Intelligence Management and Agile Operations:
Lack of coordinated organization among those charged with insuring the domestic tranquility of the United States contributed to the devastation of September 11th. When Castro entered Havana on New Year’s Day of 1960 there were no U.S. diplomats in Cuba because of the holiday and when India tested two nuclear weapons in 1998 no analysts were working, despite satellite evidence of nuclear test preparation six hours before detonation, because it was a Sunday. These circumstances greatly affected any possibility for an agile response to the events. In most instances, the information available to the organization was more than sufficient. However, because the agencies failed in the intelligence process, electing instead to use information selectively in an effort to provide and intelligence product, they were unsuccessful at the act of intelligence. Using a historical perspective for our criteria, we have observed that unless each of the described elements is present in the intelligence process, value and usefulness from intelligence products is diminished.