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Intelligence and the Art of

Command, 17991945
Huw Davies
Published online: 29 Nov 2007.

To cite this article: Huw Davies (2007) Intelligence and the Art of Command,
17991945, Intelligence and National Security, 22:5, 589-600
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Intelligence and the Art of Command,

17991945

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HUW DAVIES

When valour plays on reason,

It eats the sword it ghts with.
(Anthony and Cleopatra, Act III, Scene 13)
Although it refers to warfare in Roman times, Shakespeares famous
statement nevertheless teaches a timeless lesson, both for operational and
military, and strategic and political decision-makers. In making the comment,
Enobarbus, Mark Anthonys faithful advisor and soldier, is referring to his
friends mistaken belief that he can ght Octavius Caesar, Anthonys
challenger for the seat of power in Rome, at sea. All advice and intelligence
suggests the contrary, that although Anthony has Cleopatras vast eet at his
disposal, it is still no match for Octaviuss. Anthony is much stronger on land,
but his valour, and his mistaken belief in his own invincibility, prevents him
from understanding this. Subsequently, Anthony is defeated at sea. Anthonys
valour, or his preconceived belief in his own invulnerability, prevented him
from acting on intelligence which predicted his almost certain defeat.
Strategically, of course, the same intelligence indicated that war with
Octavius was unnecessary and foolish. Not only was Anthony militarily and
strategically weaker than Octavius, but the war was tearing apart the Roman
Empire, making the victor weaker. Despite this, the war occurred, and this
was due to political imperatives: Octavius had attacked Anthonys ally,
Sextus Pompeiius. As a result, despite the debilitating nature of the conict,
the primacy of the political imperative made it inevitable.
The remainder of the story is typically Shakespearean. Suspecting
Cleopatras betrayal, Anthony determines to kill his lover. Scared for her
life, Cleopatra sends word she has killed herself in grief. Anthony, stricken by
the news, attempts suicide, only to be reconciled with his lover moments
before his death. Captured by Caesar, Cleopatra commits suicide herself with
the bite of a poison asp. The story would have been much rosier, but innitely
less interesting, if Anthony had only listened to reason rather than valour.
Such is the case with countless military defeats across history, and military
Intelligence and National Security, Vol.22, No.5, October 2007, pp.589 600
ISSN 0268-4527 print 1743-9019 online
DOI: 10.1080/02684520701717932 2007 Taylor & Francis

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commanders in the modern age, would do well to consider Enobarbus when

they attempt to balance uncertain intelligence with their intuition and
preconceptions.
The methods used to meet the demands of successful intelligence
exploitation, and how this subsequently impacted upon command practices
at both the operational and strategic level of war is the subject of this Special
Issue. This collection deals with operational and strategic intelligence.
Operational intelligence has been dened many times before, most clearly by
Clausewitz . . . every sort of information about the enemy and his country
the basis, in short, of our own plans and operations1 but it is important to
understand also what operational intelligence sets out to achieve the
mitigation of risk.2 Strategic intelligence, by contrast, is used to inform, or,
more regularly, support policy decisions Who are ones enemies? What
threat do they represent? How does one counter them? What actions should
be taken as a result? The impact of human nature, of intuition, has very
different consequences in these two arenas. In order to discuss the
continuities and changes of this period, this series of articles is divided into
three sections. Section One discusses the impact of intelligence on command
at the operational level during the military campaigns of the nineteenth
century. Section Two discusses the transformation of intelligence machinery
and strategic command in the age of total war, 190045. Section
Three returns to the operational level for a discussion of the inuence of
intelligence on the art of command during the closing stages of the Second
World War.
Each article provides relevant lessons and themes, but that are necessarily
conned to the level of warfare which they discuss. Nine historians consider
the inuence of intelligence on the art of command either at the operational
or strategic level of war. In so doing, very different, indeed, contradictory
lessons are identied. At the operational level the equal importance of
intelligence and intuition is explored, as various campaigns and commanders
from 1799 to 1945 are considered. At the strategic level, the primacy of the
political imperative is identied. The ne line between acting on or ignoring
intelligence which compromises a political imperative is discussed from three
differing perspectives. As such, this introduction will explore these general
lessons, rst at the operational, that is to say, military decision-making, level
and then at the strategic, or political decision-making, level of warfare.
There is signicant and authoritative scholarly literature on this subject.
Michael Handels seminal edited collections Intelligence and Military
Operations, Leaders and Intelligence, and his monograph, War, Strategy
and Intelligence,3 provide discussions of the impact of intelligence at the
operational and strategic levels and how the application of intelligence can
vary depending on the level of decision-making at which it is used.

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Intelligence and Military Operations focuses, as one would expect, on the

operational level of warfare, and provides a detailed analysis of the impact of
intelligence on decision-making from the American Civil War to the Second
World War. Of particular interest is Patrick Beeslys contribution on the loss
of Convoy PQ 17 during the Second World War, and the decision-making
which surrounded that incident.4 This case study demonstrates that, despite
intelligence on German U-Boat patrols in the area of the convoy, and the
enclosed nature of the theatre of operations (the Arctic Ocean north of
Russia), the decision was still taken to scatter the eet, a standard cautionary
manoeuvre, but one which proved fatal in the circumstances. This decision
was taken by the First Sea Lord, Admiral Dudley Pound, and despite the
intuitive advice of his subordinates, that the convoy stood a better chance of
survival if it remained with its escort. The case study is interesting as it
reects the problems of balancing uncertainty, intelligence and intuition in
difcult and high-pressure situations, a key theme central to this Special
Issue. Handels collaboration with John Ferris produced an important
contribution to the literature on this subject,5 by discussing and clarifying
Clausewitzs ideas on intelligence, and how, in the nineteenth century, when
intelligence was usually of dubious reliability, a commander had to utilise his
inherent intuition to make a decision in conditions of partial or total
uncertainty. This introduction and the Special Issue is an extension and
development of this discussion rather than a re-evaluation of it.
The inuence of intelligence at the strategic level is deliberately treated
separately, despite obvious convergences. At this level of decision-making,
there are several complicating factors which are peculiar to the strategic
level, among them the notion that the political imperative can supersede
intelligence. These concepts are also dealt with in the literature on the
subject, although this Special Issue represents the rst to identify explicitly
the differences and similarities in the inuence of intelligence on the art of
command at the operational and strategic levels of war. Amongst the
literature on the subject, a central theme seems to be the ethical or moral
stance in ignoring intelligence in favour of policy imperatives.6 Whilst such
decisions might be ethically or morally dubious, the reasons why intelligence
might be ignored in the decision-making process, and how intelligence can
materially alter the nature of a society, is well worth exploring.
I. INTELLIGENCE AND THE ART OF COMMAND AT THE
OPERATIONAL LEVEL

Successful exploitation of intelligence at the operational level of warfare

depends on three factors: the timely acquisition, analysis and application of
relevant and accurate information. Warfare underwent revolutionary

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transformations between 1799 and 1945. Virtually all aspects of conict,

from the political, economic and cultural to the technological, changed in this
time period, in a fashion never before seen. One might expect that a series of
studies of intelligence and the art of command in this time period would
record a similar journey. Undoubtedly, the way intelligence was collected,
collated, and disseminated, changed in this period, as technological
innovation enabled swifter communications. However, obtaining, interpreting
and disseminating correctly analysed intelligence is only useful if it is
successfully integrated into the decision-making cycle.7 In order to achieve
this, as Enobarbus advised in 41BC, a commander must relinquish his
preconceived notions, he must not let his valour play on his reason;
intelligence must be used to mediate intuition. At the same time, however,
intuition must not be completely abandoned. Intelligence never provides a
true or complete picture of events and a certain reliance must be placed on
intuition if one is to make a decision without all the facts. The constant battle
to achieve this, to balance valour with reason, intuition with intelligence, and
learn how to apply intelligence, is a central theme of this Special Issue, and
one which is largely immune from the political, social and technological
revolutions of this period.
In general terms, it is possible to argue that, between 1799 and 1945, there
has been a shift from an emphasis on intuition as the determining factor in the
operational decision-making process, to a concentration, during the Second
World War, on intelligence as the basis for such decision-making. Intuition
provided an important balance in the nineteenth century because of the poor
nature of information collection methods, and the unreliable nature of the
intelligence they produced.8 With the development of faster and more reliable
communications techniques, intelligence became more timely, accurate and
trustworthy. As a result, greater reliance was placed upon it. This resulted in
an over-reliance on intelligence in certain campaigns of the Second World
War which led to over-caution and subsequent operational paralysis. The key
to this problem, and a central lesson identied by the articles in this Special
Issue, was the need, in situations of partial uncertainty, to make decisions
based in part on intuition and in part on intelligence. This is an aspiration that
was and is rarely achieved.
Throughout history, one can refer to commanders who have relied on their
intuition to make decisions, when not in possession of the whole story. How
far and how much they rely on this intuition often dened the difference
between success and failure. The over-condent commander who ignores the
facts at his disposal can be as soundly beaten as the over-cautious or
indecisive commander. One could cite Napoleon at Waterloo, for overextending himself against Wellington and refusing to believe reports of the
approaching Prussians; or Cornwallis at Yorktown, over-cautious and holed

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up in an indefensible position, mistakenly believing the Royal Navy would

come to his rescue. Clausewitz identied the impact uncertainty can have on
human nature:
. . . The great majority of generals will prefer to stop well short of their
objective rather than risk approaching it too closely, and . . . those with
high courage and an enterprising spirit will often overshoot it and so
fail to attain their purpose. Only the man who can achieve great things
with limited means has really hit the mark.9
Intelligence should not, and cannot, form the sole basis for decisionmaking. No intelligence is ever completely certain, and over-reliance on it
can lead to strategic and operational paralysis, particularly if reports are
contradictory. The key is balancing intuition and intelligence.10 As such, this
is a skill to be learnt, not one which is inherent.
In order to explain the elaborate successes of military commanders at the
operational level in the uncertain conditions of warfare prior to industrialisation and mechanisation, when communication and mobilisation was slow,
and battles and campaigns were often decided in the course of one or two
days, military commentators and theorists created the concept of the military
genius. This was, as Clausewitz said, the combination of strength of
character and determination;11 the strength of character to make a decision
amid confusion and uncertainty, and the determination to see that decision
through to the end.12 Military geniuses, if they exist, do not simply come into
being, they evolve. It is the special set of circumstances which exist
throughout the career of a lucky general which allows him the ability to
develop the skills and thought processes by which military geniuses are
dened. A person can be born with the characteristics and intelligence of a
military genius. But it is the experiences of battle, of high-pressure
decisions, correct and incorrect, and the experience of what Clausewitz
termed friction in war, which dene and identify a military genius.
With this in mind, Michael Handel identies a military genius as a man
with a very highly developed mental aptitude for war-making, a
courageous but not reckless leader who [took] calculated risks that
[were] intended to exacerbate his opponents confusion and uncertainty.13
Emphasis must be placed on the fact that Handel dened a military genius as
a calculated risk-taker, a general who was not reckless. In order to calculate
risks, objective analysis of accurate intelligence was needed. This process
could not be clouded by preconceptions and prejudgements. Handel identies
this as a fundamental weakness of the military genius concept. Unregulated, a
military genius can rely too heavily on his intuition, leading him to ignore
intelligence which conicts with and contradicts his pre-existing notions.

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Within intelligence circles this is known as cognitive dissonance. Overreliance on intuition can blind a commander to the truth. The mark of the true
military genius was the commander who was able to base his intuition on
sound intelligence, to achieve a balance between intuition and arrogance.
True appreciation of intelligence could help achieve such a balance. Within
this must be a stronger understanding of the intelligence picture; that a true
reection of the military situation is never static; and that intelligence is the
realm of probabilities, not of certainties. Intelligence can provide the means
to achieve the end; it is not the end itself. This is where intuition plays a
signicant role in deciding what to do when intelligence suggests multiple
courses of action. It is here where intelligence can have a signicant impact
on the art of command.
This statement apparently contradicts Clausewitzs maxim that many
intelligence reports in war are contradictory; even more are false and most are
uncertain.14 Intelligence, according to Clausewitz, bred uncertainty. From
this, one might imagine, the less intelligence one receives, the less uncertain
one is. Intelligence did, and does, breed uncertainty. But it also made the
astute commander more knowledgeable of his situation, and aware of the
many different scenarios in which he and his army might nd themselves.
Intelligence should not be perceived as a solution to operational challenges,
but as a means to solving them, by providing the knowledge to plan
contingencies, and coordinate effectively multiple-scenario reactions. It was,
and is, impossible to predict precisely enemy intentions, but with accurate
knowledge of terrain on which operations occur, of the strengths and
preparedness of ones own, and ones enemy army, gained through
widespread intelligence collection, one could make a series of predictions
of likely scenarios that the adversary may pursue. The resultant operational
plan often translated into a multifaceted attempt to prepare for all, or at least
some of the most likely, scenarios. This did not guarantee success, but made
it more likely.
Thus, multiple-scenario planning is applied when intelligence is collected
and attempts are made to utilise it. The commander who either ignores or
does not understand the importance of intelligence seldom plans more than
one course of action. In general terms, it is possible to speak of military
commanders, in the nineteenth century, as falling into one of three broad
categories. First, military commanders might understand the importance of
intelligence, and make some effort to organise collection and analysis of
intelligence to inform their decision-making. Second, they might understand
that intelligence could be useful in decision-making, but found the nancial
and labour costs of establishing a means of collection and analysis too great
for the dubious benet of having the intelligence. Finally, the nineteenth
century military commander might not regard intelligence as important at all,

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and thus not even consider its use. In the total warfare of the twentieth
century, the cost and effort of establishing intelligence apparatus no longer
existed, as the Directorate of Military Intelligence, from 1873 onwards, began
to oversee the creation of permanent intelligence units, trained in the
collection and analysis of information. Improvements in communications
technology meant commanders could be informed in real-time. The use of
intelligence therefore became a central focus in decision-making.
This is not to suggest that objective intelligence analysis has been a
decisive factor in victory and defeat. Objective or rational analysis is an
unreachable standard towards which analysts and decision-makers must
strive, but it is impossible to achieve. Intelligence is rarely used properly,
as this Special Issue illustrates. Either too much or too little emphasis is
placed upon it, and it is impossible to consider intelligence wholly in isolation from preconceived notions and beliefs. At the same time, intelligence
used in isolation from experience and intuition can have equally disastrous
results.
This series of articles is thus a chronicle of continuity as well as change. In
terms of continuity, unchanging human nature meant the same mistakes and
misperceptions which paralysed the British government during a moment of
crisis in 1799, caused strategic and operational inertia in the Second World
War. The same lessons learned in the Napoleonic Wars were relearned in the
Colonial Campaigns 60 years later, during the First World War and in the
Second World War. In terms of change, the heavy reliance on intuition which
caused strategic paralysis in 1799 was replaced by a heavy reliance on
intelligence, resulting in a similar level of paralysis in the Second World War.
Throughout, a battle to balance intuition with intelligence can be identied.
These articles reect on these issues across a 146 year period, in which
some of the most turbulent political, social, technological and military events
occurred in world history. With these events in mind, the importance of
human nature in the acquisition, analysis and application of intelligence is
reinforced. Michael Duffys article on British intelligence failures leading to
and after the breakout of the French eet from the port of Brest in 1799
reects the haphazard nature of nineteenth century intelligence, of how
intuition and cognitive dissonance can lead to mistakes both at the
operational and strategic levels, and how interference between the operational
and strategic levels can lead to confusion and inaccuracy. Also highlighted is
the difculty of sorting the reliable from the unreliable. My own contribution
to this collection focuses on Wellingtons career as a military commander
who realised the importance of, and utilised intelligence. Nevertheless, the
article traces the development of a strong-willed intuitive commander,
initially disinterested in intelligence, to an experienced military commander
who recognised the importance of intelligence to his decision-making. In so

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doing, he established one of the most sophisticated intelligence networks to

date in the Peninsular War.
Stephen Manning and Edward Spiers deal, in their two articles, with the
use of intelligence in the colonial campaigns of the 1870s and 1890s.
Focusing on several key gures in the military history of the period, the
development of intelligence skills is identied as a difcult process fraught
with mistakes and reappraisals. The nineteenth century need for selforganisation of intelligence collection and analysis is a key theme, with those
that made the effort to acquire intelligence often achieving far greater success
than their less well-informed contemporaries. How to balance intuition and
intelligence is a key debate dealt with by all four authors. In the nineteenth
century, with intelligence at a premium, intuitive decision-making was
clearly central to military planning. Those that incorporated intelligence into
their assessments were, in general, much more successful, than those that
failed to recognise its importance, or failed to delineate between reality and
their preconceived notions.
This assessment is contrasted by Kevin Jones and Jon Robb-Webb, both
writing on the use of intelligence in the Second World War. Intelligence
played a central role in the planning of the Liri Valley Offensive in Italy in
May 1944. So great, in fact, was the emphasis on intelligence that it curbed,
perhaps unnecessarily, the ambition of the generals in charge of planning and
execution. In this case, an over-cautious intuition was reinforced by intelligence, with the result that the campaign moved much slower than was perhaps
possible. In the Pacic Theatre, British naval intelligence resembled the level
of organisation of the nineteenth century, but the importance of intelligence
was identied, and very heavy emphasis was placed on its acquisition. Also
intriguing is the nature of the intelligence sharing which occurred between
the British and American eets, a negotiation which took place outside of the
strategic arena, and thus helped reinforce the Anglo-American alliance in the
Pacic. The key lesson, however, is that with limited intelligence, the intuition
of the naval commanders was forced to the surface, in many cases reluctantly,
and the balance necessary to help achieve success, the balance between
condence and caution, was attained.
II. INTELLIGENCE AND THE ART OF COMMAND AT THE
STRATEGIC LEVEL

Three very different viewpoints are offered in the articles on intelligence and
the art of command at the strategic level. Often, it is assumed that the perils
and problems which face military commanders at the operational level are
also faced by political and military leaders at the strategic level. These
articles demonstrate that there are many complicating factors which confuse

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the decision-making process signicantly. Each article explores a different

aspect of strategic command and decision-making, and highlights very
different difculties and solutions.
Alex Marshall highlights the differences between the intelligence gathering
mechanisms of Russia and Japan before and during the Russo-Japanese War.
Japans surveillance state provided a much more panoptic understanding of
both internal and external threats to the security, stability and integrity of the
state. Russia, with a political-police state, focusing on internal discontent and
dissatisfaction, had a much less circumspect understanding of her enemies.
The experience of countering Japanese intelligence efforts whilst herself
trying to collect intelligence during the Russo-Japanese War inuenced the
development of what was to become the Soviet surveillance state. In this
sense, we can discern the impact of the experience of intelligence and
counterintelligence on the development of strategic culture. This argument
deals with the impact of intelligence in the widest possible sense. The impact
was global, both during peace and war, and affected Russian strategic
perceptions, and strategic perceptions of Russia, for the remainder of the
twentieth century and into the twenty-rst century.
Greg Kennedy identies the impact of economic and industrial intelligence
on the conduct of the British blockade of enemy forces during the First World
War. The argument identies two parallel lessons. First, the impact is
discussed of intelligence on the strategic management of the conict, and on
the infrastructure of strategic command during the First World War. The
result was a massive increase in administrative staff to cope with the
increasing levels of intelligence being received. Second, and perhaps more
importantly, a re-evaluation of British strategy in the war is proposed. With
so much economic and industrial intelligence available, Kennedy argues that
the primary British attritional strategy was the blockade rather than the
military operations on the Western Front. Such a strategy was only possible
because of the collection, source-based analysis, and swift dissemination, of
reliable intelligence. Thus we see that intelligence impacted directly upon
strategic command decisions in the long term, transforming not only the
infrastructure of command, but also the direction of the war effort.15
Both Marshall and Kennedy offer insights into how intelligence affected
alterations in strategic command, in two very different ways. Pia Molander,
in her analysis of the impact of intelligence collected by the Special
Operations Executive in neutral Sweden, highlights how strategic intelligence
can remain suborned to the primacy of the policy imperative. Whilst
highlighting a range of events and intelligence operations in neutral Sweden
drawn from archival sources both in the United Kingdom and Scandinavia,
the most important point made about the impact of intelligence on the art of
strategic command is precisely the lack of impact. SOE intelligence

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operations revealed in some detail that Sweden was providing economic and
industrial, and by extension military, aid to Nazi Germany. Such intelligence
would normally result in some sort of response to curtail this aid, but in this
case the clear primacy of the political imperative of keeping Sweden out of
the war and maintaining her neutrality meant that no action was taken. This
was, and is, a very peculiar situation, in which intelligence calls for a
reaction, but none is taken.16 In many ways, the lessons of the operational
level are relevant here. It takes a certain degree of intuition to know when to
apply and when not to apply intelligence. Indeed, to apply such a situation
solely to the strategic level of decision-making would ignore the many
problems such reactive intelligence causes at the operational level.
Decisions are made at the operational level to ignore intelligence because
of the likely strategic repercussions. This also is based on intuition. But this is
a phenomenon that particularly reverberates to the strategic level. Operational
decision-makers are acting usually to plan a campaign, and only those that
underestimate the value of intelligence would choose to ignore it in their
decision-making cycle.
The development of the intelligence cycle instilled a certain degree of
doctrinal guidance in the use of intelligence.
Those who use intelligence, the consumers, indicate the kind of
information needed. These needs are translated into concrete requirements by senior intelligence managers. The requirements are used to
allocate resources to the collectors and serve to guide their efforts.
The collectors obtain the required information or raw intelligence.
The raw intelligence is collated and turned into nished intelligence
by the analysts. The nished intelligence is distributed to the
consumer and the intelligence managers who state new needs, dene
new requirements, and make necessary adjustments in the intelligence
programs to improve effectiveness and efciency.17
Thus, intelligence was made as accurate as it could be, and this denition of
the intelligence cycle suggests that the consumer should improve
effectiveness and efciency. A signicant issue arises when the intelligence
does not conform to preconceptions. Increasingly, policy ofcials seem to
want intelligence to support policy rather than inform it.18 The effect this
attitude has depends on the level of command the consumer occupies. At
the operational level, ignorance of intelligence can be disastrous, whilst at the
strategic, policy imperatives can, indeed, take precedence. Intelligence can be
ignored to maintain a certain policy, particularly if following an alternative
policy, as informed by intelligence, can result in a less appealing scenario.
The intelligence cycle does not take account of human nature; it is a

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methodology for requisition, acquisition and analysis of intelligence, but it

cannot be used to inform the application of intelligence. This collection
of articles therefore seeks to highlight that area of the intelligence cycle
which cannot be easily quantied, and in so doing presents a compelling set
of historical case studies which shed light on the successes and failures of
intelligence exploitation in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
This introduction has separated the lessons of intelligence and the art of
command and the strategic and operational levels. To consider both in
isolation from each other is useful to simplify the conclusions which can be
drawn, but hides the fact that one impacts upon the other. Intelligence is used
by commanders at both levels in different ways. The most successful military
campaigns consisted of an intelligence-driven plan penned by a commander
with the intuition, at least in part, of a military genius. At the strategic level,
intelligence can drive decision-making, but policy imperatives, where they
were applied, always took precedence.
One factor, however, remains extant in the discussion of the inuence of
intelligence on the art of command, and that is time. The Duke of Wellington
recognised in 1800 that intelligence needed to be timely, whilst time was
needed to assimilate it and integrate it into the decision-making process. How
true it is, wrote the future Duke, that in military operations time is every
thing.19 Clausewitz repeatedly denigrated the value of intelligence on the
battleeld, and in a tactical situation in the nineteenth century, rarely could
intelligence be timely, such was the nature of communications. But at the
operational and strategic level, intelligence proved highly important, and
exerted a great deal of inuence over the panning and execution of campaigns
and policy. This was possible because intelligence was made exploitable, in the
nineteenth century, by those that realised its importance and made the effort to
obtain it. In the twentieth century, undoubtedly the importance of intelligence
was recognised, but in certain cases too much emphasis was placed upon it.
Military commanders wanted to use it to abolish risk, but all intelligence
provided was mitigation of that risk. Intuition, both at the operational and
strategic level, was necessary in order to know when the risk was sufciently
mitigated to make action likely to succeed. More than anything, this is where
intelligence inuenced the art of command to the greatest extent.
NOTES
1 Carl von Clausewitz, On War, Michael Howard and Peter Paret (eds.) (Princeton: Princeton
University Press 1976) p.117.
2 See relevant chapters in M. Herman, Intelligence Power in Peace and War (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press 1996).
3 M.I. Handel (ed.) Intelligence and Military Operations (London: Routledge 1988) and
Leaders and Intelligence (London: Routledge 1989). Both books cover the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries, and draw important and consistent lessons despite the technological

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innovations in intelligence collection which occur over the two centuries. See also M.I.
Handel, War, Strategy and Intelligence (London: Routledge 1989).
P. Beesly, Convoy PQ 17: Intelligence and Decision-Making in Handel, Intelligence and
Military Operations, pp.292322.
J. Ferris and M.I. Handel, Clausewitz, Intelligence, Uncertainty and the Art of Command in
Military Operations, Intelligence and National Security 10/1 (1995).
See, among others, T.L. Cubbage III, Westmoreland vs CBS: Was Intelligence Corrupted by
Policy Demands? in Handel, Leaders and Intelligence, pp.11880.
See, for example, H.C. Deutsch, Commanding Generals and the Uses of Intelligence in
Handel, Leaders and Intelligence, pp.194260.
Ferris and Handel, Clausewitz, Intelligence, Uncertainty, p.2.
Clausewitz, On War, p.117.
Ferris and Handel, Clausewitz, Intelligence, Uncertainty, pp.45.
Clausewitz, On War, pp.1056, 117.
Ferris and Handel, Clausewitz, Intelligence, Uncertainty, pp.45.
M.I. Handel, Intelligence and Military Operations in Handel, Intelligence and Military
Operations, p.16.
Clausewitz, On War, p.117.
For more on command decision-making see R.V. Jones, Intelligence and Command in
Handel, Leaders and Intelligence, p.288.
See M.I. Handel, Leaders and Intelligence in Handel, Leaders and Intelligence, p.7.
US Senate, Final Report of the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with
Respect to Intelligence Activities (The Church Committee) (Washington, DC: US GPO 1976)
cited in Herman, Intelligence Power in Peace and War, p.285. See also A. Kovocs, Using
Intelligence, Intelligence and National Security 12/4 (October 1997) pp.14564; and L.K.
Johnson, Decision Costs in the Intelligence Cycle, Journal of Strategic Studies 7/3
(September 1984) pp.31835.
A.S. Hulnick, Whats Wrong with the Intelligence Cycle, Intelligence and National Security
21/6 (December 2006) p.959.
Arthur, Duke of Wellington, The Mysore Letters and Dispatches of the Duke of Wellington,
17991805 (Bangalore, 1862), A. Wellesley to Close, Camp at Kenny Bednore, 30 June
1800, p.108.