Intelligence for an Age of Terror

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Intelligence for an Age of Terror
Gregory F. Treverton | 2009-03-23 00:00:00 | Cambridge University Press | 320 | Terrorism
During the Cold War, U.S. intelligence was concerned primarily with states; non-state actors like terrorists were secondary. Now the priorities are reversed. And the challenge is enormous. States had an address, and they were hierarchical and bureaucratic. They thus came with some "story." Terrorists do not. States were "over there," but terrorists are there and here. They thus put pressure on intelligence at home, not just abroad. They also force intelligence and law enforcement - the CIA and the FBI - to work together in new ways, and if those 700,000 police officers in the United States are to be the eyes and ears in the fight against terror, new means of sharing not just information but also analysis across the federal system are imperative. The strength of this book is that it underscores the extent of the change and ranges broadly across data collection and analysis, foreign and domestic, as well as presenting the issues of value that arise as new targets require collecting more information at home.
Reviews
Gregory Treverton has a career that is fairly typical for that range of mid-level bureaucrats that help keep the wheels of the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC) moving. It began with a staff job with Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, a stint with the National Intelligence Council (NIC) and as vice chair for National Intelligence Estimates (NIE) with various positions with Rand Incorporated between government jobs. Although he has never done any actual working level collection and analysis, he is what in Washington D.C. is considered an intelligence expert. In a sense he is and as this book demonstrates an unusually thoughtful one.

Treverton understands the often complex relationships between policy and intelligence and the impact or lack thereof of intelligence analysis on executive decision making. He makes a very useful distinction between intelligence `mysteries' and `puzzles' as means of determining both analytic techniques and more importantly consumer expectations. He also has some rather broad, but relevant ideas on how to make the IC work better.

Yet in the end one has the impression that Treverton himself is not at all sure that the political will and the dedicated focus that would be needed for the reform of the IC are there.





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