Intelligence in Complex Environments
Small Wars Journal, 1 August 2014
Four years into the United States military’s effort to counter the Lord’s Resistance Army in central Africa its leader, Joseph Kony, remains elusive. This certainly isn’t for lack of effort or resources. One hundred Special Forces advisors, a robust command and control structure, contracted airplanes, even the occasional short-term deployment of a CV-22 squadron have all assisted African partner forces to remove a few leaders from the battlefield and enable many more fighters, wives, and children to escape the organization. Yet the mission still faces serious obstacles. The tyranny of distance has oftentimes been crippling to the effort, hindering logistical resupply and time sensitive strikes. In addition to geography, this mission continues to pose many challenges which test the U.S. intelligence community but, if overcome, can serve as a model for U.S. intelligence support in low-intensity conflicts and other crisis areas worldwide. Removing Kony and his LRA from the battlefield is, foremost, an intelligence problem. Without accurate intelligence of Kony and his forces’ location, counter-LRA forces will continue to be reduced to “searching for a needle in twenty haystacks.” Further complicating the situation, in addition to the joint U.S. and combined foreign forces requiring coordination, many other stakeholders are active in the area of operations. Non-government organizations (NGOs), aid organizations, the United Nations, civilian village defense forces, even the Catholic church all contribute to central Africa being a complex environment.
