Studies in Intelligence: A Collection of Articles on the Historical, Operational, Doctrinal, and Theoretical Aspects of Intelligence

The first issue of the Intelligence Community journal Studies in the Intelligence was published in 1995. It featured an article by Sherman Kent, a legendary figure in CIA called the "father of intelligence analysis," who served with great distinction from 1952-1967 as chairman of the Board of National Estimates and as director of the Office of National Estimates. Kent laid out the arguments for studying and treating the analysis of intelligence information as a defined, rigorous discipline with its own criteria and standards. Kent's 1955 article, reproduced in this Special Edition, eloquently argued "The Need for Intelligence Literature" by proposing regular production of a journal such as Studies to build a body of professional intelligence literature to keep it a "robust and growing discipline."

Kent's call was heeded, and Studies has endured and proposed for 45 years. Intelligence officers, current and retired, as well as, scholars of intelligence -- both teachers and students -- have been the journal's lifeblood, writing articles that encompass the entire craft of intelligence -- historical, operational, doctrinal, and theoretical.

Studies was a quarterly classified journal until 1992, when an annual unclassified edition -- composed largely of unclassified articles from previous classified issues -- was added to reach a wider audience beyond the Intelligence Community. Hundreds of scholars in the United States and abroad, as well as CIA Officers in Residence and Faculty Representatives as American colleges and universities, now rely on the journal's wider publication for thoughtful and though-provoking articles on topics that are otherwise scarcely covered in regular academic literature.