PEACEKEEPING INTELLIGENCE: Emerging Concepts for the Future
Chapter 3—Tony van Diepenbrugge
Peacekeeping and Intelligence: An Experience in Bosnia-Herzegovina
Tony van Diepenbrugge
It was a great experience to be a year in command of the Multinational Division South-West (MND (SW)) as part of the Stabilisation Force (SFOR) in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In this chapter I want to share my experiences in the field of peacekeeping and intelligence. I will first devote a few words to the area of responsibility and the mission of the division before I cover the topics related to peacekeeping and intelligence. I will look at ‘situational awareness’, whereby it is of utmost importance to be able to be proactive and to act when necessary. I will further examine the intelligence organisation and assets that are vital to getting the information we need in order to create the desired situational awareness. Finally I will cover some recent developments and conclude with the lessons that we learned from our experiences. Based on these lessons we can make improvements for the future.
Multinational Division South-West
I shall briefly describe SFOR for purposes of this discussion. From the top-down, the SFOR operation in Bosnia-Herzegovina is controlled by AFSOUTH in Naples and HQ SFOR in Sarajevo. MND (SW) is one of the composite units of SFOR. It is connected to the north and east by Croatia, to the east by Multinational Division North, and to the south is Multinational Division South-East.
MND (SW)—with a strength of approximately 4,250 military—consists of three battle groups and several assets at divisional level. The battle groups have a number of teams or companies varying from two to five that, with the exception of one company in reserve, have their own area of responsibility.
MND (SW) is a truly multinational division: the main troop contributing nations are Canada, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Representatives from Australia, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, New Zealand, Rumania and the Slovak Republic also participate in MND (SW). The divisional area of operations is the largest in SFOR, encompassing about 41% of the land mass of Bosnia-Herzegovina; it is, however, more sparsely populated than other areas. The British battle group operates entirely in the Republica Srpska, the Netherlands battle group in most of Canton 6, and the Canadian battle group in all of Canton 1 and Canton 10. In mid-August the Netherlands battle group took over responsibility of the southern part of Canton 10 from the Canadians. The main bases are: the Divisional HQ and the Division Support Group, located in the Banja Luka Metal Factory (BLMF); the Canadian battle group with its headquarters in Zgon and companies in Bihac, Drvar and Glamoc and its air assets in Velika Kladusa. The Netherlands battle groups have their headquarters and one all-arms combat team located in Bugojno, and a second team in Novi Travnik. The British battle group has its headquarters and two companies in different locations in Mgornic Grad, an artillery battery in Sipovo and an armoured reconnaissance squadron and a company in the Banja Luka Metal Factory. All three battle groups have several platoon bases spread over their area of operations. And finally the divisional medical facilities, an integrated unit with personnel from the three major troop contributing nations, are located at Sipovo.
Mission
The operations of the division in theatre are based on the following mission: ‘MND (SW) is to eliminate any threat to the safety and security of Bosnia and Herzegovina in order to implement the General Framework for Peace’.
Much of the military work necessary to allow the implementation of the civil aspects of the General Framework for Peace has been accomplished. However, the mission will not be finished until this important civil part is completed. It is therefore important to maintain a safe and secure environment in order to allow the international community to attain its strategic objectives, as described in the multi-year road map. We will act pre-emptively, or respond quickly to any activity that threatens public security. However, it is also our intention to encourage the local authorities to take responsibility for local security. Therefore, whenever possible, taking into account their limited resources, we try to let the local authorities take charge. Some good examples are crowd and riot control and the handling of unexploded ordnance.
Situational Awareness - Areas of interest
The operation in Bosnia-Herzegovina, as all operations, should be intelligence-driven. Situational awareness is of the utmost importance. It is essential that we are aware of what is going on around us in order to be able to take precautionary measures and ultimately react if necessary. Our primary mission is to control the armed forces in Bosnia-Herzegovina. But the threat, or our interest as it were, is not only military. In fact in the current situation we evaluate the military threat as low. Our focus was to prevent reserve units from quick mobilisation and to improve safety; one of our priorities was the separation of units and equipment as well as weapons and ammunition. We deployed to Bosnia just a few days after September 11, 2001, thus it is not difficult to imagine that terrorism also had our special attention. Another focus was on civil developments. Ultimately a situation has to be created wherein the presence of international organisations is no longer needed. Civil developments have a great influence on a safe and secure environment. So we are very much interested in refugees and displaced persons; politics; economic development; social, cultural and religious development, and last but not least, crime and corruption.
The Intelligence Organisation
Intell-organisation
The intelligence organisation is organised along the same lines as the SFOR hierarchy. All levels have their own dedicated assets to gather and analyse information. Next to the NATO line there is a national line. The National Intelligence Cells (NICs), co-located with HQ SFOR in Sarajevo, have a special position. They are commanded in the national line. Their proximity to the operational commander differs from nation to nation.
Intell assets
National Assets
The National Intelligence Cells, located at HQ SFOR in Camp Butmir in Sarajevo, have direct access to national resources. They have a special position, as they are directed through national channels. All major troop-contributing nations are represented, and often put a lot effort into the operation, ranging from 5 to 50 persons per NIC. Some countries have even more personnel in their NICs, which are strictly speaking not part of SFOR, than in their contingents in SFOR. There are mutual interests between the two. NICs need information from SFOR assets to construct their picture. SFOR needs information from national channels to procure information that SFOR is otherwise unable to gather on its own. Exchange of information within the intelligence world is not simple. There exists the principle of reciprocity, nothing is for free; exchange of information is always on a give and take basis. In this field personal relations are important and often yield much better results than formal requests. Another issue is the protection of sources. A lot of information is NATO-classified and a complicating factor is the involvement of non-NATO countries in the operations.
SFOR Assets
The Allied Military Intelligence Battalion operates at SFOR level. This unit is specialised in human intelligence. Its personnel operate in all three MND AORs and are even physically located within the MND HQs. This would not be the standard concept of operations in a high-intensity conflict, where the different levels focus on different areas. Different units operating in one area create a need for close coordination and, when necessary, ‘deconfliction’ (i.e. de-escalation of conflict). Another unit at SFOR level is the Military Support Unit (MSU), Italian Carabinieri, whose primary task is crowd and riot control. When not employed in that manner they reinforce the patrol schemes within the MNDs, which brings them into frequent contact with the SFOR AOR. In the course of their duty, they gather a lot of useful information.
Divisional Assets
The division itself has several intelligence gathering assets. In the first place, of course, there are the sub-units of battle groups and teams with their organic personnel. The essence of what are called ‘Normal Framework Operations’ is all about ‘constructing the picture’ and getting a feeling for what is going on.
It is important to note that, especially in peacekeeping operations like those in Bosnia, every single man and woman is a collector. The daily patrols, the helicopter pilot flying back to his detachment or the commander visiting one of his units, they observe what is going on and sometimes this can be valuable information. The division also has specialised intelligence elements. In the field of human intelligence the MND has personnel to handle locals that come to SFOR with information. The MND also has enhanced reconnaissance capability to actively observe if necessary, and limited electronic warfare capabilities to monitor the communications of the armed forces in Bosnia-Herzegovina. A frequently underestimated, but very important, source of information is our liaison officers. Through their almost daily contact on various levels with the armed forces, canton governments, international organisations and several non-governmental organisations, we can achieve a good and balanced picture of what is going on in local society.
The Concept of Intelligence Operations
N
When we take a closer look at the sub-units, we can observe that nations differ in their concept of intelligence operations. In a country like the Netherlands, where the concept is based on high-intensity conflict, the battalion is the lowest level with its own intelligence cell. In peace support operations like Bosnia, where a team has its own area of responsibility, the team also gets its own intelligence cell (TIC). People do their utmost, but the lack of experience is significant. British units, for example, are more accustomed to having team intelligence cells. In some cases, positions in the intelligence cells are filled for a year or even longer to ensure the continuity of ‘corporate knowledge’. Another necessity for continuity is a good and easily accessible database. It would be even better if these systems could communicate with each other. There are also a few shortcomings in analysis capacity. This is not only applicable to the division level, but also to SFOR and the National Intelligence Cells. Firstly, there is a lack of sufficient numbers of experienced analysts. What we see is that the few qualified people are used preferably in the home countries. Secondly, there is very limited availability of systems like link-analysis for automatic data analysis.
Other Assets
I shall devote a few words here to the special assets available to the division. Radio Oksigen is a low cost, high impact tool for information operations. It is a very popular radio-station run by locals supervised by a UK manager. The target audience is the youth, ages 16 to 25. It covers items like: safety, co-operation, elections, etc. We can see that it has a very positive influence by the large number of people that react by telephone or mail. At the moment of my departure from Bosnia-Herzegovina the establishment and possible funding of SFOR radio-stations was under discussion.
Civil Military Cooperation (CIMIC) is another activity that provides useful information. In the early phases it concentrates on humanitarian aid and later shifts its attention to nation building. CIMIC plays a major role in improving relations with the local population. The ‘hearts and minds campaign’ results in regular contacts. That again leads to information and, in this sense, improves the safety of our forces. A British warrant officer, for example, was coach of a Bosnian youth football team. As part of the education he warned the children of the dangers of mines and ammunition. A member of his team told him that he regularly played in a cave that contained a lot of ammunition. Since extracting weapons and ammunition is one of the main efforts of SFOR, this proved to very useful information and resulted in the extraction of more than nine tons of mine-and-mortar grenades. The boy was rewarded with a football.
Downsizing SFOR
The situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina changes over time and influences the concept of operations of SFOR and, of course, the way SFOR collects and handles information. Both the military and other organisations show symptoms of Bosnia fatigue. This leads to downsizing of SFOR, from 60,000 troops to 18,000 in 2001, further to 12,000 by the end of 2002. But not only is SFOR downsizing, also the International Police Task Force (IPTF), which consisted of 1800 policemen on the ground, changed into the European Union Police Mission (EUPM), comprising 450 policemen in the higher management levels. UNHCR plans to leave by the end of 2003, the last year that property can be claimed under the Property Implementation Law. The OSCE and even the Office of the High Representative (OHR) are planning to leave in a few years.
The size of the force and the changing concept of operations have influence on the intelligence process. Initially military units can cover their whole area of responsibility with their own means. They have enough troops, intelligence assets and liaison personnel available to field outposts (company, platoon and troop level) where necessary. The downsizing of the force has brought us to a point where further reductions render it impossible to cover the whole area with our own means. This makes it necessary to work together with other organisations that are in fact facing the same problems. The challenge is to enhance situational awareness by synchronising the efforts of the international community, local authorities and (major) NGOs.