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History of Formation of the Cia

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In September of 1947 the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was realised and hatched, the eventuality of the intelligence reformation in the United States occurring after the Second World War. Less than a year before this date a Joint Congressional Investigation had come to the inevitable conclusion that the Pearl Harbour attack illustrated America’s need for a unified command structure and a more efficient centralised intelligence system. In an attempt to bring these conclusions into realisation, Congress, in September 1947 passed the National Security Act of 1947 (NSA47) that brought into existence an intelligence infrastructure comprising of the National Security Council (NSC), a Secretary of Defense, a statutory Joint Chiefs of …show more content…

NIAD-5 was the directive of the National Intelligence Authority that was comprised of the Secretaries of State, War, and Navy, joined by the President’s chief military adviser, Admiral William Leahy. NIAD-5 represented perhaps the most expansive charter ever granted to a Director of Central Intelligence. It enabled CIG to “centralise” research and analysis in “fields of national security intelligence that are not being presently performed or are not being adequately performed.” NIAD-5 also directed the DCI to coordinate all US foreign intelligence activities “to ensure that the over-all policies and objectives established by this Authority are properly implemented and executed.” Congress initially paid scant attention to the new Central Intelligence Group. CIG had been created with no appropriations and authority of its own precisely to keep it beneath congressional scrutiny. As CIG gained new authority in 1946 through NIAD-5, and the White House gained confidence in its potential, a consensus emerged in Congress that post-war military reforms would not be complete without a simultaneous modernisation of American intelligence capabilities. With the President’s goal of military modernisation suddenly in sight, the White House firmly told

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