A Small Unit Intel and Operations Success Story: Marine Corps Intelligence Operations
Sunday, May 22nd, 2011One of you sent me the following story from the Marine Corps Gazette in response to last week’s note. It is a wonderful example of small unit organization, leadership, gathering information among the people, processes, embedding of experts, learning the local sociocultural behavioral network, and other components that enable “the humans in the loop” to understand, plan and operate effectively.
Marine Corps Intelligence Operations in Anbar: A Blueprint for Success
Author:: LtCol Timothy Oliver
The Marine Corps is beginning its second year as a major force provider and Regional Command holder in Afghanistan. While there may be refinements to intelligence manning and equipping to adapt to this particular environment, the original architecture and capabilities have been established based upon the operational similarly to the Iraq problem set. The Marine Corps experience in Western Iraq from 2004 to early 2010 provides a good framework for how we approach the current counterinsurgency (COIN) fight. The Marine Corps waged an arguably successful campaign in the Anbar Province (See Figure 1), of which, intelligence played a significant role. The discussion that follows outlines the nature of the intelligence organization and processes in that campaign, and our intelligence organization to operate effectively, and should be the basis for orientation to the intelligence effort in Helmand.
In Anbar much of the initial focus of the intelligence effort was directed at the insurgency and kinetic efforts. While development and engagement efforts were important and were tracked, the effectiveness of the insurgency’s murder and intimidation campaign completely overwhelmed these other lines of operation. Establishing security was the prerequisite to building a civil society. This necessitated a “red” focus for the initial intelligence effort.
As the security environment improved the intelligence focus shifted to support engagement and governance and improved the opportunities for collecting information from organic non-intelligence sources such as engagement activities, civil affairs units, patrol reports, census operations, etc., but there was always a need to vet and integrate that information with traditional intelligence means, primarily SIGINT and HUMINT. In Iraq, accepting any information at face value was ill-advised. For a variety of reasons, locals often did not share the US agenda and deep seated resentment of being occupied by infidels, murder, and intimidation campaigns, greed, shame etc., all played a part in determining the accuracy of open source information.
So what then did Marine Corps intelligence do in Iraq that was so effective? On the face of it nothing so very different from what others did there. In general terms what it was successful in doing was getting the intelligence support to whom and where it was needed, and sufficiently integrating the intelligence effort across the force to produce actionable intelligence and something close to a net assessment. Net assessment is defined by DoD Directive 5111.11 as, “the comparative analysis of military, technological, political, economic, and other factors governing the relative military capability of nations. Its purpose is to identify problems and opportunities that deserve the attention of senior defense officials.”
The key here is intelligence support. MNF-W was not able to hand every echelon of the force a neat, orderly, all encompassing assessment. What they did was provide them the tools to do their job, supporting them as best they could, and archiving their efforts. What was delivered were the geospatial products, the HUMINT and SIGINT support, the overhead coverage and the construction of and access to a database that allowed the force to learn, remember, make associations and do what was necessary in order to be successful. This was greatly facilitated by dealing with Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) functions as an “Enterprise”, working together holistically across the force rather than a series of unrelated actions and activities.
There were many discrete incidences of astounding tactical successes, combining precision technical means, excellent all-source analysis and “detective” work to achieve high profile successes. These events saved lives and forwarded the agenda, but COIN is about draining the swamp not swatting mosquitoes. The most important intelligence work is the never-ending grind of collecting, processing ever larger amounts of data, and building an accurate picture that, little by little, strips away the anonymity and freedom of movement from adversaries.
In broad terms the great degree of success achieved by the Marine Corps in MNF-W was most attributable to continuity of experienced personnel, the synthesized intelligence from the Tactical Fusion Center (TFC), focus on the tactical fight, good information management, and effective leadership.
Continuity
The duration and intensity of the Marine Corps intelligence community experience in MNF-W required the same two Intelligence and Radio Battalions, (who provided nearly all Service intelligence capabilities beyond all-source analysts at tactical units) alternate rotations in Iraq beginning 2003.5 Seven years of seven months in and five months out to the same place and the same problem set developed an area expertise among the MNF-W all-source analysts, HUMINT and SIGINT collectors, collection managers and the organizations themselves.
An analyst or collector with this sort of experience can and did provide useful analysis, perspective, and support to decision makers at all levels. Practice may not have made perfect, but it made pretty good.
There is little substitute for this kind of experience both in an individual sense and in a corporate sense. An analyst working on a problem for a year may gain this level of understanding toward the end of his deployment, but takes this knowledge with him upon rotation. Additionally, the synergy gained from maintaining unit integrity should not be undervalued. Teamwork, corporate knowledge, and individual commitment matters.
Fusion centers and other organizations made up of an endless rotation of individual augments can never achieve this same effectiveness. All organizations are more than the sum of their parts. Building a net assessment is a team effort: all the disciplines understand their piece of the elephant. Putting that elephant together requires sustained team work. The Marines in Anbar
benefited from deploying their intelligence capabilities as a unit, rather than a collection of capabilities to be subdivided and farmed out.
Tactical Fusion Center
The concept of Intel Operations Centers, Fusion Centers, Joint Intelligence Centers or Stability Operations Information Centers (see Civil Military Operations Centers) are not new nor unique to the Marine Corps nor the Intelligence Community. The rationale for consolidating and coordinating research, collections, information processing, or the analytical functions of any complex corporate activity for the sake of efficiency and synergy is well understood.
The first Marine Corps Intelligence Operations Center in Iraq in 2003 had an “Air” and “Ground” order of battle section and was geared toward supporting the march on Baghdad. When the Marine Corps took over much of the South after the regime fell, it started initial efforts to track individuals, political affiliations, infrastructure, and those vaguely defined “atmospherics.” This was, at best, an ad hoc effort.
As the nature of the fight changed, the focus of the TFC evolved, adding teams to work economic and political intelligence, focus on particular insurgent groups, train and mentor Iraqi police intelligence units, conduct forensic work and coordinate detainee exploitation and prosecution. In the spring of 2006 for example, very little effort was placed on tracking government and political intelligence. By 2008, governance was a primary focus.
In execution the TFC6 was not so much a building as an operating principle, ensuring the optimal employment of enablers, fostering integration, producing assessments and most importantly, maintaining the databases and institutional memory. Often associated solely with the intelligence summary or “INTSUM,” the real TFC success in Anbar was its ability to unite and integrate the intelligence effort across the force.
The TFC further served to integrate the Anbar intelligence effort through virtual collaborative intelligence forums. A TFC analyst was able to maintain chat links with analysts at the Regimental Combat Teams (RCTs), battalions, many Company Level Intelligence Cells (CLIC), adjacent units, as well as other agencies. This on-going, unconstrained collaboration was exceedingly useful. As ideas were exchanged, techniques and advice passed, and situational awareness greatly increased. Often this interaction is transparent to leadership, but is increasingly effective in maintaining intelligence connectivity with a generation more tech savvy than the one currently in charge.
The MNF-W TFC analysts seldom told an infantry battalion or RCT what was happening in their AO, but they facilitated this process by collaborating, assisting, integrating and maintaining the database.
Tactical Focus
As previously noted, in a war among the people, intelligence needs to be collected (and usually acted upon) among the people. Since the infantry battalions and other tactical and advisor
elements are living among the people, they are the logical focus of the intelligence effort. MNF-W was successful in enabling these tactical elements to read their environment and maneuver in the complex human terrain through a combination of deliberate organizational decisions and the ability to capitalize on service unique capabilities.
After establishing a force level TFC to ensure adequate integration and support to the tactical efforts, the MEF G-2 pushed the necessary enablers down to the lowest tactical level. The small organic intelligence sections in each infantry battalion (initially 1 x officer & 3 x enlisted) were reinforced with a HUMINT Exploitation Team (HET), a Ground Sensor Employment Team, additional TFC analysts and generally a SIGINT element. These enablers more than doubled the size of those sections and exponentially increased their capabilities. These organic Marine Corps enablers, most of which participated in the battalion’s workup, gave them the tools they needed to better understand their battle space and ensured that they remained integrated with the larger MNF-W intelligence effort.
Putting Analysts up Front. While virtual connectivity is good, there is no substitute for first hand experience. MNF-W TFC analysts began a rotational program in 2005 on an ad hoc basis and formalized it in 2006. The tactical fight was not an abstraction for those analysts. They walked the ground and knew personally the Marines on the other end of the radio. In 2007, more than 38 percent of Intelligence Battalion personnel were assigned to the battalion and an additional 25 percent were directly supporting those same battalion operations from the TFC. The remainder was spread out between the RCT’s and other elements operating in Anbar. These numbers included 16 TFC analysts attached to infantry battalion S-2 sections on any given day.
CLICs. The CLIC concept, which is now being codified in doctrine, is an outgrowth of the early experiences in Anbar. As Marines dispersed ever more widely over the Western Euphrates River Valley in order to get out among the people, distributed operations became the norm. Companies, and sometimes platoons, became widely separated in time and space and responsible for waging their own campaign among the people at the street level.
As this became common practice and reinforced with additional personnel, equipment, training and other support; the benefits were undeniable: more astute and informed collections deeper into the human terrain, more first-hand understanding, and most importantly, the ability to provide intelligence at the point where it was most needed. This practice benefited not just the Marines supported directly by the CLIC, but the entire MAGTF through the two-way flow of information.
While these organizational decisions to push the enablers down were a key to success, they would have been of limited utility if the Marine Corps had not already built a solid tactical intelligence capability across the force.
Since the early 90s, the Marine Corps has been creating Intelligence Officers directly out of the Basic School, and having them cut their teeth as reconnaissance platoon commanders, HUMINT and SIGINT Officers, or Aviation Intelligence Officers before becoming Marine Air-Ground Task Force Intelligence Officers. Further, efforts to rotate them through both leadership and staff jobs as they progress has greatly improved the operational focus of the community. It is an
imperfect system, but it has created over the last 15 years a cadre of high quality company, field grade and general officers who are not just competent “analysts” but experienced leaders and operators.
HETs. The first and probably most important intelligence capability deployed in Anbar were the HUMINT Exploitation Teams (HETs). One of these teams usually supported each infantry battalion with trained collectors to ensure that there was a HUMINT collector present with each rifle company in the field and a team leader available to advise and assist the battalion commanders. These teams established habitual relationships with their supported battalions early in the “work up” cycle and were fully integrated into their pre-deployment training. The organic HUMINT effort provided the lion’s share of actionable intelligence in Anbar and was the primary factor in understanding the area of operations (AO).
The HUMINT effort, like the rest of the intelligence effort, also derived a significant benefit from the continuity factor. Rotating to the same AO for two and three years allowed them to maintain a familiarity with the people and the environment.
Organic Tactical SIGINT. The capability to employ organic SIGINT teams, trained and equipped, to support MAGTF operations, was a tremendous force multiplier. Like the HETs, these capabilities were fully integrated into the larger effort and pushed down to the absolute lowest tactical level. This focus, combined with the continuity gained by the unique deployment cycle and habitual integration with the other disciplines in the TFC, provided the Marines in Anbar with a responsive capability that could not be replicated by theater or general support assets that lacked familiarity with the supported units mission, requirements and Area of Operations.
Information Management
Few things in a COIN environment are as important as keeping good, intelligence information records, and centrally managing and integrating these record-keeping efforts across the force. For years in Anbar, every unit on the battlefield maintained their intelligence information in a different format, if they kept records at all. In most cases this practice rendered that unit’s hard won information unusable to adjacent units, higher headquarters, or the unit that relieved them.8
In many cases the most useful function a TFC analyst could perform for a tactical unit was not tell them was happening or going to happen, but what had happened two years before their rotation. In the COIN environment, the past matters. Knowing that the new favorite local notable had previously been detained, had a brother in Bucca, absconded with a government payroll, or was the cousin or mortal enemy of some other local notable was useful to know. Making this happen was a function of information management.
Being able to process and correlate all the information produced on the battlefield is not just the key to “net assessment,” but to a thousand other discrete actions needed to drain the swamp. The ability to connect biometric databases to SIGINT reporting to census data to everything else and further provide that ability to a Marine or soldier manning a check point, or that civil affairs unit digging a well is critical. This data archiving and retrieval, or information management function,
enables analysis and assessment at all levels, but is a distinct function from analysis. No matter how experienced or proficient the analyst, effective analysis is constrained by the quality of information management.
The Marine Corps fielded a software and server program in Anbar that provided a common environment to do this. Establishing common formats, data repositories, common naming conventions etc., became a mission essential task for intelligence. The effort to build relevant information management systems was supported by the Marine Corps Systems Command and Marine Corps Combat Development Command, but much of the databases, tools, and software programs were built onsite in the TFC. In one example, lacking any reliable means for tracking the records of the many thousands of detainees or correlating records and intelligent reports relating to them (other than extremely labor intensive and cumbersome key word searches), Systems Marines in the TFC built an interactive database that correlated and tracked thousands of detainees and their associated reporting, hearing and release dates. By mid 2007, The Joint Prosecution and Exploitation Center (JPEC) within the TFC was tracking 3600 detainees while adding 50 new entries a day.5 This system eventually became a theater standard.
More than just a labor saving device, this system led to vastly improved exploitation of detainees for intelligence value, and directly led to an exponential increase in the numbers of detainees who were transferred into long-term detention. This greatly improved the 14 day revolving door that was the detention system in Anbar. Without question, more insurgents were kept off the streets through the integrated mining of the detainee tracker database, biometrics and census data than by kinetic actions alone.
Much progress has been made toward better information management, but much more needs to be done. Theater specific data formats, contractor controlled proprietary information management systems, and in some cases, unwillingness to adhere to reporting standards continues to plague this process. It did so in Anbar and is apparently doing so in Afghanistan. This is both a policy and education problem, as well as a technical one.
Finally, Leadership
Any success or failure of intelligence stems from the same source as other types of military failures, from the leadership. Intelligence must be an “all hands” effort and commanders, consumers, and producers all must drive this process and insist on its success. Complaining is not enough; leaders must make it their business to understand the whole process and make it work. For this there is no substitute for leaders understanding, monitoring, and directing the intelligence process.
Experience has begun to teach the force and its leadership what intelligence can and can not do for them, how to collect and use intelligence, and how to employ its enablers. A large number of commanders in 2003 were exceedingly resistant to the idea of “wasting lift” on any intelligence enabler; that has changed. The leadership in the Marine Corps saw the need and gave improving and supporting the process the attention it needed to succeed.
The Way Ahead
While the Marine Corps experience in Anbar provides a sound point of departure for the ongoing efforts in Helmand, the Marine Corps must not rest on its laurels or assume that “we know how to do this.” The Marine Corps must continue to be both a learning and adapting organization. What the Service supporting establishment must do is work the doctrine, organization, training, materiel, leadership and education, personnel and facilities (DOTMLPF) processes to institutionalize those lessons that have been learned and provide the necessary enablers to the Marines forward. To this end, Marine Corps intelligence is focusing on several initiatives to better support efforts in the current fight and ensure it is better prepared for the next one. As outlined in the Intelligence Annex of the Marine Corps Service Campaign Plan, the focus going forward will be building a Marine Corps Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Enterprise (MCISR-E). MCISR-E is an operating concept that will achieve the “synergistic and holistic integration of all ISR elements, to include the Supporting Establishment, into a single capability or system:10 Centrally organized, integrated, and networked across all echelons.”
This operating concept will institutionalize the CLICs and those operating principals, open architecture, non-hierarchical intelligence architecture, synergistic integration of intelligence across disciplines and echelons, etc., that have proven successful.
Analysis Training. In addition to optimizing the operating concept, the Service Campaign Plan “Intelligence Annex” lays out a plan for a new emphasis on developing better analysts. This will begin with more rigorous entry level screening for aptitude and provide the long term career development to ensure that written and analytical skills are world class and equal to highest government/academic standards.
Developing Non-traditional Skills. The Service is, through a variety of initiatives, enhancing the Marine Corps Intelligence Community and the MAGTF’s capabilities to maneuver in the “complex human terrain.” Beyond the aforementioned initiatives, language and cultural training centers are being put in place, Cultural Intelligence Teams are providing those anthropology and social science skills sets fused with current intelligence to the Enterprise, and a variety of initiatives are bringing law enforcement and forensic skills and capabilities to the force. Though blurring the line with more traditional military intelligence functions, the current operating environments requires these capabilities and they are being integrated into, and enhancing the larger intelligence enterprise.
Conclusion
The current environment requires an Intelligence Marine who is part police officer, social worker, amateur anthropologist, and linguist. It also demands the production of actionable intelligence on an ever larger and more complex problem set. It’s a challenge for the MAGTF to be sure, but the Marine Corps believes that it has a proven template for doing this and is pursuing the initiatives necessary to improve upon past success and field an Intelligence Enterprise equal to the challenges in Helmand and beyond.
Please let us know your reactions and thought relative to this article and approach. You can post your comments on the Roundtable at www.lsi-llc.com, or send me an e-mail at john@lsi-llc.com, and we’ll share your views with our 4,000+ readers.
John