Signalling a significant upgrade in intelligence cooperation between New Delhi and Washington, US Director of National Intelligence (DNI) J. Michael McConnell, who heads the entire US intelligence community and reports directly to the US President, made his first visit to India on Tuesday. He left the next day.

During this quiet trip — no official announcement was made — McConnell met National Security Advisor M K Narayanan, the heads of RAW and the Intelligence Bureau as well as the National Technical Research Organisation. The visit, sources said, was aimed at establishing contact at the highest level given that the DNI is the focal point for all intelligence gathering by different US agencies.

With 16 agencies including the CIA, FBI, DEA and Homeland Security reporting to him, McConnell is today the highest ranking intelligence official in the US. The office of the DNI was created through the Intelligence Reform and Terrorist Protection Act, 2004, a fall out of the 9/11 Commission report. The main purpose was to create a nodal authority that analyses inputs from different agencies and provides regular assessments to the US President and relevant US Congressional committees. The first DNI was the current Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte.

It’s learnt that the discussions McConnell had with Indian officials covered a whole range of issues including recent terrorist trends, the situation in Pakistan as well as the kind of effort being put in by the DNI to streamline intelligence gathering and analysis in the US. In this context, both sides discussed ways to strengthen intelligence cooperation and maintain high-level contacts.

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