Looks like Bob Gates and Mike McConnell were serious about deconflicting control of intelligence assets between the Defense Secretary and the Director of National Intelligence. ODNI announced this morning that Gates's undersecretary of defense for intelligence, James Clapper, will also serve as overall head of defense intelligence for McConnell:

As the Director of Defense Intelligence, Clapper will report directly to the DNI
and serve as his principal advisor regarding defense intelligence matters. The
director of defense intelligence will have responsibilities as determined by the
DNI in consultation with the Secretary of Defense and promulgated separately.

The secretary and the director made this agreement in recognition of the
crucial importance of coordinated intelligence efforts to the national security
of the United States. The defense intelligence components provide a full
range of intelligence products and analysis to a broad spectrum of consumers;
from military forces in the field to senior policy makers across the federal
government. These efforts are intertwined with the national intelligence
efforts overseen by the DNI.

“The creation of the Office of the Director of Defense Intelligence is in
recognition of the importance of coordinated intelligence efforts to the
national security of the United States,” said Clapper. “This office will serve to
strengthen the relationship between the DNI and the DoD.”

Clapper's predecessor, Steve Cambone, served as an alternate center of power to first the CIA and then the ODNI. Now, Clapper actually works for ODNI. An interesting question will be whether this arrangement will last through to the next administration, or whether the USD-I position will remain the SecDef's instrument of control over the nearly 90 percent of the intelligence budget that the Pentagon controls.