On Tuesday 16 May 2023, the Deputy Assistant Secretary General for Intelligence Major General Jürgen Brötz hosted the fourth annual meeting with the intelligence and security related Centres of Excellence (CoEs), at NATO Headquarters in Brussels. The centres have come to form a vibrant Community of Interest with NATO's intelligence and security stakeholders, and meet regularly to discuss common work strands, mutual support and ongoing engagements.
Representatives of Allied Command Transformation (ACT), Allies, partners and other NATO divisions attended this fourth annual meeting of the Community of Interest, projecting a strong signal of unity. Major General Brötz noted in his opening remarks that "our leaders have recognised the challenges that the Alliance is facing in today's security landscape and the need to adapt NATO's posture to face them". In this context, ambitious communities such as the one that brings together NATO's intelligence and security stakeholders and the CoEs are essential to NATO's understanding of the security environment, which in turn allows to decide quicker and to be stronger together".
The CoEs act as capacity multipliers, providing expertise in all their four pillars of work: Education & Training, Exercise and Evaluation; Analysis and Lessons Learned; Doctrine Development and Standardization; Concept Development and Experimentation. Moreover, they play a crucial part in promoting innovation and improving the interoperability between Allies and Partners. "In today's strategic environment, it is more important than ever for NATO to leverage this unique subject matter expertise, while in turn providing support to the centres, as required", underlined the Deputy Assistant Secretary General.
Attendees used the meeting to update each other on ongoing work strands, such as the CoE's important contributions to NATO's Requests for Support regarding the Eastern Strategic Direction and the training opportunities that are available to the Intelligence Enterprise. The meeting also provided the opportunity to address room for improvement, especially when it concerns access to NATO Secret systems that will allow CoEs to access intelligence tools and information, needed for supporting the NATO Intelligence Enterprise. Additionally, all attendees saw the possibility for a stronger community if even more alignment between the CoEs would take place.
Moving forward, NATO's efforts in the context of the NATO 2030 Agenda and the NATO Warfighting Capstone Concept will continue to fuel cooperation and provide momentum for the cooperation with the centres. "The CoEs have an important part to play in this overall strive to future-proof our Alliance. Their role as hubs of innovation and expertise contributes to ensuring that we out-think and out-pace our adversaries", concluded Major General Brötz.
