ACCESSION NUMBER:00000
FILE ID:96011803.POL
DATE:01/18/96
TITLE:18-01-96  COALITION FORCES SHARING MILITARY INTELLIGENCE IN BOSNIA

TEXT:
(Technology called "real key" to joint effort) (900)
By Jacquelyn S. Porth
USIA Security Affairs Correspondent

Washington -- Good intelligence, which is critical to the success of
any military mission, is particularly critical for the multi-national
Operation Joint Endeavor that is monitoring the peace in Bosnia, says
Defense Department spokesman Ken Bacon.

The quick provision of timely intelligence is needed, Bacon says, not
only to monitor compliance with the November 1995 Dayton peace
agreement but also to protect the troops from threats and to aid the
military so they can "direct their own operations as efficiently and
quickly as possible."

Defense Secretary Perry and CIA Director John Deutch have placed "a
high premium" on "reducing the amount of time it takes to get
intelligence from the collectors and the analysts into the hands of
the soldiers, the pilots and the sailors who actually have to use the
intelligence on a day-to-day basis," he told reporters January 18.

As a result, the "sensor-to-shooter time" is being reduced, the
spokesman said, and "a much shorter connection time" is being achieved
in Bosnia "than we have (had) in any other operation."

A senior U.S. intelligence official told reporters at the Pentagon on
January 18 that "technology is the real key to this effort" and that
U.S. intelligence personnel "have augmented the NATO intelligence
structure throughout the entire architecture of IFOR" in Bosnia.

A variety of electronic and human intelligence sources are being
brought to bear in Operation Joint Endeavor, including motion and heat
sensors and the "sensing of ancillary activities by political
authorities which have an effect upon tactical operations and military
activities," he said.

As an example of a human intelligence success, he noted that a CIA
case officer was able to obtain "the exact procedures" used by one of
the warring parties when installing minefields in Bosnia. "It is
always nice to have the other guy's manual to know how his people were
instructed to lay the mines as you go in" to check them out, the
official pointed out.

The briefer said the intelligence-sharing process across military and
civilian lines and across coalition boundaries is working "pretty
smoothly." Each nation in Operation Joint Endeavor is responsible for
providing intelligence support to its own military forces, he
explained, but within the coalition "it's a shared arrangement."

U.S. intelligence is being routinely shared with coalition partners
such as the British and the Russians, although he said the shared
information that the Russians have at their fingertips doesn't reveal
its source. The official said the British and French are making "a
substantial contribution" to joint intelligence efforts and he
believes the Russians will make a substantial one "in their own
sector." Efforts are being made to provide "real-time" intelligence to
the Russians, he added, noting that this should occur within "a few
days."

Within the U.S. national intelligence network, the official said the
first priority is to deal with immediate threats against U.S. and IFOR
forces, then to support IFOR's mission in carrying out the Dayton
agreement, and, finally, to support the effort to prosecute
international crimes against humanity.

The key, he said, is pulling all the intelligence information together
and "then parsing it out to the right person." Having the ability to
do so, the official stressed, "is gold" to an operational commander.

Rapidity of transmittal is also critical. When U.S. Air Force pilot
Scott O'Grady was shot down over Bosnia last April, a warning about a
pending missile threat was passed through U.S. military intelligence
channels about a minute too late for the American aviator. Now, the
official noted, "we are talking about shaving seconds and minutes off"
transmittal time.

On the subject of cooperation with the International War Crimes
Tribunal in The Hague, the official indicated that the U.S. government
has been asked for support such as satellite photographs, which are
passed on through the State Department. He pointed out, however, that
a person cannot be convicted of a war crime based upon a satellite
image, although it can be used as a pointer in the collection of
evidence.

Meanwhile, U.S. Air Force Colonel John Baker described how recent
improvements in NATO's Combined Air Operations Center (CAOC) in
Vincenza, Italy, have resulted in the provision of near real-time
information to ground forces in Bosnia. He told reporters at the
Pentagon January 18 that the objective is to make the most effective
use of NATO air assets assigned to the operation.

Currently, eight NATO nations are flying together to support the
combined operation, Baker said. The percentage of aircraft flying
missions from any single country changes daily.

Allied commanders have access to databases with information on
potential threats and the latest intelligence, Baker said, so that
they can "rapidly re-task and reorient airborne assets to support a
developing situation on the ground."

Baker, who is Air Force deputy director of operations, said real-time
radar and visual information flowing into the CAOC creates the wide
information net which gives today's military commanders a "tremendous
advantage" and what they have always wanted: "to see over the next
hill."

Baker said "real-time connectivity" also allows the IFOR commanders
"to assess the warring factions' progress in meeting certain time
lines set out in the Dayton accord.
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