A joint study group in 1958 recommended the consolidation of mili-
tary intelligence agencies within the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
However, President John F. Kennedy’s secretary of defense, Robert
McNamara, decided to allow the services to retain tactical intelligence
and transfer strategic military intelligence to the Defense Intelligence
Agency (DIA), which was established in 1961 as the intelligence arm
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The energetic use of new collection technologies enabled U.S. intel-
ligence agencies to score some impressive successes during the 1960s.
For example, U.S. intelligence did forecast the Sino-Soviet split in
1962, the development of the Chinese atomic bomb in 1964, the de-
ployment of new Soviet strategic weapons, the Arab-Israeli War in
1967, and the Soviet antiballistic missile (ABM) system in 1968. How-
ever, there is also an equally impressive list of intelligence failures dur-
ing the 1960s. The Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961, intended to
oust Fidel Castro from power, turned into a disaster. In quick succession
thereafter, U.S. intelligence failed to forecast developments in Vietnam,
although intelligence officials were split on various issues, with the CIA
assessing the war as unwinnable and the military holding on to the view
that sufficient force could conclude the war. American intelligence also
failed to foresee the toughness of the Vietnamese guerrillas—the Viet
Cong—and the Tet Offensive of 1968, which is generally considered
the watershed event that turned the American public against the U.S.
political leadership and the conduct of the Vietnam War. U.S. intelli-
gence failed in 1968 to forecast the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.
The decade of the 1970s ushered in an era that weakened U.S. intel-
ligence. Soon after the decade began, American intelligence was mired
in defending itself against a public outcry about its illegal activities.
Revelations came in quick succession—assassination attempts against
Castro, an assassination program in Vietnam (the Phoenix Program),
spying on antiwar activists in the United States (COINTELPRO), dirty
tricks against civil-rights leaders and liberal politicians, and the over-
throw of democratically elected governments. The public as well as po-
litical leaders demanded curbs on U.S. intelligence, which were quickly
set in place.
In 1974, the Hughes-Ryan Amendment, an amendment to the Intelli-
gence Authorization Act, prohibited the Central Intelligence Agencyxlviii • INTRODUCTION05-398 (1) FM.qxd 10/20/05 6:14 AM Page xlviii