ABSTRACT
The American intelligence community consists principally of three substantial networks around the world that are capable of collecting intelligence - from electronic signals, imagery and espionage - and the infrastructure that is necessary to analyse and disseminate their product. There are other collection networks that make important contributions as well, such as that for open sources and that for measurement and signatures intelligence (MASINT), but it is helpful to focus on the three first-mentioned, since it is they that drive the cost and the structure of the community, as well as much of the controversy about it.
