What Latin America and elephant tusks can tell you about intelligence

4knowledge had a couple of recent posts worthy of checking out.

The first is about an article about the need for Latin American nations to have ‘professionalized’ spy agencies to keep track of and stymie the threat posed by Cuba, Venezuela and other assorted commies.  Now, I have no visibility (at all) on Latin America and so can’t weigh the merits of his article other than to note that previous regimes based on anti-communism haven’t done the people of Latin America a whole lot of good.

What I do want to point out is a brilliant sentence the author mentions in the first paragraph:
“Coherent and fluid intelligence agency structures for achieving the mainstay of intelligence, which is organizing evidence for sound hypothesis, eludes many governments.”

Ok, not the most finely crafted sentence but can I still get an ‘Amen’?  The mainstay of intelligence is organizing evidence for sound hypothesis.  I’ve heard a lot of organizations (on the sub-federal level) struggle with trying to explain why they want to get into the intelligence business and how it would make them more efficient and effective but I don’t think I’ve ever seen this point addressed.  That’s because, in part at least, the overwhelming emphasis on tactical issues and concerns.

As I’m also on a kick about good intelligence requiring well thought out processes, the first phrase is appealing as well.  He doesn’t say you need a rigid, hierarchical organization but (and I think this is important) a ‘coherent and fluid’ one.  When your threats are formed into loose networks (either criminal or terrorist), rigid hierarchies have a difficult time dealing with them.

Quite frankly, I would have been much more interested in seeing the author develop that one sentence.  I suspect it’s a very rich vein to be mined.

The second post concerns a very exciting aspect of intelligence:  Wildlife crime.  It cites a report by the Environmental Investigation Agency (website here) which advocates for ‘intelligence led enforcement’ for environmental crimes.

“Without intelligence, enforcement officers canonly operate on a reactive basis, with limited insight into which tactical responses should be adopted or where to direct resources.”

“The primary objective of any criminal intelligence system or group of systems should be to contribute to the prevention and detection of a crime.” (emphasis added)

And, of course, if we want to look at prevention rather than reaction then we need to look at new metrics of success:
“In order to accurately measure successes and identify areas for development, enforcement agencies need to establish clear performance indicators.”

Pretty interesting stuff.

Flattery will get you everywhere

I was poking around my blog stats recently and found a link to this site from 4knowledge which is a South African company which conducts training on intelligence issues.  Allow me to quote the all wise Ms. Duvenage.

I just love Travels with Shiloh - cynical,tongue-in-the-cheek and in-your-face realism about intel stuff, events and manipulations.

Ms. Duvenage, I believe I love you (oh, and any chance you can open comments on your blog?).

Ok, enough narcassistic preening.  Even though I began perusing through the blog in hopes of finding more complementary things about me in it, there are a lot of really good ideas bouncing around there worthy of your time.

Case in point:  This post about the question of ‘professionalizing’ the analytical community.

[we're] still in the awareness-building phase. There is little sharing…and people are either just too lazy, disinterested or restricted by operational security organisational culture to contribute…Interest in belonging to professional organisations is also minimal. We only have 5 members of the International Association for Law Enforcement Intelligence Analysts (IALEIA) in SA. Why so little interest? The same reasons as above apply, plus people do not see their jobs as careers. Before we can even think about a professional organisation for organisational or South African or African Intelligence Analysts, there should be a shared vision built on passion for what we do.

I get both hopeful and discouraged reading stuff like this.  Hopeful because when I look around I realize we’re not as far behind everyone else as I sometimes fear and discouraged because we’ve got so far to go and there aren’t any trailblazers we can follow.

So, regarding her post specifically.  I would argue that looking to the FBI specifically or the (U.S.) national level intelligence community generally might not be a good example for trying to professionalize other (smaller, less ‘networked’) agencies.  It seems however, like we’ve got two choices of how to go (you will note the influence my studies in Soviet political theory have upon me here):

1. The Menshevik approach:  Appeal to the broadest possible audience.  The terms ‘Analyst’ or ‘intelligence professional’ will be used in their most general sense in order to swell your ranks in the hopes that numbers lead to influence.  Of course, the drawback is that any loyalty you garner may be broad but shallow.  Further, because you’ve cast your net so wide, it’s difficult to discuss anything in any detail.  You’re constantly spending your time trying to get everyone to understand the basics of your field and so can never get into advanced or detailed issues because you’ll lose your constituancy.
   
2. The Bolshevik approach:  Forget the masses, they’re “lazy, disinterested or restricted by operational security organisational culture” and won’t do anything to advance your agenda.  Instead, focus your attention of identifying people who will act as a vanguard of the proletariat and drag history kicking and screaming into the next stage.  If you’d like a metaphor a little less Marxist-Lenninist, think of Kevin Costner in ‘Field of Dreams’ (which I haven’t seen, btw).  If you build it, they will come.  This is the sort of ‘judo analysis’ I’ve discussed before when talking about organizational change only on a broader front.  It’s certainly frought with more danger than the other approach but the payoff is greater.
   

I’d argue IALEIA is an example of the first approach.  What is it, really?  Read their ‘About Us‘ section and I defy you to tell me anything about it an hour later. What does it really stand for or against? Does it advocate for anything or is does it just exist so people can look for new job opportunites and go cool places for conferences (and believe me, I’m totally jealous about those conferences and would go in a second)?  If that’s what the organization is about, that’s cool but you shouldn’t really expect to generate much passion or interest in the organization.  It possesses the worst characteristics of new and old organizations, few resources and capabilities, and a conservative ‘don’t rock the boat’ agenda.

It needs to carve out a niche and it’s not going to do that by being a tool of governmental glacial change (or worse) not having a position on anything.  IALEIA needs to develop some positions and then push for them.  If that causes people to leave the organization, so be it.  What are they doing for you now, anyway?

If you want to know why IALEIA membership constitues a fraction of the potential membership (and more importantly, the active membership is probably even much smaller) ask yourself, why should analysts need to be members?  What would drive them to say to themselves ‘Yes!  I want to be a part of that.’  There are problems with analysts not seeing their jobs as careers but a distant professional organization isn’t going to change that.  Better to identify the people who already see their vocation as a profession (or better yet, a calling) and recruit them.

Product versus process

As I slowly (oh, so slowly) try to climb out of this deep, deep hole otherwise known as pursuing a graduate degree I’m mildly surprised how much I miss blogging.  So, I’m up for a quick breath of air…

I’ve seen a lot of attempts to ‘reboot’ the intelligence process in organizations.  One reason why I think I’ve seen so many is that all of the previous attempts have failed.  It struck me as I was listening to a pitch for yet another attempt (Once more into the breach!) that these attempts have shared some common characteristics.

• Sense of urgency – It’s eight years after 9/11, and nobody wants to hear that our intelligence work isn’t up to snuff or that we need to go back to the drawing board and do all the foundational work that wasn’t done initially.  In short, no one wants to have to answer the questions “Well, what have you been doing for the past 8 years?”  So, once the determination has been made that the intelligence/analytical process needs help, there’s the follow on demand that change occur NOW.  The underlying assumption is that all of the foundational work must be correct and any shortfalls must be superficial in nature (software applications, training deficiencies, etc.)
• Product fetish - The demand to see immediate results leads to an expectation to see a ‘quick win’ (a phrase which should result in immediate flogging if ever uttered again) in the form of some sort of intelligence product.  The stated reason for such a product is that it will build momentum.  I suspect the real reason for such a product is that it allow the sucker who was roped into this new responsibility a way to get higher ups off his/her back with the appearance of progress and the ability to leap to the next higher wrung on the ladder before the edifice crumbles yet again.
• Process avoidance – What doesn’t happen is an examination of what processes are needed to build an effective intelligence system and the development of a strategy to implement such a system.  I am hard pressed to find an analyst below the federal level who can claim to have a working planning and direction process in their agency.  Collection plans?  Who has time for that.  Analytical standards?  Hey, this isn’t some ivory tower.  The pathological avoidance of processes means that intelligence efforts will remain ad hoc and require constant reinvention.  (I’ll admit the possibility that such a system may be in the best interest of the institution by creating an ever renewing opportunity for ‘rising stars’ to make their mark by delivering such ‘quick wins’.  Such a position would be valuable for a person to have within his/her pervue within a system which allows for the distribution of promotional opportunities based upon patronage rather than merit.)
• Lack of appropriate expertise – If you ask analysts about the people put in charge of them or their agencies and specifically inquire about the backgrounds of their leadership you’ll often find a lack of training or experience in intelligence and analytical work.  I attribute this to two primary factors:
  • patronage – ’nuff said.  These jobs tend to be high profile and often on the ‘fast track’.  Leaders like to put their favorites in those positions.
  • Tom Clancy – Well, maybe it’s not really his fault but since I don’t like the guy I’m going to blame him.  What I mean here is the increasing access of information over the past decade or so along with a reoccuring narrative that everyone’s opinion is just as valid and insightful as everyone else’s.  As a result intelligence and analysis are viewed as no big deal and something that can easily be picked up.  Just watched season 1 of ‘24′?  Sure you’re qualified to run a counter-terrorism center.  I exaggerate, to be sure.  But not by much.

This is all facilitated by the fact that analysts remain the red headed step children in virtually all (I’d say all but I haven’t spoken to people in every agency) sub-federal level agencies.  In part this is because analysts are relative newcomers to the field, encompass such a wide range of duties (from data entry to investigative support to ‘true’ analysis) to almost make the title ‘analyst’ useless, and have no real institutional power (control of resources or the ability to make policy).

If you can get your hands on an organizational chart for an agency with analysts in it, see how many levels of non-analyst leadership a product or idea would need to go through to get to the top of the food chain.  Then try to see how many of those intervening levels have a familiarity with intelligence issues.  In most cases you’ll see that a lot of talk about ‘breaking down information silos’, ‘intelligence fusion’ or ‘intelligence led’ whatever really boils down to security theater.

What has improved (marginally) over the past eight years has been in information collation and distribution.  Many more people get information they wouldn’t have otherwise received.  The problem is that information almost never is evaluated in a meaningful way, analyzed, placed into context or combined with other information to answer questions that analysts should be paid to answer.  We need to stop obsessing on the ‘who, what, and where’ questions (which investigators, law enforcement officers and other currently do very well on their own) and work on the ‘why, so what and what’s next’ questions (which nobody is doing).  After all, if we aren’t answering those, what exactly is the job of an analyst?

The Artic Sea and Intelligence Analysis Training

I’m really interested in the idea of conducting scenario based training as a way to teach the principles of intelligence analysis and have written in the past about my thoughts of using horror movies as a teaching tool.  At the time I wrote that the movie I was recommending, The Thing by Jon Carpenter, was well suited as such a tool because of the many dimensions with which it could be viewed.  Here, there are even more moving parts to get analysts used to making tough decisions in a real world environment:

• multiple actors  – you’ve got three nations involved in the ownership/operation of the ship, others whose waters it passed through, others who might have an interest if it was carrying illicit cargo, plus NGOs, IOs, various criminal networks, not to mention individual elements of each government which may have their own (sometimes competing) interests in some hypotheses.
• ambiguous ending/no clear resolution – Just like real life, you often don’t know what the ‘real’ story is and might never find out.  Nevertheless, you’ve got to make assumptions and predictions
• extended time line
• lack of utility of previous knowledge

These same characteristics apply to the recent Artic Sea incident and I’m increasingly of the opinion that it would have superb training value with little preparation needed.  I’m therefore thinking about putting together a plan for conducting analytical training using this scenario.  Any feedback you may have to improve upon my thoughts here would be greatly appreciated…

This scenario based training would have to come after participants had already been trained in critical thinking and analytical techniques.  The curriculum done by the group I evaluated earlier this year would be adequate (even better if it incorporated my recommendations!).

Since all of the information to be used in this scenario would be open source, participants should have access to the internet.  I imagined running this chronologically, so that you would furnish participants with the initial story, followed periodically with further updates in a compressed fashion so that the the entire incident could be played out over a day.  I’m not sure you’d want to go much shorter than that since you’d want analysts to have time to dig into the context of potential actors.  Presenting them with too little time might force them to discard potentially profitable hypotheses since they wouldn’t be able to explore them sufficiently.

Now, one of the drawbacks is that trainees could try to game the scenario by reading reports/articles/etc. written further in the chronology than you want them to be or they could use their knowledge of events to likewise game the system.  One way to mitigate this would be to create a stand alone database that would replicate the internet and you could thereby restrict when participants see information.  Unfortunately, this would require you to fill this database with all the information participants might consider relevant which would really be impossible.  The best you could hope for would be filling the database with all the information you think the participants could find valuable but I think that would a Quioxtic quest at best and, at worst, might artificially guide analysts down certain paths (if they searched for something and came up with no results they might, reasonably, think that that hypothesis wasn’t reasonable and dump it).  One of the valuable points of this scenario should be that if you don’t apply a methodology and continually check it you might find yourself down a very long and unproductive road.

The facilitator would need to make sure each analyst (or team of analysts) received injects of information periodically.  Ideally with enough time to process the information and do some follow on research but not so much time that they can just lollygag their way through the scenario.  Analysts should be able to initiate the intelligence process without any specific or technical details that can’t be provided via open source reporting but they should be allowed to generate requests for information (RFI) as part of a collection plan.

In addition to feeding information injects to the analysts, the most important role of the facilitator would be as the ‘decision maker’.  He/she should expect regular briefings from the analysts, asking what they believe has happened and (more importantly) answer the questions why, what next and so what.  The facilitator shouldn’t just be a passive actor though and should play the role of devils advocate as well as asking detailed questions about alternate hypotheses.

This role of decision-maker would require some significant preparation before the scenario to be familiar with not just the specifics of the disappearance and reappearance of the ship but the larger issues involving the potential actors and their interrelationships.  Without knowing facts outside of the case, for example, (like that Russia is a significant arms exporter and Israel has publicly objected to the sale of advanced weapons to Iran and Syria) one wouldn’t have a reason to consider an Israeli connection to the hijacking.  The facilitator should, therefore, drop hints where needed to make sure analysts are getting too myopic, too early.

“Conjecture without evidence of imminent harm…”

“…simply fails to meet the board’s burden of proof.”

That was part of a quote by a federal district judge rejecting the argument by the Federal Reserve that releasing the names of financial institutions which received assistance would cause harm and instability to the financial system.  (You can hear a little more on this Planet Money podcast)

I thought about this quote and how it could equally appeal to the over classification of information, particularly in law enforcement circles.  Don’t get me wrong, over classification is a big problem in the military (and I assume throughout the rest of the national security system) as well but that deserves it’s own treatment by someone more familiar with the subject than I.

Law enforcement, however, seems to fetishize the classification of information and do it for particularly poor reasons.  Now, there are some very good reasons for keeping some information generated by law enforcement and sub-national intelligence organizations (in which I’ll lump fusion centers and state or regional ‘homeland security’ agencies in addition to others).  Information about confidential informants and ongoing operations need to be kept secure lest investigations and the safety of people involved become compromised.  Likewise, some information about the understanding of the threat and vulnerabilities that can be exploited should be kept secret.

That does not mean, however, that the default position for all information generated or intended for consumption by these agencies needs to have a classification label attached to it.  Yet, far too often, information that is either publicly available or of an entirely trival nature is festooned with some many security caveats that you’d think that it contained the nuclear launch codes.

I think there are three basic reasons for this, two of which are never stated when defending the current practice but which, I believe, exert a considerable force in preventing any real reform to the system.

1. The criminals will know what we know. By far, this is most often cited as the reason by information has to be classified.  It assumes that criminals (and there is no distinction made about criminal groups with this argument, both the street level addict ripping off hubcaps for his next fix and the highly sophisticated international criminal network are viewed as equal here) are all conducting intense counter-intelligence operations with advanced collection plans and analysis of their own.  In short, agencies argue that criminals are doing a better job of intelligence work than they are.  The fact that such operations are exceedingly rare makes no matter.  The fact that anyone has done such work anywhere means that we need to act as if everyone is doing it everywhere.  This is where the judge’s quote comes into play.  Just because you can conceive of a possible threat doesn’t mean that threat is likely.  Life isn’t a Tom Clancy novel or an episode of ‘24′.
2. Look, ma!  I’m important.  Unfortunately, regional, state and local agencies have absorbed the lesson from the federal intelligence community that the only information that is worth looking at is information which is restricted in some way.  In many cases this whole thing is a bit of a game since caveats like ‘Law enforcement sensitive’ are useless in their lack of clear definition and sanctions if violated.  As a result, agencies put these restrictions on products no so much because of any harm which would result in the event of their unauthorized disclosure but as a badge designed to impart some authority on the product.  It’s not uncommon to see media reports, copies at length without additional commentary labeled law enforcement sensitive for no reason other than a lazy and pathetic attempt to generate an aura of authority and expertise.
3. Well, I actually forgot the third reason while writing this but I’m sure it was brilliant.  Until I can remember it and update this post, these first two reasons should be enough to support my argument.

The key in the above is that they are the victim (or, I guess, beneficiary) of unexamined assumptions.  And when there are questions about the validity of these arguments, where does everyone turn?  To the very people who propagate and operate under these systems.  Very frustrating.

We need to get away from fantastical scenarios of how criminals operate and begin to consider that, in fact, there are many benefits to making more information available to the general public.  We already release raw crime data to the public (in the form of UCR data).  Some states do a very good job of putting that data in formats that can searched in multiple ways and can be compared to other data sources.  Other states just publish a pdf document, which in todays information saturated world seems, to me at least, a lot like through a stack of papers at someone, giving them the middle finger salute and daring them to actually do anything with the data.

The public should not only know what sorts of criminal activities are occurring in their neighborhoods but they should also be able to get informative assessments of threats.  Why shouldn’t people be allowed to know if the authorities have determined a particular area is at low risk for terrorist attack but, let’s say, moderate risk for hate crimes, as well as how such a determination was made?  I fear the wrong lessons were learned earlier this summer when the DHS report on political extremism got leaked and created a PR firestorm.  Rather than caving into criticism, the DHS could have started a real dialog about their methodology and findings, using the incident to explain to the public how analysis works and what it is.  I’m sure there still would have been strong disagreements about the conclusions by many and even a bit of paranoid hysteria among the fringe but really, what a lost opportunity to educate the public.

State and local authorities have a lot to learn from this incident.  If they’re serious about conducting intelligence at all, they’d be much better off laying the groundwork and making the process as transparent as possible now, before they have to scramble to explain a potentially embarrassing conclusion or product.  The goal isn’t to get unanimous agreement with the conclusions but, as Prof. Roberto says, you need to achieve an understanding that the decision or analytical process is legitimate and fair.  Otherwise, you open yourself up to all sorts of criticism that you’re paving the way for a Socialist (or fascist, authoritarian, extraterrestrial, anti-christ, etc.) takeover of mom’s apple-pie business.

Summer reading

I’ve been working through some journal articles that have been stacking up in my ‘to read’ bin.

Training and Educating U.S. Intelligence Analysts (International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence vol22 no 1)  Stephen Marrin.

Interesting (although not particularly ground breaking) discussion of the challenges the community is facing circa 2008.  While the author confines his discussion to the federal IC, most of what he says applies to sub-national intelligence agencies as well.

He links a number of ideas that have been floated around for a few years.  I like his description of intelligence training being divided into two general camps (‘trainers vs. educators’) which roughly corresponds to the debate of intelligence as art versus science, craft versus profession, etc.  Ultimately settles on a none too surprising conclusion that a mix of both is what we need.  The devil, as they say, remains in the details of actually bringing such a system to fruition.

The best part of the paper is an unanswered question that everyone in charge of an analytical unit or designer of an analytical training program should ask themselves before they undertake any reform.

Do the training centers teach structured methods because they are the best way to do analysis, or do they teach structured methods because that’s what they can teach?…are the intelligence organizations emphasizing the value of structured methods because their application produces better analysis, or because the formal process of teaching these methods provides a way for the organizations to prove to external overseers that they are improving…?

The Intelligence Analyst as Epistemologist (International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence vol19 no 4)  Mathew Herbert

Very interesting (if somewhat dense) article that argues that “[i]ntelligence analysis, unlike many mature professions, lacks an agreed, unified methodology and the experts necessary for regulating one.”  That lack of shared paradigm allows all sorts of snake oil salesmen to sell (often times literally) their wares and drown out more rigorously done analysis.

What is required, Herbert asserts, is

• an emphasis on difference between  what is known and what is believed
• an ability to understand and communicate the level of probability or uncertainty in both individual assumptions as well as how uncertainties within a chain of reasoning interact with each other
• an understanding of key information which is unknown but could alter a particular analytical judgment (those pesky Rumsfeldian ‘known unknowns’)

Definitely worth a second read.

Political Scrutiny and Control of Scandinavia’s Security and Intelligence Services (International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence vol13 no 2) Geoffrey R. Weller

An overview of domestic intelligence scandals in Sweden, Norway and Denmark from post WWII to the mid-90s and the differing responses from the various governments.  It’s particularly interesting to read this article (written in 2000) from a post 9/11 viewpoint where intelligence services were given much wider latitude in their activities among domestic populations.

If you aren’t particularly interested in the region, here’s the relevant bit for wherever you are:

The Scandinavian experience of controversy in relation to the security and iintelligence serves indicates clearly that control that blends protection for citizens and a need for efficient iintelligence agencies is extremely difficult to achieve, even in nations with a strong democratic tradition and a strong tradition of parliamentary supremacy.

Or, may I add, with a popular leader promising change and a more open, transparent government. (H/T A. Sullivan)

Harsh Lessons:  Roman Intelligence in the Hannibalic War (International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence vol17 no 3) Daniel A. Fournie

Caesar, Intelligence, and Ancient Britain ((International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence vol15 no 1) Rose Mary Sheldon

I mention these together not only because they cover similar subject matter (intelligence in ancient Rome) but because the Fournie piece was heavily influenced by the work of Sheldon.

If you have an interest in ancient Rome or military history I’d recommend both of these pieces.   They do an admirable job of taking sparse source material to talk about ideas and concepts which weren’t developed at the time.   Even though I was familiar with both military conflicts I have to admit I never thought of them from an intelligence perspective.  Good stuff.

And the waters cleared…

Good news today as the President ordered a review of our national classification system perhaps even more interesting is that it looks like the review will include information included in the ‘Sensitive but Unclassified‘ category as well.

This is great news since it seems that everyone and their brother seems to subscribe to the idea that ‘the only valuable information is restricted information’ and so slaps all sorts of caveats onto their products to give them the air of gravitas.  My personal pet peeve is ‘law enforcement sensitive’ which is horribly overused and guidelines for its use (like who can slap that title on or take it off) are about as elusive as bigfoot.

Let’s hope this is a sign of some coming common sense.

More summer reading

I can’t recommend this as an interesting page turner, although with a title like:  “The Sensemaking Process and Leverage Points for Analyst Technology as Identified Through Cognitive Task Analysis” you probably didn’t need me to tell you that.

Still, despite its dry style it does have some interesting things to say about the mental processes behind intelligence analysis and if you have even a passing interest in the field you might want to take a look at it.  Unfortunately (for you, I’ve already read it) there are no short, insightful quotes I can put in here to give you the central argument of the paper.  You kind of have to suffer through the entire thing.  But fear not!  It’s only a few pages long.

I read this paper as I was thinking about web 2.0 applications to the analytical process and so came up with this graphic which breaks down the sensemaking loop and identifies what (I think) are tools which might make each component task easier, more efficient, and more complete.

enjoy

Click on image for larger version

Beach reading

I continue to think about how intelligence analysis can integrate with law enforcement operations and remain incredibly frustrated about how little progress has been made in the past decade on that front.  It’s been sticking in my mind since I expressed my dissatisfaction with the ‘organizational change’ element of a recent training I attended.  The one thing I’m reasonable sure of is that this problem isn’t one of dysfunction in an individual agency but rather is a function of a number of inherent characteristics of those agencies.

To that end I strongly recommend Organizational Pathologies in Police Intelligence Systems by James Sheptycki (you’ll have to have access to ProQuest or some other journal database).  It really is worth the time you might have to spend hunting it down.

Here’s a mind map that riffs off of Sheptycki’s article and captures what I think are his core ideas when overlayed with the intelligence cycle (I use a slightly different version of the cycle than is mentioned by the link).

Click on image for a larger version

What you’ll notice is that there are serious issues at every point of the cycle which indicates an serious institutional problems.  Law enforcement agencies are among the longest lived and structured government agencies we have and so introducing significant change to how they operate really requires someone who can and chooses to wield an extraordinary amount of power to alter a system which most likely brought him/her to the lofty position they now hold.

To use a rough analogy, in the military the intelligence section reports directly to the commander as does the operations section.  While operations typically has more influence the two groups are (at least in theory) on the same level of staff organization.  I would argue that translating the current law enforcement/intelligence situation into military terms would be the equivalent of placing the intelligence element not just under the operational one but, in at least some cases, one or more layers even further down the organizational structure.   Think about how military operations might change if intelligence information had to pass through two, three or more additional filters (which had limited to no experience with intelligence) before getting to the commander.  It wouldn’t just be an issue of what information gets passed up but even what questions would be asked and sent back down.  Therefore, Sheptycki warns:

The organizational pathologies outlined in this paper show that the processing of criminal intelligence is not as rationally ordered as may appear in the pages of the strategic analyses that are its product.

In the contemporary period there is a concern to use the product of strategic criminal intelligence analysis to re-order priorities. Policy makers in the field of organized and serious crime in all of the member states of the European Union are consequently exercised with commissioning and interpreting
strategic assessments of the organized crime problem and making policy of the basis thereof.There is an expectation that strategic analyses of criminal intelligence provided by the policing sector will aid policy makers in making decisions about resource allocation in the management of a wide range of organized criminal activity…Given the catalogue of organizational pathologies that affect the policing intelligence system, it will be necessary to use the analytical products of that system with circumspection. [italics added]

That’s a big reason why I’m increasingly of the opinion that analytical capability (beyond rudimentary case/investigative support which is what most in the law enforcement community consider to be intelligence analysis) needs to be either placed in a separate organization or moved up the system and placed in the hands of a higher authority.

Of course, there’s been quite a bit of discussion on this issue but not, as far as I can see, not a lot of change which indicates that the powers that be don’t want to upset the apple cart.  While most of the discussion has focused on terrorist/espionage threats I would argue that the arguments for a domestic intelligence agency are just as applicable for significant criminal threats coming from networks.  Too often law enforcement agencies (both local and federal) have to follow the headlines and respond to public perceptions of threats rather than actual threats to public safety and well being.  As a result, criminal threats that don’t generate local news headlines (and corresponding outcry from voting constituents) don’t generate pressure from elected officials to ‘do something’.

As one crime researcher told me:  ‘Look around you.  On the internet, in the newspapers, even in the phone book there are all sorts of advertisements for ‘escort’ services.  Do you hear anyone complaining or demanding the authorities stop prostitution because of those ads.  But…put a streetwalker on your corner and the police switchboard will light up like a Christmas tree.’  Since most people are going to respond to the perception of threats, there should be someone out there attempting to see if those perceptions are grounded in reality.

Do we have anyone looking out over the next 6, 12, 18 months (or longer) to try to figure out what trends we can expect to see among criminal networks?  What vulnerabilities those networks are exploiting and which ones can be used to exploit them?  Is anyone looking at the effectiveness of various suppression/prevention strategies?  On an even more basic level, are we confident we even have a handle on the number, characteristics and activities of criminal networks out there so that we can have the confidence that resource allocation is being done in a (semi) rational way?

Hysteria over the DHS

I’m not entirely sure why but there’s been some hysteria over a recently leaked report by the DHS about the possible rise of right wing extremism.  Michelle Malkin’s screeching will probably be picked up by remote alien civilizations it’s so loud.  It really would be nice if these people would read the document before they start screaming about the destruction of the constitution.

This assessment is very typical of the sorts of warning that have been put out since 9/11.  Like Greenwald and Sullivan point out, we didn’t hear a peep from these quarters when the federal government was collecting intelligence and issuing warning about various peace groups and kids keying SUVs.

The truth is much closer to Marc Ambinder’s assessment.  The report doesn’t mention any groups or specific threats but is rather a general assessment of what the law enforcement/intelligence community might see in the future.  C’mon people, this is what your intelligence analysts are supposed to do.  Now, it is true, as Marc says:

The report is pretty absurd. Absurd in that a government report was prepared and disseminated to tell law enforcement officials something everyone already knows: instability nourishes discontent, some racists dislike Obama, and as the “out” group, the fringes of the right are more unhappy than usual.

Unfortunately, that is the general level of analytical product circulating nowadays and (equally disturbing) is not something ‘everyone already knows’.  Just because the FBI and DHS elements in Washington D.C. have a good understanding of domestic extremism (and given some of the products I’ve read about animal extremism over the years, I’m not entirely convinced of that) that can not be considered evidence that offices and agencies further away from the hub are equally well attuned.

Mark also makes a great observation that the report really sugar coats some of the motivations of right wing extremism, particularly with regards to immigration.  While the report identifies wage deflation as the cause of anger over illegal immigration that does gloss over the xenophobia that underlies much of the movement.

I agree the assessment is generally fluff and could have been summarized to a page or less but I’m guessing most of its ten pages was designed to insulate the DHS from just the sort of criticism it is now facing by trying to provide some context to their assertions. The report goes out of its way to avoid talking about mainstream political opposition in fact, ignoring the numerous ‘mainstream‘ sources which seem to be claiming that the current administration is planning to destroy the Republic in order to establish some sort of Communist regime and coming as close to inciting violence as they can while maintaing plausible deniability.

In fact, if you read Malkin’s post you’ll see that all of her objections rely on living in her paranoid world where:

“In Obama land, there are no coincidences.”

Ah, yes.  Obama the puppet master.  Pulling the strings and controlling the vast left wing conspiracy.

Now, I’m not one who believes ‘What’s good for the goose…’ in this situation.  If the rights of Americans are being violated then it’s a disaster for all of us.  Even if they are bat-shit crazy.  But that’s not the situation here.  There are no warnings about the infamous ‘Tea-Parties’ or any political groups names.  If Ms. Malkin were truly as “familiar with past assessments [the DHS] and the FBI have done” then she would know the same cannot be said of past assessments about eco-extremists over the past ten years.  One needn’t look far to find countless examples of warnings issued about legal activities conducted by law abiding citizens simply because they share similar ideological beliefs (yet to a less extreme degree).

After all, despite being active for over 30 years and consistently being labeled the most serious domestic terrorist threat in the United States, ecological extremists still haven’t managed to kill anyone.

Right wing extremists have a much more successful track record.

It’s also not insulting vets.  It’s simply saying that vets might be targeted for recruitment by extremist groups.  Just like they are supposedly recruited by street gangs.  There’s absolutely nothing new there.  Move along.

Like the recent dust up over a similar assessment by the Missouri Information Analysis Center this may be a weak intelligence product but it’s not sinister.  In fact, if you are convinced the government is salivating over the chance to kick your dog and take your guns you should be feeling pretty good about this assessment.  Is this really the best the new Maoist/Stalinist intelligence community can do when they’ve been mobilized to attack freedom loving patriots?

So my problems with the assessment are rather banal.  Annoying lack of details, over classification, no sourcing of information, no good indicators to identify illegal extremist activities and the use of the word ‘chatter’.  But that doesn’t mean assessments like this shouldn’t be done.  They just need to be done correctly.  It is can be a tricky row to hoe in not crossing the line and collecting on legitimate political activity but that’s what we are paying our intelligence professionals for.  The wrong thing to do would be to cave into pressure and stop all examination of political extremism because of hysterical rantings by people whose livelyhood depends on dividing the country.

I’d recommend checking out AJStrata’s comments of this little drama.  Today was the first I ever saw his blog but anyone concerned about the future of the Republican party/conservative movement should read his posts as a warning of what’s in store if they continue along their path.