Intel improvement

911: Do We Need A Director of National Intelligence?

The current Director of National Intelligence (DNI) is the fourth person to hold that position since the agency’s creation four years after the 911 terror attacks. Should there be a fifth?

Saying yes might invite some critical questions, starting with, well, “why?” Why should that position, and the office it heads, be funded and maintained? There’s no critical intelligence capability — at least not in public view — that would be lost; the four operational centers (National Counterterrorism Center, National Counterproliferation Center, National Intelligence Centers, and Joint Intelligence Community Council) could easily be transferred. And that might be a good idea.

No essential function or process would disappear; planning, budgets, and operations could evolve or devolve to other offices. Eliminating the DNI might increase efficiency, removing an entire layer of bureaucratic overhead and recovering for productive activity a good portion of the innumerable hours now spent in meetings and coordination and duplicative review and oversight.