Central Intelligence Group

[1] The official duties of CIG as quoted by Assistant Executive Director Sheffield Edwards: The Central Intelligence Group is a recently created interdepartmental organization in which the State, War, Navy, and sometimes other departments participate.

[5][6] The assumption by many in the government during the war was that upon the conclusion of hostilities, the United States would immediately terminate any hegemony it had fostered in global intelligence gathering.

"[4][8] Members of the Bureau of the Budget and the Department of Justice were not satisfied with the legality of a group being established by a Presidential Directive without any accompanying Executive Order, but following discussions resulted in satisfaction of all parties by 23 May 1946.

[7] The activation ceremony of this intelligence agency two days later, on 24 January 1946, involved the President of the United States of America, Harry Truman, calling Rear Admiral Sidney Souers and Fleet Admiral Willian D. Leahy to the White House, and presenting them both with black cloaks, black hats, and wooden daggers, before reading aloud the Presidential directive outlining their new duties.

[4] Souers and Truman agreed at this stage that CIG should be a small group, composed of members assigned by the military Departments, and to be operated as a cooperative interdepartmental activity.

[7] Souers initially wanted to create Ad Hoc committees for the study of specific areas, but organizing them proved difficult, so he instead assigned these duties to the Central Planning Staff, which was managed by William B.

[11] Wild Bill Donovan is noted as having "exploded" upon the news that he only had two weeks to dissolve the OSS, and pressured the government to maintain some of the organization's strategic structures.