Intelligence Plan of 1994
2024 marks the 30th anniversary of the Intelligence Plan of 1994. The purpose of the plan, approved by Commandant (CMC) Mundy in 1994, was not just to address the intelligence deficiencies that became apparent in Operation DESERT STORM (1991) but to professionalize the intelligence occupational field by structuring its manning and training the way other occupational fields were structured. This short article will focus on three areas: plan development, plan implementation, and the performance of intelligence in OIF/OEF.
For roughly the first 200 years of the Marine Corps, the role of intelligence was analogous to that of a volunteer fire department. Whenever a war or serious conflict arose, G-2/S-2 sections were manned by non-intelligence officers and enlisted personnel to augment the meagerly manned and poorly trained intelligence ranks. For the first 200 years, it worked well in the sense that we never lost a war.
It was not until advanced technical intelligence systems for collection, imagery, targeting, and analysis were developed that the volunteer fire department approach to intelligence was no longer viable. The first wake-up call came from BGen P.K. Van Riper in his June ’91 Marine Corps Gazette article entitled “Observations during Operation Desert Storm.” He said, “The weakest area I observed was tactical intelligence; many of the problems are endemic and stem from the way we select, train, and educate our intelligence personnel.” He suggested changing the way we select and train our intelligence personnel.
He also said, “Now is the time to reconsider whether we want to continue acquiring the majority of our intelligence officers through lateral moves.” This comment referenced the Marine Corps’ decision in 1978 to open the intelligence field to regular officers—not just limited duty officers. While this created an opportunity for regular officers to enter the intelligence field, the sourcing was based entirely on lateral moves. There was no dedicated sourcing of intelligence officers directly from The Basic School and, therefore, no manpower pyramid to sustain career progression in the occupational field.
In the spring of 1992, the Senate Select Committee for Intelligence became aware of deficiencies in Marine Corps intelligence and started sending questions for the record to Headquarters Marine Corps regarding its intelligence capabilities, or absence of capabilities. Ultimately, the Senate directed the Marine Corps to develop a five-year plan to correct the intelligence deficiencies that were identified during Operation DESERT STORM. MajGen Jenkins, Director of Intelligence (DIRINT) at the time, established a Program Objective Memorandum Working Group to develop a response to the Senate. Maj Dan Dietz, who was directed to write the response to the Senate based on the working group’s effort, admitted that the final report to the Senate “absolutely wasn’t a polished, staffed document, but provided a framework.” CMC Mundy approved the report in the spring of 1993.
When MajGen Van Riper became DIRINT in early 1993, one of his first initiatives was to establish the Intelligence Structure Support Group (ISSG) that would include senior officers from the FMF, Manpower, Training and Education, Systems Command, and the Doctrine Division to provide the rigorous analysis of the issues that the official response sent to the Senate did not include. He assigned Col Larry Burgess, a regular intelligence officer, as the lead for the ISSG which took place in August 1993. The findings of the ISSG were then turned over to the Resources Division of Command, Control, Communications, Computers, and Intelligence headed by Col Jim Clark (an infantry officer) and staffed with a talented group of intelligence officers including LtCol Gerry Hughes, LtCol Herb Strauss, Maj Buck Buikema, and Capt Rick Natale.
Working closely and continuously with Manpower and Training and Education over the next year (1993–94), Resource Division developed a comprehensive plan to address the deficiencies and establish a professional occupational field. They were aided greatly by the publication of the Restricted Officer Manpower Study/Act that significantly changed the warrant officer and limited-duty officer program for the Marine Corps and the Marine Corps intelligence community. It provided the Resources Division the ability to convert the limited-duty officer structure to an unrestricted officer structure and the ability to finally establish direct accessions from The Basic School to develop the essential intelligence officer manpower Christmas tree to sustain the intel occupational field.
Other important elements of the plan included the establishment of four intelligence battalions (one for each MEF and one for the reserves), an additional radio battalion (at the time only two existed), and consolidated training for basic intel officers and enlisted at the Navy-Marine Corps Intelligence Center in Dam Neck, VA. It also established separate MOS designations at The Basic School for ground, air, and counter-intelligence/human intelligence officers. Once these officers achieved the rank of Captain, they would return to the Navy-Marine Corps Intelligence
Center for the Marine Intelligence Officers Course where they would be designated as MAGTF intelligence officers (0202).
The Intel Plan of 1994 was approved by CMC Krulak—thus ending the development stage of the Intel Plan and beginning the challenging implementation phase.
The implementation phase of the Intel Plan of 1994 lasted 14 years. It was a challenging and arduous task requiring close and continuous attention to the core elements of the plan in the face of numerous challenges on several fronts. To put it in combat terms, it was a battle of inches, not yards. Responsibility for implementing the Intel Plan fell to the Assistant DIRINT, Michael Decker, and the Intel Occ Field Sponsor staff. Number one on the priority list was to recruit, train, and field the 600 new enlisted Marines and 90 officers (sourced from The Basic School) every year until the four intelligence battalions and one signals intelligence (Radio) battalion were fully sourced, trained, and fielded. This involved working closely with Recruiting Command, Training and Education Division at Marine Corps Combat Development Command, and the officer and enlisted assignments branches within Manpower, and required major adjustments to enlisted recruiting and staffing goal models and training input plans.
Initially, there was overall acceptance of the Intel Plan and little bureaucratic resistance. In the late 1990s, this began to change. It was a relatively peaceful time in the world and the operational imperative for a robust intelligence presence was no longer as pronounced as it was immediately after Operation DESERT STORM. The Intelligence Department had to overcome the institutional requirement in two CMC-directed Force Study Review Groups (1997 and 1999) to cut a table of organization and to find compensatory reductions in the structure to be added. The Intel Plan called for additional structure with no compensatory structure (other than 117 reserve officers that were converted to unrestricted officers by the Restricted Officer Manpower Study/Act directive) to offer up. It was an uphill battle. The CMC’s Force Structure Review Group of 1997 recommended a Marine Corps-wide, salami-sliced approach to downsizing irrespective of the fact the Intel Plan called for an increase. The Marine Corps Support Battalion was a target for reduction. Fortunately, several Marine generals who had commanded MEUs or had been in joint billets knew what the NSA did for the MAGTFs. Unlike command post exercises where the opposition force was a notional (Country ORANGE) threat, MEUs deployed against real-world threats. These commanders relied heavily on the embedded robust intel package that accompanied them to help define these threats. When the Force Study Review Group recommendations were presented at the General Officer Symposium, one MarFor CG with prior MEU command experience stood up in the face of the crowd in opposition to a cut to the Marine Corps Support Battalion and CMC took it off the list. It was a minor but important step in protecting further cuts to intelligence. The 1999 Force Study Review Group focused not only on cuts but also on capability gaps. Intel was still a large capability gap and once again survived any cuts despite opposition from many competing occupational fields.
The second priority in the Intel Plan implementation effort was to establish a paper trail documenting each step along the way. Much like mountain climbers drive pinions in rock to cement their slow advance up the mountain, the Intel Department created, received CMC approval for, and published ALMARS, MC Bulletins, table of organization cover letters, and Marine Corps Doctrinal Publications (MCDP 2, Intelligence) to officially document their progress. Anyone who has been involved in creating and getting CMC approval for this kind of documentation would appreciate the tedious work this requires.
The third priority was to remove the Marine Corps from under the yoke of the Office of Naval Intelligence which controlled funding from the General Defense Intelligence Program (run by the Defense Intelligence Agency [DIA]). The Navy determined how much funding the Marine Corps got (primarily for civilian hires). Up until this time, DIA recognized only the Army, Air Force, and Navy as recipients of General Defense Intelligence Program funding. The Intel Department was successful in getting the DIA to recognize the Marine Corps as a Service intelligence organization, separate from the Navy. This was a major victory that allowed the Marine Corps (with General Defense Intelligence Program funding) to increase its civilian intelligence workforce without requiring the Navy’s permission or to require offsets in the Marine Corps structure. The primary beneficiary of this was the Marine Corps Intelligence Activity (MCIA) which grew from 20 civilians in 1994 to 187 in 2009.
The importance of this became evident in the work-up to Operation IRAQI FREEDOM. CENTCOM used an Army-generated trafficability and hydrologic study of the routes the 1st MarDiv could use in their advance to Baghdad. Much of the territory on either side of the MSRs between Basra and Baghdad had been declared “not available for tracked vehicles or heavy trucks.” The CG of 1st MarDiv tasked MCIA with an updated trafficability study. The MCIA, with help from the National Ground Intelligence Agency, developed a study that refuted CENTCOM’s study and 1st MarDiv was able to significantly alter their plans, freeing them from sticking solely to the MSR and advancing more quickly and safely toward Baghdad.
Finally, the Nail in the Coffin
Operations IRAQI FREEDOM/ENDURING FREEDOM delivered the operational imperative for a professional, robust intelligence presence. In 2005, CMC held an Operations IRAQI FREEDOM/ENDURING FREEDOM after-action review. The general officer support from ground and aviation combat commanders was overwhelmingly supportive of Marine Corps intelligence. This support put the Intel Plan of 1994 over the goal line. The institutional resistance to Marine Corps intelligence faded away and cleared the way to fulfill the remaining elements of the plan by 2008.
The real heroes of this arduous fourteen-year effort were not just Deputy DIRINT Michael Decker and his talented OccFld Sponsor staff but the combat commanders of OEF/OIF who were freed from command post exercises with notional Country ORANGE threats came to embrace the role and importance of intelligence.
Since 2000, eight intel colonels have been promoted to brigadier general and then to major general. Four advanced to lieutenant general (one as Director of DIA, one as J-2 JCS, one as CG Artificial Intelligence Command, and the fourth as Deputy Commandant C4I). Where do we go from here?
Except for the MC DIRINT billet, and most recently the Deputy Commandant C4I billet, all the other billets occupied by Marine Corps intel generals have been in the joint arena. In the early stages of the Intel Plan development, (then) MajGen P.K. Van Riper said, “Intel and Ops are like the 2 sides of the same coin and shouldn’t be separated.” Intel cells are now a permanent fixture in current ops, future ops, and targeting. The two are now inseparable. The green door syndrome became a thing of the past. The intelligence officers’ knowledge of the concept of operations should qualify them for more MAGTF operational billets. Unfortunately, the intel moniker remains an impediment to being assigned to these billets. The general officer assignments branch needs to get beyond the thought that intel generals can only fill intel billets. Between 1995 and 1997, command of the 3rd Force Service Support Group was given to an aviator and a public affairs general. When the need arises, intel generals are equally qualified. Given the close relationship between ops and intel, the Deputy MEF CG is one billet that should be at the top of the list, and there are others as well.
There is a saying that it takes a generation for a major organizational restructuring to become fully accepted. I argue now, in the fourth decade of the Intel Plan, that has happened. Without Operations ENDURING FREEDOM and IRAQI FREEDOM, I am not sure it would have turned out the same way. There is now a valuable capability and opportunity for the Marine Corps not to be overlooked and needs to be recognized.
I salute those individuals and working groups that contributed to the success of the Intel Plan of 1994 and to the combat commanders of Operations ENDURING FREEDOM and IRAQI FREEDOM who provided the credibility that cemented the operational psyche of the entire Marine Corps. Well done!