The Directorate of Operations (CIA)

1.0 Introduction

The Directorate of Operations (DO), also known as the National Clandestine Service (NCS), is a major component of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). It serves as the “national authority for the coordination, deconfliction, and evaluation of clandestine human intelligence operations across the Intelligence Community”. Supporting the USA’s security and foreign policy across the globe, it conducts clandestine activities aimed at collecting information not obtainable through other means. The Directorate of Operations also conducts special activities authorised by the President of the United States. [Source]

2.0 Motto, Symbols, and History

2.1 Motto

The motto of the Directorate of Operations is: 

“Veritatem Cognoscere”

In English, this stands for “To Know the Truth”.

2.2 Symbols of the Directorate of Operations

The Directorate of Operations has an official logo which has the name of the organisation and the logo ‘Veritatem Cognoscere’ on the bottom underneath.

The Directorate of Operations also issues challenge coins for agents and operatives who have excelled in service or achievement and to commemorate special events or missions. The CIA does not publicly endorse or acknowledge the existence of these coins. [Source]

2.3 History of the Directorate of Operations

In 1951, the Directorate of Operations was first conceived as the Directorate of Plans. It has gone under several names and increasing levels of oversight until it was fully under agency control.

2.3.1 Predecessor Organisations to the Directorate of Operations

The Directorate of Plans solved the organisational rivalry between the Office of Special Operations (OSO) and the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC). Operational overlap between the two departments within the CIA created this rivalry, as the OSO focused on the collection of intelligence, whereas the OPC focused on covert action. [Source]

The Director of Central Intelligence Walter Bedell Smith, appointed Allen Dulles on 4 January 1951 to the new position of the Deputy Director of Plans (DDP). This position would oversee the two departments, the OSO and OPC. On 1 August 1952, they formally merged the two departments to create the Directorate of Plans (DDP). [Source]

The DDP was the branch of the CIA which conducted covert operations and recruited agents outside of the United States. Within the Deputy Directorate of Plans, there were several subdivisions, such as the Covert Action Staff (responsible for political and economic covert action), the Special Operations unit (dealing with paramilitary covert action), and counterintelligence. The DDP also featured specialized groups for counter-narcotics, counter-terrorism operations, and tracking nuclear materials. Additionally, there were desks assigned to specific geographical areas to handle. [Source]

On 1 March 1973, the DDP became the Directorate of Operations (DO) and the head of the organisation became known as the Deputy Director for Operations or DDO. [Source]

2.3.2 Clandestine and Covert Operations Approval

During the early days of the DDP, there was an internal authority and a semi-autonomous nature regarding the approval of covert operations. After the creation of the CIA, the agency became the initial financial manager for the OPC and OSO. They were authorised to handle “unvouchered funds” (covert black-ops funding also known as a black budget) by the National Security Council (NSC). [Source]

The NSC 4-A document made the Director of the CIA responsible for psychological warfare and established that the covert action and its approval was an exclusive Executive Branch function. [Source]

2.3.2 OPC Autonomy

The early usage of a new covert action mandate by the OPC during its creation created tensions among officials at the Department of State and Defense. The Department of State believed the role was too important to be left solely to the CIA and was concerned that the military might create a rival covert action office within the Pentagon. As a result, they created a new NSC directive, NSC 10/2, which superseded the NSC 4-A directive.

This new directive (NSC 10/2) directed the CIA to conduct covert operations rather than psychological operations. They defined these covert operations as ones 

“which are conducted or sponsored by this Government against hostile foreign states or groups or in support of friendly foreign states or groups but which are so planned and executed that any US Government responsibility for them is not evident to unauthorized persons and that if uncovered the US Government can plausibly disclaim any responsibility for them.”

[Source]

The NSC 10/2 directive defined the scope of these operations as 

“propaganda; economic warfare; preventive direct action, including sabotage, demolition and evacuation measures; subversion against hostile states, including assistance to underground resistance movements, guerrillas and refugee liberations groups, and support of indigenous anti-Communist elements in threatened countries of the free world. Such operations should not include armed conflict by recognized military forces, espionage, counter-espionage, and cover and deception for military operations.”

[Source]

2.3.3 Creation of the Psychological Strategy Board

Guerilla warfare was outside the mandate of the NSC 10/2 scope, but was under partial control of the CIA within the NSC 10/5 directive. In September 1948, they created the OPC in order to implement covert actions under the NSC 10/2. This initially had the OPC taking guidance from the State Department in peacetime and the military during wartime. It also initially meant that the OPC had direct access to the State Department and military without proceeding through the structure of the CIA. However, the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) had to be informed of all the important projects and decisions. [Source]

In 1951, the Director of Central Intelligence Walter Bedell Smith asked for enhanced policy guidance surrounding the correct ‘scope and magnitude” of CIA operations. The White House responded in April 1951 with the creation of the Psychological Strategy Board (PSB) under the NSC to coordinate the government’s psychological warfare strategy across departments. [Source]

The NSC 10/5 which was issued in October 1951, made it certain that covert action was under the NSC 10/2 directive and also expanded the CIA’s authority over guerilla warfare. The Eisenhower administration abolished the PSB, but NSC 10/5 ensured that covert action would remain a major function of the Agency. [Source]

2.3.4 CIA control of the OPC and OSO

The Eisenhower administration began narrowing the CIA mandate in 1954 following the consolidation of the CIA, OPC and OSO in 1952. The National Security Council issued many directives to clarify the Director of Central Intelligence’s responsibility for conducting covert operations. NSC 5412, approved by President Eisenhower in March 1954, reaffirmed the responsibility of the CIA to conduct covert operations outside of the United States. [Source]

Several committees oversaw the operations, containing members from the State, the Defense Department and the CIA, as well as the White House or the NSC. Over time, these organisations were called the Operations Coordinating Board (OCB), NSC 5412/2 Special Group, Special Group, Special Group (Augmented), 303 Committee, and Special Group (Counterinsurgency). [Source]

2.3.5 Post 9-11 Intelligence Community Legislation

After the 9/11 attacks, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence conducted a joint report known as the ‘Joint Inquiry into Intelligence Community Activities before and after the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001’. This report, alongside one released by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, showed a series of serious shortcomings in the Intelligence Community’s HUMINT (Human Intelligence) capabilities. These shortcomings ranged from a lack of qualified linguists to the lack of intelligence community-wide information sharing. [Source]

These reports resulted in the passage of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act in 2004. This created the position of the Director of National Intelligence and gave the CIA director the task of creating a “strategy for improving the human intelligence and other capabilities of the Agency”. [Source]

2.3.6 Creation of the National Clandestine Service

In 2004, the Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senator Pat Roberts, drafted the 9/11 National Security Protection Act, proposing the removal of the Directorate of Operations from the CIA and its establishment as an independent agency named the National Clandestine Service (NCS). The creation of the NCS was also recommended by the Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the US Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction. [Source, source]

The Commission found that HUMINT capabilities within the broader intelligence community had significantly deteriorated since the end of the Cold War and were ill-equipped to target non-state actors, particularly terrorist organizations. It also revealed poor coordination of HUMINT operations between agencies and recommended the implementation of improved methods for verifying human sources, particularly in light of controversies surrounding sources like Curveball. [Source]

The CIA announced the creation of the NCS in a press release on 13 October 2005 and contrary to the proposal by Senator Roberts, the NCS would be a component of the CIA rather than an independent executive branch agency. [Source]

2.3.7 Curveball

Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi, also known by his cryptonym ‘Curveball’, was a German citizen who had defected from Iraq in 1999. He had claimed that he worked as a chemical engineer at a plant that manufactured biological weapons as a part of the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD) program. [Source, source]

The US and British governments disregarded warnings from the German Federal Intelligence Service (BND) and the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), citing them as justifications for military action in the lead-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.w President George W. Bush stated that 

“We know that Iraq, in the late 1990s, had several mobile biological weapons labs”.

[Source]

On 24 September 2002, British Prime Minister Tony Blair stated in a document published by the British government that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had continued the production of WMD “Beyond doubt”. [Source]

In February 2011, Alwan admitted in an interview with the Guardian newspaper that “He lied about his story, then watched in shock as it was used to justify the war.”

3.0 Organisation of the Directorate of Operations

The National Clandestine Service has two ways of organization. One is under the Deputy Director of the National Clandestine Service, which is:

• Deputy Director of the National Clandestine Services
  • Counterintelligence center
  • Counterterrorism center
  • Counterprolfiertaion Center
  • National Resettlement Operations Center
  • Information Operations Center
  • Geographical Divisions
    • Latin America Division
    • Europe Division
    • Central Eurasia Division
    • East Asia Division
    • Africa Division
    • Near East Division
    • Iran Operations Divison
• Special Activities Division
  • Special Operations Group
  • Political Action Group
• National Resources Division
  • National Collection Branch
  • Foreign Resources Branch
• Technology Support Divisions

The other way is under the Deputy Director of the NCS for Community HUMINT

• Deputy Director of the NCS for Community HUMINT
  • Community HUMINT Coordination Center

[Source, source]

3.1 Special Activites Center

The Special Activities Center (SAC) is the paramilitary function that enters and prepares an area before operations by US Special Forces. It can conduct psychological operations and more overt military actions. Paramilitary Operations officers from the Special Operations Group (SOG) are under the SAC. Highly skilled in a variety of military techniques, including weaponry and infiltration/extraction methods, they maintain a symbiotic relationship with the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), largely led by former JSOC members. [Source]

3.1.1 SAC and Special Operations

The SAC is a special operations force and operates alongside the military five special missions units, which include:

• US Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU, NSWDG or SEAL Team Six)
• US Army 1st Special Forces Operational Attachment-Delta (Delta Force, A.C.E or C.A.G.)
• US Army Intelligence Support Activity (I.S.A., The Activity previously known as Gray Fox)
• US Army Regimental Reconnaissance Company
• US Air Forces 24th Special Tactics Squadron

3.2 Directorate of Operations Officers

The DO has four designated categories of officers and they are as follows:

• Case Officers (CO) – Case officers, former operations officers, specialize in clandestinely identifying, assessing, and developing/recruiting individuals with access to crucial foreign intelligence. [Source]
• Collection Management Officers (CMO) – These officers oversee and facilitate the collection, analysis, and dissemination of foreign intelligence gathered from clandestine sources. These officers ensure that any intelligence collected from foreign sources applies to national security issues. [Source]
• Staff Operations Officers (SOO) – These officers are based out of the CIA headquarters in Washington D.C. and they plan the intelligence collection operations, covert action programs and counterintelligence activities undertaken by the DO. [Source]
• Specialised Skills Officers (SSO) – These officers consist of language experts, paramilitary Operations Officers, Programs and Plans Officers and Targeting Officers and Information Resource officers. The SSOs conduct or directly supports CIA operations and focuses on HUMINT. [Source]

3.3 Financing

The Directorate of Operations budget is unknown, but it receives its funding from the CIA and the United States intelligence budget. This budget funds the 18 agencies of the US intelligence community and runs according to the Fiscal Year (FY). It has two components which are the National Intelligence Program (NIP) and the Military Intelligence Program (MIP). [Source]

The aggregate amount that the appropriations requested for both the NIP and MIP programs in 2023 alone was $93.7 billion. This provided $67.1 billion for the NIP and $26.6 billion for the MIP in FY2023. [Source]

3.4 Key Figures of the Directorate of Operations

David Marlowe – David Marlowe is the Deputy Director of the CIA for Operations and is one of the Directorate of Operations Agency executives. With a 30-year career in the CIA, Director William Burns appointed him to lead the Directorate’s shift from counterterrorism operations toward addressing near-peer competition. He can speak Arabic and 20 years of his career involved overseas field assignments. [Source]

William J. Burns – William Joseph Burns is an American diplomat who has served as Director of the CIA since 19 March 2021. In Early 2021, he flew to Moscow to notify the secretary of Putin’s security council, Nikolai Patrushev, that the US believed that Putin was considering a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. In his confirmation hearing, he reiterated that 

“an adversarial, predatory Chinese leadership poses our biggest geopolitical test”

[Source, source]

3.5 Recruitment

The Directorate of Operations recruits from several areas and this ranges from university programs, academic institutions and also direct applications on the CIA website. [Source, source, source]

3.5.1 Minimum Requirements

The variety of jobs under the Directorate of Operations has several minimum requirements. These include, but are not limited to:

• Bachelors or Masters degree
• High GPA (grade point average)
• High writing ability
• Interpersonal/communication skills
• Foreign travel and area knowledge
• Prior residency abroad
• Cross-cultural sensitivity
• Foreign language proficiency
• Ability to work in a team

 [Source, source]

3.5.2 Successful Applicants to the Directorate of Operations

Successful applicants have to undergo several further checks, such as the following:

• Personal Interviews
• Medical examination
• Psychological examination
• Polygraph interview
• Extensive background checks

[Source]

3.5.3 Paramilitary Operations Officer Training

Paramilitary Operations Officers undergo training at Camp Peary in Virginia, “The Point” a facility outside of Hertford, North Carolina and also at private facilities all around the United States. [Source, source]

Paramilitary Operations Officers undergo rigorous training to achieve a high level of proficiency in:

• Explosive devices and firearms (foreign and domestic)
• Hand-to-hand combat
• High-performance/tactical driving (on and off-road)
• Apprehension avoidance (including picking handcuffs and escaping from confinement)
• Improvised explosive devices
• Cyberwarfare
• Covert channels
• HAHO / HALO parachuting
• Combat and commercial SCUBA
• Closed circuit diving
• Proficiency in foreign languages
• Surreptitious entry operations (picking or otherwise bypassing locks)
• Vehicle hot-wiring
• Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE)
• Extreme survival and wilderness training
• Combat EMS medical training
• Tactical communications
• Tracking

3.6 Connections to other important organisations

The CIA places the Directorate of Operations under its authority and, therefore, connects it to the Agency. It therefore works alongside a variety of other intelligence agencies under the wider umbrella of the US intelligence community. This includes:

• Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI)
• Coast Guard Intelligence (CGI)
• Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR)
• Sixteenth Air Force (16 AF)
• National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS)
• National Reconnaissance Office (NRO)
• Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA)
• Military Intelligence Corps (MIC)
• Office of Intelligence and Counterintelligence (OICI)
• Marine Corps Intelligence (MCI)
• National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA)
• Office of Intelligence and Analysis (OIA)
• Intelligence Branch (IB)
• Office of National Security Intelligence (ONSI)
• Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A)
• National Space Intelligence Center (NSIC)

4. Equipment of the Directorate of Operations

The Special Activities Center (SAC) is the paramilitary operations division within the Directorate of Operations and uses a variety of equipment. They will use a variety of domestically produced weapons and vehicles but will also use in-country weapons and equipment when it is necessary for their operations to be plausibly deniable.

4.1 Weapons

The SAC likely use weapons which are common to the region they are operating in or whatever weapons and equipment their partner forces are using. Notable weapons of the SAC include:

• M4A1
• M203 Grenade Launcher
• M320 Grenade Launcher
• M79 Grenade Launcher
• HK 416 (10.4in and 14.5in barrel variants)
• Mk18 Mod 0 & Mod 1
• M14
• M249 SAW
• Mk12 Mod 0 & Mod 1
• Mk18 Mod 0 & Mod 2
• Mk 46
• Mk48
• AK variants
• Glock 17, 19, 22 &26

[Source]

4.2 Vehicles

The SAC and DO likely manage a fleet of vehicles that they can plausibly deny and potentially acquire from foreign nations to maintain this secrecy. [Source]

5. Tactical-Operational Information

The DO officers specialize in several areas of tactics. This includes the clandestine spotting, developing and recruitment of individuals and the analysis of information of these individuals who have access to vital foreign intelligence.

5.1 Covert Action

The definition of covert action is…

“an activity or activities of the United States government to influence political, economic, or military conditions abroad, where it is intended that the role of the United States Government will not be apparent or acknowledged publicly”.

413b TITLE 50—WAR AND NATIONAL DEFENSE

[Source]

In a covert action, the emphasis lies on concealing the sponsor rather than the operation itself, distinguishing it from a clandestine operation. These covert operations also encompass paramilitary and psychological activities. However, Executive Order 12333 has banned people employed by or acting on behalf of the US government from conducting assassinations. [Source, source]

5.2 Operations of the Directorate of Operations

The DO and its paramilitary arm, the SAC (SAC/SOG) have been involved in several notable operations over the years. These include:

• Somalia – The CIA sent teams of paramilitary Operations Officers into Somalia before the 1992 intervention by the US. SAD/SOG teams were responsible for the tracking and capture of HVTs (high-value targets) with little or no support. One such HVT was Osman Ato who was a money man with ties to Mohamad Farrah Aidid, a Somali General wanted for several crimes against humanity. A CIA case officer and a CIA Technical Operations Officer worked together to deliver a can with a beacon to Osman, whom JSOC’s Delta Force tracked and captured. [Source]
• Tora Bora – In December 2001, the SAC and Delta Force tracked down Osama Bin Laden to the Tora Bora cave complex in Afghanistan. The CIA and JSOC forces were outnumbered by al-Qaeda forces and were also denied additional support and troops by higher command, according to former CIA station chief Gary Berntsen. [Source, source]
• Syria – On 26 October 2019 a US JSOC Delta Force group conducted a raid which resulted in the death of Abū Bakr al-Baghdadi, the ex-caliph of the Islamic State. This two-hour-long raid ended in Baghdadi fleeing from US forces into a tunnel and detonating a suicide vest. The raid was conducted based on intelligence gathered by the CIA Special Activities Division’s intelligence collection division. [Source, source]
• Abd al-Rahim Hussein Muhammed Abdu al-Nashir – The Special Activities Division captured al-Rahim, a Saudi Arabian citizen alleged to be the mastermind behind the bombing of the USS Cole, in 2002. [Source]

5.3 Personnel size

Like much of the US Intelligence Community, the size of the Directorate of Operations personnel is classified and thus not publicly disclosed. However, a 2013 news report of the CIA’s overall size estimates the entire organisation at having 21,575 employees. [Source]

6. Conclusion

The Directorate of Operations is predominantly focused on foreign intelligence collection. Supporting the USA’s security and foreign policy across the globe the Directorate of Operations conducts clandestine activities aimed at collecting information not obtainable through other means.

While the last 20 years of the Global War on Terror (GWOT) there was a a strong focus on counterterrorism and covert action. Today, there is a cultural and operational shift towards countering near-peer threats such as Russia and China.