Intelligence Analysis, Policy & Practice
Week 12 Class Notes: Ethics in Intelligence
1. Introduction
Acting in an ethical manner as an intelligence professional has its
pitfalls like most professions with a few special challenges such as
covert action and spying. Or maintaining a cover. Or deciding when it
is right to warn the public about a pending threat.
2. Covert Action/Spying
Let’s face it. The act of intelligence collection, particularly clandestinely
or covertly, is about convincing individuals to commit a crime—treason
against their own country. It sounds much like the old saying, “One
man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.” It’s all about your
perspective.
So, our country needs individuals patriotic enough to recruit foreigners
to betray their country by selling the reason that our side or viewpoint
is superior. Money can be involved as well, and we all know too well
that we all have our price. So, let’s add bribery to the list of crimes
that agents may commit. Forgery? Theft? Breaking & entering? The
rap list gets longer and longer.
Many IC professionals have to maintain a professional cover—that is to
lie about what they do every day. I had a co-worker who did not know
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his father worked for the CIA until he was in his late teens—think
about the plethora of lies which were utilized to keep that cover that
long!
3. Interrogation & Detention
During this week, you will have the opportunity to explore the topics of
interrogation and detention through the discussion questions, and the
readings you will do prior to answering the discussion questions.
Basically, our nation, post 9/11, has had a checkered history of
treating those terrorists we have captured, detained or imprisoned.
I highly encourage each one of you to look further into this topic—start
with the information provided in the Reading Material for Week 12
Discussion Question folder. Decide for yourself, where is the line drawn
regarding what is ethical and unethical behavior in interrogation.
Moreover, are the results of torture worth the contamination of
unethical or inhumane treatment? Where does the rule of law, US or
international, come into play?
I am very much looking forward to hearing what you have to say on
this topic.
4. Intelligence Analysis & Dissemination
The analytical area most affected by ethical decision-making in modern
times is terrorism, and it is important to know that this date well
before the 9/11 attacks.
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The term “no double standard” really took root after the 1988 Pan Am
103 terrorist bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland. There were
accusations, later found to be true, that warnings regarding threats to
this flight or similar flights were shared among govt. employees but
not the public (read here for more info).
Congress, in its oversight role, created a new law in 1990 tasking the
Executive Branch to warn the public to “…timely, credible, and
corroborated specific threats.” Some intelligence and security experts
would claim while this was good legislation, its implementation has
caused too many alerts as govt. officials are looking to protect
themselves. Think of how many alerts we had post 9/11—those
incessant public announcements at airports. All of that was tied to the
1990 legislation. I have loaded up the pertinent policy on this week’s
webpage under Week 12’s Reading Material for your review.
I think we would all agree that the govt. has a “duty to warn” within
the bounds of maintaining social order and protecting sources and
methods. If the govt. has credible information indicating a potential
attack, domestic or overseas, does the govt. have a responsibility to
warn its citizens? That can be a tricky path as evidenced by the
historical example of the bombing of Coventry, UK by the Germans in
WW2. If you have seen the movie, The Imitation Game, regarding
the creation of Project ULTRA, the breaking of the German military
codes, then you are familiar with the ethics of having such valuable
intelligence.
In WW2, the British govt. had broken the German military operational
code, which was based upon a machine called Enigma. The intelligence
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gleaned from this source was called ULTRA, a precursor to what we
now call special compartmented intelligence or SCI. In Nov 1940,
British intelligence learned from ULTRA sources that Coventry was to
be the target of a large bombing raid including an emphasis on
firebombs. Review the Wikipedia article on the bombing of Coventry,
UK during WW2 for more information.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coventry_Blitz .
The British govt. chose not to warn Coventry or bolster its defenses in
order to protect its ULTRA source. As a result, over 600 civilians were
killed and over 1,000 were injured. Some thoughts to ponder
regarding this decision:
What decision would have you made? Why?
Do you agree with the British govt.’s decision? Why?
How would you have handled ULTRA generated intelligence?
