Imaginary constellations meet visionary capabilities

We rarely comment on ongoing matters in the intelligence world due to the natural restrictions which accompany a professional’s responsibilities. However, the very public intercept of USA193 does touch upon an issue that we have previously discussed in these pages – the disconnect between what assets those planning for the future intelligence community thought they would have, and those that exist in an IC in which we have gone to war with what we actually have.

The shot itself has been extensively discussed by others, including In From the Cold, Arms Control Wonk, Ares, Danger Room, and many of the more mainstream blogs. We will not rehash these public details.

However in this particular instance, we find the contrast between the notional pieces on the chess board (and the detritus they left behind when the model came tumbling down) quite striking against the very effective real world capabilities offered by one of the most condemned warfighting concepts of recent history - hit to kill. These differences are also at the heart of the classic tensions between intelligence and operators. But it also demonstrates the value of innovative vision – and the need for persistent effort towards what may seem an unachievable goal. The operation also shows the adaptability of those capabilities towards missions that may never before have been conceived – particularly when the tools to execute them were first on the drafting boards.

The debates of the past few decades across all of the systems involved, and last night’s operation itself, also brings to mind the Bill Whittle’s now seminal essay on Tribes. The defense space community gave the public an unprecedented glimpse of world of the Gray at the high frontier. The press briefing (found here) is as specific a discussion as ever has occurred regarding a once entirely classified area. One has to remember that only a few short years ago, even the name of the National Reconnaissance Office was not publicly acknowledged – let alone the kind of systems of systems approach evident in this operation. But the briefing also displays strong analytic tradecraft, and an excellent use of estimative language to communicate intelligence and operational information in a transparent manner. It was indeed an impressive display, and is well worth studying for those that are in the business of facing tough talks.

Altogether, this was a unique mission, and those involved will be able to look back on the operation with pride. They have most deservedly earned the drinks being poured last night and this morning. Space control has a new face. Let us hope that this will also be the symbol that inspires future generations of capabilities on the intelligence side of the house, and the desire to avoid any other holes in the imagined sky.

Novel UFACs

The evolving sophistication of commercial construction techniques is increasingly popularizing elaborate underground structures for a variety of entirely novel applications. The latest of these – urban luxury homes in development restricted areas - are profiled by various British print media outlets.

London’s newest urban underground reminds us a great deal of author William Gibson’s fictional “stealth houses” – structures designed to conceal high value properties entirely within apparently abandoned industrial areas, providing security through obscurity.

However, these are very real examples of the growing complexity of urban geographies – and the increasing challenge to planners, operators, and intelligence professionals which will encounter these spaces in the cities of the tomorrow. Such future underground facilities will make the Hezbollah fortifications in urban Beirut encountered during the Harb al Tammuz in 2006 look insignificant in comparison.

While costly, these architectures do not require a great deal more sophistication than any other typical commercial construction project, especially any building that already requires building sub-basements for drainage, power, or HVAC systems. Of course, it is even easier to arrange for these features when fitted to new building sites.

Frankly, we are quite surprised we have not seen these yet in the high value property markets in Manhattan, San Francisco’s Bay area, or in particular the greater Washington DC metro area – there are plenty of row homes in Georgetown, Arlington or Alexandria that one would suspect might benefit from such modifications (though we suppose there is always the question of the water table to worry about in some of those areas). But give it time…

Of course, familiarization tours for new analysts to these types of underground facilities will be far more pleasant than the trips taken by their counterparts. We would certainly far rather enjoy a glass of wine next to a private pool than tramp through the damp tunnels of some Cold War era concrete structure.

UPDATE: Thanks to one of our readers who wrote in to recommend changing the choice of acronym from UFAC (underground facility) to HDBT (hard and deeply buried target). The specific meaning of the original wording within the IC apparently now creates some confusion based on its typical application to the analytic center responsible for study of these targets. (Our use was based on a more generalized, and perhaps older, naming convention - in the same manner that derived naming for chow halls and other structures. We shall have to update our style guide.) Text above corrected in accordance with that convention, with our humblest apologies to the fine folks over at the center, and sincere gratitude to those who raised the matter.

Good old fashioned military analysis

One of the persistent problems in most mainstream media coverage of ongoing matters of national security interest is the continual failure to understand even the most basic factors military analysis. Evaluating weapons system effectiveness, for example, requires parsing through the marketing hype of the manufacturing country (or company), and examining the hard details of design, employment, and logistics that are essential to understanding how that system will perform in the field.

The recent abysmal state of press coverage is demonstrated amply by case studies of Syrian and Iranian air defense network, the “new” re-manufactured Iranian tactical fighter aircraft, Russian fuel air explosive development, and any of the missile test dog and pony shows conducted by the Iranians, North Koreans, or non-state actors such as Hezbollah and HAMAS. Indeed, this was perhaps the dominant media game of the 90’s, in which pundits came to prominence speculating about campaigns which would never come to understand during Kosovo, East Timor, and even the Desert Fox air strikes against Iraq.

This is not a new phenomenon, and certainly not limited to the areas of military interest given the wide range of other areas in which modern journalism fails utterly to provide an accurate comprehension of difficult subject matter – such as medicine, economics, or law. It is in part the raison d’etre for a whole range of custom open source intelligence services – from the Economist Intelligence Unit to the venerable Jane’s Information Group. Indeed, it was in the Kosovo conflict in which the Stratfor notably (or infamously) first made its bones.

The blogsphere is changing these dynamics, however. Now, within a very short amount of time, substantive analysis is published by a number of individuals possessing real expertise and experience on the matters at hand. Whether it is to take down a fabulist or fauxtographer, or to dissect the propaganda claims of a potentially hostile regime – the distributed and self-organizing interests of milbloggers (and experts in a range of other fields) is producing a kind of open source analysis capability that one could only have dreamed about in earlier years.

And when one considers the old OSINT maxim that an author will only ever write less than 20% of what they actually know about a subject, one begins to glimpse the potential of this population - given a means to organize and direct their “hobby” level efforts in a larger architecture of participation.

At the same time as this is occurring in the open environment, the intelligence community has seen a dramatic decline in its bench and depth, of those products which are produced as “shelfware”. We use the term not in a pejorative sense, but in recognition of the very real need for a baseline reference set by which current issues and future estimates made be assessed. Perhaps the better term we may coin for this class of intelligence are “enabling products”. Many commentators within and outside of the IC have bemoaned the shift of emphasis and resources away from strategic and long term production to the ever-expanding needs of the tactical and immediate. And while we support a community which can and will run to the sound of the guns in order to support the warfighter’s ongoing operations, the length and demands of the Long War will have to force the community to examine how it can serve both ends effectively. To be sure, enabling products has true limitations: whole ranges of issues and concerns simply did not have the same priority – or even the same conceptualization – before developments in the field made them central concerns. After all, in 2001 it would have been quite hard to predict that the humble IED would be the primary weapon of strategic influence, or that the Katyusha would become the strategic equivalent to a stand-off bombardment capability of a type seen previously only in the War of the Cities.

It is in this environment that we look around with the growing realization that there may be an unprecedented opportunity to change the traditional model of analysis through new partnerships with those outside of the core community. There are a host of concerns – from dealing with statements intended to influence rather than inform, and some very valid counterintelligence / denial and deception issues, particularly if requirements and questions become too widely known or too narrowly specific. The logistics and coordination of such an engagement – even a in narrowly bounded iteration – would be far from trivial. Yet the potential for leveraging the contributions of the kind of capability that occasionally emerges in ad-hoc fashion at present into a more dedicated and systemic resource is frankly one that would be worth at least an exploratory effort by certain parties with natural interests in the area.

We look forward to a day when good old fashioned military analysis is easier to come by and of better quality, based on such efforts, than has regrettably been the case in recent years.