This report addresses how the National Intelligence University can define its role in conducting and overseeing research that is relevant to the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC) and identify study areas related to IC requirements and gaps. This report explores the definition of research, how it differs from traditional intelligence analysis, what intelligence research is currently being done, and what pressing research questions are unanswered.

Furthering Intelligence Research

How the National Intelligence University Can Fill Critical Gaps for Intelligence Research

Heather J. Williams, David Stebbins, Richard S. Girven, Tracey Rissman, Sunny D. Bhatt, Gregory Weider Fauerbach

ResearchPublished May 8, 2025

This report addresses how the National Intelligence University (NIU) can define its role in conducting and overseeing research that is relevant to members of the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC) and how it can identify study areas related to IC requirements and gaps. This report explores the definition of research, how it differs from traditional intelligence analysis, what intelligence research is currently being done within the IC and academia, and what pressing research questions are unanswered. 

The report provides insights into the NIU’s unique position between academia and the IC and how its access to classified holdings and its understanding of a largely closed part of the U.S. national security enterprise allow NIU to conduct research that most organizations cannot. NIU can be a critical convener between the outside academic and research communities doing cutting-edge research and the IC. NIU should consider multiple factors in developing a research agenda, but its best value proposition comes when it leverages one of its four unique assets: organic access to IC stakeholder needs, access to classified data and data sets, faculty expertise in intelligence subjects and methods, and student subject-matter expertise. These unique assets would be engaged for research on unclassified or classified projects about the theory of intelligence and the intelligence discipline, and for practical questions relevant to national security priorities that can only be answered with the use of classified information.  The report then suggests a decision-aid framework that can be used when making decisions about NIU’s research agenda.

Key Findings

  • A review of definitions and processes used in academia, the federal government, and intelligence directives, revealed that there is no common definition for research. The IC often uses the term research, but there is little done or commissioned by the IC that reaches the threshold of research.
  • There are important distinctions between the academic research process and the intelligence cycle. While the overall academic research process is best approached stepwise by a single researcher or research team, multiple IC entities work continuously on all elements of the intelligence cycle for any topic of intelligence interest, often with different components oriented toward specific phases.
  • The gaps in intelligence research are particularly acute in the discipline of intelligence. Institutions sponsoring research often use an entrepreneurial model in which scholars or program managers often drive the research agenda from the bottom up, which has benefits but can create gaps in research. NIU could supplement the work of unclassified intelligence journals on analytic tradecraft, operational tradecraft, and intelligence ideology and policy.
  • NIU’s best value proposition comes when it leverages one of its four unique assets: organic access to IC stakeholder needs, access to classified data and data sets, faculty expertise in intelligence subjects and methods, and student subject matter expertise. These unique assets would be engaged for research on unclassified or classified projects about the theory of intelligence and the intelligence discipline, and for practical questions relevant to national security priorities that can only be answered with the use of classified information.

Recommendations

  • NIU could play the role of a broker or translator that helps connect the academic and research resources outside the IC to the gaps and demands within it. Resource limitations and potential security risks inhibit the amount of cutting-edge research that could ever be done within the IC.
  • As NIU structures its own research agenda, it should create a process that maintains its diverse benefits from being both an academic institution and having access to the IC: operational needs can drive short-term research questions with strong potential value, but allowing faculty to pursue their own research pursuits often establishes the foundation for future innovation and development.
  • In setting research priorities, NIU should leverage its four unique assets: (1) organic access to IC stakeholder needs, (2) access to classified data and data sets, (3) faculty expertise in intelligence subjects and methods, and (4) student subject matter expertise.
  • NIU should consider contributing to intelligence research that advances the intelligence profession by examining traditional analytical methods, evaluating policymaker information consumption, and examining competition across intelligence collection methods.
  • NIU should apply a research agenda decision-aid framework when considering a research agenda. A suitable research topic should meet one or more of the components of all four of the following criteria: (1) demand signal, (2) capabilities and data, (3) resources available and (4) researcher interest. The feasibility of the research effort depends on the available funding and time for its pursuit.

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Williams, Heather J., David Stebbins, Richard S. Girven, Tracey Rissman, Sunny D. Bhatt, and Gregory Weider Fauerbach, Furthering Intelligence Research: How the National Intelligence University Can Fill Critical Gaps for Intelligence Research. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2025. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA2172-1.html.
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This research was sponsored by NIU and conducted within the Personnel, Readiness, and Health Program of the RAND National Security Research Division.

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