Smarter intelligence

Eric J. Dahl seems to understand the intel issue. But will Congress listen to the experts? Politics is no reason to change government; in fact it is a bad reason. And this intel bill reeks of politics...More to follow//JW sends.

The 9/11 commission, to its credit, did recognize the importance of these analytical shortcomings and called for the "institutionalizing of imagination" among analysts and policy-makers in combating terrorism. But such broad advice cannot easily be translated into legislation, and most intelligence reform proposals do little more to address this issue than to establish "alternative analysis" units that attempt to imagine out-of-the-box scenarios.

True, no nation and no intelligence service can ever provide a 100 percent guarantee against disaster. But history suggests that the footprints of tomorrow's terrorist attack can be seen today.

Indeed, the lessons from these attacks suggest three approaches that may help us recognize these indicators and anticipate attacks in the future.

First, the intelligence community must devote more attention to long-term analysis, with less emphasis on quick turnaround of current information. Military commanders and policy makers are inundated with threat reports but often complain that little of what they get is useful.

Second, the intelligence community must do better at anticipating innovation on the part of an enemy. Most of the successful terror attacks against the United States since 1983 have either used familiar weapons in new and more deadly ways or attacked targets that had been attacked or targeted before but attacked them in a way we did not anticipate.

Third, policy-makers and intelligence officials must realize that precise warning of attack will almost never be available, and they cannot hold off making difficult policy decisions or taking expensive protective measures while waiting for such warning. In the past, when our leaders have hesitated because the intelligence wasn't clear, Americans have died.