SECRET SERVICESThe Hole in Canada’s Intelligence System Is ASIS-shaped
A hardy perennial in Ottawa politics is whether Canada should create a foreign intelligence service equivalent to the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service (SIS, aka MI6).
A hardy perennial in Ottawa politics is whether Canada should create a foreign intelligence service equivalent to the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service (SIS, aka MI6).
If it does, it should note that collecting foreign intelligence abroad through personal contact with human sources—humint—can be consistent with liberal-democratic norms and can be done on a middle-power budget. The model is the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS).
Canada already collects humint domestically. Gathering intelligence about matters abroad is likewise nothing new to it. The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) can collect intelligence without geographical restriction—but only intelligence concerning actual or suspected threats to Canada’s security.
Security intelligence is narrower than foreign intelligence, which Canadian law defines as ‘information or intelligence about the capabilities, intentions or activities of a foreign individual, state, organization or terrorist group, as they relate to international affairs, defense or security.’
Canada’s signals intelligence (sigint) agency, the Communications Security Establishment, has a mandate to collect this broader category of intelligence. CSIS, however, may collect foreign intelligence only inside Canada, only at written ministerial request and, if concerning an individual, only on non-citizens. No Canadian intelligence service has ever had a mandate to collect foreign humint abroad.
The assumptions behind previous decisions not to create such a service have become questionable.
Outside the cursory efforts of its foreign ministry, Canada depends wholly on allies for foreign humint, mainly the US. That makes sense if one assumes that US and Canadian interests compete in few areas, that Washington’s foreign intelligence priorities are also Ottawa’s and that the US will remain tolerant of Canadian dependence. This arrangement provides far more humint than Canada could collect by itself, while the US foots the bill and takes any reputational damage.
If those assumptions no longer hold, Canada should look to develop a foreign humint capability. This would entail substantial, though not unmanageable, expense. Something on the scale of a Canadian CIA would be unaffordable, but the most appropriate model within Canada’s means has existed in Australia for 73 years.
ASIS is costing Canberra $718 million this financial year due to a once-in-a-generation modernization program. That’s similar to what Ottawa already spends on CSIS, and it’s still significantly less than either country’s investment in sigint. It’s true that initial set-up costs would be considerable. A new service would require premises, talent and bespoke institutional machinery. All told, it might take 10 years to reach maturity.
An arguably easier interim option would be expanding CSIS’s mandate to include a foreign intelligence function. It would be then like the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service, collecting foreign intelligence domestically and, presumably, abroad. But the Australian model, the ASIS model, is more responsive to the longstanding concerns of Canada’s intelligence policy.
Those concerns are not just about cost or potential loss of face, although the then government cited both in 2007 when it reneged on an election promise to create a foreign intelligence service.
Canada’s hesitancy about humint is based on concern for liberal-democratic norms. Its modern intelligence system was born in scandal, after the 1981 McDonald Royal Commission found that officers of the security service of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) had flagrantly broken the law in the line of duty. The commission’s resulting recommendations led to the withdrawal of the RCMP’s national security mandate and the creation of CSIS in 1984, separating intelligence collection from law enforcement.
While the McDonald report did not recommend for or against establishing a foreign intelligence service, it was clear about what one should look like, above all that it should be separate from CSIS. This was, firstly, to prevent the habits of foreign humint collection (bluntly put, empowering public officials to break other countries’ laws) from spreading into domestic security work. Secondly, the country needed to avoid the perceived dangers of having a monolithic security apparatus—precisely the problems that had arisen with the RCMP.
The report further recommended that such a service should have a legislated charter, be forbidden from engaging in subversion or paramilitary activity, should be subject to executive and parliamentary review and should engage solely in intelligence collection, with assessment done elsewhere.
That hypothetical service is almost a precise description of ASIS as it has functioned since the passage of the Intelligence Services Act 2001. The ASIS model is right for Canada because Australia’s intelligence apparatus happens to have rigorously (if unconsciously) implemented the McDonald commission’s recommendations, and with them the principled separations intended to balance intelligence needs with parliamentary democratic norms.
Linus Cohen is a research intern at ASPI. This article is published courtesy of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI).
