TACTICAL HUMINT

TACTICAL HUMINT
HUMINT is collected information which we term positive intelligence after processing.HUMINT collectors access human sources and multimedia to gain information about enemy intent,composition,disposition,capabilities,table of order and equipment, command control nodes, centers of gravity,leadership,personnel—this is also called Order of Battle when conducted prior to a combat situation. The Commander specifies his intelligence requirements explicitly and going by these requirements , prioritized , human sources,informants,and other human elements possessing information compatible with the said requirements are utilized by application of specific techniques like tactical questioning,debriefing,document exploitation, eliciting and interrogation and reconnaissance and surveillance. The HUMINT collectors are not intelligence operatives with general intelligence education and training but specialists. Counterintelligence is also a collection oriented discipline like HUMINT but not an intelligence discipline in the strictest sense. It is concerned with enemy intent while HUMINT is concerned with collection part only so  as  to  satisfy  Commanders  intelligence  requirements  in  order  to  answer  certain  information  gaps.CI attempts to prevent sabotage,assassination,terrorism,subversive and enemy intelligence activities , deny the enemy access to installations and sensitive information , acts as a protective shield for the Commander by supporting OPSEC and force protection and acts in an advisory capacity recommending countermeasures to enemy  intelligence  activities.CI  is  a  protection  component  in  the  Commanders  repository  of  defensive tactics  and  techniques  and  CI  also  protects  the  intelligence  cycle.  Several  definitions  exclude  personnel, physical, document or communications security programs from CI purview , but on close inspection it will be seen that CI invariably is resorted to while implementing force protection and denial/deception measures (information  warfare)  thus  bringing  in  play  the  security  aspects  of  personnel  ,  physical,documents.CI support  tio  physical  security  ,  infrastructure,  technology  protection,  military  security,HUMINT  –all  these some way or the other involve those elements that are kept out of general definitions.Definitions can be very confusing, may render doctrine imperfect and lead to redundancy. For example the Army ten ds to  maintain a general perspective  on threat—statements like  our forces are prepared  to  deter /attack/defend against a wide spectrum of threats, ranging  from criminal activity  in our jurisdiction which may  abet  our  main  enemy,  terrorism  ,  subversion  to  small  wars,  wars  and  battles.  Now  this  generalized concept is fine in that we can have several security programs, each tending to one specific threat type in the entire spectrum. But the disadvantage in this approach is we cannot focus on the main threat, say terrorism, and as security concepts like force protection, deception operations, physical security, military security,etc  all have certain elements in common we land up with redundant programs designed to handle these security concerns.  For  example  antiterrorism  and  force  protection  both  have  in  common  physical  security  as  a passive  defensive  subcomponent  where  the  installation  critical  points  are  protected  after  vulnerability assessments  and  red  teaming.  The  same  subcomponent  is  the  major  component  in  a  physical  security program. Thus  there  occurs  good  redundancy  if  we do  not  have  a  focused view  of the  threat  and  counter threat measures become diffused over the broad spectrum.The same goes  with  the definition of intelligence and CI. Or rather I should say  the  general  perspectives held by most Commanders and even intelligence officers.The main idea is to remove uncertainty and gain a decision advantage. This should be the prime objective of the Commander.HUMINT and CI are both shaping operations but with a critical difference.HUMINT shapes the Commanders view of the battle space by providing him accurate intelligence about enemy order of battle. Plus other information requirements when ops are in progress.CI on the other hand penetrates the enemy commanders decision cycle and shapes his views ‘’like the way’’ our Commander desires by denying the enemy commander access to our operations, plans and information systems , and using offensive methods like penetration , infiltration and also denial/deception operations. Both shaping operations have one thing in common as goal. To act as force enabler. To heighten the Commanders situational understanding. In other words to gain that ‘’decisive ‘’ advantage. .To get a ‘’positional’’ advantage.
HUMINT shapes the "Blue" forces' understanding of the "Red" forces while CI affects the Red forces' knowledge of Blue forces.HUMINT shapes the understanding of the ‘’Blue forces’’ with respect to the ‘’Red forces’’ while CI does the reverse. True both use several techniques which are in common like interrogation and other low level source operations but going by what has been discussed CI is not HUMINT and not in the least a subset of HUMINT. Being a subset would mean CI operations would be counter-HUMINT only. But CI looks beyond that, by conducting offensive operations, denial and deception operations , exploiting enemy intelligence activities ,neutralizing them through collection of evidence and subsequent prosecution for national security crimes, and supporting tactical and theater operations by feeding inputs to the decision cycles. Thus we see CI goes far beyond Counter-HUMINT operations. InterrelationshipCI also provides positive intelligence about the enemy as a byproduct of its operations.CI and HUMINT operations overlap in that very similar techniques are often used. In fact in tactical operations a mix of HUMINT and CI operators plus a linguist carry out tactical HUMINT operations where the roles of both are more overlapping and confusion arises when either may operate like the other. We should not always justify HUMINT source operations..this leads to the mistaken impression that CI only lends support to HUMINT and has no other function and that HUNMINT and CI are the same thing.NO.Whereas HUMINT focuses on the enemy’s organization,composition,capabilities and decision making without any focus on the intent of collection , only collecting all require information laid down in the commanders prioritized intelligence requirements order , and reporting it through proper channels (and here full stop) CI will go much further , exploiting , neutralizing the enemy intelligence activities or doing both…CI is concerned with enemy ‘’INTENT’’.HUMINT focuses on the enemy’s decision making cycle to gain information for the Commander whereas CI attempts to ‘’INFLUENCE’’ that decision cycle and shape it the way we want it in order to achieve winning objectives. Thus the HUMINT operative tasking end after detecting and identifying enemy intelligence activities while the CI agents tasks begin afresh.From all this discussion we can derive two things:1. HUMINT and CI are different.CI is not a subset of HUMINT.2.As HUMINT and CI have  many  similar lines of operation  ,  if both can be combined  to satisfy   tactical requirements ,(during theater or national-level requirements they can revert to individual role-this capability must  be  retained)  ,  we  will  have  an  intelligence  operator  who  will  be  more  versatile,adaptable.and  can confirm easily to all army requirements at the tactical level. Tactical intelligence formations can execute this tactical  HUMINT  asset  (the  operator)  to  satisfy  commanders  requirements.  Merging  the  capabilities  of HUMINT  and  CI  results  in  a  task  organization  of  skills  for  the  Commander—definitely  an  improvement over  either  HUMINT  or  CI  enabled  operations.  Tactical  HUMINT  operations  are  most  suitable  for developing and maintaining an excellent informant/source base that provides timely, specific and accurate information.  Tactical  HUMINT  operations  combine  both  HUMINT  and  CI  techniques  and  together  with linguist  assistance  ,  are  more  capable  of  developing  and  maintaining  contacts  than   only  HUMINT  or  CI ops.For example , the Tactical HUMINT team comes across few individuals of interest near the forward area , the HUMINT operators conduct tactical questioning to extract information of intelligence value and then pass them over to their CI colleagues for further interrogation if they discern any information of interest to the  CI  operators.  This  can  be  switched  to  and  fro  and  the  application  of  the  combined  faculties  of  both results in more refined, relevant and timely/accurate information. If the individuals are of the witting type or have voluntarily offered to deliver information or are community members sympathetic to the forces, then they can be inducted into the source repository by establishing rapport/giving incentives etc and then later their assistance taken for more information. Tactical HUMINT teams can act as mobile interrogation teams at  forward  areas,  quickly  disposing  off  sources  after  tactical  questioning  and  interrogations,  thereafter detailing  escort  for  those  who  may  render  more  information  or  who,  it  appears  are  suppressing  tactical information, sending them to detention centers  and  collocated  interrogation areas  near  forward  areas or in the rear. The standard procedure of detaining and escorting to rear interrogation areas is hereby bypassed as in this procedure , the time taken to assess , detain , segregate , and transport to rear areas can negate the availability of timely intelligence—intelligence is highly perishable ,. Especially combat intelligence, where time is of essence.Hence as the repository of sources grows, the quality and content of available information is enhanced and for the commander tactical intelligence, most of the time, is at his fingertips. Compare this to the situation where earlier, HUMINT or CI operations had to be complemented by intelligence from theater or national agencies,  and  it  so  happens  they  cannot  provide  real  time,  ground  intelligence  always  for  combatant commanders.The soldiers will be given language training, Basic CI training, operational debriefing training so that as and when  required  they  can  shift  from  tactical  to  operational  briefing  to  CI  functions.  The  focus  of training should  be  cultivating  the  capability  to  conduct  contact  and  informant  operations,  recognize information of CI value, and execute tactical questioning of civilians, and screen EPWs and detainees with the assistance of an interpreter.Tactical HUMINT team functions:1. Tactical tasks with Language training2. HUMINT Ops=Strategic Debriefing3. CIHere  it  should  be  stressed  that  intelligence  nowadays  is  tactical—the  focus  should  be  at  tactical  level  as soldiers  fight  wars  nowadays  more  than  battles.  Small-wars  in  fact.  Hence  the  dire  need  for  actionable intelligence/tactical  intelligence.  Here  the  players  are  combatant  commanders  who  must  move  swiftly  in their maneuver and strike decisively. Higher echelons are there for planning, average intelligence support, but it  is  for the  ground  based  Tactical  HUMINT  teams  to  do  most  of  the  work. And  they  do  it—as  their composition is quite what the modern day warfare demands.CI/HUMINT Counterintelligence  functional  services  are  provided  to  promote  the  Commanders  situational understanding. Define and analyse mission Execute CI Surveys Prepasre a brief on CI Awareness Execute CI Vulnerability Assessment Execute CI Threat assessment Execute CI Inspections Execute CI Reviews Execute CI Evaluations Conduct CI support to HUMINT activitiesIdentify, exploit and counteract foreign intelligence activities across the full spectrum of HUMINT activities. CI activities include, but are not limited to, identifying friendly and hostile capabilities and vulnerabilities; providing  CI  review  of  HUMINT  activities;  conducting  CIdamage  assessments;  providing  support  to Counter  Espionage  (CE)  investigations;  conducting  and/or  assisting  in  asset  validation  by  physical  and technical means.Perform CI/HUMINT operational planning.1. Supervise the preparation of CI products, as required.2. Obtain necessary approvals.
3. Supervise CI support to HUMINT operation.4. Supervise asset validation procedures.5. Conduct post-mission analysis.6. Disseminate required reports/products.CI/HUMINT Collection management The  CI/HUMINT  officer/JCO  will  match  the  requirements  with  the  collection  assets  in  hand  ,  checks availability  ,  usage  by  other  adjacent  units  ,  deployable  possibilities  etc  and  then  determines  the  best collection plan.  Receive  prioritized  intelligence  requirements  from  higher  headquarters  or  collection  manager  , conduct analysis Create the collection plan Study all CI/HUMINTcollection assets available and match them with the requirements Decide on the course of action to fulfill collection objectives  Docex The CI/HUMINT officer/Jco must be acquainted with the exploitation setup and the units exploitation SOP so that he may, after receiving, accounting and sending the captured materials he may be able to follow-up for results and give future feed inputs to the exploitation cell/agency. Understand exploitation agency infrastructure Identify exploitable materials Categorize them as Biometric Examination or Forensic Examination. Take possession of exploitable materials Account for  and categorize exploitable materials Prepare catalogues Dispatch the materials to exploitation agencys custody Followup with the agencies for resultsIdentify orders of battle in given Area of operationsIdentify Ground military  attack and  defense capability,  Air-defense  and attack  capability,  naval  capability and all associated  military  weaponry systems  and  equipment, such as  ground  combat systems, antiaircraft systems, naval vessels, etc.Study the enemy infrastructure and locate/identify the keys areas.Intelligence support to Targeting.This includes identifying enemy targets , both high value and high payoff , nominating in order of priority , recommending kinetic or non kinetic attacks, and thus assist the Commander to destroy, neutralize or exploit the target in a manner which is in line with the units mission and in keeping with the Commander and his staffs requirements. The  Unit  intelligence  supervisor  who  controls  the  target  intelligence  collection  and  associated ops/recommendations  to  the  Commander  must  be  as  thorough  as  possible,  evaluating  all  factors  and intelligence  inputs  carefully,  studying  imagery  data  and  compiling  and  organizing  target  information efficiently so that while nominating to the Commander and making recommendations there is absolutely no ambiguity.  Target  descriptions  including  composition,  location,  importance,  imagery,  graphics, construction—all  of  these  are  spelled  out  correctly  and  particularly  for  HVTs/HPTs  their  location, significance, all associations determined and influence with respect to the leaderships decision cycle/battle space situation.Identify:
?Targeting Categories ? HVTs/HPTs  Areas of Target value  Build a list of targets   Locational factors of each target Associations of each target(COIN) Social circles of each target (COIN) Assess target significance/value Determine whether to employ kinetic or non kinetic attack  Contribute to attack guidance  Assess effect of removal of targets on battle space Create and maintain target folders Decide on target intelligence requirements Create target nomination list  Combat assessment Update target folder based on combat assessments. Contribute to IO decide on restrike optionsEvaluate the ThreatDetermine  threat  intent,  capabilities,  vulnerabilities,  possible  courses  of  action  and  the  most  dangerous course of action.It is of prime importance to study enemy activity and indicators to assess his capability to attack, defend, withdraw, reinforce. Focus on the intelligence gaps and this focus can determine the direction of collection of intelligence. Enemy activity patterns should be studied.Factors influencing the intelligence product are the time available for collection, assets available, unit size, the intelligence requirements, AO features and the mission. The enemy, terrain, weather, local populace are taken into consideration. Identify: Enemy Intent Enemy Capability HVT HPT C.G. Critical areas: Capabilities,Requirement