Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ihsan BAL printable version send your friend

Global Terrorism and the Failure of Intelligence

The new security concerns which were triggered by the 9/11 terrorist attacks, undoubtedly made the intelligence services deeply debated. As the CIA-like worldwide famous services are in the very center of the debates, the subject becomes more interesting. The 9/11 attacks have commenced a debate more than visible and put the intelligence services which were responsible to avoid this attacks on the target.

Briefly, intelligence can be explained as the optimum use of available data and the power of the information. In this respect, the intelligence involves both inferences devoted to future and the actual time. As for the aims it can be expressed as economical, military, strategic and criminal intelligence. It can also be defined as the superiority of the information, knowing and deciding in accordance with this knowledge or taking essential precautions.

The understanding of the security and intelligence is expected to change in parallel with the economical, political and social changes in the world. Especially the intelligence studies in the field of security show compulsory developments bound to the changes in the fields of crime and strategic security. The globalization and its actors which are regarded the engine of the rapid change in the last fifteen years of the world, cause many conceptual and related organizational changes in many fields. The frequently mentioned 9/11 attacks as well as the globalization, global security  and the global terrorism concepts set a course to action and the execution of the intelligence.

We face the global era in the form of the rising importance of the transnational actors of the economy, people’s fast and frequent border crossing and the rapid travel of the ideas in parallel with the technological opportunities. Besides, globalization puts the national borders in a different form. In this context, globalization changes the security concepts in the world. The security of the states and the societies become more vulnerable with the more frequent and large-scaled threats of the individual and the groups. So the more powerful and creative individual and small groups gain the capabilities to pose big threats in the global era. The 9/11 attacks are the most apparent example. An organized group’s, consist of 19 people, achievement in attacking to the most important trade and defense centers by overcoming the whole security systems of the most powerful state of the world and killing three thousand people in the Twin Towers revealed a new security threat.

The Conceptual Changes of Security and the Intelligence in the Global Era

The security concept is being subjected to big changes in respect of its aims, capabilities and the dimension of threats. In the new era "the security threat” has no visible front, borders or armies as well as countries of which borders are defined in the political maps. The common point of this worldwide spread threat/criminal groups is to meet in the same interest and enemy manifesto. The threat and the danger of these new groups require a new security and a new intelligence understanding.

In the base of the logic of the intelligence before the global era lie the powers of the enemy and exploring, evaluating and finishing the opponent’s capabilities. The states’ strategic policies of the future were based on the intelligence reports and the success of the governments’ policy making was dependent on these studies. The security measures and the intelligence of the Cold War Era were focused on the most effective use of the countries’ capabilities and military forces against the attacks and the threats as well as the conduct of the national security intelligence in accordance with the aforementioned aims. However, the rapid changes both in the definition of the enemy, the security and the threat perceptions subject the actors of security, their capabilities, characteristics and the intelligence deeply debated and force to change.
The intelligence has an absolute importance in maintaining the national security and the intelligence services are the most important and leading organizations of every country for its security. However, the intelligence services’ way of conduct and the supervision of these services often come to agenda. In this respect, the 9/11 attacks made the world wide famous intelligence service CIA, FBI and even the role of the intelligence in the new world order debated: It is argued that the powerful intelligence agencies carried out these attacks or deliberately overlooked them in order to fined a secret global state-within-state due to the impossibility of missing such a large scaled attack of the global terrorists. Similarly how the theatre raid in Moscow and the London bombings were neglected by the powerful intelligence agencies as MI5-MI6 and KGB and how these attacks had successfully been accomplished give the most fertile example for the conspiracy theorists.

The New World Order: The New Threats

The security and the threat perceptions are the most affected fields by the new world order or the new world disorder. The terrorist organizations and the world wide spread global terrorism are the new threats. The sub-components of the new threat are the human trafficking, illegal immigration, illicit drug trafficking and the organized crime groups dealing with money laundering. In this respect, the interconnected terrorist organizations and the organized crime groups which have conceptual definitions without any physical aims are the new threat concepts those limit the operational capabilities.

The inevitable consequence of this new threat reality is that it requires new security organization systems, strategies and new intelligence tools and concepts. In the global era, the effects of economy, mobility of man and the transnational organizations haven’t been fully perceived in the field of security. For example, "the criminal groups” commit organized crimes in various places of the world using the deficiencies of the states’ legal systems. The most important advantage of the "terrorist organizations” is the lack of an international unified front against them. Although the international cooperation is usually argued in theory, an intelligence and security cooperation against the terrorist and organized crime organizations cannot be realized in practice. And this shows the differences of limiting the security concerns within the national borders or trying to maintain it with bilateral agreements. Concisely, in the global age, the global security threats have managed to form a unified front. But the national states of the global age haven’t managed to form a common platform in order to maintain their security.

The origins of the new threats of the new world go back to the modern era. The ideology of terrorism came on the agenda in the late 19^th century and spread out as a struggle tool in the 20^th century. In parallel with the developments in transportation; human trafficking and the other economic crimes have risen. The fight against these kinds of crime was handled as a police concern and the police organizations became the first responsible organizations in the fight against economic and ideological organized criminal groups. As the rule of law, human rights, the prevention of torture and the responsibility of police techniques and practices are the growing values of our age; it requires the police to be equipped with suitable tools and methods. So the escalation of this kind of crimes gave rise to professionalism in policing and united the crime intelligence and operational capabilities in orientation and synchronism.

The Professional Fight against Terrorism and Organized Crimes: Criminal Intelligence and Policing

The police organizations, those are dealing with this kind of criminal groups in their own countries, have sought some available areas in the fight against the transnational criminal organizations. But in this field, the law enforcement agencies cannot be regarded successful. Although several international police cooperation organizations have been founded the required level hasn’t been reached. The states are very far away from the terrorist and organized criminal organizations in respect of cooperation capabilities because of the problems in the extradition of the suspects or the criminals, sharing common knowledge or intelligence and conducting joint operations. It is to be noted that the international cooperation is weakening in the cases of terrorist organizations. In an age where the intelligence sharing is regarded as the privacy of the states, an effective fight against criminal organizations (terrorist or organized criminal groups) cannot be achieved.

It is impossible to develop an effective fight against the new organizations by the national or international organizations which are guided in accordance with the old security concept. The 9/11 attacks and the ongoing terrorist activities are the most obvious examples for this situation. The mystery of the activist terrorist organizations could be revealed very late after the attacks. Namely, we have intelligence services and law enforcement agencies those are shocked with the activities of the enemy. After each attack, especially in the U.S. and U.K., commissions have been formed due to the intelligence deficiencies and the measures have been discussed. As a result of these workshops it is assumed that the attacks would continue and prevention of further attacks cannot be achieved by the military capabilities or the old intelligence understanding. The threats for the states are originated from their own people and from various places of the world. Against this new threat, "enemy” or "criminal” or in whatsoever form it is defined, law enforcement agencies that are eligible to conduct more effective criminal intelligence, work cooperatively and rapidly in a selective manner are required. These agencies aren’t new organizations in all aspects. The professionalism of policing, emerged by the modern society must bring its national experiences into the international arena.

In the global age and in accordance with the new threat perception, the criminal intelligence must be embedded in the national security intelligence. The world’s most destructive war weapon is the "nuclear weapons” and the great countries have taken appropriate measures against this threat. But as all these measures were taken according to the military dimensional Cold War circumstances, this packet of measures is not adequate in the new era. The U.S. and the other countries think that they are more vulnerable to the nuclear threats now than in the Cold War era. The cause of this threat is not the new countries or the blocks but the terrorist organizations. The intelligence and law enforcement agencies must be reorganized according to the operational capabilities and characteristics of the criminal groups in order to chase these personal groups in wherever they are. Especially in maintaining the national security, to achieve an important success in the fight against global terrorism it has an utmost importance to combine the criminal intelligence with criminal and preventive policing practices in coordination. In order to realize this success in the transnational arena the UN must be the framework of the international cooperation. The main obstacle, that is the national borders, which the security forces face in the fight against global terrorism, will be overcome with the new tragedies.

It cannot be neglected that behind the every wide-dimensional organization lie the big tragedies. The states’ partial fight against the security concerns and destructions after the 9/11 attacks will be on the world stage in the 21^st century for a specified time. But the experiences gained in the last three years those give the hints of the new security actors and the way the intelligence community goes, the new experiences those will be gained after the new tragedies will force the societies meet in the common security concept. The leading outputs of these experiences are;

-         the criminal intelligence must be spread world widely,
-         the more common, fast and effective usage of information flow,
-         forming professional joint intervention teams and
-         proper criminal presentation of evidence after the joint operations.

Accordingly, we have to try the actors of the new threat in the regular courts of the criminal system not in the military tribunals. The natural consequence of this obligation is the proper presentation of evidence before the courts. And this can only be achieved by an accurate and common usage of criminal intelligence in an international cooperation and conducting related joint operations in a police mind.

Conclusion

In the global age the leading countries of the world are founding new organizations or reorganizing the existing ones by redefining their roles. According to the mirror reflection of this age’s threats the law enforcement agencies and especially the intelligence services must be reorganized. This reorganization also forces the functions and characteristics of the intelligence to change as well as the logical concept it is based on. The countries and regions of which economies can read the 21^st century accurately will certainly be the authorities. However, what will make these countries more advantageous is realizing the developments in the field of security and especially the new way of intelligence.

China and India can be seen as the economic powers of the global era, but a futurist who can point the new organizational addresses which will replace the FBI and CIA - the knock-downed ones by the Twin Towers on 11^th the September- haven’t been appeared yet. In the interim, the popular conspiracy theories of the ones those think the failure impossible, try to enlighten the misty 9/11 attacks. But the conspiracy theories cannot enlighten anything but darken it. In my opinion, why the most important security concern of the global age, the 9/11 attacks, could not be prevented successfully must be analyzed from a different aspect: In the simplest form, it is just because of the famous U.S. intelligence agencies’ wastage of energy by looking for wrong enemies in wrong fronts by acting in accordance with the classical enemy definitions. When this reality will be fully and accurately realized, it will be possible to institutionalize the new age security; reform the security strategies and define the correct intelligence understanding.

By Ihsan BAL
ihsanbal@hotmail.com
Translated by Omer Yilmaz
3 December 2005

Journal of Turkish Weekly. An ISRO Publication
ISRO: International Strategic Research Organization. Ankara based NGO.