US Joint Chiefs of Staff

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   An adversary is not analysed in a vacuum: first the environment — political, military, economic, social, information and infrastructure systems — then what the adversary can do within it.

   Joint Publication 2-01.3: Joint Intelligence Preparation of the Operational Environment · 2014

   A PMESII inventory with no conclusion about what matters is paper, not analysis.

   US joint doctrine calls the process JIPOE, joint intelligence preparation of the operational environment. The 21 May 2014 edition of JP 2-01.3, which superseded the 2009 one, sets out four steps: define the operational environment, describe its impact, evaluate the adversary and other relevant actors, and determine their courses of action. The environment covers the physical domains, the information environment (including cyberspace) and the PMESII systems — political, military, economic, social, information and infrastructure. The civilian variant used in business analysis is STEEP: social, technological, economic, environmental, political. To apply it, list the elements, links and pressure points of each system, then ask how they constrain each actor's options — an energy embargo read as an economic event has political and social effects in another country. The companion technique in the 2009 Tradecraft Primer is outside-in thinking: start from the external forces you do not control and only then narrow to your subject, so that no variable is missed. It pays off at the start of a new analysis or when the subject shifts. The trap is the inventory: a complete PMESII list with no conclusion about what matters. The 2014 edition is the latest public one; the current joint doctrine list sits behind a restricted portal.

   “The JIPOE process provides a disciplined methodology for applying a holistic view of the OE to the analysis of adversary capabilities and intentions.”

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