Six bloody years ago today, a warmonger pretzeldent said: ' MONEY TRUMPS PEACE.'

[Octafish]

14. Team B: The trillion-dollar experiment

Two experts report on how a group of Cold War true believers were invited to second-guess the CIA. Did the "outside experts" of the 1970s contribute to the military buildup of the 1980s?

By Anne Hessing Cahn
April 1993 pp. 22, 24-27 (vol. 49, no. 03) © 1993 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

lection years have much in common. They produce a profusion of punditry, media attention, and politically expedient action, quickly forgotten, and with little lasting impact. But not always; sometimes events are set into motion that have long lifetimes. This was the case in 1976 when, as in 1992, an incumbent Republican president faced a strong challenge from the right wing of his own party. Then (as last year) sops were offered to placate the far right and, while it is too early to know which of the 1992 capers will endure, we now know a great deal about one of the most political events of 1976, and its remarkably long-lasting effects on U.S. policy.

Late last year, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) released the 1976 "Team B" reports. Team B was an experiment in competitive threat assessments approved by then-Director of Central Intelligence George Bush. Teams of "outside experts" were to take independent looks at the highly classified data used by the intelligence community to assess Soviet strategic forces in the yearly National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs). NIEs are authoritative and are widely circulated within the government. U.S. national security policy on various issues as well as the defense budget are based on their general conclusions. Although NIEs represent the collective judgment of the entire intelligence community, the lead agency is the CIA.

There were three "B" teams. One studied Soviet low-altitude air defense capabilities, one examined Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) accuracy, and one investigated Soviet strategic policy and objectives. But it is the third team, chaired by Harvard professor Richard Pipes, that ultimately received considerable publicity and is commonly referred to as Team B.

The Team B experiment was concocted by conservative cold warriors determined to bury détente and the SALT process. Panel members were all hard-liners. The experiment was leaked to the press in an unsuccessful attempt at an "October surprise." But most important, the Team B reports became the intellectual foundation of "the window of vulnerability" and of the massive arms buildup that began toward the end of the Carter administration and accelerated under President Reagan.

How did the Team B notion come about? In 1974, Albert Wohlstetter, a professor at the University of Chicago, accused the CIA of systematically underestimating Soviet missile deployment, and conservatives began a concerted attack on the CIA's annual assessment of the Soviet threat. This assessment--the NIE--was an obvious target.

In the mid-1970s, the CIA was vulnerable on three counts. First, it was still reeling from the 1975 congressional hearings about covert assassination attempts on foreign leaders and other activities. Second, it was considered "payback time" by hard-liners, who were still smarting from the CIA's realistic assessments during the Vietnam war years--assessments that failed to see light at the end of the tunnel. And finally, between 1973 and 1976, there were four different directors of central intelligence, in contrast to the more stately progression of four directors in the preceding 20 years.

The vehicle chosen from within the administration to challenge the CIA was the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB). Formed as the Board of Consultants on Foreign Intelligence Affairs by President Eisenhower in 1956, PFIAB was reconstituted by President Kennedy in 1961 after the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Members are appointed by the president but hold no other government positions (except possibly on other advisory committees or panels). By 1975, PFIAB was a home for such conservatives as William Casey, John Connally, John Foster, Clare Booth Luce, and Edward Teller.

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