Book Description

Writing products related to terrorism has become a cottage industry within the Intelligence Community. Few, however, have produced a work as sweeping and as functional as has Major Troy Thomas in Beneath the Surface . This work represents not merely the careful and extremely useful adaptation of classic principles of Intelligence Preparation of the Battlespace (IPB) to the emerging threat of terrorism, but it offers a truly new and effective means by which intelligence professionals may approach this critical topic. If this was all that Major Thomas had achieved in this work, it would remain an essential reference to be added to the libraries of all academicians as well as intelligence and law enforcement professionals who focus upon terrorism and its neutralization. Beneath the Surface represents something far more profound than merely serving as an incredibly useful analytical "tool," however. By painstakingly melding classical IPB methodologies with open systems theories, Major Thomas has achieved a means by which even the novice analyst can apprehend not merely the complexity of the terrorist threat, but its inevitable environmental, structural or sub-systemic strengths and weaknesses as well. Beneath the Surface constitutes, therefore, a truly effective representation of the paradigm shift in warfare that has been induced by our intense focus on terrorism. Major Thomas' approach provides an entirely new means by which to think about the problem of terrorism, compelling lines of inquiry that would be extremely unlikely to emerge using previously existing methodologies. Beneath the Surface demands a full-spectrum examination of the threat not only from physical and social perspectives, but in terms of information and cognitive warfare. The assessment of factors ranging from geography and weather to culture and technology is essential to carrying out Major Thomas' counterterrorism IPB process. Each of these factors is then subjected to a multifaceted examination from the environmental, systemic and sub-systemic dimensions to identify centers of gravity, critical capabilities, critical requirements and, finally, critical vulnerabilities on the physical, moral and cognitive planes of war. As he demonstrates, the results can be remarkable-whether applied to a local militia group or a transnational terrorist group. Beneath the Surface promises to be much more than an analytical handbook; it is, in itself, a manifestation of an entirely new way of problem solving-a work that is destined to be reprinted countless times.