud
    tradition of service, a tradition that is reflected in the 59 stars that
    shine on the CIA's memorial wall in honor of those who gave their lives
    to serve our country.
        So we owe it to all of you in the intelligence community and to the
    American people to make sure we act on the lessons of his treason but
    also to remind the American people that the people who work for the
    Central Intelligence Agency are patriotic Americans who have made a
    decision that they are going to devote their careers to keeping this
    country safe and strong. And I thank you for that.
        As soon as Ames was brought to justice, I ordered a comprehensive
    reexamination in both internal and external studies of our
    counterintelligence operations. As a result, we changed the way
    intelligence community does its business. Each agency now requires more
    attention and continuous training in counterintelligence and evaluates
    its employees more thoroughly and frequently.
        Above all, we are insisting that those involved in an operation take
    responsibility for its integrity. That requires careful advanced
    planning that integrates counterintelligence into everything you do from
    day one. This isn't just about safes and locks, it's about designing
    operations that minimize the possibility of a security breakdown.

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        Director Deutch and I want to ensure that these new policies are
    carried out carefully so that we can avoid creating a climate of
    suspicion that embitters rather than empowers you. As we guard against a
    repeat of the Ames episode, we have to be careful not to produce a
    culture so risk averse that case officers refuse to take chances and
    analysts are afraid to speak their minds. You must not be paralyzed by
    the fear of failure.
        This administration will continue to support bold and aggressive
    actions by the intelligence community consistent with the laws of the
    land, consistent with our interests, and consistent with our values. I
    applaud Director Deutch's plan, for example, to issue new rules on
    dealing with foreign agents suspected of human rights abuses. We owe you
    clear guidance on this issue. And as a country, we have to resolve it in
    the right way.
        Finally, we owe the American public and Congress a full role in the
    debate over the future of intelligence. For over 40 years, bipartisan
    support for the work you perform has been central to your success. That
    support and the confidence of the American people were built on the
    unique oversight and consultative role Congress plays in intelligence.
    That's why Director Deutch and I will take with the utmost seriousness
    the concerns and suggestions of both the Congress and the Aspin
    commission.
        Every morning I start my day with an intelligence report. The
    intelligence I receive informs just about every foreign policy decision
    we make. It's easy to take it for granted, but we couldn't do without
    it. Unique intelligence makes it less likely that our forces will be
    sent into battle, less likely that American lives will have to put at
    risk. It gives us a chance to prevent crises instead of forcing us to
    manage them.
        So let me say to all the men and women of our intelligence
    community, I know and you know the challenges we face today will not be
    easy, but we know that you are already working every day to increase the
    security of every American. You are making a difference. Now we have to
    work together, and I have to support you so that we can meet the
    challenge of doing this work even better with even more public support
    and confidence in its integrity and long-term impact. That is my
    commitment to you as you renew your commitment to America in a world
    fraught with danger but filled with promise that you will help us to
    seize.
        Thank you very much, and God bless you all.

    Note: The President spoke at 11:45 a.m. In his remarks, he referred to
    Director of Central Intelligence John M. Deutch and his wife, Patricia;
    Deputy Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet and his wife,
    Stephanie; and former Director of Central Intelligence Adm. William O.
    Studeman, USN (Ret.), and his wife, Diane.