Fixing a Failure to Identify Intelligence in the Domestic Setting: Aligning Collection and Analysis to Address an All-Hazards Mission

The US’ domestically-oriented, homeland security enterprise lacks a structure that facilitates an all-hazards intelligence mission. An all-hazards mission must account for both positive and negative intelligence information. The primary hubs for interagency collaboration and collection, within the US, are the Department of Homeland Security-funded state and local fusion centers and the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s joint terrorism task forces (JTTFs). Both of these entities focus on negative intelligence. The FBI JTTFs focus on one element of negative intelligence, the DHS fusion centers have unfocused, but still negative, missions, due to bureaucratic realities. Meanwhile, other government agencies, notably the CIA’s National Resources Division and even other elements of the FBI are engaged in uncoordinated collection, an activity that threatens to bring even more disorganization to the homeland-security enterprise. Rather than creating yet another agency, the strengths of both the JTTFs and the fusion centers should be leveraged, in conjunction with other domestically operating collectors, to establish new platforms, using fusion centers as a backbone, staffed with a service of joint duty personnel.