Through a Glass, Darkly:The CIA and Oral History

This article broaches the thorny issue of how we may study the history of the CIA by utilizing oral history interviews. This article argues that while oral history interviews impose particular demands upon the researcher, they are particularly pronounced in relation to studying the history of intelligence services. This article, nevertheless, also argues that while intelligence history and oral history each harbour their own epistemological perils and biases, pitfalls which may in fact be pronounced when they are conjoined, the relationship between them may nevertheless be a productive one. Indeed, each field may enrich the other provided we have thought carefully about the linkages between them: this article's point of departure. The first part of this article outlines some of the problems encountered in studying the CIA by relating them to the author's own work. This involved researching the CIA's role in US foreign policy towards Afghanistan since a landmark year in the history of the late Cold War, 1979 (i.e. the year the Soviet Union invaded that country). The second part of this article then considers some of the issues historians must confront when applying oral history to the study of the CIA. To bring this within the sphere of cognition of the reader the author recounts some of his own experiences interviewing CIA officers in and around Washington DC. The third part then looks at some of the contributions oral history in particular can make towards a better understanding of the history of intelligence services and the CIA

Social Media and Intelligence

This paper is part of CATS’ project on intelligence for terrorismand homeland security, sponsored by the Swedish CivilContingencies Agency (MSB). It addresses the use and potentialuse of social media in intelligence – looking across the range ofpossible uses both externally and as collaborative tools within andacross agencies. The first half of the paper lays out four categoriesof intelligence interactions using social media, and then discussesthem briefly, drawing primarily on U.S. experiences. The secondpart of the paper turns more specifically to the mix of new mediaand old at play in conflicts around the world, especially in theMiddle East and Russia/Crimea/Ukraine. Gregory Treverton is chairman of the U.S. National IntelligenceCouncil. However, this paper was written when he was a Directorof the RAND Corporation’s Center for Global Risk and Security,and a visiting fellow at CATS. Renanah Miles is a Ph.D. candidate in Political Science atColumbia University and a summer associate at the RANDCorporation. She concentrates in international relations with afocus on security studies and the Middle East. Previously she wasa program analyst in the Office of the Secretary of Defense