Externally, U.S. intelligence community faces unprecedented challenges amid sweeping national and international political, economic and social changes. Striking failures to meet counterterrorism and intelligence objectives in both national and international arenas indicate current tools and policies are short of closing growing gaps between intelligence work as is performed by existing intelligence agencies and hostile states, groups or individuals, locally and abroad. Counterterrorism and intelligence are still viewed in older, established Soviet-era framework (McConnell, 2007; Turner, 1991; Godson, 2010). Flaws in counterterrorism and intelligence work is, further, attributed to a set of a factors including, but are not limited to, lack of baseline intelligence analysis method (CIA & Johnson, 2005), infeasible dichotomies of domestic / international and peace / war or intelligence / operations and open source / national intelligence databases (Dupont, 2006), defects in Intelligence Cycle model (Hulnick, 2006), interagency poor or lack of cooperation (Treverton, 2008) as well as overspending, redundancies and inefficiencies (CBS News, 2010). Crucially, counterterrorism and intelligence delivery seems to lag far behind pace of policy officials to boost policies rather than to qualify decision-making processes (Hulnick). One most recent example of a movie ban in theaters in response to claimed threats by a hostile state (Cieply & Barnes, 2014) suggests changing roles of counterterrorism and intelligence agencies. This very same example of banning a movie offline and movie producer's decision to show online questions viability of current frameworks of cyber terror and calls for further qualification and investigation (Cavelty, 2008).
Internally, conventional ways of performing intelligence work by focusing on insurgent and/or hostile groups, rather than on broader communities at large, show critical intelligence flaws and emphasize growing needs for outsourcing intelligence (Center for a New American Security, Flynn, Pottinger, & Bachelor, 2010; Chesterman, 2008). The scope and depth of recent national security demands require a critical review of participant counterterrorism and intelligence agencies, particularly as far as agency mission and law enforcement roles are concerned (Treverton).
Critically, needs for an overall review of current counterterrorism and intelligence work cannot be overemphasized. Rapidly shifting national and international military, political, legal, economic and social contexts; unstable international partnerships; unprecedented pools of open source intelligence; and emerging innovations in intelligence gathering all mandate a more informed, dynamic framework of counterterrorism and intelligence. This policy paper aims, accordingly, to set a framework of counterterrorism and intelligence which should better address changing U.S. intelligence community as well as national security questions.
The framework addresses: (1) roles and responsibilities of concerned agencies; (2) resources exploited by each agency; (3) interagency collaboration; and (4) policy recommendations.
1. Roles and Responsibilities
The proposed framework includes five existing intelligence entities whose roles and responsibilities require re-establishment in light of specific reorganizations and integrations. The five entities are:
- Central Intelligence Agency (CIA);
- National Security Agency (NSA); and
- FBI Directorate of Intelligence.
The stated missions for each entity include roles and responsibilities which are in some cases overlapping, identical, independent, focused or broad. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Intelligence and Analysis stated strategic missions fall into intelligence analysis, collection, sharing and management with no reference to execution and/or law enforcement capabilities ("About the Office of Intelligence and Analysis," n.d.). The State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research mission is primarily concerned with counterintelligence and law enforcement globally with no reference to collaboration with similar entities ("Bureau of Intelligence and Research," n.d.). The CIA's stated mission is broad and overlaps with counterterrorism and intelligence work of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Intelligence and Analysis, State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research, NSA, and FBI Directorate of Intelligence ("Our Mission," n.d.). The FBI Directorate of Intelligence stated mission, finally, overlaps with Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Intelligence and Analysis' CIA's ("Directorate of Intelligence," n.d.).
In order for all five entities to perform effectively within an overall framework of counterterrorism and intelligence, specific roles and responsibilities should be assigned, reframed or combined.
Given State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research's and CIA's broad foreign engagement, both should work in close association particularly in areas of intelligence sharing and international partnerships (Reveron, 2006), outsourcing intelligence (Chesterman) and broader local community engagement (Center for a New American Security, Flynn, Pottinger, & Bachelor, 2010; Chesterman). As such CIA would combine operational excellence with State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research's vast diplomatic capabilities of intelligence gathering. Both entities would continue to provide concerned policy stakeholders – particularly Department of Justice – with required counterterrorism intelligence which would help carry out judicial procedures based on solid evidence. But each, as well, via a possible joint, central unit, would combine unique capabilities for added-value intelligence. The proposed joint, central unit would, for example, carry out roles and responsibilities such as:
(a) Create a Global Terrorism Database (GTD);
(b) Enhance Terrorist Network Visualization (TNV); and
(c) Leverage digital media and network exploitation.
1. 1. Tools and Resources
These functions would be carried out using a broad range of capabilities and resources including, but are not limited to, imagery satellites, signals intelligence, open source intelligence gathering particularly for anti-Western sentiments and intelligence rotation.
2. Roles and Responsibilities
Meanwhile, given Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Intelligence and Analysis' and FBI Directorate of Intelligence's focus on national front, both entities should better combine efforts such as to carry out intelligence work under a broader law enforcement umbrella. Concerted efforts of both entities would be executed not by creating a joint, permanent central unit, for example, but by merging existing directorates of Counterintelligence Programs and Homeland Counterterrorism Directorates of DHS and Surveillance Specialists Group of FBI's Intelligence Workforce. The resulting merge should aim to perform roles and responsibilities, including but are not limited to,
(a) Promote public awareness programs such as "If You See Something, Say Something";
(b) Adopt broader crime scene investigation strategies in order to incorporate more sophisticated intelligence analyses such as bio surveillance and biometric and DNA analyses; and
(c) Broaden policing cooperation initiatives based on partnerships with community-engaged grassroots police organizations.
2.1. Tools and Resources
This should enhance national capabilities for intelligence forecasting, developing leads, community engagement and engaging broader spectra of outsourced secret agents and informers. Further, insights into contextual intelligence would enhance law enforcement-community engagement coupling.
3. Interagency Collaboration:
NSA would, meanwhile, fit in proposed framework as a focal point of all four entities. Binding at once sophisticated reconnaissance satellite resources, communication interception technologies as well as cyber terrorism, NSA would provide valuable intelligence for all four entities. In a schema, NSA would be central for all four entities with intelligence inflows and outflows pouring in and/or coming out of NSA. This can be represented as follows:
4. Policy Recommendation
Three major policies emerge with proposed five-entity collaboration framework:
(a) Intelligence and law enforcement should be streamlined;
(b) Intelligence and operations should be inseparable; and
(c) National and international intelligence collaboration should inform one another.
These policies, if enacted collaboratively, would not only address bureaucratic issues and help cut out redundancies in U.S. intelligence community but would contribute to further enhanced performance based on informed intelligence.
Streamlining intelligence and law enforcement would, for one, bridge one essential gap between intelligence gathering, civil liberties and law enforcement. Traditionally, intelligence gathering has been in constant conflict with civil liberties since more often than not most if not all intelligence operations intercepts personal space of individual and corporate citizens in a way which does not warrant intelligence work during judicial procedures. Law enforcement officials become as a result in no position to carry on with intelligence findings due to missing legal backing. The practice of rendition, interestingly, has proven disastrous both to national security and U.S. international image as a beacon of democracy. Therefore, streamlining intelligence and law enforcement becomes a necessity in order to overcome conflicting legal considerations, particularly during periods of crisis and in hostile zones. By combining intelligence efforts of FBI Directorate of Intelligence and DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis, law enforcement is given further boost not only enhancing intelligence operations but by further engaging local communities and hence establish legitimacy of intelligence and counterterrorism work.
Intelligence and operations should, as well, be inseparable. In an increasingly interconnected, dynamic world, static frames of operational reference isolated from intelligence gathering phases are no longer viable. The scope, depth and immediacy of present intelligence and counterintelligence demands mandate more dynamic, interchangeable intelligence analysis and operational performance. Being at intelligence work center, NSA would muster counterterrorism and intelligence capabilities such as to merge intelligence and operations into a unified conception.
Finally, collaboration between national and international entities cannot be overemphasized in an increasingly interconnected world. Interestingly, existing intelligence entities reflect such collaboration as in FBI Directorate of Intelligence. Therefore, by establishing and developing interactions between CIA and State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research, national agencies could tap into broader international intelligence pools.
Conclusion
This paper policy assumes five entities for a dynamic framework of counterterrorism and intelligence: DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis, State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research, CIA, NSA, and FBI Directorate of Intelligence. Intelligence work for DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis and FBI Directorate of Intelligence are better coordinated at national level such as to raise community awareness, adopt wider strategies for crime scene investigation and broaden community-based policing initiatives. The proposed collaboration between State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research and CIA, meanwhile, is aimed to develop a global terrorism database, further visualize terrorist networks and boost open media exploitation. Informing all four entities is NSA whose central and support role acts as a focal point between national / international and intelligence / operation as well as international collaboration in counterterrorism and intelligence.
Three policy recommendations are proposed: (a) Intelligence and law enforcement should be streamlined; (b) Intelligence and operations should be inseparable; and (c) National and international intelligence collaboration should inform one another. These policy recommendations would help leverage performance of concerned intelligence agencies within a dynamic counterterrorism and intelligence framework.
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