After four years of advocacy by the US Marine Corps, in 1992 the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) agreed to take action on Open Source Intelligence (OSINT). As would be natural, the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) was asked to provide a report on behalf of a Joint Open Source Task Force. As is the custom at CIA, everything having to do with OSINT is classified. Below is the UNCLASSIFIED Marine Corps evaluation of the Final Report. So very little has changed within CIA and FBIS in 20 years that most of this evaluation–and especially those aspects of this evaluation pertaining to the CIA/FBIS (or Open Source Center/OSC) ability to a) understand the military and b) meet military needs, remain valid as a starting point for discussing how DoD and other elements of the US Government not now satisfied by CIA or OSC, should address their needs for OSINT in support of policy, acquisition, and operations.
