Did the marines in Lebanon receive adequate intelligence support? Should they have been able to predict an attack of the magnitude experienced on October 23 due to their intelligence sources? The subcommittee looked closely at these questions and concluded that serious intelligence inadequacies had a direct effect on the capability of the MAU to defend itself against the full spectrum of threats. Serious problems existed prior to October 23--and continue to exist today--with the quality of intelligence support available to the MAU. Two issues stand out. First, the marines do not possess adequate capability to analyze the massive infusion of data provided them. Second, the intelligence on potential threats is generally nonspecific and of little use in planning defenses. Intelligence Support
Irrespective of possible intelligence inadequacies, the subcommittee concludes there is no basis for the marines' differentiating among vehicular threats, as was strongly suggested by several witnesses, i.e., car bombs were real threats, but a large truck bomb was not.
Intelligence support to the MAU is provided through a variety of sources and methods and from numerous national-level organizations, including the Defense Intelligence Agency, Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency, as well as individual military service intelligence activities. Tactical, on-the-ground intelligence is available to the marines from daily airborne and seaborne collection platforms, an integral part of Amphibious Task Force 61 and from intelligence assets that are part of the MAU commander's immediate command.
In addition to this intelligence support, the MAU possesses a limited counterintelligence capability that primarily serves to conduct vulnerability assessments and maintain liaison with host country intelligence and counterintelligence organizations.
These sources generate a voluminous quantity of information that is provided to the task force in Lebanon, more specifically, to the marine S-2 intelligence officer located at the MAU headquarters at the airport and to the CTF 61 Staff Intelligence Officer located aboard ship. The S-2 intelligence officer reports directly to the MAU commander, while the CTF 61 staff intelligence officer reports to the commodore of the AMphibious Task Force, Captain France. These individuals serve as the focal points for collection, processing, analysis and dissemination of intelligence and counterintelligence to the military forces in Lebanon.
LACK OF ANALYTIC CAPABILITY One example of the voluminous quantity of intelligence received by the marines is a message from the task force in Beirut advising that the communications path between the task force ashore and
the one afloat was "36 to 40 backlogged because of information being pushed to us now." Testimony received from one intelligence organization shows that from September 15, 1983, until October 23, 1983, one small section of its agency provided "over 170 exchanges of information during that time frame dealing with items of immediate interest to the tactical commander, . . . time-sensitive information that could be utilized by the tactical commander on the scene to make decisions on the safety of his forces."Captain France and Colonel Geraghty were in agreement that one of their major problems areas was taking advantage of so much information coming in from so many different areas. In fact,m the MAU commander testified that it would have been helpful to have a special intelligence officer onshore attached to the marines who was trained in evaluating and interpreting the terrorist threats.
As stated before the subcommittee, terrorism is here to stay. It will continue to be used as a tool by some nations to accomplish objectives they cannot otherwise achieve. Our armed forces have a need for consolidated, specific intelligence information, rather than a deluge of information of questionable value, especially in light of their lack of capability to analyze and use the information.
Both raw intelligence and finished intelligence products are provided to the task force. The marines on the ground are left with the responsibility of assimilating those bits of information (form all the data received) that might enable them to predict a terrorist act. Testimony revealed that, "If there was any failure in taking advantage of all the information, it was probably that we had so much coming in from certain areas. What we didn't have was a real good ability to assess what we were getting and to sort it out."
This problem was particularly notable the latter part of September and in early October when the situation in Lebanon was changing very rapidly.
To compound further the analytic problems, the subcommittee found that, even within the marines' limited analytic capability in Lebanon, there was no expertise in terrorism. In spite of the fact that Lebanon is often described as the "car bomb capital of the world," and in view of all the terrorist training suspected of being conducted there, the subcommittee found no evidence of a concerted effort by any intelligence organization to bring terrorism experts together to support the marines. Such experts could serve to assemble all-source intelligence in a usable form that might assist the commander in making more accurate and timely security decisions.
LACK OF SPECIFICITY OF INTELLIGENCE Testimony revealed most of the information received by the MAU was not in a form that could be acted upon. For the most part, these were reports of general threats. Captain France testified, "From the time I arrived here, there has been a continuous threat, as an example, of remote control speed boats; these are radio-controlled, loaded with bombs. . . ." There were also many car bomb threats. He related one threat received with regard to a blue Mercedes, but added, "There are quite a few blue Mercedes over in Lebanon."
Colonel Geraghty said:
Since we have been here, we have, I think, counted over a hundred car bomb threats, for instance. Some of those were specific enough for us to maintain a list of, for example, a gray mercedes with license number, that we give to all our posts, as well as share with other Multinational Force members and the Lebanese.The MAU commander testified that he believes intelligence is certainly partly to blame for the tragedy in lebanon because intelligence never indicated a threat of this magnitude, both in delivery and explosive force.
Intelligence was often cited as the rationale used in the design of physical security barriers at the BLT headquarters. That its to say, because intelligence indicated the threat to be car bombs, then physical security was allegedly built to secure the area against that threat. However, irrespective of possible intelligence inadequacies, the subcommittee found no basis for differentiating among vehicular threats.
One intelligence officer concurred with this finding during testimony stating, "In a situation like this, you can never afford to overlook anything, and if a truck was not considered, why it was not considered, I can't tell you."
The subcommittee would like to underscore its concern for this failure to consider a truck as an explosive delivery vehicle in light of the multitude of other threats considered by the task force. Testimony from several witnesses showed that the ships offshore cruised at about three knots because of the threat of speed boats and tankers laden with explosives that could have been used to target the fleet. There was even consideration of airborne kamikaze threats. In fact, on the day of the BLT bombing, a small, unidentified aircraft approached the U.S.S. Iwo Jima. An H-46 helicopter armed with a .50 caliber machinegun and a Cobra gunship were dispatched to divert the aircraft.
The subcommittee also determined that a counterintelligence survey conducted in the summer of 1983 for the MAU commander recommended that trucks should be visually inspected for explosive devices at the main gate. The MAU commander testified that as a matter of routine "any vehicle or truck or school bus or whatever" would be inspected carefully and vehicular traffic on the perimeter roads would be kept moving.This fact seems to refute contentions that trucks were not considered as possible threats.
The question then remains: Why did the marines not take adequate security measures against this threat?
The lack of adequate analytic support and the nonspecific nature of the intelligence provided certainly cast a shadow on the quality of intelligence support available to the marines in Lebanon. Intelligence should not bear full responsibility for the bombing, but the subcommittee concludes that its failures were significant and concurs with Colonel Geraghty's assessment that certain intelligence organizations must share part of the blame for this disaster.
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