I am a librarian for Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC), a research and development arm of US Army Corps of Engineers, and served as an all-source intelligence analyst in the Georgia Army National Guard. My academic background consists of my Bachelor of Arts in History from American Military University, Master of Library Science from Indiana University and my Master of Arts in Intelligence Studies, also from American Military University.
Timely and accurate intelligence is not always possible to glean from complex conflict areas. Soc... more Timely and accurate intelligence is not always possible to glean from complex conflict areas. Social Media Intelligence (SOCMINT) is the newest “INT” to the intelligence discipline and it adds a robust resource to the existing, traditional “INT” toolkits. The real-time, firsthand accounts of the ground situation that social media provides constitute an effective indications and warning (I&W) provider for dynamic ground situations where traditional intelligence collection methods are challenged. The research in this area is still in its infancy, however, studying the 2015 actions in the Syrian Arab Republic by the Russian Federation military offers an opportunity to study SOCMINT’s capability to provide I&W and compare its content with that of conventional news outlet reports. This study is quasi-experimental, employing qualitative methods using non-random samplings of Twitter posts and news reports from Al Jazeera (English) and Washington Post outlets. The research finds that SOCMINT has positive potential for providing I&W in these situations and that, in aggregate, reliability is on par with traditional news outlets. The success of SOCMINT as an intelligence collection field requires systematic analysis processes that exploit the best aspects of automated and manual analysis procedures.
Timely and accurate intelligence is not always possible to glean from complex conflict areas. Soc... more Timely and accurate intelligence is not always possible to glean from complex conflict areas. Social Media Intelligence (SOCMINT) is the newest “INT” to the intelligence discipline and it adds a robust resource to the existing, traditional “INT” toolkits. The real-time, firsthand accounts of the ground situation that social media provides constitute an effective indications and warning (I&W) provider for dynamic ground situations where traditional intelligence collection methods are challenged. The research in this area is still in its infancy, however, studying the 2015 actions in the Syrian Arab Republic by the Russian Federation military offers an opportunity to study SOCMINT’s capability to provide I&W and compare its content with that of conventional news outlet reports. This study is quasi-experimental, employing qualitative methods using non-random samplings of Twitter posts and news reports from Al Jazeera (English) and Washington Post outlets. The research finds that SOCMINT has positive potential for providing I&W in these situations and that, in aggregate, reliability is on par with traditional news outlets. The success of SOCMINT as an intelligence collection field requires systematic analysis processes that exploit the best aspects of automated and manual analysis procedures.
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