# AISE The Agenzia Informazioni e Sicurezza Esterna (Agency for External Intelligence and Security) is Italy's foreign intelligence service — the Italian equivalent of the [[CIA]] and [[MI6]]. Established in 2007 by reorganizing the previous SISMI (which had been discredited by its role in providing fabricated intelligence on Iraqi WMDs to the US), AISE conducts foreign intelligence collection and counterproliferation. Italy participates in the [[Fourteen Eyes]] intelligence-sharing arrangement. Italy's intelligence history is marked by the "Strategy of Tension" during the Cold War — a period when Italian intelligence services collaborated with far-right terrorist groups and [[NATO]]'s stay-behind networks (Operation Gladio) to prevent communist electoral victories, conducting or facilitating bombings attributed to left-wing groups. This history connects to the vault's broader documentation of intelligence agencies being used for political rather than security purposes. ## See Also - [[Fourteen Eyes]] — the intelligence-sharing tier - [[CIA]] — US equivalent - [[Global Intelligence Hub]] — full agency index