Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Preface and acknowledgements
- Glossary of terms and abbreviations
- Introduction
- I Evolution and outline
- II Components and boundaries
- III Effects
- 8 Intelligence and national action
- 9 International action
- 10 Intelligence and security
- 11 Intelligence threats
- 12 Intelligence cooperation
- IV Accuracy
- V Evaluation and management
- VI The 1990s and beyond
- VII Summary
- Suggestions for further reading
- Index
8 - Intelligence and national action
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 October 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Preface and acknowledgements
- Glossary of terms and abbreviations
- Introduction
- I Evolution and outline
- II Components and boundaries
- III Effects
- 8 Intelligence and national action
- 9 International action
- 10 Intelligence and security
- 11 Intelligence threats
- 12 Intelligence cooperation
- IV Accuracy
- V Evaluation and management
- VI The 1990s and beyond
- VII Summary
- Suggestions for further reading
- Index
Summary
The previous group of chapters described the intelligence system and its boundaries. This group covers its effects; what it does for governments. The present chapter deals with its most important purpose: affecting decisions. Chapter 9 discusses its contribution to arms control and other measures of international security. Chapters 10–12 describe its other effects, as a defence of national secrecy; a set of international threats; and the promoter of its own set of international relationships.
Rational action and the intelligence dimension
Intelligence is produced to influence government action, however remotely. Before the modern system developed Clausewitz was inclined to discount it in warfare; important things could never be known with sufficient reliability at sufficient speed. ‘Many intelligence reports in war are contradictory; even more are false, and most are uncertain … In short, most intelligence is false.’ The commander's intuition and will-power were better foundations for generalship.
This was before the growth of organized, permanent collection and analysis, and by the second half of the century there were more positive views about intelligence. A British book in 1895 agreed with Clausewitz that ‘It is beyond the nature of things to avoid getting meagre, inexact or false information’, but contradicted him by adding ‘ … for all that he [the commander] must strive to acquire as much positive intelligence as he can, as it is on this alone that he can base his most important resolutions.’
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Intelligence Power in Peace and War , pp. 137 - 155Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1996