Direct Action Services
There is no consensus on whether it is, or is not, advisable to intermingle espionage and direct action organizations, even at the headquarters level. See Clandestine HUMINT and Covert Action for more history and detail. A terminology point: current US terminology, ignoring an occasional euphemism, has now consolidated espionage into the National Clandestine Services. These are part of the CIA Directorate of Operations, which has some responsibility for Direct Action (DA) and Unconventional Warfare (UW), although the latter two, when of any appreciable size, are the responsibility of the military.
There is much more argument for doing so at headquarters, possibly not as one unit but with regular consultation. Certain services, such as name checks, communications, cover identities, and technical support may reasonably be combined, although the requirements of a particular field network should be held on a need-to-know basis.
Other countries might have the functions under the same organization, but run them in completely different networks. The only commonality they might have is emergency use of diplomatic facilities.
Read more about this topic: Clandestine HUMINT Operational Techniques
Famous quotes containing the words direct, action and/or services:
“O wretched fool,
That lov’st to make thine honesty a vice!
O monstrous world! Take note, take note, O world,
To be direct and honest is not safe.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Besides, our action on each other, good as well as evil, is so incidental and at random, that we can seldom hear the acknowledgments of any person who would thank us for a benefit, without some shame and humiliation. We can rarely strike a direct stroke, but must be content with an oblique one; we seldom have the satisfaction of yielding a direct benefit, which is directly received.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Those services which the community will most readily pay for, it is most disagreeable to render.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)