Lost agency: CIA must return to its roots to become effective once again.

• Author: Faddis, Charles
• Position: VIEWPOINT - Central Intelligence Agency - Viewpoint essay

In 1942, as the United States went to war with brutal and fanatical foes, President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the creation of the first civilian intelligence collection organization in U.S. history.

The Office of Strategic Services (OSS), under the brilliant direction of its first and only leader, Gen. William "Wild Bill" Donovan, performed legendary service throughout World War II from the jungles of Burma to the mountains of Norway and into the heart of the Third Reich, itself.

At the advent of the Cold War, the OSS became the Central Intelligence Agency--and the CIA morphed into a large, lumbering bureaucracy.

Almost seven decades after the birth of this civilian intelligence agency, we need to go back to the beginning--to a lean, flexible, imaginative organization trained and equipped to confront our nation's enemies. We need a new OSS.

The office in 1942 was an organization built in the image of Donovan, himself, and staffed by what he called his "glorious amateurs." Occasional failure was accepted as the cost of doing business. Inactivity was not. Donovan told bis agents that it they fell, "they should fall forward." Within the OSS were Army paratroopers and regular military officers. There were also former communists, actors, professional athletes, bankers, lawyers and socialites. Probably the single most effective OSS operative was a one-legged woman named Virginia Hall, who operated inside occupied France disguised as a peasant despite continuous, ruthless efforts by the Gestapo to hunt her down.

The OSS adopted a simple operational methodology: it did whatever it took to acquire the intelligence the nation desperately needed. Across the world it penetrated embassies, recruited foreign diplomats and stole secrets to intercept the official communications of hostile nations. The intelligence acquired was important, but it was not enough, and so the OSS also sent operatives deep into occupied territory under a variety of non-official covers to steal secrets, conduct sabotage and make contact with resistance groups. The dividends paid were enormous, but so were the costs. OSS agents caught by the Germans were lucky it they were killed quickly. Donovan knew what price his people would pay for acquiring the intelligence the nation needed. The men and women of the OSS understood exactly what sacrifices they would have to make.

After a hiatus following the end of the war, the OSS was reborn in 1947 as the Central Intelligence Agency...