In June 2005 we suggested that the CIA’s shortage of linguists trained in strategic languages might be alleviated by a No Linguist Left Behind Act. Perhaps spurred by the massive amount of information from NSA domestic spying, the president found a new educational hobby horse that has been ridden (unsuccessfully) by Rush Holt (a New Jersey congressman from the opposition party).

According to James Banford, author of an often-cited book about the NSA, the “Puzzle Palace,” the NSA intercepts 2 million communications per hour per listening station — many of them in inconvenient languages not typically studied by American high-school or college students. Filtering technology, reductive algorithms, and other specialized techniques reduce that quantity to a handful of messages, but many of them never get translated (like a few memorable intercepts from 10 September 2001 that were not translated until 12 September).

Previously Bush could have pointed to the fact that a surprising 44% of U.S. high school students study a second language, neglecting to mention that 70% of those study Spanish. To his credit, the president will request US$114 million in fiscal 2007 (starting in September 2006) for programs involving the departments of State, Education, and Defense, and the director of national intelligence. The president announced the spending proposal at a government-organized gathering (photo-op?) of U.S. university presidents meant to focus attention on the challenges of international education. The Washington Post reported that “the senior educators appeared to welcome Bush’s initiative, with several calling it a positive first step toward addressing a serious shortage of linguists. But they also noted in interviews that the initial funding would be a tiny fraction of the amount needed to make a real impact.”

This under-investment on critical training for the future should surprise no one. In 2005, the “education president” allocated US$24.5 billion for the “No Child Left Behind” education initiative, the same amount as in 2004. The 2006 Bush budget cuts education financing to US$23.5 billion. Given the time it takes to learn a language well enough to understand cultural nuance, this decreased year-over-year funding augurs badly for the strategic language proposal — some of the languages to be addressed by this spending require 10 years of study before a student gains fluency. Since the reason for this program is national security, maybe funding should come from the less-at-risk Defense and intelligence budgets.