lOMoARcPSD|255728 27
Defining Strategic Intelligence in Today's National
Security Environment
In the book, Strategic Intelligence: A Handbook for Practitioners, Managers, and
Users, author Don McDowell explains gives detail to the intelligence cycle by using
seven processes. Such processes include tasking and focus, planning the strategic
research project, information collection, collating and evaluating data, analysis,
developing some workable concepts and hypotheses, and reporting the results of
strategic research, (McDowell, 2009). All seven processes are important to the whole
of strategic intelligence. Heidenrich, however, states that the United States has been
neglecting strategic intelligence in recent years. “Those analysts who grew up in the
period when attention to strategic intelligence permitted them to deepen their skills
and become genuine subject-matter experts have been dwindling away. Many have
retired from government services for private sector jobs or left the field entirely,”
(Heidenrich, 2007). “Strategic intelligence is intelligence that is required for the
formulation of strategy, policy, and military plans and operations at national theater
levels,“ (Federation of American Scientists, n.d.). Due to his belief that areas of
McDowell’s seven processes are deficient, Heidenrich states that those deficiencies
have caused many failures in strategic intelligence, including 9/11 and the attack on
Pearl Harbor.
In Heidenrich’s article, The State of Strategic Intelligence, he says, “Strategic
intelligence collection and analysis is a capability they took pains to preserve; we are
perilously close to losing it,” (Heidenrich, 2007). There are two of the seven
processes that Heidenrich seems to believe are deficient, one of them being
information collection. While collecting data for tactical intelligence involves targeting
individuals and their associations, collecting data for strategic intelligence involves
digging deep into a crime and forming an understanding of its impact. McDowell
(2009) says, “For this purpose, data collection is aimed at gathering all sorts of data
from every source imaginable, both within and outside of government circles.” In
regard to collecting data, the WMD Commission says, “Managers and analysts
throughout the Intelligence Community have repeatedly expressed frustration with
their inability to carve out time for long-term research and thinking,” (WMD
Commission, 2005).
The second intelligence process that Heidenrich finds to be deficient is analysis.
McDowell says, “If the issues are complex and the data of widely varying quality,
then it follows that the analyst needs to spend some considerable time working out
just what types of analysis suit what categories of information,” (McDowell, 2009).
While this may be true, Heidenrich argues that one of the reasons why strategic
intelligence is deficient is due to the amount of time it takes to gather pertinent
information. “It is lacking because skills necessary for strategic intelligence do not
thrive in the equivalent of a crisis center, rushing from task to task, fact-sheet to fact-
sheet, and blurb to blurb,” (Heidenrich, 2007).
Due to the neglect in some areas of the strategic intelligence processes within the
United States, tactical intelligence has become the preferred method for some.
Despite this, strategic intelligence is not going anywhere. It is crucial to look at the
processes in which strategic intelligence falls behind and make improvements.
lOMoARcPSD|255728 27
“Consumers may not always call for strategic intelligence, but they will always need
it. We must never neglect it,” (Heidenrich, 2007).
References:
WMD Commission, (2005). Commission on the Roles and Capabilities of the United
States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction, Report to the President. WMD
Commission, Washington DC.
Federation of American Scientists, (n.d.). The Nature of Intelligence. Federation of
American Scientists. Retrieved from: https://irp.fas.org/doddir/dod/jp2-0/j2-0ch2.htm
Heidenrich, J. G. (2007). The State of Strategic Intelligence. Studies in Intelligence,
51(2). Retrieved
from: https://www.cia.gov/static/789d2c84e758c9111bdaaa2adb8c628a/the-state-of-
strategic-intelligence.pdf
McDowell, D. (2009). Strategic Intelligence: A Handbook for Practitioners,
Managers, and Users. Scarecrow Press, Inc., Lantham, MD.
