Cultures, Conditions, and Cognitive Closure: Breaking Intelligence Studies’ Dependence on Security Studies (CROSSTON 2015)

Matthew Crosston, Cultures, Conditions, and Cognitive Closure: Breaking Intelligence Studies’ Dependence on Security Studies, „Journal of Strategic Security”, 8, no. 3 (2015): 24-45.

 

(33) When this is done, Russian intelligence is inevitably seen as aspiring to help the state achieve new ‘great power’ status or attempting to reconstitute Soviet glory or is subconsciously beholden to an autocratic instinct that dates even further back, to the czars or even back to Byzantium.(23)

23 = K.C. Gustafson, “Echo of Empires: Russia’s Inheritance of Byzantine Security Culture,” Journal of Slavic Military Culture 23 (2010) pp. 574-596.

 

(34) “Of the organization of the Soviet and subsequent Russian state we can draw no specific indication of Byzantine bureaucratic organization, but in spirit the way the Soviets organized their government for security purposes is still quite Russian…the way the Byzantines managed their security and intelligence was a function of the political culture of the state, the same political culture that was inherited later by the Kievan and then Russian state, which has served the Soviet and subsequent post-Soviet Russian state.”(26)

26 = Ibid. p. 591.

 

(38) If Russia is dependent on the legacy of the Byzantine Empire and China is hard pressed to move beyond the ideas of Sun-Tzu, then it is simply hypocritical to not make Spain beholden to the same type of historical and cultural legacies.

 

(38-9) Turkey

Turkey intensifies the characteristics seen in the Spanish case. Analyses on Turkish intelligence tend to be dominated by the ever-changing current and future developments of the Turkish state. Rather than trying to adhere to some ancient tract that demands a particular mindset and behavioral tactic, Turkish intelligence by default must be ready to always adjust and adapt to the unpredictable domestic and foreign policy winds.

“What intelligence is the Turkish intelligence community interested in? First and foremost, it is concerned with any intelligence that would contribute to national security and public safety. A second interest is solid intelligence that would support Turkey’s active role and interest in balancing the influence of Iran and Russia in the Balkan, Middle Eastern, and Caucasian triangle, which is the primary focus of Turkey’s regional security policies. Third, it is seeking good quality foreign intelligence to allow the government to have a modicum of international influence.”33

Just as with Spain, Turkey emphasizes the now when it evaluates and assesses its intelligence community. There is no point droning on about the legacy of the Ottoman Empire or the spirit of Ataturk or what it historically means to be the Western-Eastern crossroads for humanity. These cultural

33 Stephane Lefebvre, “Turkey’s Intelligence Community in Changing Times,” International Journal 61/1 (2005-2006) p. 113.

and historical legacies matter if you are a Turk. But they do not explicitly and powerfully impact Turkish intelligence as it watches what happens in Syria, or tries to decide how to respond to the Islamic State, or considers various overtures from the United States, Israel and the EU on hindering Iranian nuclear development, or grows weary about a strengthening Kurdish autonomy in Northern Iraq, just to name several prominent contemporary examples.

Grand strategic cultural approaches have very little to say to these real-time dilemmas and it is these priorities that occupy the thinking of Turkish intelligence today. So, analysis that wants to properly evaluate the national security decision-making calculus of Turkey is much better off focusing on the organizational cultural conditions that demand the attention, budget, and leadership of Turkish intelligence. The explanatory power of these analyses is in the substantive relevance that can be addressed when not shackled by ancient historical and cultural legacies. They make for wonderful stories but not very compelling intelligence product.