(CIA) of documents exclusively on the Vietnam war

(CIA) of documents exclusively on the Vietnam war

http://www.cia.gov/nic/NIC_foia_vietnam.html

This collection of declassified estimative products is the first such release by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of documents exclusively on the Vietnam war and is one of the largest such releases to date. Of the 174 documents that comprise the collection, 38 appear at least in part on this site as selected Vietnam NIEs, and all are on a companion compact disk in their entirety. The intent is to add to the scholarship of the period and to make the documents more readily accessible to the general public.

All but 18 of the documents were produced by the Office of National Estimates (ONE), which was established in November 1950 for the sole purpose of producing such "national intelligence" assessments. ONE was replaced in 1973 by the National Intelligence Officer (NIO) system, which remains an integral part of today's National Intelligence Council (NIC). Fourteen documents in the collection published between 1973 and 1975 were produced by the NIO system, and four documents published before December 1950 were produced by ONE's predecessor organization, the Office of Reports and Estimates (ORE).

The documents fall into two broad categories: 1) formal products of the national intelligence estimative process, and 2) memoranda put out unilaterally by ONE. The most important difference in the two categories is that the products of the formal process— mostly National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs) or Special National Intelligence Estimates (SNIEs)— were coordinated with the constituent agencies of what is now known as the Intelligence Community while the ONE memoranda for the most part were not. Importantly, however, both the formal products and substantive ONE memoranda in the collection were written for and disseminated to the highest levels of policymaking, including in many cases the President. Few of the ONE memoranda have been declassified before, and many of the NIEs and SNIEs published between the late 1960s and 1975 have not been previously released.
http://www.cia.gov/nic/NIC_foia_vietnam.html

Purchase a Hardcopy of “Estimative Products on Vietnam, 1948-1975”
(including the companion CD). GPO stock number #041-015-00242-2
http://bookstore.gpo.gov

Visit the Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) Web site - Vietnam Collection for the full text of the 174 declassified Vietnam NIEs.
http://www.foia.cia.gov/nic_vietnam_collection.asp

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NIC MISSION
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The National Intelligence Council (NIC) is the Intelligence Community's (IC's) center for midterm and long-term strategic thinking. Its primary functions are to:

* Support the DNI in his role as head of the Intelligence Community.
* Provide a focal point for policymakers to task the Intelligence Community to answer their questions.
* Reach out to nongovernment experts in academia and the private sector to broaden the Intelligence Community's perspective.
* Contribute to the Intelligence Community's effort to allocate its resources in response to policymakers' changing needs.
* Lead the Intelligence Community's effort to produce National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs) and other NIC products.

NIEs are the DNI's most authoritative written judgments concerning national security issues. They contain the coordinated judgments of the Intelligence Community regarding the likely course of future events. The NIC's goal is to provide policymakers with the best, unvarnished, and unbiased information—regardless of whether analytic judgments conform to US policy. National Intelligence Officers' (NIOs) primary functions are to:

* Advise the DNI.
* Interact regularly with senior intelligence consumers and support their current and longer-term needs.
* Produce top-quality estimative intelligence in a process that is efficient and responsive.
* Engage with outside experts to tap their knowledge and insights.
* Help assess the capabilities and needs of IC analytic producers.
* Promote collaboration among IC analytic producers on strategic warning, advanced analytic tools, and methodologies.
* Articulate substantive priorities to guide intelligence collection, evaluation, and procurement.
http://www.cia.gov/nic/NIC_about.html