THE BLUF: Working with partners is a key intelligence tool. While the US has one of the best if not the best intelligence organizations in the world, it still cannot collect and analyze all global trends. The US sets intelligence priorities based on threats against the nation and the American people. Trends and anomalies in areas that may not have a direct impact on the US are of a lesser priority. Other countries do the same. If we share our analysis and collection among allies and partners, we are able to retain our focus without missing trends that could end up as a major issue down the road. If we are not a stable and trustworthy partner, we will miss out on potentially important intelligence that could affect our nation.
The US intelligence community has worked hard to develop strong relationships with its allies and partners. For the last 10 years, the US has led intelligence in NATO as the Assistant Secretary General for Intelligence and Security. The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) has put in place a Deputy Director for the Commonwealth. Allies have offices in the Pentagon to be better able to share intelligence. Many of the Combatant Commands have partners and allies sitting in their intelligence units. Two successful examples of close intelligence sharing are:
·Operation Gallant Phoenix (OGP): an intelligence fusion center established in 2013 in Jordan. It is made up of over twenty countries with representatives from a variety of agencies, including law enforcement, military and civilian intelligence. OGP focuses on response to current, evolving and future violent extremist threats - regardless of threat ideology. Gallant Phoenix allows nations not only to share intelligence on the foreign fighter threat, but also to get that information back to their law enforcement and homeland security agencies.
BICES: Battlefield Information Collection & Exploitation Systems (BICES) links intelligence between a range of partner nations. The system originally centered on NATO, but today's version goes beyond that. It delivers technical capability to provide multinational intelligence and information-sharing capabilities.
The importance of these types of intelligence sharing constructs is seen in how intelligence sharing has saved lives. In 2025, intelligence sharing thwarted attacks against US allies.
·In July 2025, the CIA said that it helped Germany foil a Russian plot to assassinate the head of a German arms manufacturer that produced weapons for Ukraine.
·In August 2025, the CIA said it provided intelligence to Austrian authorities that allowed them to disrupt a plan, allegedly inspired by the Islamic State group.
Allies and partners, however, are raising concerns about sharing intelligence with the US. They have given a host of reasons for that concern that largely reflect unease about intelligence being leaked to adversaries, either unwittingly or for political reasons. Some partners have raised issues with how their intelligence is being used by the US. The Danish Defense Intelligence Service, one of Denmark’s key spy agencies, has described the U.S. as a potential security risk, saying in a 2025 report that the United States is increasingly prioritizing its own interests and “now using its economic and technological strength as a tool of power, also toward allies and partners.”
These concerns continue to grow with two staunch allies declaring that they are either completely halting or are curtailing intelligence sharing with the US:
·Colombia: Through the early 2000s Colombia became a close partner with the US in combatting drug cartels and left wing insurgent groups. The close intelligence relationship contributed to the operation to rescue US hostages in Colombia and the demise of the FARC narco-terrorist group. Under leftist Colombian President Gustavo Petro, the intelligence relationship faltered with Petro completely halting it as a result of the current US counter drug policy. We will see what a new Colombian President will decide vis a vis the US intelligence relationship.
·UK: The intelligence sharing relationship between the US and the UK is one of the strongest ones the US has. Because of UK concerns about the legality of US maritime strikes against alleged drug runners, the UK has announced last year that it would curtail its intelligence sharing with the US on cartel related issues.
This trend comes at a time when Europe is rethinking its future intelligence organization. The US’s influence on that organization could lessen if our long-time partners believe that they cannot count on us to keep their secrets, share our intelligence, and use their intelligence for legal purposes.
These recent events should raise larger strategic concerns as the US relooks the future of its intelligence community. With new technologies that help us collect and analyze open source data, sharing intelligence should be easier. If we start with open source and commercially available information that AI can curate, we are starting in a place that is unclassified and thus easily sharable. The ability to share and its importance married with using the latest technologies is why the US needs to build a new open source center that feeds into each of the intelligence community components. This center would have as part of its organization, partners and allies who would bring their open source information to the table—much like Operation Gallant Phoenix but with a global threat based problem set. This is where the US and the world would see the first trends of a new global pandemic, watch out for signs of instability in countries that normally are not first tier priorities for the US, and understand how climate change might be affecting global economies that could result in unrest or regime change.
This is not the time to go it alone in the intelligence community. In order to keep our nation safe in a cost effective way, we need to continue to work closely with partners and share intelligence and intelligence operations. We can only do this if our partners and allies see the US intelligence community as strong, effective, apolitical, and leading in sharing with its partners.
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