The Core Area Initiative is a NATO initiative on security policy launched by Norwegian representatives in September 2008 calling for a renewed focus on security challenges within geographical areas and peripheries of the alliance. Based on data from a series of semi-structured elite interviews with bureaucrats working at the Norwegian Ministry of Defence (MOD) and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), this article presents an inside-out analysis focused on bureaucrats and policymaking. The relationships between bureaucrats and politicians within the MOD and between bureaucrats in the MOD and the MFA are explored. It is found that bureaucrats at the MOD were particularly active in the process of drafting the initiative. The analysis also draws attention to what seem to be conflicting interests within the bureaucracy in promoting the Core Area Initiative.