Identifying Requirements For High Level Policy Makers

Non-acknowledgement occurs when a political leader has clear knowledge of some fact or intelligence report but does not acknowledge it. It occurs most often when a political leader will substitute their own knowledge for that of the intelligence community’s assessment. This non-acknowledgement of intelligence warning is considered politicization of intelligence. Politicization of intelligence occurs when political leaders guide the information being collected, rather than the information leading the them, to an outcome. Political leaders politicize intelligence by “cherry picking” information that favors their assessment, while ignoring alternative reports.

The intelligence community has undergone some major changes in the past thirty years. During the cold war this section of defense had massive funding. There needed to be an ability to predict what the Soviet Union was planning to do and what they were actually doing in order to prevent a nuclear war. After this period in time ended there was again large changes. The budget to the intelligence community was cut astronomically because there was perceived to be less of a threat to the United States (“9/11 Intelligence Failures Report”, 2002). This misperception was actually due to a lack of ability to shift to a new changing threat. This mind set allowed many unwelcomed risks to enter into the United States.

Intelligence gathering operations is vital to any operation and the same holds true to border and coastal security. While the question pertains mostly to Post 9/11, the DOD provided intelligence and manpower in support of border security and in the war against drugs. In the mid1990s, I was assigned to a Joint Task Force (JTF) with several missions within the United States. One such operation was in Arizona providing over watch for specific areas the United States and Mexican border. Our role was strictly intelligence gathering for US Customs and Border Protection (CFB) and they acted upon the information gathered. We had the man power, experience, and more importantly stealth to carry out the missions while the CFB could concentrate on other areas until our surveillance and information gathered led to the arrest of individuals who were leading the border

Caparini agrees with the sentiment that the programs by the intelligence community are essential, but the article deals much more with the complexities of oversight (Caparini 2007). Caparini recognizes the conflict that Representative Hamilton debated regarding the need for public debate for this type of foreign policy, but also the vitality of secrecy in these programs. A bigger institutional problem she identifies facing oversight is the, “dependence of oversight committees on the intelligence community for

Perhaps the most important change in how the federal government was reorganized after September 11th is the creation of both the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) position and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) in 2004 with the passage of the same IRTPA that created TSA. This concept had been first suggested in 1955 after a study by Congress then and was recommended time and again but only became a reality after the September 11th attacks drove the need for major intelligence reform home and the 9/11 Commission continued the push for the creation of such a position (ODNI, n.d., paras. 1-5). As one can see from the mission and vision of the ODNI, the importance cannot be overstated. The mission includes leading intelligence integration while having the IC produce the most insightful intelligence products possible and the vision is fully integrating the IC thus making the nation more secure (ODNI, n.d., paras. 1-2).

Congress has for a long time has tried in various ways to oversee the intelligence community which have shown to be sometime controversial, and a very difficult responsibility. What make this task so hard is the secrecy and sensitivity intelligence information finding, the sources, and the methods in which the information is obtain. Congressional oversight has evolved since the mid-1970s and a lot more since the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. The critics about Congressional oversight by some as being inadequate, ineffective, or worse, while at the same time proposal that was made in the 9/11 commission report was met with challenges from within the Legislature Branch and from the Executive Branch

Congress built upon the reforms of the 1970s by passing the Intelligence Oversight Act in 1980. This Act was an amendment to the Hughes-Ryan Act and obligated the IC to report covert actions to both the SSCI and the HPSCI prior to their implementation, unlike the ambiguous previous requirement of a timely manner. The Intelligence Oversight Act was noteworthy in that it constrained the intelligence community more than any previous legislation (Riley 2010). The two biggest shortfalls I see to the system is the number of contributors there are to the system on such a large scale. When I think about all of the redundancy built within the system, I think about all of the possible breakdown in communications that could take place. The second shortfall I see is the legislative leverage that is held over the Intelligence community. I personally believe this to be a mistake because this power could be held in a negative manner and to gain a political stance or agenda. The Congress can withhold money and resources, can leak information to the media and which could cause a mission or operation to

In this paper the subject of interest is the role of congress in the oversight of strategic intelligence, or the lack there of. Does congress have a proper role in the oversight of strategic intelligence? If not what should the proper role be? These are the questions best answered by looking at the history of congressional over sight and where it is at today. The next few pages will cover the topics above and shed light on what it is congress calls oversight.

Other kinds of intelligence failure have resulted from the fixed ideas of leadership and their deliberate sightlessness to uncomfortable facts. To some extent, intelligence chiefs are more comfortable with conformity than the contestability of ideas. In fact, the more rigid the hierarchy, the higher is the likelihood of intelligence failure.

The “need to know” system is an outdated and inefficient way of sharing information, both within a single agency and when it comes to interagency cooperation. The “need to share” system is a much more logical way to go about disseminating intelligence of all variations. The “need to share” system theoretically mandates the interagency sharing of information that is pertinent to national security , and operational success, thus paving the way for much more efficient operations between the Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security (DHS), as well as other federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies. If I were in charge of the DHS I would put into effect a long term interagency liaison program, that would be aimed at the sharing

The DNI has modestly more power than the old Directors of Central Intelligence (DCIs), but not enough to give the ODNI/AIS real clout. “Herding cats” remains a decent description of the ODNI’s basic role. The DNI has several duties and responsibilities, but for the subject of improving intelligence information sharing the focus will be directed towards: Improving Analytics, Improving Information Security, Improving Foreign Liaison Relationships, and the end state of Improving Information Sharing.

The production, analysis, or dissemination of intelligence can be improve to provide actual benefit to homeland security leaders and practitioners in numerous ways. For this to happening, everyone who receives access to intelligence reports must be educated about intelligence itself and willing to understand it. The Washington Post reported in 2004, no more than six senators read beyond the five-page executive summary of the NIE, although 77 senators voted to authorize the use of force in Iraq. (Lowenthal, 2008). Even though it was inevitable of going to war with Iraq. The NIE can foreshadow problems to occur, and could have aid senators in different ways. From understanding the situation better, to helping with foreign policy. Homeland security leaders and practitioners must be direct of what types of reports they are requiring.

The United States Intelligence community draws on advanced technology and analytical techniques. An intelligence process that sets objectives, collects, analyzes, and report findings, with feedback loops integrated throughout. Explicitly, the intelligence community advantages technology and tradecraft within a proscribed process. However, estimation of threats and decision-making are outcomes of human thinking. Analysts and policymakers create mental models, or short cuts to manage complex, changing environments. In other words, to make sense of ambiguous or uncertain situations, humans form cognitive biases. Informed because of personal experience, education, and specifically applied to intelligence analysis, Davis

In most cases these INTs community compete among each other to provide needed intelligence information to policy makers to justify their budgetary allocations (Lowenthal, 2014). However, intelligence collection can be divided into five main categories referred to as “intelligence collection disciplines” or the “INTs”. These include Human Intelligence (HUMINT), Signals Intelligence

The analysis is then given to consumers and policy makers, once it is checked by the analyst supervisor and peers. The analyst should also be ready to give a briefing on short notice. But both the analyst and the policy maker or consumer have to be aware of at all times, is that the intelligence field does not know everything. “On any given subject, the intelligence community faces what is in effect a field of rocks, and it lacks the resources to turn over every one to see what threats to national security may lurk underneath” (Pillar).