Deciphering intelligence analysis: the synthetic nature of the core intelligence function

ABSTRACT

Intelligence analysis is one of the most explored topics in intelligence studies. However, decoding its nature is still challenging. A unifying question must be considered: ‘Is intelligence analysis – analysis?’ Unfolding the problem leads to an extreme conclusion: intelligence analysis is a way to structure sensory data collection and reduction. It is, namely, synthesis. A systematic scrutiny of the general nature of analysis is considered to compare it to what intelligence analysis is intended to be. As it will turn out, intelligence analysis is much more synthesis – namely, structuring sensory data collection – than analysis per se, which is the main conclusion of the argument.

Acknowledgements

I’m grateful to Jules Gaspard for helping me in improving the early versions of this paper. Franck Bulinge and Ralf Lillbacka sent me important comments and observations which assisted me in editing and emending potential mistakes. I am extremely grateful to Terry Quist’s efforts of improving this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Marrin, “Is intelligence analysis an art or a science?”.

2. Pili, “Toward a Philosophical Definition of Intelligence.”

3. Sean Mcfate, The new rules of war: victory in the age of durable disorder; Pili, “The Wild Bunch is Enrolled to the Army.”

4. Warner, “Wanted: A definition of “intelligence”; Diaz, “Forming a definitional framekork for ‘intelligence”; Gill and Phythian, “Intelligence studies.” Gill and Phythian, “What is intelligence studies?” Gaspard, “Intelligence without essence”; and Alan Breakspear, “A new definition of intelligence.”

5. Such as the data collected through passive or active sensors, measurments etc., anything that puts a means between the human cognition and reality.

6. Gill and Phythian, “Intelligence studies”; and Gill and Phythian, “What is intelligence studies?”.

7. As the quest for intelligence definition showed, defining something requires technicalities that would exceed the space of this paper. This effort would be a major improvement in the research on this topic.

8. This is what I discover during an exchange of email with several national researchers from different part of the world and with different first languages.

9. Such as the sight, the hearing or the other data collected by human senses.

10. See note 5 above.

11. Finley, A Brief History of U.S. Army Military Intelligence Training, U.S.

12. Marrin, “Intelligence Analysis Theory “.

13. Yergin, The prize: The epic quest for oil, money & power, 45.

14. Marrin, “Intelligence Analysis Theory “, 830.

15. Ibid., 830.

16. Ibid., 827.

17. Pili, Filosofia pura della guerra, 413–493.

18. Gill, Phythian, “What is intelligence studies?”, 19.

19. Warner, “Intelligence as risk shifting”; Gill, “Theories of intelligence”; Gartin “The Future of Analysis”, 1; and Breakspear, “A new definition of intelligence”.

20. Odom, “Intelligence Analysis,” 330.

21. Lillbacka, “An Outline of a Clausewitzian Theory of Intelligence.”

22. Lowenthal, “Towards a Reasonable Standard for Analysis,” 308.

23. Coulthart, “Why do analysts use structured analytic techniques?” 933.

24. Pherson and Heuer, “Structured analytic techniques,” 232.

25. Ibid., 232.

26. Goldman, Epistemology and cognition; Goldman, Olsson, “Reliabilism and the Value of Knowledge”; and Nozick, Philosophical Explanations.

27. Chang et. Al., “Restructuring structured analytic techniques in intelligence”, 340.

28. Ibid., 346.

29. For interesting application of Aristotle’s concepts to intelligence ethics: Hatfield “An ethical defense of treason by means of espionage”.

30. Coulthart, “Why do analysts use structured analytic techniques?,” 945.

31. Ibid., 942.

32. Arcos and Palacios, “EU INTCEN: a transnational European culture of intelligence analysis?”.

33. Ibid., 87.

34. It sounds slightly trivial, saying that training is an important factor in predicting analysts’ SATs use. Indeed, an analogy can be drawn for driving licenses as a predicting factor for driving propensity. It is obvious that an average person with a driving license (and then capable of driving) will much more likely drive than a person without any driving training.

35. Kreuzer, “Professionalizing Intelligence Analysis: An Expertise and Responsibility Centered Approach,” 591.

36. Pili, “Intelligence and Social Knowledge,” 185.

37. Hare, Coghill, “The future of the intelligence analysis task,” Floridi, “What the Near Future of Artificial Intelligence Could Be”.

38. Bruce, “Making analysis more reliable”; and Pili, “Toward a philosophical definition of intelligence.”

39. For a detailed analysis of the intelligence managers, a cornerstone is Gentry “Managers of Analysts”, which is definitely as sharp as enlightening.

40. Clausewitz, On War; Gill and Phythian, “Intelligence studies: Some thoughts on the state of the art,” and “What is intelligence studies?”; Horn, “Knowing the enemy”; Treverton and Gabbard, “Assessing the tradecraft of intelligence analysis”; and Luttwak, The grand strategy of the Byzantine Empire.

41. Schmitt, The concept of the political. International Relations theories explore this topic and, some of them, diverge with this conception. But this is not the place to go further on the elaboration of this crucial aspect of intelligence, namely on the notion of natural or artificial categorical enmity.

42. Marrin, “Rethinking analytic politicization,” 54.

43. Pili, “Toward a philosophical definition of intelligence”, 185.

44. Beaney, “Analysis.”

45. Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes: Volume 1, 120.

46. Goldman, “A Causal Theory of Knowing,” and Epistemology and Cognition.

47. Pili, “Intelligence and Social Epistemology.”

48. Ibid.

49. Kreuzer, “Professionalizing Intelligence Analysis,” 586.

50. Even in formal logics a context of interpretation is required; otherwise, the logical variables are just what they are, namely symbols.

51. Braun, “Indexicals.”

52. Definitely blue and red teams require both formations of new knowledge; therefore, they are not entirely analytical at least.

53. This is a reduction of the compelling, Gentry, “Managers of Analysts,” 162.

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Notes on contributors

Giangiuseppe Pili

Giangiuseppe Pili is Research Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defense and Security Studies. He is an external member of Intelligence Lab – Calabria University and a former Lecturer in the International Master in Security, Intelligence and Strategic Studies at Dublin City University in Ireland. He earned a Ph.D. in analytic philosophy from Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele (Milan, Italy). He is an editorial board member of the Italian Society of Intelligence, and host of the series Intelligence & Interview. Along with professor Mario Caligiuri, he is the author of Intelligence Studies (2020).