The Intelligence cycle describes how

intelligence Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. It can be described as the ...

is ideally processed in civilian and military

intelligence agencies An intelligence agency is a government agency responsible for the collection, analysis, and exploitation of information in support of law enforcement, national security, military, public safety, and foreign policy objectives. Means of informati ...

, and law enforcement organizations. It is a closed path consisting of repeating nodes, which (if followed) will result in finished intelligence. The stages of the intelligence cycle include the issuance of requirements by decision makers, collection, processing, analysis, and publication (i.e., dissemination) of intelligence. The circuit is completed when decision makers provide feedback and revised requirements. The intelligence cycle is also called the Intelligence Process by the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and the uniformed services.

Conceptual model

Relationship of data, information and intelligence

Direction

Intelligence requirement {{Confusing, date=April 2008 Intelligence requirements are the listing of intelligence priorities by officials, usually part of a "threat assessment". As former Secretary of State Dean Rusk once said "Providence has not provided human beings with t ...

s are determined by a decision maker to meet his/her objectives. In the

federal government of the United States The federal government of the United States (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States, a federal republic located primarily in North America, composed of 50 states, a city within a fede ...

, requirements (or priorities) can be issued from the

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest, Washington, D.C., NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. preside ...

or the

Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...

. In

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two No ...

, a

commander Commander (commonly abbreviated as Cmdr.) is a common naval officer rank. Commander is also used as a rank or title in other formal organizations, including several police forces. In several countries this naval rank is termed frigate captain ...

uses requirements (sometimes called Essential elements of information (EEIs)) to initiate the intelligence cycle.

Collection

In response to requirements, an intelligence staff develops an

intelligence collection plan An intelligence collection plan (ICP) is the systematic process used by most modern armed forces and intelligence services to meet intelligence requirements through the tasking of all available resources to gather and provide pertinent information w ...

applying available sources and methods and seeking intelligence from other agencies. Collection includes inputs from several intelligence gathering disciplines, such as

HUMINT Human intelligence (abbreviated HUMINT and pronounced as ''hyoo-mint'') is intelligence gathered by means of interpersonal contact, as opposed to the more technical intelligence gathering disciplines such as signals intelligence (SIGINT), image ...

(human intelligence), IMINT (imagery intelligence),

ELINT Signals intelligence (SIGINT) is intelligence-gathering by interception of '' signals'', whether communications between people (communications intelligence—abbreviated to COMINT) or from electronic signals not directly used in communication ...

(electronic intelligence),

SIGINT Signals intelligence (SIGINT) is intelligence-gathering by interception of '' signals'', whether communications between people (communications intelligence—abbreviated to COMINT) or from electronic signals not directly used in communication ...

(Signals Intelligence), OSINT (open source, or publicly available intelligence), etc.

Processing and Exploitation

Once the collection plan is executed and the data arrives, it is processed for exploitation. This involves the

translation Translation is the communication of the Meaning (linguistic), meaning of a #Source and target languages, source-language text by means of an Dynamic and formal equivalence, equivalent #Source and target languages, target-language text. The ...

of raw intelligence materials from a foreign language,

evaluation Evaluation is a systematic determination and assessment of a subject's merit, worth and significance, using criteria governed by a set of standards. It can assist an organization, program, design, project or any other intervention or initiative ...

of relevance and reliability, and

collation Collation is the assembly of written information into a standard order. Many systems of collation are based on numerical order or alphabetical order, or extensions and combinations thereof. Collation is a fundamental element of most office fil ...

of the raw data in preparation for exploitation.

Analysis

Analysis establishes the significance and implications of processed intelligence, integrates it by combining disparate pieces of information to identify collateral information and patterns, then interprets the significance of any newly developed knowledge.

Dissemination

Finished intelligence products take many forms depending on the needs of the decision maker and reporting requirements. The level of urgency of various types of intelligence is typically established by an intelligence organization or community. For example, an indications and warning (I&W) bulletin would require higher precedence than an annual report.

Feedback

The intelligence cycle is a closed loop; feedback is received from the decision maker and revised requirements issued.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cycle Intelligence analysis Military intelligence