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CHAPTER 4
THE INTELLIGENCE PROCESS—A MACRO LOOK: WHO DOES WHAT FOR WHOM?
THE TERM intelligence process refers to the steps or stages in intelligence, from policy makers perceiving a need for information to the community’s delivery of an analytical intelligence product to them. This chapter offers an overview of the entire intelligence process and introduces some of the key issues in each phase. Succeeding chapters deal in greater detail with the major phases. Intelligence, as practiced in the United States, is commonly thought of as having five steps, to which this book adds two. The seven phases of the intelligence process are (1) identifying requirements, (2) collection, (3) processing and exploitation, (4) analysis and production, (5) dissemination, (6) consumption, and (7) feedback.
Identifying requirements means defining those policy issues or areas to which intelligence is expected to make a contribution, as well as decisions about which of these issues has priority over the others. It may also mean specifying the collection of certain types of intelligence. The impulse is to say that all policy areas have intelligence requirements, which they do. However, intelligence capabilities are always limited, so priorities must be set, with some requirements getting more attention, some getting less, and some perhaps getting little or none at all. The key questions that determine these priorities include, Who sets these requirements and priorities and then conveys them to the intelligence community? What happens, or should happen, if policy makers fail to set these requirements on their own?
Once requirements and priorities have been established, the necessary intelligence must be collected. Some requirements will be better met by specific types of collection; some may require the use of several types of collection. Making these decisions among always-constrained collection capabilities is key, as is the question of how much can or should be collected to meet each requirement.
Collection produces information, not intelligence. That information must undergo processing and exploitation (usually referred to as P&E) before it can be regarded as intelligence and given to analysts. In the United States, constant tension exists over the allocation of resources to collection and to processing and exploitation, with collection