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Intelligence and Security Committee (Annual Report)

Our intelligence and security agencies are indeed looking at that issue. One difficulty in using our resources, however vastly they are expanding, is that they have to be converted into personnel with such skills. I return to the point that I was making, and making at some length. I do so because it is important that we ensure that everyone in this country understands that intelligence is not an exact science. It is not like reading a spy novel. Piecing together intelligence is more like trying to complete a jigsaw puzzle that has no picture, many pieces missing and no pieces with a straight edge, and without knowing how many pieces one should have or whether the existing pieces are all from the same puzzle. Just to complicate completing that puzzle, one has to do so against the clock, with additional pieces being thrown helpfully in one’s direction by friends, and some intentionally misleading pieces being thrown by one’s enemies. That is a fuller description of the process of constructing an assessment of threat and intelligence than would normally be gained from some reports in some of our popular press or from novels. That is the nature of the task that we set the dedicated and talented people who serve in our intelligence services. The most remarkable thing is that, more often than not, they succeed against all the odds in putting together significant parts of the puzzle in a way that makes sense of the bigger picture. That saves lives, for which we ought to be grateful. It has done so many times before the 7 July attacks, and will continue to do so. That is the most important return of all on the investments about which Opposition Members have asked me. All those difficulties have always existed, but they are now more challenging than ever. They have become larger and more difficult with the emergence of global terrorism. For nearly half a century after the end of the second world war, our intelligence agencies focused on fighting the cold war. From the late 1960s onwards, they played an important role in a conflict within the United Kingdom, in Northern Ireland. Nowadays, their primary focus is on the international terrorism of al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda-inspired groups. As well as bearing in mind the normal difficulties affecting intelligence, we should recognise how much more challenging today’s actions are than what went before. Today’s enemy is unfettered by any sense of international convention, legality or even morality. Indeed, it is spurred on by a perverse perception of morality to achieve an even greater extent of civilian carnage. It uses methods of which we would not have conceived even a short time ago. Moreover, the form of today’s enemy has changed. In the past, we faced a foe with a structure. We knew the structure of the Soviet infantry and we often knew the structure of an active service unit of the Provisional IRA, along with its commander. We either knew the names of those involved, or were aware of an intelligence gap that needed to be filled. Not only did our former foe have a structure, but that structure was fairly static and unchanging. When it comes to al-Qaeda and the like, we face an enemy that is structured only loosely, if at all, and comprises numerous largely autonomous groups acting outside any recognisable chain of command. Nor do those groups have a permanent base from which to operate. All that makes the job of our intelligence services much harder than it was before. Today’s terrorist is also helped by the ease of modern transport and communications. The internet and cheap mass travel have created a global village that is home to the global terrorist. All that makes life easier for the terrorists and harder for those who seek to counter them.