page_title: Schlesinger Report
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Schlesinger Report / History
caption_attribution_description: James Schlesinger, former United States Secretary of Defense.
context_page_description: The Schlesinger Report, originally titled A Review of the Intelligence Community, was the product of a survey authorized by U.S. President Richard Nixon late in 1970. The objective of the survey was to identify and alleviate factors of ineffectiveness within the United States Intelligence Community organization, planning, and preparedness for future growth. The report, prepared by James Schlesinger, Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget, was submitted to Nixon on 10 March 1971.
  The survey was the first of the IC reform attempts to specifically address the growing technological capabilities of the IC and their impact on the collection process. The report highlighted two "disturbing phenomena" within the IC: an "impressive rise in ... size and cost" and the "apparent inability to achieve a commensurate improvement in the scope and overall quality of intelligence products." The report analyzed issues pertaining to organizational fragmentation, lack of interagency centralization, costly emerging technologies, duplication of collection and analysis, and institutional disorganization, and offered the administration several practical options for improving IC functions.
context_section_description: Following the 1968 presidential election, the newly elected Nixon administration immediately focused its attention on the IC.  Nixon and his National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger initially viewed the IC, particularly the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), with condescension, believing it was not sharing important information with the administration.  Additionally, Nixon felt that steadily increasing capabilities and costs directed toward IC functions should naturally be yielding a better intelligence product.  Nixon also lost faith with the analytical arm of the IC when the Cambodian coup of 1970 took the administration by surprise.
  Since little evidence indicated a direct correlation between intelligence expenditures and quality outputs, Nixon commissioned James Schlesinger to conduct a survey of the IC.  Schlesinger's goal was to identify problems within the IC and recommend ideas for improvement.  While Schlesinger is credited as chief preparer of the document, it was drafted by Arnold Donohue of the OMB.
caption: James Schlesinger
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