The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)

     Since I have been talking about various agencies, such as the FBI and ATF, I knew it was a matter of time before  I would cover the CIA. The CIA is the Central Intelligence Agency, which is one of the main intelligent-gathering agencies for the U.S. government, and is headquartered in Langley, Virginia. It succeeded the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and was formed officially by the National Security Act of 1947, under President Harry S. Truman. The person in charge is known as the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (D/CIA), who is nominated by the President with consent of the Senate. As you can see, being in charge of the CIA seems parallel to picking a Supreme Court justice. The main functions of the CIA are gathering information about foreign governments/corporations; analyze that information in order to provide national security assessments to the President and US policymakers; and to conduct covert activities by its own employees. Here is a picture of the CIA logo, and of the CIA headquarters in  Langley, Virginia.

     One similarity that the CIA and the FBI share is that new employees and existing employees must take a polygraph test. According to a fiscal 2013 budget, the CIA has five main priorities: counter terrorism, counterintelligence, cyber intelligence, nonproliferation of nuclear weapons, and warning American leaders of overseas events. If you were to work for the CIA, you would see that there are a lot of jobs that require a wide variety of specialties, which include: operation officers working overseas recruiting foreign agents, intelligence analyst writing about nuclear forces/terrorism, and a security officer. Some of the professions that are still in demand are engineers, economists, accountants, and computer specialists. Sadly, there are no public tours of the CIA's headquarters because of security considerations and logistical problems, but there is a virtual tour available at www.cia.gov that can provide you with additional information and insight about the organization.