The unclassified 20-page National Intelligence Strategy says the American intelligence community's top "mission objective" is to defeat terrorists inside the United States and in foreign countries by disarming their operational capabilities and seizing the initiative from them by promoting the growth of freedom and democracy.
National Intelligence Director John Negroponte told reporters that a key goal of the strategy was to set out common objectives in order to achieve a coordinated effort by the United States' 15-agency intelligence community.
The U.S. intelligence community has come under criticism for failures leading to the 11 September 2001 terror attacks and over Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction.
(Reuters/AP/AFP)
