Combating Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction

For a variety of reasons, however, there is not adequate sharing of information betweenenforcement agents and the Intelligence Community. Moreover, agents are limited in theirability to tap into information outside BXA on end-users. Because of BXA’s visibility in theexporting community and the outreach efforts of the agents, many exporters call OEE firstwhen they are concerned about an end-user. BXA officials can query only the Bureau’sown database in response to these calls, and there is no way for them to query other USGovernment sources of information about end-users, classified and unclassified. It isessential that BXA be fully integrated into the information-sharing process in order to takeswift action to prevent illegal export.Recommendation 5.21: The National Director for Combating Proliferation shouldwork with the Under Secretary of Commerce for Export Administration to improveinformation sharing between the Bureau of Export Administration and theIntelligence Community, and should develop mechanisms by which special agentsin the field can request and receive end-user information from US Governmentsources.Specifically, BXA should be connected to the IC network in order to facilitate queryingclassified sources regarding end-users.Training of PersonnelExport license application processing requires the assessment of the potential proliferationand strategic uses of an item, vetting the end-user through the Intelligence Community,and consulting with other agencies who review these applications, including theDepartments of State, Defense, and Energy, and the Nonproliferation Center. The initialanalysis of an export license application is done by BXA’s licensing officers. Theselicensing officers need technical expertise in the technologies for which they review licenseapplications. These officers are not the sole source of expertise, as some technicalanalysis is contributed from other agencies during the interagency review process.Recommendation 5.22: The Bureau of Export Administration should take steps toincrease the expertise of its licensing officers.The ideal solution would be to recruit specialists in the technologies of WMD. Where thisis not possible, training of existing personnel should be a priority, and BXA should takeadvantage of the expertise among the various agencies, including the IC, to providetraining for licensing personnel.75