Intelligence, Information, Power

Intelligence is important because it is information; information is important because, like knowledge, it is power. Consider some examples.

In 1673, Louis XIV declared that he had a right to the revenues of any vacant bishopric in France and that he alone had the right to appoint bishops. This declaration revived and extended a royal prerogative that had been debated for centuries. A few bishops objected to Louis's assertion and extension of these prerogatives. The pope supported the dissenting bishops. The debate turned not on abstract claims of right but on the legal standing of Louis's claim. Legal standing in turn depended on laws, charters, deeds, letters—a mass of legal and historical documents. On one side were the pope's canon lawyers and librarians; on the other, Louis's archivists and advisers. Force was always the ultimate resort, but for many reasons a legal battle was preferable. So Jean Baptiste Colbert, Louis's principal adviser, dispatched an assistant to collect documents from episcopal offices and archives. Analyzing this information, and other information already in the royal archives, Colbert prepared a report for Louis in 1675 justifying the assertion of Louis's right. This report became the basis for royal policy, as well as the principal weapon in the struggle, conducted both in the court of public opinion and the private offices of lawyers, with recalcitrant French clergy and the pope. Ultimately, Louis prevailed.

In this case, information was a power that substituted for physical force. Information could also make the use of physical force possible, however. Warfare in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as it had for centuries, strained the finances of the state. In fact, wars were fought less often to a decision than to financial exhaustion, with treaties setting in place what arms had managed to achieve, until the antagonists could replenish their funds and fight again. Thus the state that could most efficiently refinance itself had a military advantage because it could dictate the initial action of the next war. In its contest with the France of Louis XIV and his immediate successor, Britain was at the beginning the weaker power but had the advantage of a financial system that allowed it to extract resources more efficiently and effectively from the British population. This was an important reason why it was able to contend with French power and, by the middle of the eighteenth century, defeat it.

The effectiveness of the British financial system derived in large part from an efficient method for gathering and analyzing information. A principal source of British state revenue was the excise tax, a tax on goods produced, bought and sold within Great Britain. To collect this tax, of course, the government had to know what was produced and sold and for how much. The British developed a special information system to track this activity, recruiting only the most competent administrators to do this. In other parts of the government administration one might get a job because of one's name or connections—but not in the Excise Department. The British filled excise positions through competitive examinations that tested mathematical ability, and not just simple matters of addition and subtraction. Those who passed the test and entered the service became what we would now call civil servants, long-term specialized employees of the state whose job it was to collect, store, and analyze detailed information on the minutiae of British economic activity. Gathering that information—how many heads of cheese or casks of port in a shop in Bristol, for example—required that the British develop and regularize unprecedented powers of government inspection. The excise system had its own system of inspectors, enforcement officers, and administrative courts to implement and administer the information system. So intrusive was this power that William Blackstone, certainly not a radical critic of Britain's constitutional system, wrote in his Commentaries on the Laws of England that the excise system was "hardly compatible with the temper of a free nation."

An internal taxation system is not the only way that information can affect military power, of course. It may have a more direct effect. When Caesar decided to invade Britain, he sought to gather information about this unknown island. Among other things, he wanted to know what its topography might be, how many tribes it contained, how they fought, what kind of weapons they used. He also wanted to know the character of the people. The more Caesar knew about the island and its inhabitants, the better he could prepare for his expedition and the more likely that it would succeed. Seeking this knowledge, Caesar consulted traders, who knew little, and his Gallic allies, who knew less. Undeterred, he pressed on. When his forces went ashore in Britain, they were surprised at the resistance they met. The Britons had anticipated the attack. In questioning traders, Caesar had indicated his interest, and some of the traders had informed the Britons. Caesar avoided defeat because of the skill and valor of his soldiers—at a critical moment, the eagle-bearer of the Tenth Legion, rather than lose the eagle in disgrace, cried out to his comrades and charged alone through the surf at the enemy, drawing his legion and then others behind him. Critical as well was Caesar's ability to inform himself of what was happening in the battle and to respond. His means of gathering information as the battle progressed being all but nonexistent, he was dependent entirely on his ability to see and analyze the battle as it unfolded before him.

Caesar's experience invading Britain shows the disadvantage a military force can labor under if it lacks relevant information. For example, not having learned much about Britain's harbors, Caesar's flotilla had to move about the coast in view of British forces before he found a place where he could disembark his troops. This gave the information advantage to the Britons, who watched as Caesar chose his landing site. On the other hand, despite his lack of intelligence, Caesar prevailed. His generalship and the overall quality of the Roman army overcame intelligence deficiencies. Caesar's approach in this instance exemplifies the idea that as long as the Romans continued on the strategic offensive, expanding their empire, thinking themselves invincible, intelligence was less important to them; it became essential when they had reached the limits of their empire, sensed the vulnerability at their borders, and in effect adopted a defensive strategic outlook. The invasion of Britain was in effect an ongoing reconnaissance in force. Conquest was a form of intelligence gathering, rather than something made possible or facilitated by intelligence. Caesar sought information on Britain after he had already decided to invade.

The role of intelligence when an empire reaches its limits and takes on a more defensive outlook is evident in the way the British used intelligence on the northwest frontier of India. In this area, men called Political Officers dealt with the tribes. They lived, for example, among the tribes in Waziristan, learned tribal languages, and accumulated a good deal of knowledge about the tribes and how to deal with them. They understood which were the most influential tribes, those whose support of British policy would carry others along. They met with tribal leaders separately or in jirgas, assemblies in which decisions were (and are) taken by consensus. In each case, they had to know enough about the leaders to persuade them to act in accordance with British interests. They persuaded using the language, images, and sayings of tribal rhetoric but beyond that by understanding what the tribes and their leaders valued. They knew whom to praise and whom to insult, how and when. They also dispensed money, the British adopting the Roman custom of dealing with tribes by paying allowances that turned the tribes into clients, at least for a time. Political Officers were not uniformly knowledgeable and long-serving, but when they were, they were often effective. The British stationed forces near the tribal areas, but an effective Political Officer could limit the risk and expense of their use. At the outbreak of World War I, a Political Officer persuaded the British government to increase the allowance of a key tribe in Waziristan, which ensured its support and the support of neighboring tribes during the war. This allowed the British to send to more important theaters troops that might otherwise have been needed on the frontier. Information or intelligence in this case was what is now called a force-multiplier. Knowledge of the tribes allowed the British to remain in control on the frontier and put more forces on the front in Europe.

Political officers succeeded by using their knowledge of the tribes to build influence over them. This influence was a source of power. It was also openly developed and exercised. Usually when one speaks of intelligence and influence, one implies clandestine tactics. For example, during World War II, an Italian airline flew from Brazil to Italy, in defiance of the British embargo of Europe. The flight carried personnel, gold, industrial material, and information from German agents in Brazil to Italy, where such cargo and information could make it to Germany. How could these flights be stopped? The Special Operations Executive, which carried out sabotage and other clandestine operations for the British, suggested blowing up the plane or otherwise physically disabling it. MI6, the British foreign intelligence organization, pointed out that this would only temporarily stop the flights and, since the British would be the most obvious suspects, would certainly damage British relations with Brazil. MI6 offered an alternative: through its human sources, it would obtain some of the airline's official stationery and forge on it a letter supposedly from the head of the airline in Italy to his manager in Brazil criticizing and insulting the Brazilian head of state. MI6 was given permission to conduct the operation. Leaked to the Brazilian head of state through an unwitting Allied embassy, the letter had its intended effect. The flights were shut down.

This influence operation from World War II brought together several different kinds of information to produce a desired result. For example, the operation required the technical knowledge needed to forge a letter, as well as the no less important but certainly vaguer sense of how the Brazilian head of state would respond to it. In this case, knowledge allowed the British to get the president of Brazil to do something he would not have otherwise done, a simple definition of power. Often, however, intelligence is used not to gain power but to prevent suffering, particularly that caused by an unpleasant surprise, thus countering the power of uncertainty in human affairs. Consider a simple example drawn from World War I.

As the war in Europe settled into bloody stalemate, it became a matter of launching or repelling offensives against entrenched positions. Where an offensive would occur was uncertain. If one side could reduce this uncertainty and prepare in advance for an offensive, it would be more likely to repel it. British intelligence realized that it would be able to understand German offensive plans by noting the movement of troops by rail. By observing the length of trains and the equipment they carried, the British could determine which units were moving. By observing the rail lines the trains moved on, the British could determine where these units were going, and hence, where the Germans planned to attack. To gather this information, the British established and ran train- watching networks behind German lines. In one case, they recruited Luxembourgeois who could return to their home country. Some of these individuals in turn recruited others. Communicating with their British handlers in Paris by inserting coded messages in newspapers and by letter through Switzerland, the train watchers provided a stream of information that allowed the British and their Allies to anticipate German military action. The information the train watchers supplied reduced British uncertainty, increasing British power.

A more complicated example of the relationship of intelligence to uncertainty comes from the Cold War case of an American source, Colonel Ryszard Kuklinski, a Polish military officer who worked with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 1972 until 1981. During these years, Kuklinski gave the agency more than forty thousand pages of documents on Soviet war plans, wartime command and control, and advanced weapon systems. Kuklinski also was a key source of information during the Solidarity crisis, which culminated in the suppression of the Solidarity workers' movement and the imposition of martial law in December 1981. By that time, Kuklinski had been in the United States for five weeks, having signaled the CIA that he had fallen under suspicion and that he and his family needed to be brought to safety.

The documents that Kuklinski provided allowed the U.S. government to understand Soviet plans and intentions for military operations and technology. This spared resources that would have been spent countering threats that did not in fact exist, allowing their use on those that did. This increased American power in several ways. Kuklinski's information helped NATO identify key targets that it would need to attack in the event of war, reducing NATO's uncertainty about how to fight. Kuklinski also revealed Soviet deception efforts, allowing NATO to maximize the power of its military capabilities: it would not waste effort on less important targets. In addition, Kuklinski's information on Soviet/Warsaw Pact war plans and ways of mobilizing reduced uncertainty about Soviet intentions. Knowing what the Soviets would do if they were preparing for war improved the ability of the United States to extract accurate warnings from Soviet military activity. This made the United States less likely to misread Soviet training activity, for example, and overreact, thus bringing on a war neither side intended.

As noted, Kuklinski also reported on the events surrounding the imposition of martial law in Poland. Here the issue of uncertainty gets more complicated, not to say uncertain. The analysts and policy-makers who read Kuklinski's information understood it in light of what they already knew. They were convinced that not the Poles but the Soviets would impose martial law, because the Soviets had done so in Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968. Kuklinski's firsthand information and, according to one analyst, in retrospect, the run of events leading up to the imposition of martial law, contradicted the view of the analysts and policy-makers. Nonetheless, the United States was surprised when the Poles themselves imposed martial law. In fact, the erroneous view of the analysts and policy-makers may well have encouraged the Poles to do so. Focused on the Soviet Union, the United States did little if anything to indicate to the Polish government that imposing martial law would be costly. Consequently, the government may have thought it had an implicit "green light" to go ahead with the suppression of Solidarity.

That the Polish government thought it had a "green light" draws support from the consequences of Kuklinski's departure for the United States. He had fallen under suspicion in part because a Soviet intelligence source in the Vatican told the KGB that the Americans had the plan for the imposition of martial law. The KGB passed this information on to the Polish intelligence service. The Vatican had the plan, or at least some details of it, because once the United States received it from Kuklinski, it informed the Vatican in hopes that Polish pope John Paul II could influence the Polish government not to impose martial law. Kuklinski, who was involved in planning for martial law, was one of the few people with access to the complete plan. The sudden departure of Kuklinski and his family removed any doubt that he was the one who had given the plan to the United States. Thus, both the Soviets and the Poles knew that the United States knew the plan for martial law and knew, furthermore, that the United States was aware that they knew that the United States knew. Although this situation may sound like a parody of the world of intelligence as a refracting hall of mirrors, it was actually a situation of unusual clarity in international relations in which intelligence work in principle removed ambiguity and uncertainty for both sides in a conflict. Given this unusual transparency, it was not unreasonable for the Soviets and Poles to conclude that the lack of a red light for the Poles from the United States was in fact an implicit green light. Surely, the Soviet and Polish leaders must have thought, the actions of the Americans must be based on the unusual degree of knowledge they had. In fact, as we have noted, American actions were based not on what Kuklinski revealed but on what past events suggested. The fact that preconceptions prevailed over Kuklinski's information on the suppression of Solidarity demonstrates the limitations of even the best intelligence. It reminds us that whatever may be true of knowledge and power, there is no necessary connection between intelligence and power.