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Original Articles

Miscalculation, surprise and American intelligence after the cold war

Pages 1-16 | Published online: 09 Jan 2008

References

  • Garthoff , Raymond L. 1989 . Reflections on the Cuban Missile Crisis , 46 157 Washington, D.C. : The Brookings Institution .
  • Wohlstetter , Roberta . 1962 . Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision , 55 Stanford, Calif. : Stanford University Press . Kimmel quoted in
  • Wirtz , James J. 1990 . “Deception and the Tet Offensive,” . The Journal of Strategic Studies , June : 82 – 98 .
  • Cohen , Eliot A. and Gooch , John . 1990 . Military Misfortunes: The Anatomy of Failure in War , 128 – 131 . New York : The Free Press .
  • Wirtz . “Deception and the Tet Offensive,” . 94
  • Garthoff . Reflections on the Cuban Missile Crisis 157
  • Handel , Michael I. , ed. 1989 . Leaders and Intelligence , 26 – 27 . London : Frank Cass and Co. .
  • Tzu , Sun . The Art of War , Edited by: Griffith , Samuel B. 66 – 69 . 77 Oxford : Oxford University Press .
  • Handel , Michael I. 1984 . “Intelligence and the Problem of Strategic Surprise,” . The Journal of Strategic Studies , September : 230
  • Luttwak , Edward N. 1987 . Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace , 8 Cambridge : Harvard University Press . The difficulty of concealing initiatives from one's opponent, while still concentrating sufficient forces to have a decisive effect, was long ago recognized by Clausewitz: “Preparations for war usually take months. Concentrating troops at their main assembly points generally requires the installation of supply dumps and depots, as well as considerable troop movements, whose purpose can be assessed soon enough. It is very rare therefore that one state surprises another, either by an attack or by preparations for war,”
  • Clausewitz , Carl von . 1967 . On War , Edited by: Howard , Michael and Paret , Peter . 199 Princeton : Princeton University Press . Clausewitz's pessimistic assessment of the problems inherent in achieving surprise, however, should be balanced against his equally pessimistic assessment of intelligence estimates; see
  • Kahn , David . 1986 . “Clausewitz and Intelligence,” . In Clausewitz and Modern Strategy , Edited by: Handel , Michael I. 117 – 126 . London : Frank Cass and Co. .
  • Handel , Michael I. 1976 . Perception, Deception and Surprise: The Case of the Yom Kippur War , 16 Jerusalem : The Leonard Davis Institute .
  • Mearsheimer , John J. 1983 . Conventional Deterrence , 34 Ithaca : Cornell University Press .
  • Handel . “Intelligence and the Problem of Strategic Surprise,” . 230
  • Cole , Hugh M. 1965 . The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge , Washington, D.C. : Office of the Chief of Military History . On the Ardennes Offensive see
  • Eisenhower , John . 1969 . The Bitter Woods , New York : G.P. Putnam's Sons .
  • Baldwin , Hanson . 1966 . Battles Lost and Won , 315 – 367 . New York : Harper & Row .
  • Bradley , Omar N. 1951 . A Soldier's Story , 447 – 495 . New York : Henry Holt & Co. .
  • Eisenhower , Dwight D. 1948 . Crusade in Europe , 337 – 365 . New York : Doubleday & Co. .
  • Wohlstetter . Pearl Harbor 353 According to Wohlstetter, Japan's “initial success might discourage us [the United States] and make us quit, and her leaders could only hope that that was what would happen; but they had no way of depriving us of the means and the will to continue fighting,”
  • Betts , Richard K. 1982 . Surprise Attack: Lessons for Defense Planning , 122 Washington, D.C. : The Brookings Institution . For fine discussions of the relationship between mirror‐imaging and surprise see
  • Kam , Ephraim . 1988 . Surprise Attack: The Victim's Perspective , 64 – 69 . Cambridge : Harvard University Press .
  • Wohlstetter . Pearl Harbor 354 – 355 .
  • Wirtz . “Deception and the Tet Offensive,” . 93 – 94 .
  • Westmoreland , William C. 1976 . A Soldier Reports , 322 Garden City, N.Y. : Doubleday . Davidson quoted in
  • Betts , Richard . 1987 . “Analysis, War and Decision: Why Intelligence Failures are Inevitable,” . World Politics , October : 63 For examples of this consensus see
  • Handel . “Intelligence and the Problem of Strategic Surprise,” . 229
  • Wirtz , James J. 1989 . “The Intelligence Paradigm,” . Intelligence and National Security , October : 829 – 837 . For a dissenting opinion see
  • Levite , Ariel . 1987 . Intelligence and Strategic Surprise , New York : Columbia University Press .
  • In a relative sense, the decline of the threat posed by the USSR could heighten American perceptions of the apparent threat to U.S. interests posed by Third World contingencies. In an absolute sense, instability in the “periphery” could mount as the superpowers’ “spheres of influence” recede, leading to an objective increase in the threat posed to American interests by events in the Third World.
  • Van Evera , Stephen . 1990–91 . “Primed for Peace: Europe After the Cold War,” . International Security , Winter : 45 This positive evaluation of the situation faced by the American intelligence community during the Cold War is based upon
  • Waltz , Kenneth N. 1979 . Theory of International Politics , Reading, Mass. : Addison‐Wesley .
  • Gaddis , John Lewis . 1986 . “The Long Peace: Elements of Stability in the Postwar International System,” . International Security , Spring : 99 – 142 .
  • Eickelman , Dale F. 1988 . “Intelligence in an Arab Gulf State,” . In Comparing Foreign Intelligence , Edited by: Godson , Roy . 89 – 114 . Washington, D.C. : Pergamon‐Brassey's . For an insightful discussion of a non‐Western intelligence organization, see
  • Smith , R. Jeffrey . 1990 . “U.S. Forces Seen as Only Option,” . The Washington Post , 30 September : 23 Saddam Hussein quoted in
  • Jervis , Robert . 1976 . Perception and Misperception in International Politics , 343 – 355 . Princeton : Princeton University Press .
  • Lardner , George . 1990 . “Saddam's Inner Circle Seen as Unquestioning,” . The Washington Post , 3 December : 17
  • Macdonald , Douglas . 1989 . ‘The Vietnam Metaphor in United States Foreign Policy,” . paper presented at the New England Political Science Association Annual Meeting . April 7–8 1989 , Cambridge, Massachusetts. Ibid. In employing the Vietnam analogy, Hussein apparently focuses on the American decision, interpreted as a lack of will, not to see the war to a successful conclusion. Hussein ignores the fact, however, that the United States was heavily involved in Vietnam for over twenty years, an involvement that produced hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese casualties. Despite this perceived “lack of will,” the Vietnamese still have not recovered from their exposure to American military power. For a discussion of the way American and foreign statesmen have employed the Vietnam analogy see
  • Dobbs , Michael . 1990 . “Moscow Struggles to Determine Role in Gulf Crisis,” . The Washington Post , 7 August : 12
  • Cody , Edward . 1990 . “Iraq Warns Soviets Against Giving U.S. Military Information,” . The Washington Post , 13 October : 17
  • Shenon , Philip . 1990 . “Iraq Says U.N. Backing for Use of Force is ‘No Concern to Us,’” . The New York Times , 29 November : 14 As the United Nations Security Council deliberated the resolution to use force to drive Iraq from Kuwait, Al Tharawa, Iraq's government‐run newspaper declared, “any decision taken by the Security Council under the present U.S. hegemony is of no concern to us. It will not force us to step back or relinquish our national historical rights,” quoted in
  • 1990 . “Over 200 Western Firms Exported Weapons to Iraq,” . The Wall Street Journal , 3 October : B4 Although the Soviets and Chinese supplied Hussein with the bulk of his arsenal, several Western nations, including the United States, contributed over the years to the Iraqi military machine, see
  • Coll , Steve . 1990 . “U.S.‐Gulf Ties Eased Buildup,” . The Washington Post , 14 August : 14
  • Hoffman , David and Balz , Dan . 1990 . “Iraqi Threatens U.S. Interests, CIA Says,” . The Washington Post , 6 August : 1
  • Miller , Judith . 1990 . “Saudis Tell of Iraq Hot‐Line Drama,” . The New York Times , 4 October : 15
  • Scarborough , Rowan . 1990 . “CIA, Defense Saw Different Aims in Buildup,” . The Washington Times , August : 11
  • Evans , Rowland and Novak , Robert . 1990 . “Saddam's Dangerous Vision,” . The Washington Post , 3 August : 23
  • Munro , Neil . 1990 . “Invasion Shows Interpretation, Politics Restrict Value of Military Intelligence,” . Defense News , 13 August : 35
  • Lardner , George . 1990 . “Amid Defense Cuts, Intelligence Funding Allocations May Shift,” . The Washington Post , 9 October : 4 The debate over future intelligence budgets has already raised these and similar issues, see
  • Wirtz , James J. 1989 . “On Using Mirrors to See Others,” . International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence , Winter : 588 – 592 . For an elaboration of these ideas, see

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