Introduction

This article analyzes the main challenges
currently facing strategic intelligence, stresses their singularity in relation
to the challenges facing operational and tactical intelligence, and recommends
some directions for addressing them. It focuses primarily on Israel and the
United States, and in light of differences between national intelligence
cultures (Crosston, 2016), it tends toward the “Anglosphere” (the United States
and Western countries) (Aldrich & Kasuku, 2012).

The article does not present a comprehensive discussion of the nature of strategic intelligence, or of the relationship between intelligence and leaders; both subjects have been extensively studied (for example, Johnson, 2003; Gazit, 2004). For the purposes of this article, strategic intelligence (Brun, 2015) is seen first of all as a field that serves the strategic decision making echelons (in Israel: the politicians, and in a certain sense, the IDF General Staff and the heads of organizations in the intelligence community). Second, the field deals with the strategic environment (the strategic echelons of adversaries, rivals, and friends, and with elements that influence strategy the stability of regimes, economies, technologies, and so on). Its primary purpose is to provide information, but also to create knowledge and insights that are relevant to the planning, implementation, and critical review of strategy. It is also in charge of clarifying reality on a strategic level[1] and for creating insights that affect strategy. In turn, this should lead to changes in reality (Dado Center, 2016).

The article covers a variety of
challenges: sociological, philosophical, methodological, and technological;
challenges connected to the nature of the leaders; and others relating to the
environment in which intelligence operates. It posits that unlike in operational
and tactical intelligence, most of the challenges derive from the difficulty of
strategic intelligence to establish its epistemological and professional
authority. While most of the challenges are not new, it appears that changes in
the strategic environment, together with significant improvements in
operational and tactical intelligence, the unique character of some decision
makers, subversion of the status of truth and facts in decision making processes
in the post-truth and fake news era, and technological changes in the
information age intensify familiar challenges.

A recent description of the glass
ceiling of strategic security intelligence proposes learning from the world of
business (Barnea, 2019), but this article argues that in the current era, there
is actually an increase in the added value strategic intelligence can provide
for commanders and leaders. In order to meet these challenges, national strategic
intelligence must engage in methodological reflection and implement advanced
technologies. It must undergo the same Revolution in Intelligence Affairs (RIA)
as did operational and tactical intelligence.

Context

A recent article (Palacios, 2018) offers
a sharp description of the challenges faced by strategic intelligence “in the
post-everything age” and hints at the ramifications of post-modernism, post-truth,
and fake news. First, strategic intelligence competes for the attention of
decision makers against other elements that create strategic information,
knowledge, and insights; second, traditional intelligence grew and developed in
the modern era in which it was important to clarify the truth, but in the post-modern
era the status of truth is undermined and is replaced with narratives; third, traditional
intelligence developed on the basis of a perception that the exposure of
secrets would help complete the puzzle, but today it is necessary to deal more
with mysteries and complexities; fourth, traditional intelligence focused on countries
and organized entities, but today must deal with non-state and non-organized entities,
and identify emerging units; fifth, a considerable number of leaders’ decisions
today are based on opinions, perceptions, beliefs, and their derivatives,
rather than on intelligence; sixth, strategic intelligence is used to support
decisions that have already been taken, and in effect help the leaders to
“market” narratives to the public; and seventh, intelligence organizations
strive to strengthen their influence by means of strategic intelligence, while
decision makers are more interested in operational and tactical intelligence,
and even use intelligence for other needs, such as covert diplomacy. This
analysis forms the basis for the challenges discussed below.

Contemporary
Challenges to Strategic Intelligence

Competition and the National Intelligence Monopoly

Competition for attention of leaders
and the loss of the national intelligence monopoly have been mentioned in
recent years largely in the context of information overload (Treverton, 2004)
and the availability of open information and intelligence (William & Blum,
2018). In 2005 it was even suggested that intelligence analysis could become
less relevant for decision makers (Teitelbaum, 2005). Some have referred to
“the rise and fall of intelligence” in the 20^th century (Warner,
2014), while others argue that intelligence is currently the business of many
elements apart from security intelligence, partly in view of the development of
artificial intelligence and machine learning (Brantly, 2018). In other words,
for the last decade strategic intelligence has been fighting for its place.

Presumably in cases where operational and tactical intelligence is required to launch air attacks, frustrate terrorism, level focused economic sanctions, and so on national intelligence faces no real competition. But at the strategic level, the situation is different.

The first potential area of
competition is linked to the possibility that leaders do not rely only on
intelligence to clarify and understand situations, but rather base their
decisions on their own direct understanding of the strategic environment as
well. For example, US President Trump, responding to an assessment by the American
intelligence community of January 2019 that Iran was not taking the steps necessary
to develop a military nuclear project, said that the intelligence personnel
“should go back to school,” since in his opinion they were “passive and naive”
(Oprysko, 2019). Trump’s different assessment regarding Iran was ostensibly not
a case of deliberate deflection or politicization of intelligence (Hastedt,
2013), but reflected his own assessment of the strategic environment, which in
this specific case differed from that of the intelligence professionals. To be
sure, the phenomenon of leaders “ignoring” intelligence that does not match
their own perceptions is not new (Handel, 1989); however, in recent years
leaders have apparently acquired greater access to the strategic environment, inter
alia through direct meetings between the leaders themselves, and through the
use of technology that enables them to consume “customized” information. Therefore,
it is possible that they have a stronger sense that strategic intelligence created
by national state institutions offers no added value in relation to their own
understanding of the situation.

The second possible area of competition is linked to the security and civilian research institutes and think tanks that are engaged in strategic analysis. Much of the output of these institutions is designed to influence strategy and policy (e.g., Institute for National Security Studies INSS; RUSI; Chatham House; Washington Institute; Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs). Research studies created by these civilian institutions examine interactions between arenas and beyond arenas; deal with more than military aspects; analyze developing technologies; and create an assessment and long term forecast. They also include a combination of observations of "the red" (the environment) and "the blue" (own forces) in net assessment/thinking (such as Marshall, 1972) a subject that is sometimes absent from security intelligence products, which are ostensibly not supposed to analyze “the blue side.” In Britain, for example, the study produced by a long term analysis of the strategic environment was not written by an intelligence entity (Ministry of Defence, 2018).

The main challenge, therefore,
derives from the possibility that some decision makers feel that there is a
substitute for strategic intelligence. This position might have existed in the
past, but the leadership style of some contemporary decision makers intensifies
it. Moreover, it appears that leaders do not have the same approach to
operational and tactical intelligence. If this hypothesis is correct, it
explains why strategic intelligence might face difficulty in establishing and
justifying its epistemological basis and demonstrating to the leadership its
unique added value.

The
Decline of Truth and the Rise of Narrative

The common assumption is that intelligence is an institution to clarify reality and discover truth (Brun, 2015). A notable reflection of this perception is the way the American intelligence community describes their relations with senior members of the administration, namely, “truth to power” (Morrell, 2018). Brun and Roitman (2019) argue that in the post-truth and fake news era it is difficult to clarify reality, and this harms decision making in the fields of national security. In their view, such decisions are often made on the basis of beliefs, opinions, and feelings, rather than on the basis of orderly processes (that includes strategic intelligence) conducted by professionals as part of the broader trend of a loss of faith in state institutions. RAND even gave the trend a name: “truth decay” (Kavanagh & Rich, 2018). Brahms (2019) described the link between post-truth and the difficulty of discovering objective truth, and the era of technology and information overload. Michlin-Shapir & Padan (2019) use the concept “liquid modernity” and claim that today’s prevalent approach holds that there is not one single truth but a range of narratives, and there is no central authority that is able to judge which narrative is correct. These issues are relevant to the discussion of strategic intelligence.

National intelligence developed in the modern age, which prioritized truth and deemed science the main institution for its discovery. In this sense, it is a clear product of the Enlightenment (Hayden, 2017). In Israel there was an emphasis on the need to use scientific methods in intelligence practice (Ben-Israel, 1999), and the terminology used by the American intelligence community based on the tradition of Kent (1949), who saw intelligence as a scientific discipline shows how they carried the torch of the search for truth. Perhaps not surprisingly, etched into the wall of the lobby of the CIA Original Headquarters Building is a verse from the Book of John (8:32): "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

However, the literature recognizes the limitations of intelligence to function only as “an institution for discovering truth.” As far back as the early 1960s, Wasserman (1960) wrote about erroneous basic assumptions naive realism and inductionism that lead to intelligence failures. Wasserman attacks the perception that can be called “objectivist,” which maintains not only that the objective truth exists, but also that intelligence can reveal it using scientific methods. In Israel, Granit (2006) was one of the most prominent opponents of this perception, which he called “the realistic paradigm.” The American application of this approach was recently thoroughly researched (Marrin, 2020).

In addition, the term “post-modern
intelligence” has arisen often in recent years (Rathmell, 2002), and studies
claim that scientific approaches should be combined with creative approaches
(Cavelty & Mauer, 2009). It is possible that intelligence has remained
planted in the positivist approach, while it is in fact other disciplines in
the fields of social sciences and the exact sciences that are liberating
themselves from this paradigm (Manjikian, 2013).

At the same time, it does not appear as though leaders have stopped asking intelligence to uncover the truth. In 2018, for example, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu presented the operation by the Israeli intelligence community to disclose the Iranian nuclear archive. He claimed that Iran had lied to the international community about its military nuclear project (Hai, 2018), and also revealed the sites used by Hezbollah in Lebanon to convert rockets into precision missiles (Azoulay, 2018). The implication is that not only does the Prime Minister deem truth important; he also uses intelligence to reveal it. In the United States, while the Trump era is perceived as an expression of post-truth and deliberate lies (Cassidy, 2018), it also looks as if the American President is not questioning the importance and place of truth and facts, but rather arguing that national intelligence institutions have not engaged in clarification of the relevant facts. The President claimed contrary to the facts presented by the intelligence community in January 2019 that Iran had conducted tests with rockets, that the Iranian economy was collapsing, that North Korea had stopped testing missiles and returned the American prisoners, and more (Oprysko, 2019). In fact, the President did not present narratives that were not dependent on truth, but focused on facts and truths, including the “alternative facts” (Bradner, 2018) that supported his narratives.

While the subversion of the importance of truth is a challenge for intelligence in general and strategic intelligence in particular and may have intensified recently, it appears that leaders are not necessarily questioning the ontological basis of the truth. However, they are perhaps questioning the epistemological, institutional, and methodological basis of intelligence for the discovery of truth. Moreover, since strategic intelligence deals fundamentally with abstract phenomena that are open to interpretation and less with physical facts defined by orderly and generic behavior (Shapira, 2019), it is harder to apply the concepts of “truth” and “facts” to it. It appears therefore that strategic intelligence has difficulty justifying its epistemological basis mainly for the purpose of an abstract description of the strategic environment. Operational and tactical intelligence do not face a similar challenge, since they deal mainly with the discovery and exposure of factual and physical truths. They are concerned with secrets, while strategic intelligence focuses also (although not only) on puzzles and mysteries.

Secrets,
Puzzles, and Mysteries

Many argue that today’s intelligence must deal mainly with highly complex mysteries (Treverton, 2004), whereas formerly for example, in the struggle against the Soviet Union during the Cold War in the American context, or in the location of military preparations for war on the part of Syria and Egypt in the Israeli context (Gazit, 2003) it was primarily concerned with revealing secrets.

Nevertheless it appears that strategic intelligence has dealt with mysteries for many years (Hulnick, 1999). A study of the archives of National Intelligence Assessments in the United States illustrates this, and a similar phenomenon is found in Britain (Cradock, 2002). However, it appears that the mysteries have become more complex. For example, in its National Intelligence Estimates, American intelligence presents issues relating to advanced technologies, artificial intelligence, energy, climate, organized crime, and cyber. In order to locate developments in these areas, a different kind of strategic intelligence is required, unlike its previous format in which it was mainly intended to warn of war preparations or report on regime stability. Moreover, many of the current mysteries are not focused on just one country, but are also linked to non-state entities.

Irregular
and Non-State Entities, and New Cyber Challenges

Numerous studies have stressed the
need to adapt intelligence to deal with terror (Herman, 2003a), and maintain
that today’s central challenges originate in irregular entities (Freedman,
2006). Terror organizations, cyber hackers, and international technology
companies are prominent examples of such entities, but in recent decades
intelligence organizations have made changes to deal with them, so these are
not new challenges for strategic intelligence.

In Israel, for example, warnings of
war preparations are a vital component in the concept of security (Hershkovitz,
2017) and in IDF strategy (IDF, 2018), but in recent years changes have been
required in the functions of intelligence in this context. Kuperwasser (2007),
for example, described changes introduced in the first decade of the new
millennium; Kochavi & Ortal (2014) and Brun (2015) described changes in the
IDF Intelligence Directorate since 2011, based in part on the need to produce
additional output apart from war alerts. In fact it appears that Israeli
intelligence has succeeded in adjusting to the challenges of terror (Kabir,
2019; Shpiro, 2012), and for some years has focused on irregular and sub-state
entities, whose activities also find expression in interactions between arenas
and beyond arenas (A. E., 2016). This issue in itself does not create a new
challenge.

Moreover, the need to deal with state and regular issues is actually returning, and to a large extent presents itself as in the Cold War period (Hennigan, 2018). A study of documents published by the US administration dealing with national security issues in 2015-2019 national security strategy (The White House, 2017; The Pentagon, 2018; Joint Chiefs of Staff, 2015; Office of the Director of National Intelligence, 2019; and Coats, 2019) illustrates the greater priority given to the two countries that create strategic competition (the great powers competition) China and Russia and the lower priority given to two rogue countries North Korea and Iran. In April 2019 the CIA Director remarked that in recent years the Agency had focused on fighting terror and supporting military operations, but had neglected its traditional capabilities vis-à-vis states (Central Intelligence Agency, 2019).

Thus it appears that the need to deal with irregular and non-state entities, together with the necessity to engage once again in traditional intelligence concerning states, does not create new challenges for strategic intelligence. However, an examination of the challenges facing American strategic intelligence with respect to countries such as Russia, China, and North Korea leads to an assessment that it is no longer only a matter of issuing warnings when military force and expeditionary forces are activated, or about the deployment of nuclear weapons or the stability of the regime and the economic situation. American intelligence is required in addition to, and not instead of the above to analyze scenarios in the cyber dimension. To a large extent this is a new challenge.

Although the literature is replete
with studies of cyber as a dimension of warfare (Sharma, 2010); of the need to
create a revolution in intelligence affairs in the reciprocal relationship
between data collection and research (Siman Tov & Allon, 2018); of the
difficulty of attributing a cyber attack to its source (Rid & Buchanan,
2015); of intelligence as the basis of creating cyber defense (Mattern et al.,
2014); of the intelligence challenge posed by cyber attacks on national
infrastructures (Rudner, 2013); of the challenge of exploiting cyber to track
the sources of terrorist funding (Winston, 2007); of the cyber challenge
created by states (Brantly, 2014), and more, it is hard to find a rich
theoretical basis for a discussion of the link between strategic intelligence
and the cyber dimension. Are concepts such as “strategic warning” or “a Pearl
Harbor-type surprise” relevant in the field of cyber (Wirtz, 2018)? Is the link
between operational/military intelligence that deals with capabilities and
strategic intelligence that deals with intentions also relevant to the cyber
dimension? How, for example, should strategic intelligence handle groups of
Russian or North Korean hackers? And can it make use of a methodology similar
to the one used to track operational expressions of the strategic logic of
Russia and North Korea? The dearth of literature dealing with these issues and
with the concept of “strategic cyber intelligence” to a great extent demonstrates
the intensity of the challenge.

Intelligence
and Leadership

Complicated links between leaders
and intelligence, whereby intelligence is used to support decisions already
made by leaders, existed in the past (Herman, 2003b; Bar-Joseph, 1998; Freedman,
1997). Matza (2017), for example, described strategic intelligence inter alia
as the “spokesperson” that enables the leader to recruit public support for a
decision that has already been made. The use of intelligence to facilitate the
United States withdrawal from the war in Iraq in 2003 is an accepted example of
this process (Hastedt, 2005; Freedman, 2004).

It appears that the relationship between a leader and intelligence which is also influenced by the character and personality of the leader (Steinhart & Avramov, 2013) could today, as in the past, lead to a politicization of intelligence. But it is possible that intelligence organizations are currently perceived as part of the traditional establishment, and certain leaders even demonstrate a lack of trust in them (Zelizer, 2018). In the United States, for example, it is argued that the CIA is going through a process of politicization, marked by opposition to the President’s approaches (Gentry, 2018); some Agency employees have described liberal bias (Gertz, 2018); and even in the 1960s it was possible to discern political bias in its assessments (Freedman, 1997).

There have already been some who argued that strategic intelligence analysis has had limited influence over American foreign policy (Marrin, 2017); that US presidents since World War II have arrived “prepared” for the presidency with perceptions and strategies, and intelligence only influences them to the extent that it supports their original views (Immerman, 2008); or that even though the strategic intelligence was high quality and relevant, the leaders often chose not to make use of it (Kovacs, 1997). In this sense, strategic intelligence continues to struggle with a familiar challenge the superiority that leaders ascribe to their own world view and ideology compared to the professional analysis, and certainly if the latter claims to be objective. Operational and tactical intelligence appears to be unable to confront a similar challenge, since its main purpose is to enable the implementation of policy, and not to influence or change it.

But do today’s leaders rely on beliefs,
opinions, and feelings more than in the past? Does the debate that they lead
today deal more with ideology than in the past, which means they have less need
of intelligence that is designed to reveal the truth and presents itself as
objective, or do they feel that they are less dependent on strategic
intelligence than their predecessors? A full response to this question is
beyond the scope of the present study, but leaders and commanders seem to rely increasingly
on tactical intelligence.

Improved
Operational and Tactical Intelligence: At the Expense of Strategic Intelligence?

Intelligence
Gathering and Output

In recent years collecting and
processing intelligence capabilities have greatly improved, thanks partly to
advanced technology, artificial intelligence, and machine learning (Weinbaum
& Shanahan, 2018). This allows more intimate access to raw information,
which ostensibly gives a better reflection of what is happening in the area
where the data is collected. It seems reasonable for leaders and senior
commanders to demand and consume such information, which consists almost
entirely of operational and tactical intelligence.

The importance of reading raw
information and the “addiction” of leaders to such information are not new – at
least in Israel (Ben-Porat, 1984; Bar-Joseph, 2013). However, it seems likely
that these phenomena have intensified in recent years in view of the quality
and intimacy of the data. Therefore, the more a commander makes use of intimate
and sensitive information that symbolizes penetrating to the heart of the
secret, the more information he or she feels they need, and it must be more
intimate. And the more intimate the information, the more powerful the addiction.

While the use of tactical
information and intelligence is relatively intuitive, and leaders or commanders
may feel that they experience the environment directly without the need of
interpretation or mediation, this is likely not the case with strategic
intelligence (in this context an American study even examined the difficulty
for senior generals of using strategic intelligence; Wolfberg, 2017). While
tactical intelligence is usually factual and therefore also concrete and deals
with physical entities, strategic intelligence is usually abstract and vague, and
deals with human phenomena that are difficult to quantify. Therefore it is
difficult to point to a link between improved data collection and improved
strategic intelligence, more than to the impact of improved collection on the
quality of tactical intelligence. And since this is the case, leaders are
apparently more and more “addicted” to operational and tactical intelligence,
but not necessarily more dependent on strategic intelligence.

However, military actions that depend
on tactical intelligence also require high quality strategic intelligence for
their formulation and implementation.

The
War on Terror in the United States, Prevention and Influence Strategy, and the Campaign
between Wars in Israel

The strategy of prevention and influence
is a central component of IDF strategy (IDF, 2018) “to frustrate the threats,
to deter and postpone war, and to shape the area in a way that suits Israel…and
damage the enemy’s capabilities in order to create the optimal military,
political, and cognitive conditions for the future decision of any war that may
erupt, and to strengthen deterrence” (pp. 19-20). The Campaign between Wars (CBW)
makes it possible to implement this strategy: “CBW activity is ongoing, exists
in every arena of war, based on a situational assessment and the facilitating
intelligence…CBW activity is based on quality intelligence” (p. 24). In order
to carry out an attack in Syria against Iranian and Hezbollah sites, to expose
the Hezbollah tunnels on the Lebanese border (Mizrachi, 2019), or to attack the
legitimacy of Hezbollah in the international community (Zeitoun, 2018), there
is a need for high quality and intimate operational and tactical intelligence,
at high resolution and in real time. And since CBW has become a central
component of Israeli security activity (Zeitoun & Porat, 2019), the demand
for this type of intelligence will probably grow.

But how far is strategic intelligence adapted to the format of CBW warfare? Intelligence at various levels, including the strategic level, is described as one of the conditions for its implementation (Allon & Freizler-Swiri, 2019). CBW planning and implementation requires the highest quality of strategic intelligence, which analyzes the strategic environment holistically and identifies a window of opportunities; possibly this was the process that in recent years led Israel to embark on a campaign against Iranian entrenchment in Syria (Even, 2019). However, a study of the professional literature reveals a significant gap in the methodological debate about the link between strategic intelligence and CBW. Apparently, CB given the high speed at which it is managed, the significant risks it involves, and its need to engage constantly with secrets, but also with puzzles and mysteries¾creates a new challenge for strategic intelligence.

In the United States it is also possible to point to a link between the rise in importance and relevance of certain types of conflic above all the war on terror (CT – counterterrorism) and insurgency (COIN – counterinsurgency and the prominence of operational and tactical intelligence. For example, there is a strong link between operational and tactical intelligence and the activity of the American Special Forces (Gentry, 2017) and these forces are the central component of the war on terror. But what is the place of strategic intelligence in these forms of action? Some argue that the American intelligence community has adopted an approach that puts the emphasis on information (information-centric intelligence) and by implication on tactical intelligence, more than on research and assessment (Dudley, 2018). In Britain it has been claimed that the roles of strategic intelligence are in doubt (Gibson, 2009). Moreover, in the United States there is apparently a trend of focusing on current intelligence in a way that leads to neglect of capabilities and skills that are more relevant to strategic intelligence (Marrin, 2013; Heinderich, 2007). A further illustration of the prominence of operational intelligence rather than strategic intelligence emerges from an analysis of the place of intelligence in the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) (Hundley, 1999). Such a revolution is usually the result of a combination of changes in technology, weapons, structure, organization, and perceptions (Adamsky, 2012). The latest revolution is based to a large extent on precision information, of high quality and high resolution, that facilitates the activation of an “information-crush combination” (Rosen, 2019). There is no doubt that this in fact refers to operational and tactical intelligence, but with regard to strategic intelligence, it is relatively absent from the literature on the subject, possibly indicating that strategic intelligence has not yet adjusted to changes in security thinking and practice.

The
Revolution in Intelligence Affairs and Strategic Intelligence

While tactical intelligence is undergoing a Revolution in Intelligence Affairs, mainly by exploiting new technologies, strategic intelligence appears to have been left behind. Underlying the theory of the RIA is the idea that a radical change in intelligence is influenced by technologie particularly those relating to artificial intelligence and data analysis; combat efforts in the intelligence context this refers mainly to information systems that enable data mining and use of big data; structural and organizational issue mainly regarding units that fuse various intelligence sensors, but also those that combine intelligence with operations and technology; and new perception mainly those relating to the search for an alternative to the “intelligence cycle” as the organizing idea of the intelligence process, while creating new combinations of collection and research. In the professional literature, it is common to refer to several revolutions in intelligence affairs over the course of history (Lahneman, 2007; Denece, 2014; Barger, 2005), but it is clear that the main catalysts for the current revolution are big data and the information revolution. The most relevant type of intelligence for this type of revolution is operational and tactical.

Col. Y. of IDF Intelligence describes
(2018) the potential of the digital age. He looks mainly at intelligence that facilitates
the struggle against suicide terrorists, in other words, operational and
tactical intelligence. As background to this discussion, in the Israeli
context, the focus on improvements in operational intelligence is due inter
alia to the gaps identified during the Second Lebanon War in 2006 (Bar-Joseph,
2007), and it appears that this was also one of the considerations for setting
up the Activation Unit in the Intelligence Directorate (Buhbut, 2016).

Another expression of the role of operational intelligence in military and intelligence revolutions can be found in the literature dealing with changes underway in military intelligence (Ferris, 2005). In 2004, the emergence of the RMA was descried as the result of how intelligence is incorporated into net-centric warfare (Ferris, 2004), and clearly these are the consequences of the information revolution. Another study (Evans, 2009) describes the changes that are needed in the “traditional” model of the intelligence proces the “intelligence cycle”; this study also focuses on military intelligence, and implicitly on operational and tactical intelligence.

However, the literature dealing with
the link between the information revolution and big data on the one hand, and strategic
intelligence on the other, is rather limited. In the United States it is
already argued that the CIA units that dealt with strategic intelligence did
not fully exploit the information revolution (Berkowitz, 2007). There are many
references to an article dealing with the use of big data for strategic
intelligence purposes (Lim, 2016) but this is apparently the exception that
proves the rule.

Conclusions,
Further Research, and Recommendations

This article presents various
challenges facing strategic intelligence, and even if most are not new, it
appears that taken together they become more intense. It describes the
sociological aspect of the loss of trust by the public and its leaders in
institutions, of which state intelligence is one; the philosophical aspect
linked to the weakening of the ontological basis of objective truth and in particular
the epistemological basis of its discovery by means of facts and empirical
findings; aspects relating to the difficulty of intelligence to influence vision
and ideology; the growing demand from commanders and political leaders for operational
and tactical intelligence, rather than strategic intelligence; and the
methodological aspect, linked to the limited adoption of innovative
technologies by strategic intelligence and only partial implementation of the
Revolution in Intelligence Affairs.

The article presents the hypothesis that strategic intelligence has difficulty in establishing its epistemological and methodological authority. It has not sufficiently adopted innovative technologies, and is largely based on intuitions and familiarity with the environment and past experience; Brun (2018) calls this the “educational school” of intelligence research. At a time when information science and advanced technologies have become an important condition for making decisions, strategic intelligence has difficulty persuading leaders of its unique added value and its ability to make full use of technologies for the purposes of strategic analysis.

In order to validate or refute the
hypotheses raised by this article, it is necessary to develop an empirical base
and conduct interviews with leaders and senior members of the intelligence
community (an example of over sixty years ago is Hilsman, 1956) from the very contention
that intelligence studies do not sufficiently use interviews (Van Puyvelde,
2018) or observations. Empirical information should above all provide an
understanding of the way in which leaders perceive strategic intelligence and
its added value, and of course an understanding of the latest challenges now
facing the practice of strategic intelligence. In addition, the concept “strategic
intelligence” is vague and demands interpretation, and it is therefore possible
that a different approach could refute the thesis developed by this article.

In addition, it seems that the literature on the subject of strategic intelligence continues to engage in the traditional subject surprise, warning, relations with leaders, politicization, organizational issues, cognitive deflection, and so on (for example, Betts & Mahnken, 2003; Johnson, 2003; Phythian, Gill, & Marrin, 2008). Although recently attempts have been made to emphasize the impact of theories on intelligence practice (Gill & Phythian, 2018; Coulthart, 2019), there is still a gap in orderly writing about the effect of technology on the practice of strategic intelligence, or in other words, a gap in research that combines practical, up-to-date knowledge with broad theoretical observation.

Furthermore, there is no satisfactory research into alternative models for the intelligence cycle in the context of strategic intelligence. In Israeli Military Intelligence (AMAN), for example, 2019 marked the start of implementing the Fifth Dimension project that is generating changes in the process of creating intelligence (Fishman, 2019). It appears that this project is indeed challenging the intelligence cycle and creating unique combinations of research and data collection, while utilizing advanced technology, and it is therefore recommended to use this framework to develop a theory and updated models that will also be relevant for strategic intelligence.

In order to deal with the challenges
described in this article, strategic intelligence must engage in reflection,
define its methodology, establish critical thinking (Hendrickson, 2008), and
nurture the foundations of the profession (Coulthart, 2016) in that way it will
be possible to raise its credibility in the eyes of the political leadership
(Gookins, 2008), through a combination of quantitative analysis and abstract,
qualitative analysis, giving expression to wise and innovative use of
technology, particularly with respect to information science. The ticket that
gives intelligence personnel entry to the halls of national security was and
remains operational and tactical intelligence, but strategic intelligence must
also shape its own “room for strategic discussion.” In effect it must undergo
its own Revolution of Intelligence Affairs.

The phrase “methodological
reflection” does not refer only to the implementation of basic research methods
such as scenario analysis, war games, reverse filming, red teaming, and so on. Strategic
intelligence must also examine how the utilization of big data can help to
locate patterns and thereby identify anomalies (Kuosa, 2010); a striking
example relates to macro-economic and global trends (and not only the economies
of countries). It must develop an orderly methodology for strategic warnings of
cyber attacks, not necessarily on the part of official state elements, and also
warn of emerging trade wars, such as between China and the United States. It
must establish an approach using integrative models on data collection for
strategic matters. For example, changes in the concepts of force buildup and
deployment have made the serial process of data collection guided by defined
questions (known unknowns) irrelevant, because these are cases of emerging
processes that may not be related to decisions by leaders on the other side. Strategic
intelligence must “take ownership” of methods linked to horizon scanning in
order to identify trends that could develop in the long term. One example is
the need to identify emerging technologies in the field of artificial
intelligence, which could have an impact not only on the operational
environment, but also on strategic competition between countries (Allon, 2018;
Hershkowitz, 2019).

The thread that runs through all
these recommendations is the belief that strategic intelligence should not be
deterred from the adoption of innovative technologies, maximization of
capabilities in information science and artificial intelligence, focus on
technologies as the subject of research, and systematic work on methodology. It
must not leave the field open only for operational and tactical intelligence. Apart
from the new tasks indicated above, it must continue engaging with the
traditional tasks of intelligence, such as warning of war threats, political
upheavals affecting enemies (and friends) and so on. In these cases, too,
intuition and deep familiarity with the strategic environment are essential,
but not sufficient.

What prospect, therefore, does strategic intelligence have in the current era? Paradoxically, the complex, challenging environment of information overload and rapidly changing technology; leaders who undermine a basic element of the discipline and methodology of state intelligence in general, and strategic intelligence in particular; and the difficulty of clarifying event all these factors increase its added value. Political leaders appear to consume raw information and develop independent access to the strategic environment, but in fact, quality strategic intelligence can frame the strategic discussion, indicate which information requires further investigation and which is not currently relevant, show the possible directions for development in the strategic environment if specific strategies are implemented, and give politicians suggestions for alternative strategies to the ones already chosen. Quality strategic intelligence is a holistic product (and process) that constantly moves inwards and outwards, between details and the whole picture, and also between disciplines and different research issues. Today’s complex environment demands such a holistic view. Relevant strategic intelligence is both artistic and scientific (Shapira, 2019)like strategy itself (Brodie, 1998). True, these were its essence in the past, but the sheer volume of today’s challenges and information reinforce its ability to provide unique added value.

It is certainly difficult to measure
the success of intelligence in general and strategic intelligence in particular
(Moore, Krizan, & Moore, 2005), and thus a retrospective examination of the
value of assessments is unsatisfactory. The true test of strategic intelligence
is to a large extent its ability to influence the direction, planning, and
implementation of strategy, and by implication, to shape the environment. It
must do this by means of professional analysis, which, even if it does not
claim absolute objectivity, must be based on facts, as well as on in-depth
interpretation and the use of relevant conceptual frameworks. This is what
creates the “strategic lenses” that lead to an understanding of a complex and
dynamic environment in a way that also facilitates shaping it. Strategic
intelligence is now needed more than ever: this could be its darkest hour, but
also its finest hour.

***

The author wishes to thank Brig,
Gen. (ret.) Itai Brun, formerly head of the IDF Intelligence Research Division and
currently Deputy Director for Research and Analysis at the Institute for
National Security Studies (INSS); Brig, Gen. Dror Shalom, head of the Research and
Analysis Division of the Israeli Military Intelligence; the editors of Strategic
Assessment; and the two anonymous reviewers for their professional and
constructive comments.

The views expressed in the article
are solely those of the author, and not of the IDF or Israeli Military
Intelligence.

Col. (res.) Itai Shapira has over 25
years of experience of intelligence research in IDF Intelligence Division at the
tactical, operational, and strategic levels. He is a graduate of the College of
National Security, and holds a B.A. in Economics and Philosophy, and an M.B.A. from
Tel Aviv University.

***

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Notes

[1] There is an ontological debate about "strategic
reality," and an epistemological question regarding intelligence’s
capability to clarify it, but this is beyond the scope of this article.