Operations Coordinating Board

The Operations Coordinating Board (OCB) was a committee of the United States Executive created in 1953 by President Eisenhower's Executive Order 10483 and tasked with oversight of United States covert operations. Eisenhower simultaneously gave secret instructions specifying additional functions for the new entity.[1] The board, which reported to the National Security Council was responsible for integrating the implementation of national security policies across several agencies. An important part of its mandate was to act as the president's coordinating committee for the most incendiary secret foreign policy actions, such as covert operations.[2]

The board's membership was to include the Under Secretary of State, who was to chair the board, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Director of the Foreign Operations Administration, the Director of Central Intelligence, and the President's Special Assistant for Psychological Warfare. Also authorized to attend were the President's Special Assistant for National Security Affairs and the Director of the United States Information Agency.

  1. ^ "Memorandum From President Eisenhower to the Executive Secretary of the National Security Council (Lay)". history.state.gov. 2 September 1953.
  2. ^ Jacobsen, Annie (2019). Surprise, Kill, Vanish: The Secret History of CIA Paramilitary Armies, Operators, and Assassins, (New York: Little Brown and Company), p. 115