If, as seems likely, General Michael Hayden is confirmed as director of central intelligence, his arrival could signal a separation of the CIA’s intelligence gathering and analytical functions.

The CIA traditionally has been divided into the Directorate of Operations – now known as the National Clandestine Service – which collects human intelligence, and the Directorate of Intelligence, which oversees analysis for the entire community.

In the past, the CIA was responsible for preparing the president’s daily intelligence briefing, but that task now falls to the Department of National Intelligence, headed by John Negroponte since April 2005. It is analytical work, and in the months since Mr. Negroponte took office, he has absorbed a group of CIA analysts into his operation. Some in the intelligence community worry that more will follow – in their loyalties if not their office locations.

“It looked as if, when [Porter] Goss was [DCI], that Negroponte was seeking to integrate the analysts – a number of them, anyway – more into working for him, or into subordinate entities that report to him,” the DCI from 1993 to 1995, James Woolsey, told The New York Sun.

“Goss was seeking to have the analysts work far more closely with the [National Clandestine Service] and spend some time overseas, get a much better feel for the ground truth in the area which they were analyzing,” Mr. Woolsey said.

“What Goss tried to do was something that I also worked on when I was out there, and of course then there was no DNI, so the issue didn’t come up, but I moved a number of DI and DO people into next-door offices and then used the same language expert to work for both,” Mr. Woolsey said. “[I] generally sought to, as much as we could afford it – we didn’t have any travel money – to try to get the DI more integrated with the DO.”

If General Hayden becomes DCI, more analysts may migrate to DNI, placing them on a level above the National Clandestine Service in the new organizational structure, and transforming the CIA into an all-human intelligence shop.

Some say it is not such a bad idea. “You really do need a core of analysts around the DNI who then draw on all of the different elements of the intelligence community, whereas the CIA largely focuses on human intelligence and human operations,” the dean of the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, James Steinberg, said.

Mr. Steinberg said it makes sense under the circumstances to shift some analytic capacity to DNI from CIA, and that General Hayden would make that more likely. “The problem with having the CIA as the lead analyst,” he said, “is it creates this artificial tension across the analytic community. The CIA is both responsible for coordinating but also having its own view.”

“I think there are tensions there because it’s unclear in the current structure whether the principal role of the DI is support to the [National Clandestine Service] or whether it’s just another analytic shop,” Mr. Steinberg said. “Any change causes tension, but in the long run this ought to clarify and lead to less bureaucratic turf war.”

Mr. Woolsey said he thought Mr. Negroponte and his team would distinguish themselves in their positions. “The people who are associated with this now, these are all able people: Negroponte and Hayden and, assuming it goes forward, [former deputy director of operations Stephen] Kappes. … Those three people can make either of these structures work. It’s mainly a question of getting it clear and going forward.”

Mr. Woolsey and others stressed that the structures of the institutions are of less importance than the people who staff them, and the readiness with which they share information.

“It’s largely a question of getting something set so people know whom they work for and can get down to business,” Mr. Woolsey said. “My view is that most any of these organizational constructs can work. The most important thing is the people that are in the jobs, and making a decision so people know who their bosses are … I don’t think there’s any hard and fast rule as to where the analysts ought to report.”

“The CIA did it one way for years, MI6 did it another way for years, and both, in many circumstances, produced good analysis,” Mr. Woolsey said. “There are different models. If you look at some really fine intelligence services, like MI6, the Mossad, and so forth, people do this all sorts of different ways. … What won’t work is continued uncertainty about who your boss is.”