A Memo regarding Information and Intelligence Sharing - Research Proposal Example

The danger is that these recruiters may succeed as before and produce a security breach on the scale of September 11 or something even larger1 such as the use of nuclear armaments in urban areas. The need of the hour is to innovate the security apparatus by delivering them with information and intelligence that makes a difference. Information regarding the September 11 attacks was available but ineffective information sharing and collaboration led to the tragedy. The key to avert such a disaster is to strengthen the existing information and intelligence sharing mechanisms.

This is obviously far easier said than done as the challenge is multifaceted and requires simultaneous efforts by myriad governmental and private agencies as well as the general population. It would be pertinent to attend this challenge logically with regards to the flow of information and intelligence that is used to initiate security actions. Information is first gathered by ground intelligence officials around the world and is then processed at various levels to see what information requires immediate action.

The information deemed high priority is delivered to security agencies to initiate appropriate defense mechanisms. A look into the information gathering mechanisms will reveal that the current information gathering mechanisms are robust. . It must also be related here that information gathering has been strengthened inside the United States by involving the average citizen. Initiatives such as the Wal-Mart manager intelligence gathering are aimed to involve the average American citizen since the danger to the United States is more from within that from the outside.

The multicultural composition of the United States and the underlying democratic principles mean that it is not practicable to create a police state to gather intelligence. Instead, the only real method to gather the right kind of intelligence is to have the average citizen on board. If information regarding any suspicious activity is reported from the grass roots level, there is a great chance that the information would be credible3. The next step to taking any real action would be to process and disseminate this information to the subject security agency.

This can only be guaranteed if the intelligence sharing and information distribution network is robust enough4. For example, if a suspicious person was noticed walking down a street again and again, the local police could deal with him. However, if ground intelligence reported a group of men displaying suspicious activities in a neighborhood then the services of SWAT would be required to deal with the situation. In a similar manner, the services of other defense and security mechanisms such as the FBI and the CIA may be required depending on the circumstances.

However, once again this would be subject to the processing and dissemination of information which would determine which information goes to which agencies. These inputs of information and intelligence are critical to initiating the required law enforcement processes that can guarantee the safety and well being of