Good morning, Chairman Wolf, Congressman Mollohan, and Members of the Subcommittee. I appreciate the opportunity to come before you today to discuss the President’s FY 2006 budget for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). I would first like to express my gratitude for the continued support and guidance you have provided the FBI as we continue our efforts to ensure that we are able to address current threats and keep America safe from those who would do us harm.

The FBI’s FY 2006 budget request totals 31,475 positions (including 12,140 agents and 2,745 Intelligence Analysts) and $5.7 billion. This includes 2,086 new positions—615 agents and 508 Intelligence Analysts—and $496 million in new investments, to continue strengthening our Intelligence Program and support our Counterterrorism and Counterintelligence activities. In addition, the FY 2006 budget request includes resources to address the FBI’s information technology and infrastructure requirements that are critical to the Intelligence, Counterterrorism, and Counterintelligence Programs, as well as to our traditional criminal investigative efforts, and to the support we provide to our state, local, and tribal partners.

Directorate of Intelligence: Service within a Service

In response to direction from the President and Congress, including findings from the 9/11 Commission and the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, the FBI has established the Directorate of Intelligence with clear authority and responsibility for all FBI intelligence functions, including information sharing policy. The establishment of the Directorate, as required in the FBI’s FY 2005 Appropriation, more fully integrates intelligence and operations at the FBI and provides centralized management and decentralized execution of the Intelligence Program. The Directorate is the FBI’s integrated, dedicated national intelligence workforce—a “service within a service.” It provides the FBI with an integrated intelligence capability that addresses current and future national security and criminal threats to the United States.

• This integrated intelligence service leverages our traditional law enforcement skills while ensuring no walls exist between collectors, analysts, and those who must act upon intelligence information.
• The Directorate also leverages the strong history of joint FBI operations, not only by unifying intelligence professionals, but also by integrating all of our partners, particularly state, local, and tribal law enforcement, into our intelligence structures.

The FBI’s FY 2006 budget request includes an enhancement of $26 million for the Directorate of Intelligence. The resources would strengthen three critical areas: program development; training; and recruitment and retention. These areas have been identified as critical to the success of our Intelligence Program.

• We are requesting resources to continue restructuring and integrating the enterprise-wide Intelligence Program, which would enable us to centrally manage our core intelligence functions and implement programs, standards, policies, and training for analysts consistent with standards to be determined by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). This would also allow us to manage intelligence requirements and intelligence collection activities in accordance with national intelligence priorities, and to ensure that all intelligence gathered and analyzed is disseminated to those who need it, both inside and outside the FBI.

Our efforts to date have focused on aligning our processes with partners and customers outside the FBI, and increasing our intelligence production. The FBI had a 312 percent increase in the dissemination of intelligence assessments from calendar year 2003 to 2004, and a 222 percent increase in the dissemination of Intelligence Information Reports during that same period.

• In order to ensure a consistent level of knowledge across the workforce, we have instituted specialized training, which is now mandatory for all FBI Intelligence Analysts. This year, more than 150 analysts have received intelligence training and our goal is to train at least 1,000 analysts by December 2005. In addition, intelligence training has been incorporated into new agent training. As directed in the FBI’s FY 2005 Appropriation, we are making additional improvements to expand and enhance our training program, to include joint training sessions with other members of the Intelligence Community, creation of a fellows program to exchange staff with other federal agencies and the private sector, and opportunities for academic sabbaticals to pursue advanced degrees. Our FY 2006 request would enhance the basic intelligence analyst course, and provide support for advanced Intelligence Analyst training.

• We have made substantial progress towards expanding and strengthening our intelligence workforce. In FY 2005, we received $30 million from Congress for recruitment and retention authorities. As a result of these and other hiring efforts, we have received overwhelming interest in the Intelligence Analyst position. A one-week vacancy announcement advertised in February 2005 yielded over 2,218 applicants. We have hired 476 Intelligence Analysts through February and have a hiring objective of 880 by the end of the year. The FY 2006 budget request includes resources to continue these recruitment and retention initiatives.

The FBI has integrated management of the Foreign Language program within the Directorate of Intelligence. This integration aligns foreign language and intelligence management activities and provides for delivery of service across all program areas. At the end of February 2005, there were 406 language specialists on-board. In addition, we use the services of over 900 contract linguists. This represents a 67 percent increase in the number of total linguists since 9/11. During calendar year 2004, our Language Services program reviewed over 532,000 hours of audio and over 1.9 million pages of text in support of the counterterrorism and counterintelligence missions. We are requesting an enhancement of 274 positions and $26 million in FY 2006 to enhance the program’s capacity in counterterrorism and counterintelligence-related languages, and to integrate a permanent staff of linguists within the National Virtual Translation Center.

Counterintelligence/Counterterrorism

Our Counterintelligence Program is responsible for detecting, preventing, and deterring foreign intelligence collection activities that could jeopardize national security. We have developed a National Strategy for Counterintelligence that delineates specific actions designed to enhance our capacity to address our counterintelligence responsibilities.

Similarly, we are improving our counterterrorism operations, expanding our analytical capabilities, modernizing our business practices and technology, and improving coordination with our partners. In FY 2006, we are requesting an enhancement of 791 positions, including 468 agents, and $122 million for national security field investigations.

The Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) is a multi-agency effort designed to consolidate the screening process for known and suspected terrorists and to provide for the appropriate and lawful use of terrorist information. The TSC operates 24/7 to provide a unified approach to terrorist screening. Through February 2005, TSC received 21,650 calls (over 3,500 from state and local law enforcement), made over 11,300 positive identifications, and assisted in over 340 arrests, including six with a terrorism nexus. For FY 2006, we are requesting an increase of 61 positions, to include six Intelligence Analysts and eight agents, and $75 million which builds upon the $40 million the Administration has requested through the pending FY 2005 Iraqi War Supplemental. These resources would provide the TSC the ability to fulfill the TSC’s mission as mandated by Homeland Security Presidential Directive 6, as well as begin to address the requirements generated by several other initiatives—more stringent screening at United States borders, new requirements for the government to screen passengers on domestic and international flights without unduly delaying commerce or travel and ensuring that organizations receiving public funds do not have terrorist links. TSC projects that its workload will increase by up to 3 million queries per day by FY 2006.

Another cross-agency effort to fight terrorism is the Terrorist Explosive Device Analytical Center (TEDAC). During FY 2004, the FBI, with assistance from the Department of Defense, enhanced TEDAC to coordinate and manage a unified national effort to gather, and technically and forensically exploit, terrorist improvised explosive devices (IED) worldwide. Together with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives and other partner agencies, we work to thoroughly analyze all of the information derived by TEDAC to form actionable intelligence that can be used to assist in terrorist investigations or develop strategies and technologies to counter terrorist attacks. TEDAC continues to compile data and technical intelligence and has been able to make direct links between terrorist explosive devices used in Iraq. These efforts have led directly to the capture of insurgents in Iraq. As of February 2005, 1,500 IEDs have been forwarded to TEDAC for analysis. In FY 2006, we are requesting 7 positions, including three Intelligence Analysts, and $6 million, to expand forensic examinations and to staff TEDAC.

Overseas Cooperation

International cooperation has been and will continue to be crucial to effectively prevent and disrupt terrorist networks. We are continuing to develop foreign partnerships through expansion of our Legal Attaché program. Currently, we have 51 Legal Attaché offices open covering over 200 countries around the world to support our efforts to neutralize transnational threats. We anticipate opening three additional Legal Attaché offices by the end of this year: Kabul, Afghanistan; Sofia, Bulgaria; and Sarajevo, Bosnia. In FY 2006, we are requesting an enhancement of 60 positions and $11 million for the Legal Attaché program and related information technology infrastructure requirements. We propose to reallocate operations from Almaty, Kazakhstan to a new office in Tashkent, Uzbekistan and enhance our presence in several existing critical locations: Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates; Canberra, Australia; London, England; Nairobi, Kenya; New Delhi, India; Ottawa, Canada; Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago; and Rabat, Morocco. Augmenting the Legal Attaché presence overseas will provide an operational benefit by reducing the span of control of affected offices, resulting in more manageable workloads to address terrorist and criminal investigations. Foreign law enforcement cooperation is a central ingredient in fighting the international war on terrorism.

Criminal Program

We are also continuing to enhance our Criminal Program. In 2004, we realigned our program structure. The realignment maximizes the effectiveness of resources, mirrors actual work processes, focuses on threats from criminal enterprises, and promotes the collection, exchange and dissemination of intelligence throughout the FBI and other authorized agencies. In FY 2004, we reported more than 21,000 arrests, 15,000 indictments, and 16,000 convictions.

We have placed additional emphasis on targeting violent gangs. Under the National Gang Strategy, priority is given to efforts to disrupt and dismantle gangs that are national in scope. One of the first to be targeted is MS-13, a violent gang that originated in Los Angeles and has spread across the country. We have created a National Gang Task Force specifically to address MS-13. We are establishing a new National Gang Intelligence Center (NGIC) at FBI headquarters, which has been made possible through resources the Congress provided this year. The NGIC will collect intelligence on gangs from across the United States, analyze this intelligence, and disseminate it to help law enforcement authorities throughout the country plan and execute strategies to prevent further gang activity and violence.

As our mission has changed, we are changing our drug program’s resource structure. The Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) Program is an effective means for deterring drug crime because it facilitates collaboration and information sharing between agencies. The FY 2006 President’s budget proposes to increase the overall funding for OCDETF and the allocation that is provided to the FBI from this program. This will allow the FBI to use its direct-funded drug enforcement resources for other FBI priorities. This will focus our drug resources on disrupting and dismantling those drug enterprises that pose the most significant threat to the economic and national security of the United States. To the greatest extent possible, the FBI will utilize the OCDETF Program to continue working jointly with our federal, state, local, and tribal partners to address the violent gangs that are supplied by these major international drug enterprises.

Infrastructure Improvements

The last few years have seen rapid reorganization and expansion of our organization. We have undergone much change and hired many new personnel. One of our highest priorities has been maintaining the strength of our workforce. We conducted a study in 2004 to improve the hiring process of support personnel. The study’s recommendations included streamlining several business practices and realigning resources to more effectively execute our hiring efforts. The majority of these recommendations are in the process of implementation. For FY 2005, we have initiated a plan to accelerate the interviewing and processing of applicants residing in the Washington, DC and Baltimore region for the FBI’s top priority programs, including the Directorate of Intelligence, in an effort to achieve this year’s hiring goals.

We have focused our recruiting efforts on attracting a workforce with expertise in intelligence. Developing and retaining an intelligence cadre is critical to the success of our mission. At the recommendation of this committee, we worked with the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA) and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), among others, to implement changes to help us recruit and retain the most qualified personnel. As directed in the FY 2005 Appropriation, we plan to use the services of NAPA, and others, to perform independent reviews of programs and activities related to our ongoing reorganization and transformation.

In addition to human infrastructure, we must continue to improve our physical infrastructure. Our field and headquarters facilities are in need of improvement. Facilities space to handle Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) is also inadequate, due to the large increase in team members working with SCI in the majority of our field offices. We are working closely with the General Services Administration on a multi-year plan to address these infrastructure issues, with a goal of having all FBI entities in secure and adequate space by the end of FY 2011.

As we expand our training capacity, we need to ensure that our facilities at the FBI Academy are suitable for training agents and Intelligence Analysts, as well as maintaining our support of the National Academy. Quantico provides training to an average of 1,500 intelligence and law enforcement personnel each day. We are renovating and modernizing our facilities in order to meet the demands of our new intelligence-driven training initiatives. In FY 2006, we are requesting $15 million to continue addressing the more pronounced deficiencies at the FBI Academy.

As part of our initiative to improve physical infrastructure and support the counterterrorism mission, we are requesting $10 million in construction funding to conduct architectural and engineering studies for a new Critical Incident Response Group (CIRG) facility. The funding would also be available for the purchase of land once a suitable location is found. A new complex would provide for adequate training space, and would allow CIRG’s executive management, command and control, and crisis response elements to be centralized in one location.

Information Technology Support

The ability to assemble, analyze, and disseminate information both internally and with other intelligence and law enforcement agencies is essential to our success in the war on terrorism. As a result, we have made modernization of our information technology a priority.

We continue to work daily on the Virtual Case File (VCF) issue, and I assure you that we intend to develop and implement a state-of-the-art case management system to support our agents and analysts working in the field. Currently, two of the three prongs of the Trilogy program have been successfully completed and have enhanced our information technology capabilities. FBI personnel can utilize a uniform suite of software that enables them to share information quickly, reliably, and securely.

I would also like to share some of our information technology accomplishments with you this morning.

• The Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information Operational Network (SCION) gives FBI personnel the ability to electronically receive, disseminate, and share compartmented sources of intelligence information within the FBI and with the Intelligence Community and the Department of Homeland Security, via the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System. To date, over 2,600 FBI Headquarters and 300 field office employees have SCION capabilities. In FY 2006, we are requesting an increase of $20 million to outfit up to 20 field offices and provide access to an additional 250 users at FBI Headquarters.

• We have provided approximately 300 users with Secret level connectivity to the Intelligence and Homeland Security Communities through SIPRNET from the Trilogy network. Our system is ready to take on 3,000 users and we are finalizing the policy approvals to expand that capacity.

• The FBI Automated Messaging System (FAMS) currently provides on-line message creation, review, and search capabilities to over 300 FBINET users. It provides real-time access to message traffic between the FBI and 40,000 external addresses.

• The FBI Intelligence Dissemination System (FIDS) is a web-based software application, which was developed in six months, that allows all FBI personnel with access to the FBI’s Intranet to create and disseminate standardized Intelligence Information Reports.

In FY 2006, we are also requesting an enhancement of $7 million to provide contract support for the Office of the Chief Information Officer. With these resources, we will be able to better ensure that our projects accurately reflect our operational requirements and our enterprise architecture, and support our information technology systems development and engineering.

We are equally focused on developing technology to promote information sharing with our state and local law enforcement partners. The FBI is requesting an increase of $8 million to upgrade the Law Enforcement Online (LEO) network with cost effective solutions to accommodate law enforcement user and content growth, and to conduct annual security audits, reviews, and technology assessments to ensure LEO remains compatible with emerging technologies and customer needs. As of March 1, 2005, LEO supported over 41,000 users. In addition to the current LEO user base, there are approximately 17,000 Regional Information Sharing System users who have the ability to access LEO. During FY 2004, the FBI brought on more than 4,000 National Alert System users. The system provides immediate notification regarding crisis events.

We appreciate the support you provided us for the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS) program in the FY 2005 Appropriation language. It allows us to move forward with our plans to modernize our hardware and software to ensure interoperability and increased information sharing with other agencies through use of emerging technologies. In FY 2006, we are requesting an increase of $16.8 million for Next Generation IAFIS to improve its speed and accuracy, allow for flat print capture, and enhance the Criminal History Record Information Database. That will support both our state and local partners and the security of our nation’s borders.

Conclusion

Mr. Chairman, Congressman Mollohan, and Members of the Subcommittee, the FBI continues a period of historical change necessitated by the demands placed on us to safeguard the security of the United States against those who seek to do this nation harm. We have reorganized from an agency whose primary focus was law enforcement into an integral member of the Intelligence Community. We continue to adapt and strengthen to meet our new intelligence and law enforcement challenges. I believe that by instituting these changes we have developed an organization that can protect and defend America from terrorists, while still preserving civil liberties for our citizens.

Once again, I thank you for your strong support of the FBI. It will be my pleasure to answer any questions you may have.