On the 13th of May, the ICE Academic network has conducted its first ever outreach action in order to promote the work of four of its academics, who have just issued the “Routledge Handbook of Disinformation and National Security”.

The event, which has taken place within the Brussels headquarters of IRSEM (Institut de recherche stratégique de l'École militaire) Europe, the European branch of the French MoD Think Tank, has taken place in two moments:

• A high level roundtable on the theme “Disinformation and FIMI”, where one representative of NATO Public Diplomacy Division, of the French Service VIGINUM and of a Member State service have discussed on the topic before interacting under Chatham rules with a large, but selected audience of EU actors on Disinformation, FIMI and Security,
• a Spotlight event, with the three ICE co-editors of the Routledge Handbook on Disinformation and National Security,
  Dr Ruben Arcos, Dr Irena Chiru & Dr Cristina Ivan, interacting mainly with European think-tankers.

These side-by-side events were open only under invitations and were targeting only known experts of the domain. This exclusive audience has been particularly active & reactive during the roundtable, which had to be extended from the planned one hour and a half to nearly two hours. The interest of the exchanges was such that a certain number of the first attendees have decided to stay to have the chance to interact with the scientific contributors of the first Routledge comprehensive scientific publication on the Disinformation topic.

This very first ICE Academic network action has allowed ICE to highlight and promote in Brussels the joint research effort of some of its Academics and to contribute to a common strategic culture in the Intelligence & Security domain.

This event, conducted just before the Second ICE Academic Conference, which will take place soon in Spain, will pave the way for another ICE academic event, end of this year, to mark the special edition of the International Journal for Intelligence and Counter-Intelligence (IJICI) on the Common European Strategic Intelligence culture.

The Intelligence College in Europe, which is celebrating this year its fifth anniversary, is proud, on top of its core training mission (making itself a sort of “Intel Erasmus”) and its security awareness actions, to be able to promote the joint efforts of the ICE Academics.

Do you want to know the work of an intelligence officer on strategic issues?

In this case, we invite you to watch this interview of the Intelligence and Security Senior Adviser of the Munich Security Conference (MSC), Gerhard Conrad. A former BND officer and high level hostage negotiator in the Middle East, he led the EU Intelligence Centre (UE INTCEN) from 2016 to 2020, before retiring and moving towards various advising and teaching positions. He is currently a Visiting Professor in the King's College London. Additionally, he authored an interesting book in German titled: “Keine Lizenz zum Töten” (No Licence to Kill), at the Econ Publish House in 2022.

You will find the video here.

On 21 and 22 February 2022 in Paris, the French Intelligence Community organised with the College a thematic seminar on intelligence and space. Space involves much more than military and security issues. Its mastering involves daily applications ranging from communications, connectivity and synchronisation, to geolocation and meteorology. These applications are of daily use and their resilience is strategic. Before an audience made up of members of the Intelligence College in Europe, speakers from research, institutions, industry and services elaborated on the challenges that space represents now. A summary of this seminar is available hereunder.

In September 2020, the Intelligence College in Europe invited professors from three member countries (Italy, Romania and Finland) to present their vision on European security challenges in the 21^st century. They gave their input on the impact of technology on national security, propaganda and disinformation, and hybrid warfare.

The webinar showed Members share, for the most part, similar views over these three topics, and the event paved the way for further exchanges within the College.

Here is the downloadable summary of our conclusions over this webinar.

The International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence publishes its first special theme issue in its 35-year history (available here). This issue, devoted to “Europe and intelligence”, includes contributions to the first thematic seminar organized by the College of Intelligence in Europe in Berlin in autumn 2019.

The authors express themselves in a personal capacity. They do not represent the position of the Intelligence College in Europe or the intelligence communities.