The politics of intelligence failures: power, rationality, and the intelligence process

ABSTRACT

This article develops a new approach to analysing intelligence failures. Rather than looking for their causes, intelligence failures are here analysed as part of a politics seeking to reify the value of rationality and the taming of power. To analyse this politics, the article draws on Bent Flyvbjerg’s notion of an asymmetrical relation of power/rationality, according to which power has a productive role that is inseparable from claims to rationality. The asymmetrical relation of power/rationality is used in order to challenge the instrumentalist language that pervades much of the literature on intelligence failures and what can be learned from them.

Acknowledgements

For his many insightful comments on several drafts of this article, I first of all want to thank Petter Narby. I am also grateful to Stefan Borg, Robert Frisk, Dan Hansén, and Dan Öberg for giving me vital feedback at various stages in the process of writing it. Finally, I wish to thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable criticism.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Marrin, “Evaluating Intelligence Theories,” 481.

2. Marrin, “Preventing Intelligence Failures.”

3. Handel, “The Politics of Intelligence,” 5.

4. Ben Jaffel et al., “Collective Discussion,” 326.

5. Flyvbjerg, Rationality and Power.

6. In Jervis, Why Intelligence Fails, 1.

7. Jensen, “Intelligence Failures,” 270.

8. Kent, Strategic Intelligence, 180.

9. Ibid., 155.

10. Ibid., 206.

11. Lowenthal, Intelligence, 6–7.

12. Jervis, Why Intelligence Fails, 152, 154–5.

13. Ibid., 153.

14. Ibid., 155.

15. “Fact Book on Intelligence,” Central Intelligence Agency (1983), quoted in Johnson, “Making the intelligence ‘cycle’ work,” 1.

16. Gill, “Explaining Intelligence Failure,” 54.

17. Johnson, “Making the Intelligence ‘Cycle’ Work,” 20.

18. Johnson, “Analysis for a New Age,” 670.

19. Jensen, “Intelligence Failures,” 278.

20. Marrin, “Preventing Intelligence Failures,” 669.

21. Jensen, “Intelligence Failures,” 273.

22. Fitzgerald and Ned Lebow, “Iraq: The Mother of All Intelligence Failures,” 895.

23. Betts, Enemies of Intelligence, 98.

24. Rovner, Fixing the Facts, 29.

25. Gill, “The Way Ahead,” 577.

26. Ibid., 578.

27. Jensen, “Intelligence Failures,” 265.

28. Gates, “Guarding Against Politicization,” 9. See also Westerfield, “Inside Ivory Bunkers, Part I,” 409.

29. Woodard, “Tasting the Forbidden Fruit.”

30. Flyvbjerg, Rationality and Power, 2.

31. Ibid., 2.

32. Ibid., 226.

33. Ibid., 226.

34. Foucault, “The Subject and Power,” 341.

35. Hamilton, de Werd, and Ivan, “Critical Intelligence Studies.”

36. Bean, “Rhetorical and Critical/Cultural Intelligence Studies,” 499.

37. Ibid., 504.

38. de Werd, “Reflexive Intelligence,” 514.

39. Ibid., 514.

40. Bean, “Rhetorical and Critical/Cultural Intelligence Studies,” 505.

41. Foucault, “Truth and Power,” 120.

42. Foucault, “The Subject and Power,” 343.

43. Ibid., 340.

44. Drumheller, On the Brink, 4.

45. Ibid., 91.

46. Drogin, Curveball, 251.

47. Ibid., 252.

48. Feldman, Formations of Violence, 9.

49. Drogin, Curveball, 256.

50. Ibid., 256.

51. Tenet, At the Center of the Storm, 511.

52. Ibid., 504.

53. Jervis, Why Intelligence Fails, 146.

54. Tenet, At the Center of the Storm, 503–4.

55. Ibid., 511.

56. Jervis, Why Intelligence Fails, 135.

57. Glaister, “Bush Ignored Intelligence on Iraqi Weapons, Says Ex-CIA Officer.”

58. Lucas, “Recognising Politicization,” 225.

59. Ibid., 227.

60. Drumheller, On the Brink, 2.

61. Ibid., 2.

62. See Ben Jaffel et al., “Collective Discussion.”

63. Bean, “Rhetorical and Critical/Cultural Intelligence Studies,” 514.

Additional information

Funding

Research for this article was made possible by a Swedish Armed Forces’ FoT (“Forskning och Teknik”, 2022) grant.

Notes on contributors

Tom Lundborg

Tom Lundborg is Associate Professor of Political Science at the Swedish Defence University. He is currently exploring the relationship between power and rationality as it plays out in attempts to grapple with the purpose and meaning of the intelligence process. He is the author of numerous articles on international relations and security, published in journals such as International Political Sociology, Review of International Studies, Security Dialogue, and European Journal of International Relations