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Home Front: WoT
Five Years After 9/11, Pentagon Opens Joint Intelligence Center
2006-09-23
Silly me, I'd assumed we'd done something like this about 4 1/2 years ago...
(AHN) - Five years after terrorists attacked America, the Department of Defense is opening the U.S. Strategic Command's Joint Functional Component Command for Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Director Army Lt. Gen. Michael Maples, says the center will "operationalize" intelligence collection, adding it will "operate at the defense level with national capabilities, but more importantly to respond to the needs of combatant commanders."

“Air Force Maj. Gen. Mark Welsh says the center will allow intelligence planners to sort and compile defense intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations from a global perspective...”
"(The center) takes combatant commander responsibilities and then associates that with the ability of a combat support activity - DIA on the intelligence side - and creates an ability to understand what the needs and requirements are of the other combatant commanders, what their intelligence needs are and how we ought to be managing the resources." Air Force Maj. Gen. Mark Welsh says the center will allow intelligence planners to sort and compile defense intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations from a global perspective.

The center will work with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, and the National Geo-Spatial Intelligence Agency to apply national assets to Defense problems and vice versa.
Posted by:Fred

#11  We've already had a "JIC" in Europe and in the Pacific region. It's worked pretty well. The one key element that wasn't available was strategic and tactical control of collections. This re-organization gives DOD equal priority with other intelligence agencies for collections. In the past, most strategic collection was controlled by CIA. I'm sure the battle over collections management was a major factor in why it took 4 1/2 years to make this work.
Posted by: Old Patriot   2006-09-23 13:19  

#10  that's last week's talking point, WX
Posted by: Frank G   2006-09-23 11:46  

#9  These are all Rummy's changes, but he should step down anyway, right J Fn Kerry ?
Posted by: wxjames   2006-09-23 11:34  

#8  Yup.
Posted by: lotp   2006-09-23 08:35  

#7  Marines ascending is consistent with Rummy's push for expeditonary forces.
Posted by: Captain America   2006-09-23 08:15  

#6  the center will "operationalize" intelligence collection, adding it will "operate at the defense level with national capabilities, but more importantly to respond to the needs of combatant commanders."

Intel won't be tucked away in pretty folders by CIA file clerks, not to be used because it might cut off the flow of information to be filed by CIA file clerks.
Posted by: Steve   2006-09-23 08:11  

#5  Another sign of that major restructuring that's going on:

The commanding general of SRATCOM is a Marine. A MARINE!!! heading the home of SAC bombers etc. Why? I think it's because STRATCOM is also the home of ballistic missile defense and BMD has become a battlefield operations issue as well as a strategic homeland defense issue.

A Marine heads the joint chiefs of staff.

The chief of staff of the Army is a special operations guy.

It may not be obvious from the outside, but these represent some significant shifts in priorities and doctrine. Schoomaker and the special forces were totally snubbed in Gulf I ... Schwarzkopf had no use for those "cowboy" types in his operational theater.

Now special forces are key to what we're doing, not only in Iraq and Afghanistan, but many other places too.

There's a huge set of changes happening within our military. It's pretty awesome to see it happen, even though there are some stumbles and some roadblocks from time to time.
Posted by: lotp   2006-09-23 07:32  

#4  The snark is funny LOL.

But, you're assuming intel wasn't being shared before. What's really going on here is that over the last 4+ years we've evolved a totally new approach to joint ops across the services. It never was needed before and for sure it never was possible until the availability of some newer communications and software capabilities.

On the technical/operational side, this is one part of DoD's emerging Global Information Grid. Smart weapons as well as commanders (and everyone inbetween) will tap into the GIG, sharing all sorts of info from raw sensor data to ops plans. Building that is NOT going to happen overnight. But it will happen.

Remember all the fights in Congress about reorganizing intel? One of the issues there was whether DOD would lose control of collecting and interpreting intel data in operational theaters.

It took a couple years to peel Negraponte's role away from CIA. It took another year+ for DOD to win the battle to keep the interpretation of the raw intel feeds within DOD when it pertains to the battlefield. Meanwhile, while that battle was happening on the Hill, it looks as if DOD was moving forward to put this in place.

Yeah, 4 1/2 years sounds like a long time. But this isn't a matter of "who gets the office window and what color should the carpets be". This center at STRATCOM is just one part of a MAJOR restructuring of military doctrine, organizational lines of control and technologies. What you're seeing here is another piece of our reworking our military from top to bottom to face 21st century threats. And they're doing it while also fighting in 2 theaters, plus doing major special ops.
Posted by: lotp   2006-09-23 07:17  

#3  *snicker*

"...compartments to comparmentalize, access levels to accessorize..."

Werdsmything can be fun, lol.
Posted by: .com   2006-09-23 05:33  

#2  "There were acronyms to invent, turf queens to mollify, brass to shine, knee pads to issue, special insignia to design, compartments to comparmentalize, access levels to accessorize, forms to formalize, and caterers to select - our plate was full."
Posted by: Craick Whinetle9127   2006-09-23 01:41  

#1  I know the government moves like cold molasses, but this is really ridiculous. This should have been up sometime in 2002. Just what has been going on in the meanwhile. This is like the Keystone cops.
Posted by: SOP35/Rat   2006-09-23 01:17  

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