Intelligence: From Secrets to Policy (69 page)

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Authors: Mark M. Lowenthal

BOOK: Intelligence: From Secrets to Policy
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Congress created such a reserve in 1996, but the intelligence community has not fully implemented it. Several issues are involved, one of which is security. Many outside experts do not have security clearances and may be unwilling to accept the restrictions they impose. Thus, they either are eliminated as sources or the intelligence community is required to find ways to tap their expertise without revealing classified information. Although the latter is not impossible, those responsible for security are likely to raise some objections. The irony is that these outside experts are useful because of what they know and not because they need access to classified material. It should be possible to tap their expertise and avoid the clearance issue entirely. Another issue is cost. The intelligence community does not budget for such contingencies—just as DOD does not budget for wartime operations during peacetime. As with the military, budget mechanisms—reallocations, supplemental appropriations—are available. The main impediment appears to be attitudes within the intelligence community.
Finally, there is the issue of redundancy in the three all-source agencies—the CIA, the DIA, and the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR). The intentional duplication stems from two fundamental operating principles of the intelligence community: the distinct intelligence needs of different senior policy makers and the concept of competitive analysis. Unless one is willing to give up either or both operating principles, one must accept the cost of the redundancy. Neither the executive branch nor Congress is likely to abandon the concepts or to accept the idea of having a single analytical agency, which has been among the more radical proposed alternatives.
 
INTELLIGENCE AND THE IT REVOLUTION. A major and continuing source of reform ideas stems from the ongoing information technology (IT) revolution. Some ideas concern technology; others focus on process.
The IT revolution had an interesting effect on the intelligence community. For years, its home-grown technology—that is, technology developed entirely internally or with contractors—was much more advanced than that available on the open market. However, the advent of the computer revolution allowed the open market to leapfrog over the intelligence community, through no fault of its own. The community’s first reaction was to resist the externally developed technology in a classic case of the “not invented here” syndrome. Various reasons were cited, including special needs or security requirements.
The resistance phase has passed, although the intelligence community (and the rest of the government) still has problems in bringing new technologies on board quickly. Note that the word “technology” is being broadly used here, including computer technology, analytical tools and other software, and new information sources. The issue has become more difficult as the marketplace fills with many technologies and tools, all making competing claims about their capabilities. The intelligence community, like every other modern enterprise, seeks technologies that are best suited to its specific needs. A good scouting force is required that can sample as many technologies as possible and make purchasing decisions quickly. In 1995, an IT industry expert noted that computer technology was changing every eighteen months, but that the intelligence community took from two to five years to purchase a computer. Thus, at best, an analyst was getting a computer that was already six months out of date. The situation today may be better, but the rapid absorption of modern technology remains an issue.
Process is a more difficult issue. Some reform advocates suggest that advances in IT would allow a looser intelligence structure, with a community of networks and more flexible organizations. Again, agility becomes a key goal.
The applicability to intelligence is uncertain. Greater flexibility in the analytical corps would be a tremendous improvement, but the intelligence community is unlikely to become completely free-form, relying on shifting networks of analysts to provide its structure. Much can be said for having the ability to bring together disparate and even physically distant analysts to work on pressing issues and then to disband them or to allow new groups to form as the issues change. However, such a scenario will not eliminate the need for some bureaucratic apparatus: supervisors who can relay requirements and oversee the meeting of deadlines, reviewers of analysis, and so on. The key is to find a way to provide the necessary structure without stifling analytical fluidity. Some will bridle at what seems to be a half-hearted solution, although it may prove to be more practical in the end.
The new technologies and concepts should not be overburdened with more promise than they can deliver. The dot-com meltdown of 2001-2002 is instructive in this regard. Many prognosticators proclaimed a new economic age and the victory of virtual enterprises over bricks-and-mortar firms. However, a rapid and somewhat savage winnowing of the dot-coms occurred, while the bricks-and-mortar firms go on. The problem has been a confusion of means and ends. The IT revolution is not an end in itself, at least for intelligence. Instead, it is—or should be—a means by which the intelligence community can perform certain tasks more efficiently.
The terrorist attacks and the joint inquiry and 9/11 I Commission investigations brought renewed focus on IT issues. An increased emphasis has been placed on the need to share information better. The DNI’s office has produced a very large report on information sharing, which tends to emphasize technology rather than policies and cultures, the latter being a major impediment to improved sharing. Technology is the means to this end, but it cannot make sharing happen on its own. That depends on policies that mandate sharing and penalize those who do not. Such policies have not been implemented in the past and would be difficult to enforce, but it is necessary before questioning why the technology does not work. One example of the types of policies that are needed is the concept promoted by Gen. Michael Hayden, noted earlier, about getting the intelligence out sooner. Underlying the emphasis on technology may be the unstated belief that IT improvements can affect analysis. Although Americans have had a historical belief in the power of technology, no substantive cases serve as examples in which technology precluded either sharing or better analysis. Abundant stories can be told about incompatible IT systems from agency to agency, but that is not the same issue. This belief is, in some respects, the technological counterpart to the right-or-wrong analysis belief. To date, the search for improved analytical tools has not been particularly successful, and for some it has taken on the aspect of a hunt for the Holy Grail. Part of the problem is that intelligence analysis remains an intellectual process, not a mechanical one. IT can be helpful in amassing data, collating it, sifting it, creating relationships among databases, and so on, but it cannot replace an insightful and experienced analyst.
The 2003 capture of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein may be instructive. U.S. military officials and intelligence analysts assumed that Saddam had to be depending on someone for support while he was in hiding. They began by focusing attention on his innermost circle, but the search proved fruitless. So, they began to widen the group of people in whom they were interested to more relatives, tribal allies, and lower level functionaries. More raids, more arrests, and more interrogations resulted, all of which served to expand the lists further. Eventually. they located Saddam’s hideout. Although IT could have played a role—amassing names, comparing them, creating relationship maps—the key was analysis.
The other argument in favor of improved IT tools is the commonly held perception that analysts are drowning in information. No substantive studies are available to compare the amount of data available to analysts twenty years ago, when everything was in hard copy, and today. The perception may be based, in part, on confusing the means by which the intelligence is delivered, IT, and the amount that is delivered. IT has not greatly expanded the working day of the French Foreign Ministry or the Chinese army. People can still work on and produce only so much information in a given day, whether or not there is IT. Technical collectors are struggling to put out as much finished imagery intelligence (IMINT) and SIGINT as they have in the past, so they are not sources of a major flood of information. IT certainly creates unnecessary redundancies of information, as the same data come in from separate sources. But this is not the same as a flood of new information. The irony is that people are looking to IT to solve the problems largely created by IT.
 
ADMINISTRATIVE REFORM. An important although seemingly minor issue is administrative reform. Because the intelligence community is composed of separate agencies, it has many distinct processes for security, personnel policies, training, and so on. To many, these seem wasteful and duplicative. Although significant differences exist in training a cryptanalyst, an imagery analyst, and a case officer, personnel procedures and some training are to a certain extent generic. The disparate infrastructure systems impose unnecessary costs. For example, if a terrorism analyst at the DIA seeks a better job at the CIA, also covering terrorism, more is involved than a simple transfer. The analyst must apply to the CIA, be re-vetted for security, and resign from the DIA. Managing analysts as some larger integrated corps would be an improvement. This may be a seemingly minor area where the DNI can make real progress. Several of the goals in DNI McConnell’s
100 Day Plan
and
500 Day Plan
focus on these issues. In addition, the DNI has been emphasizing more education and training that cuts across the agency stovepipes. For example, there is now an introductory course for new intelligence community employees, regardless of function or agency, and a similar course just for analysts, regardless of agency. A National Intelligence University is also being created, to provide education and training across agency boundaries.
 
OTHER REFORM CONCEPTS. Among the many other proposals for intelligence reform, a market-based intelligence community has been advocated. Proponents argue that intelligence currently exists as an essentially free benefit for policy makers, which undercuts its value to them. In part, this view may stem from the intelligence community’s habit of referring to policy makers as clients or customers. Such usage represents an effort to indicate the closeness of the relationship, but it also implies a type of relationship that may not be apt. Policy makers could be more of a captive audience than they are customers. Market advocates take the term “customer” literally. They believe that if policy makers had a better understanding of the true costs of intelligence—in terms of collection, analysis, and so on—they could make more informed decisions about the specific intelligence they wanted, for which they would then be charged. Presumably, policy agencies would have intelligence expense budgets that could be spent as they saw fit. In a variant of this proposal, a mixed economy has been suggested: Policy makers would receive a certain amount of intelligence without charge but would have to supply resources if greater intelligence support was desired.
Advocates of the idea have not yet fully developed it, so considering all the questions it raises may be unfair. The underlying premise—market competition will make intelligence more efficient and more competitive—might work in some respects for issues that are currently high on the policy agenda. However, how one would handle the sudden unexpected crisis or maintain some level of expertise on less pressing issues is not clear.
The market concept also flies in the face of some generic aspects of intelligence, especially for collection. Determining the cost of collecting against specific issues is difficult, if not impossible. For example, a SIGINT or GEOINT satellite over Iraq may be collecting intelligence for support to military operations or on proliferation or regional stability. Similarly, over Afghanistan, one might collect for support to military operations or on terrorism or narcotics. How does one then determine the fair cost for any one issue?
 
A LAST THOUGHT: THE “LESSONS” OF SEPTEMBER 11 AND IRAQ WMD. Most would agree that the creation of the DNI and the other attendant changes in the intelligence community were the result of two successive events: September 11 and Iraq WMD. Both of these events have entered into popular legend as to the mistakes that were made and the necessary fixes. However, a critical examination of the “received” lessons of these two events (that is, those that are broadly agreed to in the press and among those individuals who pay attention to intelligence) reveals that they are almost diametrically opposed.
• Warning: The lesson of September 11 is to warn as stridently as possible to make sure that policy makers comprehend the gravity of the situation. But the lesson of Iraq WMD is to warn only when you are absolutely certain that the situation is real. You can warn extravagantly or cautiously but not both.
• Information sharing: The lesson of September 11 is that intelligence must be shared broadly across the intelligence community so that necessary connections can be made. But the lesson of Iraq WMD is to be careful and not share information that is dubious, such as the discredited reporting of the human source known as CURVEBALL.
• “Connect the Dots”: If we overlook the inappropriate relationship of this phrase to the work of intelligence, for the moment, we see that the lesson of September 11 is the need to connect the dots. But the lesson of Iraq WMD is not to connect too many dots and create a false picture.
 
These lessons assume that the intelligence analysts or managers know with a fair degree of certainty which intelligence is reliable and which is not. As has been stated throughout this book, this is often not the case. There is much hindsight in both sets of lessons. But the fact that the creation of the DNI is the result of these largely opposed impressionistic sets of lessons underscores the nature of many of the problems inherent in the DNI structure. There seems to have been a fairly uncritical assumption that September 11 and Iraq WMD represented similar types of lapses and, therefore, a uniform set of fixes could be applied. In reality, they were very different lapses calling for very different changes in how intelligence is structured and how it functions.

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