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6. NIMA and Its Stakeholders
NIMA is at once a
Department of Defense Combat Support Agency and a member of the Intelligence
Community, as is the National Security Agency (NSA). Each tries to balance
its national intelligence mission with its more immediate support to the
warfighter. The extent to which either can be more or less successful
depends upon the degree to which its separate reporting lines--to the
Director of Central Intelligence in one case, and through to the Secretary
of Defense in the other--are synchronized with each other as well as with
CIA, the uniformed military services and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. This
is a hefty set of players to huddle around one playbook.
When such diverse
players must queue up to the same bank window, it is not surprising that
they try to pick each other's pockets. When there seems to be too little
imagery and exploitation for the competing intelligence processes--military
and nondefense, national and theater, strategic and tactical, short term
and long term--it is not surprising that tensions arise.
NIMA, an unlikely
marriage by some lights, and a come-lately to the game, suffers most.
It may be a reasonable stratagem to allow operators in the field to treat
imagery intelligence as a free good--more like oxygen13
than ice cream--but that simply means that, at the highest levels of leadership,
there must be an awareness of its true cost and value, and a willingness
to cooperatively ensure that the resources are made available. Having
birthed this agency, defense and intelligence leadership must commit themselves
absolutely to its health and well-being. It is that important.
At the highest level,
we are in for a rude awakening because the reliance on information superiority
to deliver bloodless victory demands intelligence capacity, especially
imagery intelligence capacity, well beyond that which current investments
can provide. Defense and intelligence leadership must redress this variance
and reconcile themselves and their accounts to support NIMA. This will
mean resisting other pressures, the true test of leadership. Firm decisions,
not just continuous deciding, are required.
To anticipate a recommendation
made later in the report, the Commission believes that a new systems engineering
and acquisition element should be formed and staffed with a caliber of
talent not now readily found in NIMA, or in the Intelligence Community
at large. In fact, the Commission refers to this creation as an "Extraordinary
Program Office," by which we mean to connote a significant departure from
the way US government components are usually configured. To get the talent
required, the Commission suggests that the Director of Central Intelligence
and the (Deputy) Secretary of Defense take a personal interest in persuading
key contractors to relinquish to the government, for a defined period,
a small number of their own very best personnel. With the help of Congress
and the cooperation of industry, all the details of transfer and compensation
can be worked out if, and only if, there is personal commitment by senior
defense and intelligence leadership--leadership committed to making things,
the right things, happen.
Footnote:
13
As with oxygen, information ought not be denied: the higher we fly, the
more we need.
Foreword
| Executive Summary and Key Judgments
| Introduction | NIMA
from the Beginning
NIMA in Context | Two-and-a-Half
Roles for NIMA | The Promise of NIMA
NIMA and Its Stakeholders |
NIMA and Its "Customers" | Is There a "National
vs Tactical" Problem?
NIMA and Its Peers and Partners | NIMA
and Its Suppliers | NIMA Management Challenges
NIMA's Information Systems | NIMA
Research and Development
NIMA and Its Information Architecture | Recommendations
| Appendix A
Appendix B | Glossary
of Terms
Table
of Contents | Home | PDF
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