Creating Intelligence Communities

Abstract

This article analyses the factors bearing upon achieving organizational change in the world of secret intelligence in the US and the UK, identifying for success the need for a convincing narrative, adequate budgetary control and understanding of the special psycho-dynamics to be expected in secret organizations. The article examines in that light the different paths of development of the concept of a single national intelligence community in the US and in the UK, and identifies common reasons for renewed pressure in the light of the experiences of international terrorism and the pre-war failures of intelligence over Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Both US and UK intelligence communities, for different reasons, are seen to be some way short of where they need to be to face the challenges of future intelligence work against global threats that span the domestic and overseas spaces.