GLOSSARY OF INTELLIGENCE TERMS AND DEFINITIONS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80M00596A000400010001-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 13, 2004
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: June 15, 1978
• Content Type: LIST

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Glossary of Intelligence -,Terms
and Definitions
.Eunc' 15, 19T S'
f
Published by the. Intelligence Corr nunnit y Staff
Intelligence Board
FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY
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I%or the Director of Central .I ntcll?1gence
With Advice of the National Fo-rOgn
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PREFACE
This publication is the product of an interagency working group formed by the
National Foreign Intelligence Board in September 1977, and composed of representa-
tives from the organizations which constitute the Intelligence Community.
This publication is designed to be a reference and guidance document for inter-
departmental communications and understanding within the Intelligence Community
and is a means of fostering communication with other Executive Branch organizations
and with the Congress and the Judiciary. The glossary reflects only those intelligence
terms commonly used within and definitions commonly accepted by the Community.
It does not include organizationally peculiar terms or definitions nor does it include
such details as could be addressed only in a classified document.
The value of this document is dependent upon its currency and completeness;
thus, it is expected that changes will occur as new terms evolve and as definitions
change. Users are encouraged to submit proposed corrections, additions, deletions, or
amendments through their Intelligence Community representative to the Executive
Secretary, National Foreign Intelligence Board. The interagency working group will
support the Executive Secretary and will be responsible for a review of proposed
changes, an annual review of the entire document for currency and adequacy, and the
submission of recommended changes to the National Foreign Intelligence Board.
Although this document has been designed to enhance the efficiency of
communications within the Intelligence Community, it is hoped that it will also
contribute to language commonality throughout the intelligence field. In this regard,
authors of other intelligence glossaries and of other special-use glossaries which contain
intelligence terms are encouraged to consider the terms and definitions contained
herein.
The definitions in this glossary may not coincide precisely with definitions used
elsewhere for departmental or legal purposes, especially where definitions were
devised for the purpose of supporting and clarifying the language of a legal document.
However, terms which have been given other definitions have been annotated with a
reference to Appendix B, which contains the term and the definition or definitions
and cites the source document. Current publications and documents known to contain
intelligence terms and definitions, to include those definitions contained in Appendix
B, are listed in the index at Appendix C.
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CONTENTS
Page
PREFACE .................................................................................................................. iii
METHODOLOGY .................................................................................................... vii
GLOSSARY OF INTELLIGENCE TERMS AND DEFINITIONS .................. 1
APPENDIX A: Acronyms and Abbreviations ...................................................... la
APPENDIX B: Alternate Definitions ...................................................................... lb
(Which appear in other publications)
APPENDIX C: Index of Intelligence Glossaries .................................................. lc
(Publications containing definitions of intelligence terms)
V
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METHODOLOGY
The definitions in this glossary have been devised by intelligence officers, not by
philologists or semanticists. Some definitions, therefore, may have limited applicability
outside the Intelligence Community, while other definitions may be restricted to the
single use of a word which has intelligence significance; as, for example, in the word
source. Insofar as possible, however, the definitions included here contain a measure
of consistency of form, and an attempt has been made to establish relationships among
important intelligence words and terms. A basic example exists in the relationships to
be found among the terms information, intelligence information and intelligence.
William R. Corson, in his The Armies of Ignorance, observed:
A word of caution about the term intelligence is in order. Too often it is
used synonymously or interchangeably with information. This is inaccurate
and quite misleading. Information until and unless it has been analyzed and
evaluated remains nothing more than a fact. Information may be interesting,
amusing, or hitherto unknown to the person receiving it, but by and in itself
it is inappropriate to call it intelligence. The three terms intelligence,
intelligence information, and information need to remain distinct. Intelli-
gence by itself refers to the meaning of, or a conclusion about, persons,
events, and circumstances which is derived from analysis and/or logic.
Intelligence information consists of facts bearing on a previously identified
problem or situation, the significance of which has not been completely
established. And information is made of raw facts whose relationship to other
phenomena has yet to be considered or established. Similarly, the methods
involved in acquiring information and/or intelligence information by any
means and turning it into intelligence constitute the intelligence process or
cycle. The distinctions between these terms are important to remember....
This glossary makes similar distinctions: information is unevaluated material of
every description, intelligence information is information of potential intelligence
value, and intelligence is the knowledge derived from a cyclical processing of
information. The articulation of these differences is fundamental to the repeated use
of these terms in defining other terms. One will find, for example, that nuclear
intelligence is defined as intelligence derived from the collection and analysis of
radiation, etc., whereas communications intelligence is defined as technical and
intelligence information derived from the intercept of foreign communications, etc.
(not yet analyzed, it is not yet intelligence). Such fine distinctions are expected to
contribute to a broader understanding of the common meanings of many such terms.
Arriving at a suitable definition for the word intelligence is a challenge unto
itself. In Sherman Kent's Strategic Intelligence for American World Policy,
intelligence is characterized as having three definitional subsets: knowledge,
organization, and activity. This concept is particularly useful in establishing the fact
that intelligence in the current context has multiple meanings.
Intelligence, he says, is the knowledge that our nation must possess regarding
other nations in order to assure itself that its interests will not fail because of planning
or decisionmaking done in ignorance; and upon which knowledge our national foreign
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policy is base Inte ligence is also an ins i ution; ... a p ysica orgamza o
people which pursues the special kind of knowledge at issue. And intelligence is the
activity which the organization performs: research, analysis, collection, evaluation,
study, presentation, and myriad others.
As helpful as they are, Kent's definitions are excessively delimiting for purposes
of this glossary. In the sense that intelligence is knowledge, for example, one cannot
assume that all intelligence is "our" intelligence. It is necessary, therefore, to fashion
the most basic definition possible for the word intelligence in this sense of its meaning,
trusting in the utilizer's ability to select a proper modifier to give the word more
precise meaning when that is necessary. More definitional flexibility results from such
an approach.
But intelligence is more than the knowledge contained in an intelligence product.
It encompasses the intelligence organizations and activities that Kent refers to, and
other activities-and their resultant products-which are known as counterintelli-
gence. For these reasons, one might be tempted to define intelligence simply as a
generic term which encompasses both foreign intelligence and foreign counterintelli-
gence, thence to formulate separate definitions for each of those terms. One quickly
discovers, however, that such a simplistic approach is insufficiently satisfying because
it fails to provide for several shades of meaning and subsequent use.
The problem is compounded by the scores of different types of intelligence that
are used commonly and which must be broadly understood, and by the variety of
headings under which these types of intelligence are classified. Some types of
intelligence are source-oriented (such as human intelligence or signals intelligence),
some form-oriented (as in raw or unfinished intelligence), some system-oriented
(electronic or telemetric), some subject-oriented (medical, economic), some use-
oriented (military, tactical), and a probable host of others. But the point to be made
here is how essential the basic definition of intelligence is to further understanding of
the many, many ways in which it can be used. The definition of intelligence as it
appears in this glossary attempts to account for all of the foregoing.
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The reader will notice frequent cross-referencing between terms and their
definitions. In addition to providing an intelligence lexicon, the glossary purports to be
tutorial, inasmuch as it is possible, and frequent cross-referencing is a technique
employed intentionally to that end.
The term cross-referenced most often is intelligence cycle which, with its
separately defined steps, is conceptually fundamental to understanding the vocabulary
of intelligence. The definitional technique is to list the steps in the cycle as subsets of it
(rather than in their normal alphabetical order in the glossary), and to refer many
related terms to the cycle and its various steps. The desired result is to keep the
reader's focus on the intelligence cycle in order to maintain the conceptual integrity of
its component steps.
The drafters of the definitions contained in this glossary were not constrained by
existing definitions or by the narrow meaning of terms where broader significance
could be achieved by redefinition. Known definitions were nevertheless accommo-
dated to the greatest extent possible. The primary objective of the drafters was to
define those terms that lacked definition and to improve on those definitions extant.
ix
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