A Study on the Explanation of the Implementation of Covert Action in Intelligence and Security Activities

In operational terms, covert action is an attempt by a country to pursue its foreign policy goals by taking some covert actions to influence the behavior of another country or to influence its political, military, economic, and social events and conditions. This research is explanatory and aims to study the conditions and status of covert action and what it is without interference or mental inference. Using documents, books, and library studies and obtaining the opinions of experts, the characteristics were examined and the article was compiled. The results of this study indicate that in the current era of the expansion of cognitive warfare and the prevalence of hybrid warfare, the justified denial guideline has received the attention of political and intelligence policymakers. The reason for this is that hybrid wars often occur in a gray area based on ambiguity, and the main actors in hybrid wars attempt to conceal their role and support by taking actions such as spreading false or misleading information and attributing it to internal factors. In this regard, justified denial is considered one of the effective techniques in covert action, which often has two types: denial of the role of the government and denial of the role of high-ranking officials. In the first type, the goal is to deny the intervention of a government in events and incidents in other countries, such as interference in elections, support for political parties, rebellions or coups, and attribute it to others. Since actions such as arms aid, the exchange of security prisoners, or assassinations were inconsistent with the country's domestic political values or had international consequences, governments attempted to deny their role in these interventionist actions in the form of a justified denial guideline and to avoid the domestic political consequences or international implications of these actions. Therefore, justified denial is considered a basic condition of covert operations, and covert operations were mainly based on the idea that the origin of the action should remain covert.