Restore the Foundation of Naval Intelligence
Commander Jason Hines, U.S. Navy
Proceedings, February 2005
 |
| U.S. NAVY (FELIX GARZA JR.) |
What makes naval intelligence unique? What does it contribute to the success of the fleet? Is it still relevant? It had better be, for customers such as these aviators assigned to Carrier Air Wing Two as they listen to a preflight brief on board their carrier supporting
Operation Iraqi Freedom.
The naval intelligence community is adrift. Uncertain of its role within the
Navy, it has embarked on a plan to focus naval intelligence on a limited set of specialized skills. Naval intelligence officers will remain generalists, with four proposed areas of specialization: human intelligence (HumInt), management of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), intelligence support to special warfare (SpecWar), and targeting.
However, these specialty areas are all too narrow in focus. HumInt, while important, represents only one mode of intelligence collection. ISR management involves managing collection platforms and collection plans, which, though important, is not enough to support all the missions of the Navy. Intelligence support to SpecWar supports one warfare area. Likewise, targeting primarily supports strike aviation. None of these skill sets provide the analytical skills needed to track mobile platforms, whether ships, submarines, or surface-to-air missiles. The lack of focus on a single unifying skill has led the naval intelligence community away from supporting the fleet. The community has been so focused on developing specialty skills it has stopped addressing the fleet's basic need: actionable intelligence. As a result, many war fighters view naval intelligence as irrelevant.
There is a skill, however, that would serve the naval intelligence community as its key core competency, and also would serve the larger purpose of restoring relevance to the community in the eyes of the fleet: operational intelligence (OpIntel). Through the craft of OpIntel we can reestablish the primacy of all-source, value-added fusion analysis, reconnect with the war fighters in the fleet by reinvigorating fleet support, and empower other disciplines such as targeting. We must move immediately to reestablish OpIntel as our key core competency and return the focus of our community to supporting the fleet.
Why OpIntel?
The
Marine Corps ethos is, "Every Marine is a rifleman." Behind this belief is the realization that, for the Marine Corps, marksmanship is the core skill. Marksmanship is considered so fundamental a skill that it defines the Marine Corps. Every Marine, whether officer or enlisted, infantry, aviator, or cook, is required first to qualify on the rifle range. The reasoning is quite simple: you cannot kill what you cannot hit.
For the Navy, there is a corollary: you cannot hit what you cannot track. OpIntel is the key that provides the analytical skill to track mobile targets. For naval intelligence, the skill of OpIntel analysis should be as fundamental as marksmanship is for the Marines.
OpIntel is tailored, all-source analysis provided directly to naval operating forces, focusing on an adversary's capabilities and intentions.1 What passes for analysis today is often merely reporting of information: analysts look at an unfolding event and explain what is happening, nothing more. This is of limited use to the fleet, since this approach forces war fighters to react to an adversary's moves. OpIntel differs dramatically from this paradigm in that it focuses on predictive analysis. By focusing on what an adversary will do in the future, analysis becomes actionable for the operator, allowing war fighters to anticipate and take the initiative.
The basic skills of OpIntel encompass the range of naval operational issues, not just those of ships and submarines. These skills apply equally as well against mobile land targets. The types of mobile platforms may vary, but the mind-set and the skills for tracking them are the same.
Today, the OpIntel culture that existed during the
Cold War is dead and its veterans are an endangered species. Closely tied to the Ocean Surveillance Information System (OSIS), set up to track Soviet ships and submarines during the 1970s and 1980s, OpIntel was a skill that enabled naval intelligence to track Soviet forces at sea and to predict the movements and intentions of those forces. It was ultimately OpIntel's association with the OSIS system that doomed it. After the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, naval intelligence leaders concluded that since the OSIS system was outdated, OpIntel must be as well. OpIntel centers were closed, courses were terminated, skills atrophied, and naval intelligence abandoned OpIntel. The results of this move have been disastrous and far-reaching.
With the end of the OSIS system, the theater joint intelligence centers (JICs) were given the fleet support mission (pushing operational intelligence products to the fleet). As the courses that taught the craft of OpIntel were canceled and the pipeline of trained OpIntel analysts was cut off, the JICs' attempts to maintain fleet support were hobbled. It was a matter of time before the JICs were unable to provide the support the fleet required.
Although JIC watches often are referred to as OpIntel watches, this is a misnomer. The JIC watches do not produce operational intelligence; the predictive element is largely missing. In some cases, JIC watches even are discouraged from carrying out analysis. A senior naval intelligence officer recently stated, "The JIC watch should not do any analysis; that's the day shop's job." Ultimately, it is the watch standers, not the long-term analytical shops, who provide the bulk of intelligence to the fleet and who have the most interaction with the war fighters in the fleet. We have lost the art of dynamic intelligence analysis when we most need it.
Currently, the submarine force is the only part of the fleet that regularly receives some semblance of the OpIntel support the entire fleet used to receive under the OSIS system. Some JIC watches still push intelligence to the submarine force. Yet, even in the support for the submarine force, the loss of OpIntel skills is evident and is negatively affecting intelligence support. The value-added, predictive intelligence that was a hallmark of OpIntel is scarce today.
(continued)
© 2005 The Naval Institute. All rights reserved.
