Quote Originally Posted by Entropy
.....indications analysis requires a focused collection effort that may not be available in COIN scenarios. IOW, indicator development and monitoring are not possible if there isn't a significant body of baseline knowledge and the ability to get information in the necessary areas.
Quote Originally Posted by marct
Entropy, thanks for posting the link to the Grabo text - I hadn't seen it before. It's an interesting blend of inductive and abductive logics; I think I will probably use it in my course this fall.
Grabo's Anticipating Surprise is a classic in the intelligence field and a great read. However, because of its fairly tight focus on warning in conventional conflict, the principles she relates may be more difficult for inexperienced readers to absorb and mentally shift into the COIN/UW context.

Entropy, I don't feel that indicator development is impossible or overly difficult in COIN/UW. But keep in mind that Grabo discusses strategic warning in her book, with the product intended to alert policymakers to emergining threats - and she also cautions about the difficulties of convincing them (and of others in the IC) of the real dangers embodied in emerging threats that are outside of their current perceptions. Warning intel in COIN/UW is most effective at the unit level.

Putting aside the formality of lists for a moment, just consider that all soldiers operating on the ground in such an environment develop their own personal indicator lists in their head. To use a cliche, but real, example - the sudden absence of locals from a normally lively street in town is usually taken as an indicator that something bad is about to happen. In the COE, such indicators range from being simple and broadly applicable as in that example, to the much more complex and focused on narrow, local context.

(Recall the bit from Go Tell the Spartans, where the analyst demonstrates to the cynical commander the ability to predict which village the VC are going to hit next.)

At an even more personal level, I used to train my HUMINT'ers in the principles of indicator analysis for interrogation. The baseline of information regarding kinesics, cognition and emotion is gathered during the first phase of the interrogation (or, if the situation allows, during the first screening interview). In this case, the indicators developed are used, not for "warning" in the standard sense, but to alert the interrogator to deception, potential leads and openings for manipulation of any one or all of the three mentioned aspects of the source.

To get back to analysis, the unfortunate truth is that many analysts at the tactical level have neither the training nor the experience to effectively implement a warning system for their units. Another obstacle is that, even if they develop the best list of indicators available in-country, unless they have an effective system for monitoring incoming information specifically for indicators and disseminating immediate warning, it ends up being a waste of valuable time of a critical asset. Just as Grabo relates for the strategic level, to be effective at the unit level it would also have to be a full time gig - and I know of few units that can spare an analyst to do nothing more than the warning job. But most competent analysts are still able to integrate elements of the warning discipline into everything else they've got on their plate. I'm sure many of those on the board can think of examples.


FYI: Several other good pubs from NDIC, along with the Grabo text, are available for download through the link posted on an earlier thread