Fixing the Facts or Missing the Mark? Intelligence, Policy, and the War in Iraq
Abstract
The major national security controversies over the last decade have revolved around intelligence. Critics blamed the intelligence community for failing to alert policymakers before the September 11 attacks, but others argued that the White House ignored intelligence that warned of the looming danger. Critics of intelligence also blamed it for exaggerating Iraq s capabilities and terrorist links before the war, but others argued that White House pressure caused intelligence leaders to inflate the threat. And the continuing controversy over estimates of the Iranian nuclear program has convinced some observers that the intelligence community is deliberately seeking to constrain policy. As these examples attest, it is impossible to understand contemporary strategic debates without thinking about the role of intelligence in strategy. Yet despite its importance, the subject has received surprisingly little attention from scholars, and nothing like the gigantic body of research on civil-military relations. A great deal has been written on espionage, analysis, covert action, and deception. Much less has been written about the causes and consequences of intelligence-policy breakdowns. The irony is that the ongoing effort to reform intelligence will be all for naught if the intelligence community cannot build a productive relationship with policymakers. Even the perfect intelligence estimate is useless until it finds a receptive reader. This E-Note outlines a framework for understanding intelligence-policy relations. It begins by describing intelligence-policy relations in the ideal, and then explaining some of the recurring problems that get in the way of productive interaction. I conclude by returning to the most notorious and controversial case of intelligence-policy failure: the war in Iraq.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Oct 01, 2011
- Accession Number
- ADA570491
Entities
People
- Joshua Rovner