Intelligence is often called the most thankless profession because it garners attention only through its failures. The aftermath of September 11 certainly supports this view. In the months that followed the attacks, extensive public debate took place over the role intelligence should play in the post-Cold War world. This issue’s symposium draws on the views of policymakers and practitioners to evaluate the important role intelligence will play in the future of international relations.

Senator Bob Graham, chairman of the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, opens the symposium by commenting on some of the most pressing issues facing the US intelligence community in the wake of September 11. Times have changed, he says, but the US Central Intelligence Agency and other intelligence organizations worldwide have failed to change with them. Balancing the concerns of policymakers, Harvard Professor of Information Resources Policy Anthony G. Oettinger and MITRE Corporation Editor Margaret S. MacDonald provide a compelling overview of technology in the international intelligence community.

What these authors agree on is the paramount importance of international cooperation. Professor Richard J. Aldrich of the University of Nottingham, co-editor of the Journal of Intelligence and National Security, assesses some of the obstacles efforts toward cooperation will inevitably face. Oleg Kalugin, professor at the Center for Counterintelligence and Security Studies and retired major general of the KGB, provides a Russian perspective on interagency cooperation by reviewing the history of Soviet intelligence efforts. In addition to history, different conceptions of intelligence can also influence the success of efforts at international coordination, as Associate Professor Philip H. J. Davies of the University of Malaya argues in his article.

Focusing on often overlooked areas of intelligence gathering, Associate Professor of International Relations Arthur Hulnick of Boston University applies his 35 years of experience in US governmental intelligence organizations in exploring the dynamics of private sector intelligence. Finally, Professor James Wirtz of the Naval Postgraduate School compares perhaps the two greatest intelligence failures of the century—the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the terrorist attacks of September 11. Finding similarities between the two events, he argues that a theoretical study can perhaps help avoid future acts of terrorism. This issue’s symposium hopes to draw attention to the steps necessary to accomplish that goal.