Joint Intelligence Research Articles

Thinking about defence intelligence: Victor Cavendish-Bentinck, Denis Capel-Dunn, Kenneth Strong and the Joint Intelligence Bureau as foundation for the Defence Intelligence Staff

The Defence Intelligence Staff’s closest relative was the Joint intelligence Bureau. The Bureau was created in 1946 as part of the post war reorganization of the intelligence machinery, consolidating a number of wartime organizations. It was a centralized organization, providing defence intelligence to customers in the armed forces and government. The Bureau was founded with the objective of implementing several lessons that had been identified in the Second World War concerning the organization and management of intelligence. This paper examines the particular lessons the Bureau’s founders and its leader had learned, and the ideas they sought to ingrain in the organization. It asks what kind of foundation the Bureau provided for the DIS, when it merged with the service intelligence directorates in 1964.

Geoffrey Vickers and lessons from the Ministry of Economic Warfare for cold war defence intelligence

Geoffrey Vickers is the forgotten man of British intelligence. As the UK’s economic intelligence supremo at the Ministry of Economic Warfare and the Foreign Office between 1941 and 1945, Vickers transformed the craft of economic intelligence in both strategic and operational spheres. In the policy arena he was the driving force behind the economic and industrial planning of civil administration of liberated Europe. Vickers was also an intelligence theorist of the first rank whose legacy survived in his holistic conception of economic intelligence, its centrality to decision-making in peace and war, and the scope and evolution of the Joint Intelligence Bureau and defence intelligence.

Book Review: Britain and Ireland: Spying on the World: The Declassified Documents of the Joint Intelligence Committee, 1936–2013

This paper is embargoed until October 2017, it is a review of the book, Spying on the world: the declassified documents of the Joint Intelligence Committee, 1936–2013 by Richard J. Aldrich, Rory Cormac and Michael S. Goodman. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2014. 448pp., ISBN 9780748678570. This paper was accepted for publication in the journal Political Studies Review and the definitive published version is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1478-9302.12101_68

The view from above: how the Royal Air Force provided a strategic vision for operational intelligence during the Malayan Emergency

It has long been held that the Federation of Malaya’s counter-insurgency campaign during the First Malayan Emergency (1948–60) was determined by the use of intelligence. Special Branch — the Federation’s primary intelligence agency — dominates the prevailing paradigm of how the insurgent threat was tackled. Conversely, the role of the Royal Air Force (RAF) within this paradigm is very limited. Most observers simply dismiss the role of photoreconnaissance or airstrikes as being largely inconsequential to the counter-insurgency effort. This is perhaps understandable: the Emergency was after all a ‘policing action’ and the insurgents were largely hidden under Malaya’s jungle canopy and amongst the Chinese community. However, further scrutiny reveals that the RAF made a much more significant contribution to the intelligence element of the counter-insurgency campaign than previously realised. First, the RAF decided to locate their Advanced Headquarters with the Army’s General Headquarters. This led to the creation of the Land/Air Operations Room, through which intelligence, tasking and resources were coordinated. Moreover, the RAF put its intelligence teams into the field to provide a practical link between local units and theatre-level assets. Second, with the support of the Army, the RAF established at the beginning of the Emergency the Joint Air Photographic Intelligence Board (Far East). This coordinated all photographic intelligence requirements throughout the Emergency, which was then delivered via the Joint Air Photographic Centre (Far East). Hence, via Joint Operations Centre and JAPIB (FE), the RAF provided both the practical means for effective joint intelligence operations at theatre level throughout the Emergency.

British Intelligence and the Fear of a Soviet Attack on Allied Communications

This article considers British intelligence fears about a Soviet attack on Allied communications. It includes a reproduction of a 1959 assessment by the Joint Intelligence Committee focusing on the means of communication across the Atlantic, and the means by which the Soviet Union could interfere or intercept them.

Terror in Galilee: British-Jewish Collaboration and the Special Night Squads in Palestine during the Arab Revolt, 1938–39

In 1938 in British Mandate Palestine, British army officer Orde Wingate organised and led a joint British-Jewish military unit, the Special Night Squads (SNSs), to defeat Palestinian rebels fighting against British rule and Jewish immigration to Palestine during the Arab revolt, 1936–39. The SNSs operated in Galilee in northern Palestine. While biographies of Wingate cover his service in Palestine with the squads, this article extends the existing literature with an empirical examination of the operations of the SNSs based on a deep mining of British and Hebrew-language archival sources. This study argues that joint intelligence gathering operations introduced the British army to Jewish agents and the possibilities of collaboration—Wingate was an intelligence officer—before detailing combined military operations in the field with the irregular SNSs. The originality of this article comes from its dissection of how British soldiers brutalised Jewish troops by training them in well-established British counterinsurgency methods that targeted civilians and villages close to rebel attacks. Away from the control of established British military chains of command, the SNSs were especially tough in their war with Palestinians and they fought a ‘dirty war', an operational method absorbed and normalised by Jewish soldiers serving under British command. This article is a military and imperial history that details the quotidian brutality of pacification, opens up wider debates on how imperial powers collaborated with loyalist colonial minorities, shows how regular armies used irregular forces in pacification campaigns and suggests that post-colonial regimes such as Israel carried over such methods of control.

How NHS Sutton Clinical Commissioning Group is working with care homes to improve the health and wellbeing of older residents

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to describe how NHS Sutton Clinical Commissioning Group (Sutton CCG) is working with nursing homes, residential homes and other health and social care organisations in Sutton to improve the quality of provision for residents in nursing and residential homes “care homes”. Design/methodology/approach – The paper explains how Sutton CCG engaged with care homes initially to seek their views on whether they wanted support and what support they would value. It describes what arrangements Sutton CCG put in place for managers and staff in local care homes to provide support face-to-face. The paper outlines the key areas for improvement that Sutton CCG and the care homes are focusing on. It includes examples of work carried out jointly by the care homes and Sutton CCG to improve the quality of care for residents. It goes on to describe joint-working arrangements between the CCG, London Borough of Sutton and other health and social care organisations to ensure the overall quality of care homes in Sutton. Findings – The paper outlines feedback from care home managers and staff who were invited to share their views about what support they wanted from Sutton CCG. It includes early feedback from care homes about the support put in place and the areas where they have found it most useful. Practical implications – In the UK many older people live in care homes. Britain has an ageing population so the need for residential and nursing homes and the numbers of people living in care homes is only likely to increase. Our ageing population also places additional demands on the NHS, with residents in care homes often spending time in A&E and lengthy spells in hospital. This paper highlights how CCGs and other health and social care organisations can work with care homes to improve the health and wellbeing of older residents in care homes and reduce pressures on other health services. Originality/value – Sutton CCG has put in place new arrangements for working with care homes that aim to support carers to improve the lives of their older residents. The paper shares practical examples of support that the CCG has provided which has successfully improved care and decision making in care homes; early indications show this has reduced 999 calls and conveyances to hospital. Sutton CCG, London Borough of Sutton and other statutory organisations with responsibility for care homes in Sutton have also set up a joint intelligence group to gain an overall picture of the quality of the borough’s care homes.

Closing the Gap: The Fifth Element and Workplace Innovation

Growing evidence shows that workplace innovation practices which empower employees tomake day-to-day-decisions, challenge established practices, contribute ideas, and be heardat the most senior levels, lead to better business results, as well as enhanced workforcehealth and engagement. Most businesses are either unaware of this evidence, or are unableor unwilling to act on it. Surveys demonstrate a gap between “what works” and commonworkplace practice.We lack an easily communicable way of sharing actionable knowledge, generated by diversebodies of research and experience, with enterprise-level decision-makers, publicpolicymakers and other actors. We need a “joint intelligence” shared by all stakeholders inthe workplace, and at the wider economic and social level. This task has been taken up byUK WON and its partners in the European Workplace Innovation Network (EUWIN).The literature emphasises the importance of internally consistent policies and practices inachieving superior outcomes for organisations and their employees, greater than the sumof individual measures. The Fifth Element captures this essential quality, providing aframework for the creation of sense-making narratives that build bridges betweenresearchers and practitioners.

Defining workplace innovation

Purpose – This paper aims to introduce the ‘Fifth Element’ as ‘joint intelligence’ shared by all stakeholders in the workplace and at the wider economic and social level, and aimed at closing the evidence-practice gap. Design/methodology/approach – The mutually reinforcing impact of practices based on employee involvement and participation at all levels of an organisation can create a tangible effect in workplaces, which is hard to quantify but which is often described in terms of “culture” and “employee engagement”. Findings – The first four elements comprise Job Design and Work Organisation; Structures and Systems; Learning, Reflection and Innovation; and Workplace Partnership. When these combine successfully, the outcome can be remarkable producing a tangible and sustainable change in the day-to-day culture of an organization, which includes across the board improvements in communications, leadership and employee engagement, higher performance, enhanced customer care and a self-perpetuating regime of innovation. Originality/value – The metaphor of the Fifth Element is a useful way of capturing this essence, describing an alchemic transformation that can only take place when the other four elements combine.

Conflicting worldviews, mutual incomprehension: The production of intelligence across Whitehall and the management of subversion during decolonisation, 1944–1966

Writing on British intelligence has tended to concentrate on the collection machinery in specific local contexts, the development of the Joint Intelligence Committee and the use of intelligence product by government. The emphasis has been on the optimisation of the intelligence bureaucracy in the face of Colonial Office intransigence. What this analysis largely leaves out, however, is a description of the culture and practices of the Colonial Office as it attempted to work with various colonial governments. Instead there is a tendency to overemphasise the rational nature of the bureaucratic changes in Whitehall and the contribution of MI5 and MI6 in the maintenance of security in the colonies. This article seeks to address these oversights by examining the divisions between the Colonial Office and the rest of the Whitehall intelligence machinery and show how counter-subversion remained a challenge to administrators both before and after the emergence of the Joint Intelligence Committee system.

The U.S.-Australia Joint Intelligence Communication Facilities: Cooperation between Material and Human Resources in the U.S.-Australia Alliance

The U.S.-Australia Joint Intelligence Communication Facilities: Cooperation between Material and Human Resources in the U.S.-Australia Alliance

‘Modern conditions demand integration and professionalism’: The transition from Joint Intelligence Bureau to Defence Intelligence Staff and the long march to centralisation in British military intelligence

This article explores the reforms that occurred in British military and military-related intelligence in 1946 and 1964. It charts the development of the Joint Intelligence Bureau, which was created as a central organisation to provide intelligence on several military-related issues, and how it was eventually merged with the service intelligence agencies in 1964 to form the Defence Intelligence Staff. It argues that the reforms of 1946, although functional, were flawed, as they satisfied neither the advocates of wholesale centralisation nor the champions of individual service responsibility. The inevitable outcome was a series of divisive arguments over responsibility and “turf”, which could only be resolved when the issue was firmly grasped by senior politicians.

The Joint Intelligence Bureau: (Not So) Secret Intelligence for the Post-War World

In 1946 veteran British intelligence officer Kenneth Strong undertook the Directorship of a new intelligence organization, the Joint Intelligence Bureau (JIB). The JIB absorbed the responsibilities of several wartime intelligence organs, and was responsible for economic, topographic, and aspects of scientific intelligence on an inter-service basis. Its responsibilities grew over the following 18 years; most notably, it absorbed atomic intelligence in 1957. When the Defence Intelligence Staff was created in 1964, absorbing the JIB and the individual Service agencies, JIB was at its heart and Kenneth Strong its first Director. The organization conducted key work in the early Cold War, was at the centre of an international network of Joint Intelligence Bureaux, and was an important stepping stone in the movement to centralize military and military-relevant intelligence in Britain – but the historiography pays it surprisingly little attention. This paper introduces the JIB and various aspects of its work, and demonstrates that its low profile in the historiography is unjustified.

Twilight of Britain's Joint Intelligence Committee?

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Additional informationNotes on contributorsPhilip H. J. DaviesDr. Philip H. J. Davies is Director of the Brunel Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies (BCISS), Uxbridge, England. He has published extensively on the organization and status of the United Kingdom's Secret Intelligence Service, the Joint Air Reconnaissance Intelligence Centre (JARIC), and the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), as well as on the comparative study of intelligence. During 2010 he headed the BCISS's work for Great Britain's Ministry of Defence on the development of the latest UK Joint Intelligence Doctrine and a new capstone doctrine on understanding. A graduate of Trent University, Peterborough, Ontario, Canada, he received his M.A. from York University, Toronto, and his Ph.D. from the University of Reading in England. His two-volume comparative study of national intelligence in Britain and the United States is forthcoming from Praeger Security International.

A Whitehall ‘Showdown’?: Colonial Office—Joint Intelligence Committee Relations in the Mid-1950s

This article sheds light on the somewhat hostile relationship between the Colonial Office (CO) and the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) in the mid-1950s. Assessing the reforms recommended following a number of counterinsurgency difficulties, it discusses the role of the CO in the centralised intelligence assessment process. This article argues that relations between the CO and the JIC were underdeveloped and that reforms aimed to allow a greater coordination and a more active JIC input into colonial affairs. However, in doing so, the committee threatened to encroach into CO territory, bringing with it military conceptualisations of the Cold War and an allegedly narrow focus on communist subversion which marginalised more complex colonial problems. This resulted in the threat of a Whitehall ‘showdown’.

Creating an extensible command and control ontology

This essay describes the process of creating a military ontology from the war-fighter's perspective. The war-fighter's perspective is expressed in joint military doctrine, which presents fundamental principles that guide the employment of USA military forces in coordinated and integrated action toward a common objective (http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/new_pubs/jointpub.htm). An ontology based upon military doctrine is intended to represent the war-fighter's direct view of the domain, and would be used to enhance: 1) situational understanding about some domain; 2) the military decision making and planning process; 3) the design of information systems in an evolving situation; 4) understanding about the relation of data elements to the domain. This essay uses the joint intelligence preparation of the operational environment (JIPOE) process as an example of how the war-fighter would create such an ontology. The JIPOE ontology described here is derived directly from JIPOE doctrine, and extends from a command and control (C2) ontology.

Indian Police Counter Terrorism Drama =Joint Intelligence Committee =Jic =Pmo = Manmohan@Sansad.Nic.In, Soniagandhi@Sansad.Nic.In, Office@Tharoor.In , Girijav@Sansad.Nic.In =Drama !!??

Indian Police Counter Terrorism Drama =Joint Intelligence Committee =Jic =Pmo = Manmohan@Sansad.Nic.In, Soniagandhi@Sansad.Nic.In, Office@Tharoor.In , Girijav@Sansad.Nic.In =Drama !!??

Europe's New Security Dilemma

After the September 11, 2001, attacks, governments throughout the world rushed to improve their counterterrorism policies. Several countries tightened legislation, increased resources available to ...

Future roles of the UK intelligence system

AbstractThe UK intelligence system is engaged in three distinct roles – producing strategic assessments in the traditional way; acting as a ‘global policeman’ by monitoring terrorist and criminal networks; and raising the capability of other countries to defeat terrorist and insurgency groups. Counter-intuitively, it is perhaps the first role that is most questionable. The use of single source intelligence reporting, drawn from individuals selected principally for their willingness to share secrets, may not be the best way to analyse emerging issues such as climate change, energy security and financial stability. The Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) may be drawing on too narrow a range of reporting to compete with increasingly sophisticated assessments from the private sector, academia and NGOs. In any event, the JIC has less impact on policy than is often imagined. The second task of ‘global networker’ is better-suited to the intelligence community's ability to combine human intelligence with communications intelligence and bulk data gathering, and is producing results. The third task of helping other countries to enforce the law and resist insurgency is proceeding on an ad hoc basis with occasional successes, but requires co-ordination across Whitehall so that improvements in the capabilities of other countries' intelligence services are accompanied by improved police and justice systems and enhanced oversight. Joint Intelligence Committee perhaps ought to be a Joint Action Committee.

The Value of Non-Governmental Intelligence: Widening the Field

In the UK, the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) has a poor track record of predicting attack. In the US, official inquiries into 9/11 identified ‘a failure of imagination’ to conceive of a large scale threat to the American homeland. There is a long-standing literature on surprise attack which emphasizes that clues to predict attack often exist but are not pieced together by an intelligence sector which is not structured to look in the right direction. In a world of increasingly fragmented threats and weak signals, it is apparent that much of the challenge in intelligence work now lies not in collection but in managing requirements, setting priorities, and conducting incisive analysis based on the ability to imagine new threats. One solution to a failure of imagination is to widen the range of people who can contribute to the task. Non-Governmental analysis of security issues, whether by academia, civil society or the private sector, can help to identify emerging issues and set priorities. Whilst collection of secret intelligence may always remain the preserve of specialist Government agencies, the rest of the intelligence cycle can benefit from external contributions and open source intelligence. We argue that the process of setting intelligence requirements could be opened to a wider range of actors. In conflict environments, there may be particular value in an open process to identify what each side would need to know about the other to confidently seek peace.