Why Secret Intelligence Fails

Author : Michael A. Turner
Publisher : Potomac Books, Inc.
ISBN 13 : 1612343074
Total Pages : 346 pages
Book Rating : 4.75/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Why Secret Intelligence Fails written by Michael A. Turner and published by Potomac Books, Inc.. This book was released on 2011-07 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Michael Turner argues that the root causes of failures in American intelligence can be found in the way it is organized and in the intelligence process itself. Intelligence that has gone awry affects national decision making and, ultimately, American national security. Intelligence officials are reluctant to talk about intelligence successes, claiming "the secret of our success is the secret of our success." But these officials also shy away from talking about failures, largely because doing so would expose the failings of American intelligence and have an impact on policy consumers who may become more reluctant to accept and act on the intelligence they receive. Rather than focusing on case studies, the book takes a holistic approach, beginning with structural issues and all dysfunctions that emanate from them. Turner explores each step of the intelligence cycle--priority setting, intelligence collection, analysis, production, and dissemination--to identify the "inflection points" within each stage that contribute to intelligence failures. Finally, he examines a variety of plans that, if implemented, would reduce the likelihood of intelligence failures. While examining the causes of intelligence failures, Turner also explores intelligence as a critical governmental activity, making the book an excellent primer on secret intelligence. Turner writes in jargon-free prose for the informed reader interested in foreign policy and national security policy matters and brings enough depth to his subject that even experts will find this a must-read.

Author : Robert Jervis
Publisher : Cornell University Press
ISBN 13 : 0801457610
Total Pages : 248 pages
Book Rating : 4.16/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Why Intelligence Fails written by Robert Jervis and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2010-12-15 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The U.S. government spends enormous resources each year on the gathering and analysis of intelligence, yet the history of American foreign policy is littered with missteps and misunderstandings that have resulted from intelligence failures. In Why Intelligence Fails, Robert Jervis examines the politics and psychology of two of the more spectacular intelligence failures in recent memory: the mistaken belief that the regime of the Shah in Iran was secure and stable in 1978, and the claim that Iraq had active WMD programs in 2002. The Iran case is based on a recently declassified report Jervis was commissioned to undertake by CIA thirty years ago and includes memoranda written by CIA officials in response to Jervis's findings. The Iraq case, also grounded in a review of the intelligence community's performance, is based on close readings of both classified and declassified documents, though Jervis's conclusions are entirely supported by evidence that has been declassified. In both cases, Jervis finds not only that intelligence was badly flawed but also that later explanations—analysts were bowing to political pressure and telling the White House what it wanted to hear or were willfully blind—were also incorrect. Proponents of these explanations claimed that initial errors were compounded by groupthink, lack of coordination within the government, and failure to share information. Policy prescriptions, including the recent establishment of a Director of National Intelligence, were supposed to remedy the situation. In Jervis's estimation, neither the explanations nor the prescriptions are adequate. The inferences that intelligence drew were actually quite plausible given the information available. Errors arose, he concludes, from insufficient attention to the ways in which information should be gathered and interpreted, a lack of self-awareness about the factors that led to the judgments, and an organizational culture that failed to probe for weaknesses and explore alternatives. Evaluating the inherent tensions between the methods and aims of intelligence personnel and policymakers from a unique insider's perspective, Jervis forcefully criticizes recent proposals for improving the performance of the intelligence community and discusses ways in which future analysis can be improved.

Author : Michael Turner
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781422390894
Total Pages : 217 pages
Book Rating : 4.96/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Why Secret Intelligence Fails written by Michael Turner and published by . This book was released on 2007-12-01 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Intelligence (intel) officials are reluctant to talk about intel successes. But these officials also shy away from failures, largely because doing so would expose their shortcomings & make policy makers more reluctant to act on the intel they receive. The root causes of failure in Amer. intel can be found in the way it is organized & in the intel process itself. Explores how the intel community functions, making it an excellent primer on secret intel. Discusses all the dysfunctions that emanate from them. Explores each step of the intel cycle -- priority setting, intel collection, analysis, production, & dissem. -- to identify the ¿inflection points¿ that contribute to intel failures. Examines a variety of plans that, if implemented, would improve Amer. intel.

Author : Kjetil Anders Hatlebrekke
Publisher : Edinburgh University Press
ISBN 13 : 0748691847
Total Pages : 272 pages
Book Rating : 4.45/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Problem of Secret Intelligence written by Kjetil Anders Hatlebrekke and published by Edinburgh University Press. This book was released on 2019-05-03 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is intelligence - why is it so hard to define, and why is there no systematic theory of intelligence? Kjetil Anders Hatlebrekke creates a new, systematic model of intelligence analysis, arguing that good intelligence is based on understanding the threats that appear beyond our experience, and are therefore the most dangerous to society.

Author : Bill Gertz
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1596987103
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.04/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Breakdown written by Bill Gertz and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-03-28 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York Times bestselling author Bill Gertz uses his unparalleled access to America's intelligence system to show how this system completely broke down in the years, months, and days leading up to the deadly terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Author : James J. Wirtz
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1317375726
Total Pages : 271 pages
Book Rating : 4.22/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Understanding Intelligence Failure written by James J. Wirtz and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-11-10 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection, comprising key works by James J. Wirtz, explains how different threat perceptions can lead to strategic surprise attack, intelligence failure and the failure of deterrence. This volume adopts a strategist’s view of the issue of surprise and intelligence failure by placing these phenomena in the context of conflict between strong and weak actors in world affairs. A two-level theory explains the incentives and perceptions of both parties when significant imbalances of military power exist between potential combatants, and how this situation sets the stage for strategic surprise and intelligence failure to occur. The volume illustrates this theory by applying it to the Kargil Crisis, attacks launched by non-state actors, and by offering a comparison of Pearl Harbor and the September 11, 2001 attacks. It explores the phenomenon of deterrence failure; specifically, how weaker parties in an enduring or nascent conflict come to believe that deterrent threats posed by militarily stronger antagonists will be undermined by various constraints, increasing the attractiveness of utilising surprise attack to achieve their objectives. This work also offers strategies that could mitigate the occurrence of intelligence failure, strategic surprise and the failure of deterrence. This book will be of much interest to students of intelligence studies, strategic studies, security studies and IR in general.

Author : Uri Bar-Joseph
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 019067699X
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.95/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Intelligence Success and Failure written by Uri Bar-Joseph and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017-03-03 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The study of strategic surprise has long concentrated on important failures that resulted in catastrophes such as Pearl Harbor and the September 11th attacks, and the majority of previously published research in the field determines that such large-scale military failures often stem from defective information-processing systems. Intelligence Success and Failure challenges this common assertion that catastrophic surprise attacks are the unmistakable products of warning failure alone. Further, Uri Bar-Joseph and Rose McDermott approach this topic uniquely by highlighting the successful cases of strategic surprise, as well as the failures, from a psychological perspective. This book delineates the critical role of individual psychopathologies in precipitating failure by investigating important historical cases. Bar-Joseph and McDermott use six particular military attacks as examples for their analysis, including: "Barbarossa," the June 1941 German invasion of the USSR (failure); the fall-winter 1941 battle for Moscow (success); the Arab attack on Israel on Yom Kippur 1973 (failure); and the second Egyptian offensive in the war six days later (success). From these specific cases and others, they analyze the psychological mechanisms through which leaders assess their own fatal mistakes and use the intelligence available to them. Their research examines the factors that contribute to failure and success in responding to strategic surprise and identify the learning process that central decision makers use to facilitate subsequent successes. Intelligence Success and Failure presents a new theory in the study of strategic surprise that claims the key explanation for warning failure is not unintentional action, but rather, motivated biases in key intelligence and central leaders that null any sense of doubt prior to surprise attacks.

Author : Christopher Andrew
Publisher : Yale University Press
ISBN 13 : 030024052X
Total Pages : 1019 pages
Book Rating : 4.28/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Secret World written by Christopher Andrew and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2018-09-04 with total page 1019 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A comprehensive exploration of spying in its myriad forms from the Bible to the present day . . . Easy to dip into, and surprisingly funny.” —Ben Macintyre in The New York Times Book Review The history of espionage is far older than any of today’s intelligence agencies, yet largely forgotten. The codebreakers at Bletchley Park, the most successful WWII intelligence agency, were completely unaware that their predecessors had broken the codes of Napoleon during the Napoleonic wars and those of Spain before the Spanish Armada. Those who do not understand past mistakes are likely to repeat them. Intelligence is a prime example. At the outbreak of WWI, the grasp of intelligence shown by US President Woodrow Wilson and British Prime Minister Herbert Asquith was not in the same class as that of George Washington during the Revolutionary War and eighteenth-century British statesmen. In the first global history of espionage ever written, distinguished historian and New York Times–bestselling author Christopher Andrew recovers much of the lost intelligence history of the past three millennia—and shows us its continuing relevance. “Accurate, comprehensive, digestible and startling . . . a stellar achievement.” —Edward Lucas, The Times “For anyone with a taste for wide-ranging and shrewdly gossipy history—or, for that matter, for anyone with a taste for spy stories—Andrew’s is one of the most entertaining books of the past few years.” —Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker “Remarkable for its scope and delightful for its unpredictable comparisons . . . there are important lessons for spymasters everywhere in this breathtaking and brilliant book.” —Richard J. Aldrich, Times Literary Supplement “Fans of Fleming and Furst will delight in this skillfully related true-fact side of the story.” —Kirkus Reviews “A crowning triumph of one of the most adventurous scholars of the security world.” —Financial Times Includes illustrations

Author : Christopher Andrew
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 0429647360
Total Pages : 698 pages
Book Rating : 4.69/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Secret Intelligence written by Christopher Andrew and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-07-26 with total page 698 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The second edition of Secret Intelligence: A Reader brings together key essays from the field of intelligence studies, blending classic works on concepts and approaches with more recent essays dealing with current issues and ongoing debates about the future of intelligence. Secret intelligence has never enjoyed a higher profile. The events of 9/11, the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the missing WMD controversy, public debates over prisoner interrogation, together with the revelations of figures such as Edward Snowden, recent cyber attacks and the rise of 'hybrid warfare' have all contributed to make this a ‘hot’ subject over the past two decades. Aiming to be more comprehensive than existing books, and to achieve truly international coverage of the field, this book provides key readings and supporting material for students and course convenors. It is divided into four main sections, each of which includes full summaries of each article, further reading suggestions and student questions: • The intelligence cycle • Intelligence, counter-terrorism and security • Ethics, accountability and secrecy • Intelligence and the new warfare This new edition contains essays by leading scholars in the field and will be essential reading for students of intelligence studies, strategic studies, international security and political science in general, and of interest to anyone wishing to understand the current relationship between intelligence and policy-making.

Author : Glenmore S. Trenear-Harvey
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN 13 : 1442232749
Total Pages : 307 pages
Book Rating : 4.47/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Historical Dictionary of Intelligence Failures written by Glenmore S. Trenear-Harvey and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2014-11-20 with total page 307 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An Intelligence failure can be defined where there was intelligence available about a particular event, but either it was not collected or was mishandled later in the assessment cycle, as opposed to the failure of an intelligence operation. The Historical Dictionary of Intelligence Failures covers the history of intelligence failures through a chronology, an introductory essay, an extensive bibliography, and over 100 cross-referenced dictionary entries on the Ardennes Offensive, the Six Day War, and the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Prague Spring, the Arab Spring, 9/11. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about the intelligence industry.