cutting threat and therefore it makes sense for the Cabinet Office to hold responsibility; we nonetheless suggest that it is kept under review.
84. The Committee has heard a great deal over the past year about the Fusion Doctrine, which aims "to deploy security, economic and influence capabilities to protect, promote and project our national security, economic and influence goals".[1] In principle, this makes sense in response to a threat as broad as that posed by Russia. We note, however, that Russia's own version of this 'joined-up working' approach is far more developed: given the amount of power centralised in the Kremlin, the lack of strong public institutions, the close connections between big business and the state, and – crucially – its operation outside the Rules Based International Order, Russia is easily able to combine its political, economic, military and intelligence power to achieve its objectives.
85. In relation to the Agencies and Defence Intelligence, given the difficulties in working against Russia (explored in the next section), it is particularly important that all sources – HUMINT, SIGINT, MASINT, GEOINT,[2] open source and others – are used to complement each other as much as possible, and that they are used across all aspects of the co-ordinated Russian threat (***). Given the combined nature of the Russian threat, it is essential that the Agencies' and Defence Intelligence's work on *** is not viewed separately from wider Russian foreign policy and influence efforts. In some cases, we have noted that it has not been clear ***: this must be addressed. It is essential that HMG takes a broader view of the full extent of the Russian threat as the cross-Whitehall Russia Strategy develops and the use of the Fusion Doctrine increases.
86. The Intelligence Coverage and Effects (ICE) process is the method by which SIS and GCHQ are tasked by the Government.[3] The ICE Plan for Russia requires *** coverage outcomes and *** effects outcomes, which are prioritised at five levels: 'non-negotiable', high, medium, low and 'opportunity only'. The intention is to ensure that the Agencies' outputs accord with the intelligence coverage and effects the National Security Council and its 'customer' departments across Government need. On Russia, the ICE requirements represent SIS and GCHQ's tasking in relation to the cross-Whitehall Russia Strategy.
87. In contrast to SIS and GCHQ, MI5 is self-tasking: it prioritises its work against threats to the UK based on its assessment of their severity. This is appropriate given the defensive focus of MI5's role. We have been informed that MI5 does, however, align its work on Russia with that of SIS and GCHQ in an agreed tri-Agency approach.[4]
88. Defence Intelligence is tasked by a separate Ministry of Defence process. Given the differences between Defence Intelligence's work and that of the Agencies – including the fact that, in its assessment function, it is a customer for SIS and GCHQ intelligence products
- ↑ HMG, National Security Capability Review, March 2018.
- ↑ Human intelligence (HUMINT), signals intelligence (SIGINT), measurement and signature intelligence (MASINT), geospatial intelligence (GEOINT).
- ↑ Intelligence coverage is the collection of information (or acquisition of information from allied intelligence services) by the Agencies and Defence Intelligence. Intelligence effects describe the Agencies' and Defence Intelligence's engagement in activities that have real-life outcomes.
- ↑ ***
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