The Future of Intelligence at the Department of Homeland Security

Despite having made real contributions to the sharing of intelligence between the federal government and state and local agencies; since its inception, the office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A) at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has struggled to find its place in the larger U.S. Intelligence Community (IC). Indeed, it is common knowledge among the IC that I&A is often viewed as the Rodney Dangerfield of that community – they get “no respect.” To shed that image and earn some respect, I&A must add real and independent value to the IC and the homeland security mission as a whole.

A Shock to the System

To understand much of why I&A finds itself in the predicament it is in today, one must go back to 2003 during the establishment of the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC), which is now the National Counter Terrorism Center (NCTC). TTIC was created to provide a “comprehensive, all-source-based picture of potential terrorist threats to U.S. interests” while I&A was created to “access, receive, and analyze…information from agencies of the Federal Government, State and local government agencies and private sector entities, and to integrate such information in order to (a) identify and assess the nature and scope of terrorist threats to the homeland… .” While TTIC’s mission went beyond the homeland to cover all “U.S. interests” it clearly collided directly with I&A when it came to homeland security.

When President Bush announced the creation of the TTIC during his State of the Union in January 2003, it sent a shock wave through DHS and particularly through I&A. So much so that then Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security, Gordon England, recommended we disband I&A since much of what is was designed to do would now be managed by the TTIC. On top of the TTIC, the FBI also believed that I&A was, and remains, duplicative of the FBI intelligence and TTIC missions and that I&A is simply not necessary. In the end, the decision was made to keep I&A in tact, but the underlying reasons that caused the basis for the debate within DHS, to this day, have hampered I&A over what its role truly is. If I&A is not to be the hub of U.S. government intelligence analysis for purposes of protecting the homeland, what is its proper role?

Before one can address what the role of I&A is one must first outline what I&A’s role is not. I&A is not a collector of intelligence. It has no agents in the field and has no direct control over intelligence gathering assets. I&A’s role is not to duplicate the efforts of other federal intelligence agencies – I&A is not the Directorate of Intelligence at the CIA or the FBI and it is not the NCTC. While competitive analysis is essential to determining the true meaning of intelligence, it alone cannot justify the existence of I&A.

Unlike most intelligence analysis units, I&A is not tied to a specific operational counterpart within DHS, e.g., the intelligence analysis units at the FBI and CIA serve, in part, to support their operational counterparts within those agencies. Compounding this fact, DHS operating components from the Coast Guard, which is an independent member of the IC, in addition to I&A, to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, have their own intelligence units further complicating the role of I&A.

Three Key Areas of Focus

I&A’s fundamental mission should focus on three parts each of which is interrelated and serves the common purpose of protecting the homeland from threats and acts of terrorism: (1) To provide assistance to and integrate the intelligence efforts of the DHS components; (2) To provide assistance to and integrate the efforts of state and local intelligence programs with the larger IC counter-terrorism efforts; and (3) To view all source intelligence as its relates to vulnerabilities of U.S. critical infrastructure and key resources (CIKR).

The DHS components are a wealth of raw data that when properly collected and analyzed can produce useful intelligence leads and products. However, integrating the intelligence efforts of agencies as disparate as the U.S. Secret Service and the Transportation Security Administration whose missions seem to have little in common, short of the seal under which they operate, is daunting. The DHS components have long viewed I&A with suspicion, unclear as to how I&A fits into the components’ day-to-day operations and intelligence needs. I&A has taken steps to overcome these challenges by including liaison officers from the components within I&A and by setting strategic guidance for intelligence units across the Department.

If integrating and coordinating the DHS components’ intelligence efforts is difficult it pales in comparison to working with state and local intelligence programs for no other reason than the size and diversity of those programs. Such programs are spread across 50 states, five territories and the District of Columbia plus hundreds of major cities and counties across the country. In addition, I&A has no field offices similar to the FBI. Thus, except for its having deployed some intelligence analysts to state and local intelligence fusion centers, I&A, unlike the FBI, has no significant daily presence among state and local agencies, especially state and local law enforcement.

I&A currently serves as the executive agent for DHS concerning state and local fusion centers. It should be given this mandate U.S. Government wide and be tasked with developing a national concept of operations for fusion centers and a federal support plan - funding, training etc. - that reaches several years into the future. This should address to what extent I&A should have a broader presence in the field similar to the FBI’s Field Intelligence Groups. It is information at the state, tribal and local level that I&A should focus much of its attention on in order to integrate that information with federal information to produce useful intelligence. This includes more than simply law enforcement information, e.g., public health, private security forces, and the fire service. However, given the criticality of state and local law enforcement in this area, until clear lines between I&A and the FBI are drawn, I&A’s role will remain murky in this critical field.

Finally, viewing intelligence through the prism of CIKR is a mission shared by I&A’s once twin brother at DHS – the Office of Infrastructure Protection, which, along with I&A and the Homeland Security Operations Center, made up the now defunct DHS Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate (IAIP). Despite IAIP having been disbanded the need to overlap intelligence threats against the known vulnerabilities of U.S. CIKR in order to design protective measures and issue alerts and warnings is still vital. These missions must be better coordinated and integrated at DHS particularly at the Homeland Infrastructure Threat and Risk Analysis Center and the National Operations Center.

For I&A to shed its Rodney Dangerfield image it must provide unique and real value to the IC and the homeland security community writ large. It must do what no one else does. Until that happens, the office will continue to struggle to find its place and earn the respect it deserves.