Intelligence_ From Secrets to Policy - Mark M. Lowenthal [206]
DBA reflects at least two trends. The first is the great strides that U.S. intelligence has made in collecting and disseminating intelligence to military commanders in the field. Commanders believe that this superiority allows them to use forces more effectively, so as to achieve ends more quickly and with fewer casualties. The second is the so-called lessons learned from the first Gulf War about the problems in bringing intelligence to the field and getting the right intelligence to the right military user.
Although Deutch cautioned that the “fog of war” (a term coined by nineteenth-century Prussian general and military theorist Karl von Clausewitz for the confusion and uncertainty that are inevitable in any combat) will never be eliminated, many advocates of DBA seem not to have heard him. DBA is often oversold as the ability to bring near-total intelligence to commanders. This hyperbole puts intelligence on the spot for capabilities it does not have. Unrealistically high expectations may lead commanders to place greater reliance on intelligence (which may not be forthcoming) and less on their own instincts when dealing with the fog of war, which is the ultimate skill of a combat commander. (Gen. William T. Sherman observed that Gen. Ulysses S. Grant was the superior commander because he was unconcerned about what the enemy was doing when out of sight.)
Department of Defense (DOD) official statements on the topic are somewhat confusing. The two key documents are Joint Vision 2010 and Joint Vision 2020. Both emphasize the importance of DBA and the role of intelligence but tend to use intelligence and information technology interchangeably. However, information technology is a means to, but is not the same thing as, intelligence.
Another problem with DBA is that delivering on its promise could require the intelligence community to allocate a large percentage of collection assets to the task, to the detriment of other priorities elsewhere in the world. As with SMO, the question “How much is enough?” is pertinent. Finally, an essential ingredient in successful DBA is getting the right type and amount of information to the right user. An army commander’s intelligence needs differ from those of an infantry squad leader or a combat pilot. Some critics are concerned that too much information is pushed down to users who have no need for it, flooding them with irrelevant intelligence simply because the means are available to do so. As a result, their jobs are made more difficult.
The military campaign in Iraq that began in 2003 illustrated both the promise and the problems involved in DBA and RMA. The vastly superior strategic and tactical intelligence of the United States and its allied forces enhanced both the general campaign plan—including the decision to make a dash for Baghdad with fairly small forces—and the ability to locate, identify, and attack in detail regular Iraqi forces. But the war also pointed out that the evolution of U.S. military doctrine continues to put pressure on intelligence for increasing degrees of support. Given the likelihood that the size of U.S. forces (as opposed to their mobility and lethality) will not grow much, intelligence will increasingly be seen as one of the factors that allows these relatively small forces to achieve both dominance and victory. How much support is entailed and what it means for the shape and practice of intelligence are not entirely clear. Also, it remains uncertain how the DNI fits into the relationship between intelligence agencies—especially those such as the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency