From what I've read, I gather that they don't always tell the President everything ;) Partly that's just complexity and incoherence. Nobody reporting to the President knows everything. Or even the important stuff. And I gather that the reporting structure is extremely convoluted.

Maybe it's all just petty fiefdom bullshit. But those are standard approaches for plausible deniability. And some bits are reportedly unaccountable, walled off through "need to know basis" policy. So how can we know who they work for?