Much has been said about Kay’s recent disclosures and his comments about failure of the intelligence community, when it comes to Iraq’s WMDs. Leaving Iraq out of the equation for a moment, what will be the aftermath of such a dramatic failure.
US had been propagating the doctrine of pre-emptive strikes. They will take out who ever is plotting against US. The pre-emption can only work if you have reliable intelligence to back up your claims. It can’t work with shabby and erroneous intelligence gathering, and analysis. So, is the whole pre-emptive doctrine now dead? Will US intelligence community and the administration be able to use the “we have credible information” card again, and not have the whole world laugh at them and point them to what happened in Iraq?
Or will this just be a passing storm which will go away and US will again regain its credibility? Afterall it has withered many such fiascos before and still remains confident-to-the-point-of-arrogance about their sophisticated intelligence gathering techniques and the reliability of information.
Excellent topic and questions. This is at the heart of my own concerns flowing from the Iraq war.
I think this is the way it was supposed to work:
1. Afghanistan is routed in direct response to WTC attack;
2. Iraq is routed as first imposition of pre-emptive self defense doctrine;
3. WMD stockpiles are found which provide strong justification for attack and the support of the American people for the policy is really, really high;
4. Sabers are rattled about who's next;
5. Because of the credibility of the threat of pre-emptive attack, many of those on the "list" modify their bahavior in ways the US finds acceptable and avoid the attack;
6. A few mop up operations occur in selected areas (Sudan??) where small resistance, at best, is anticipated.
I think the credibility of the threat of another pre-emptive attack is hurt exponentially by the failure to find the WMD stockpiles. It will be hard to get the overwhelming support of the American people under circumstances where they can't believe the intelligence assessments they are being fed. Leaders in countries that were "with" us in Iraq will also find it very problematic being "with" us again based upon flawed intelligence.
Now Libya changed its course (Step 5 above) even under the present circumstances. Others may follow suit too. But, I don't think as many countries and leaders will follow the Libya example because of the damage done to the pre-emption policy by this intelligence failure. Too bad, IMO, becuase it probably could have worked really well if the WMD thing had fallen into place.
Somehow or other, the intelligence "failure" has got to be investigated and explained to the satisfaction of the American people. They must be persuaded that the next intelligence assessments they are given are sound and true. Could take a long time. The pre-emption doctrine may still be alive, but it is probably on a ventilator for a while.
We can start with a re-evaluation of 'intelligence' we receive from 'friendly' nations who have their own vested interest in using our military might to settle their scores..
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*Originally posted by myvoice: *
Somehow or other, the intelligence "failure" has got to be investigated and explained to the satisfaction of the American people. They must be persuaded that the next intelligence assessments they are given are sound and true. Could take a long time. The pre-emption doctrine may still be alive, but it is probably on a ventilator for a while.
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Well, the Iraq WMD is not the only intelligence failure. In recent times, we have had a gross under-estimation of Iran and Lybia's nuclear program and mis-reading of North Korea, and also failure to locate OBL. In addition, since 9/11, the off-again-on-again reports about terrorist attacks have made the national threat color coding a butt of joke all over the place. All these raise some very important questions about whether US can claim to have reliable intelligence of all things which are considered vital to national security. It should be more than guess work, if US plans to use the intelligence in a concrete way.
Although, I am sure there are many intelligence successes, which will never hear about, and its possible that Kay may prove to be wrong after all (the chances are getting slim, though). But, having said that, there is no doubt that America's credibility has suffered a massive blow now.
why have a short term memory.. why not start with the catastrophic intellegence failure of not being able to prevent 9/11.. The agencies gobble up billions in budgets.. the chiefs should have had the decenty to at least pretend to resign.. instead they demand more money and then create more beurocracy..
I dislike the whole ideal behind pre-emptive strike.
Especially in the case of Iraq.
Someone please advise why I should believe that it was the right thing to do. Someone please advise or remind me of the moment Iraq threatend to harm me or my people. When exactly did Iraq say that they are prepared to invade my country?
Was Iraq ever invited to join a nuclear treaty?
What if during the cold war Russia sent over a couple of nukes pre-emptively because they were pre-defending themselves?
My thinking that pre-emptively, pre-defending....pre-emptively is Pre-negative...and the attitude a bully would exhibit.
Personally... I don't like being bullied and I don't like bullys.
What is justifiable about attacking and killing other humans based on speculation that they might be capable of hurting you? Speculating that they might hurt you in the future?
Why isn't the policy one of easing tensions? Might easing tensions be easier? Doesn't it feel better to attempt to understand, assist and try to help others?
What if you lived in a house where everyone in the house always made accusation that you were plotting against them? I mean..isn't that sort of an ugly way to live?