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This article examines certain counterintelligence (CI) aspects of the on-going conflict between Russia and Ukraine since 2014 in terms of key problems in current western CI concepts, doctrine and processes. It examines not only the CI threat to Ukraine during the Donbas 'frozen war' and 2022 invasion from the traditional CI triad of espionage, sabotage and subversion but also from Russian intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities and activities supporting both irregular and regular combatants. The article concludes that a UK and allied approach to CI shaped by a two-decade security focus on counterterrorism and counterinsurgency may not be fit for purpose in a contemporary strategic environment characterized by a persistent and escalating threat from strategic peers engaged in state-supported hybrid conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines an interval during 1970–1971 during which the Canadian Federal government established a clandestine body codenamed FAN TAN within the Prime Minister's Office to conduct surveillance of, and 'political action' against, the Quebec separatist movement. This organization, led by Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister Marc Lalonde, sought to persuade the Security Service of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to provide intelligence in support of what was a party political entity based in the Prime Minister's Office and not in the actual national security machinery of the Privy Council Office. We examine how John Starnes, Director General of the Security Service, went to considerable lengths to resist this effort to politicize his agency, and to warn the government of the potential scandal should FAN TAN become publicly known. We conclude that the FAN TAN affair leaves a number of serious questions to be answered such as: who actually originated the scheme, its legality as well as propriety, what intelligence was used or continued to be collected after the RCMP sought to end its involvement, and why the matter was ignored by the subsequent McDonald Commission that prompted the dissolution of the Security Service.1 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since World War II, much effort has gone into defining 'intelligence.' This effort has even given rise to what is sometimes called intelligence theory, which can be traced to Sherman [...]

The following article examines the relationship between the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS, a.k.a. MI 6) and the machinery of central government, particularly departments of state and other agencies which employ information generated by the SIS. It is argued the main link between the SIS and its consumers in British government is the SIS's requirements 'side', embodied throughout most of the post-war era in the form of a Requirements Directorate. The article argues that the Requirements mechanism operates as a line of communication between the SIS and its consumers separate from the Cabinet Office Joint Intelligence Organisation (JIO), although there is overlap and interdependency between the two architectures. This discussion traces the development of the 'requirements side' from the interwar period up to the post-Cold War era using information from archival sources and a programme of interviews with former UK intelligence officials. It is further argued that the structure and process of the SIS 'requirements side' has developed and changed as a consequence of changes in the structure of demand in the machinery of British government, including adapting to the increasingly central role of the JIO. However, despite that increasingly central role of the JIO, the 'requirements side' has continued to serve as the first point of contact between the SIS and its customers in Whitehall.

Examines the dismantling of the Special Operations Executive after its amalgamation with the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), and the associated development of the covert operations capability of the SIS at the end of World War II. Focus of SIS departments, the Special Operations Branch and the Special Political Action Section; Origins and function of the Special Political Action Section; Analysis of how the assets and personnel of SOE were dispersed to different versions of the SIS.