Mission Objectives
The NIS states that Mission Objectives
| “ | Relate to our efforts to predict, penetrate, and preempt threats to our national security and to assist all who make and implement US national security policy, fight our wars, protect our nation, and enforce our laws in the implementation of national policy goals. | ” |
There are five different Mission Objectives:
- Defeat terrorists: To accomplish this goal, the primary focus is disrupting their leadership and support systems. The NIS also states that the US will “deny terrorist operational have, sanctuary, and political legitimacy.” Responsibility for carrying out this objective falls under the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC). The Director of the NCTC is responsible for tasking to the individual intelligence agencies.
- Counter the spread of weapons of mass destruction: The NIS states that there can be no single approach to countering the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Therefore, stopping the spread of WMDs will likely take a multi-facet approach. The NIS does not give explicit details to further answer how the intelligence community will counter the spread of WMDs; however, it does indicate that the community will focus on the movement and transportation of the weapons. Focusing on the transportation of WMDs will require integration of the “analytic effort within the intelligence community, under the leadership of the National Counter-Proliferation Center.”
- Support democratic, or aspiring democratic, governments: The NIS states that “failed states are a refuge and breeding ground of extremism.” Therefore, the intelligence community must work to support new democracies, by providing predictive intelligence about potential threats to their governments and economies, and assist policymakers with “opportunities for promoting democracy.”
- Better existing analytical capabilities: In response to the changing type of adversary the US now faces, the US intelligence community will focus on traditional dictatorships and “amorphous groups or networks.” Doing so will require new methodologies, improving human intelligence collection, and assessing the adversary’s own intelligence capabilities. Meeting this goal will be the responsibility of the Directorate of National Intelligence for Collection, the Directorate of National Intelligence for Analysis, NCTC, and the National Counterintelligence Executive.
- Increase the role of strategic forecasting: According to the NIS, the intelligence community cannot just respond to requests by policymakers, but must also provide predictive intelligence. Giving policymakers a “heads-up” to potential problem is required. To do so, it is necessary that the intelligence community promotes a “deeper cultural understanding, better language proficiency, and scientific and technological knowledge.” Identifying the gaps in an area, region, or expertise is the responsibility of the Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Analysis.
Read more about this topic: National Intelligence Strategy Of The United States Of America
Famous quotes containing the words mission and/or objectives:
“Man is eminently a storyteller. His search for a purpose, a cause, an ideal, a mission and the like is largely a search for a plot and a pattern in the development of his life story—a story that is basically without meaning or pattern.”
—Eric Hoffer (1902–1983)
“Along the journey we commonly forget its goal. Almost every vocation is chosen and entered upon as a means to a purpose but is ultimately continued as a final purpose in itself. Forgetting our objectives is the most frequent stupidity in which we indulge ourselves.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)