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Filed under Stuff
The shah wasn’t supposed to fall; Iraq’s WMD were supposed to be a ‘slam dunk.’
By Gabriel Schoenfeld
When we hear the sound of hoofbeats, should we think horses or zebras? The question is a classic problem of intelligence analysis. Too often in recent years the CIA, FBI and Department of Homeland Security have got it wrong—most recently with the Christmas Day underwear bomber, who was able to board a U.S.-bound flight despite plenty of early warning signs. Political scientist Robert Jervis wants to know the reason for such error.
In “Why Intelligence Fails,” Mr. Jervis examines two important U.S. intelligence lapses and tries to account for what went awry. After both, the CIA hired Mr. Jervis—a longtime student of international affairs—to help the agency sort out its mistakes. He thus brings an invaluable perspective as a smart outsider with sufficient inside access to appraise the agency’s blind spots. Continue reading
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But if so, the blame doesn’t lie wholly with government agencies charged with maintaining the lists. Some share of responsibility lies with civil libertarian extremists who have ceaselessly lambasted the entire no-fly system. Continue reading
Like cancer, ideas can metastasize. In 2007, John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt — the former a professor at the University of Chicago, the latter at Harvard — came out with The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. A “situation [that] has no equal in American history” had arisen, they wrote in the book (and in a paper bearing the same title posted on Harvard’s website). A domestic pressure-lobby–a body mostly comprising “American Jews making a significant effort in their daily lives to bend U.S. foreign policy so that it advances Israel’s interests” — had accumulated “unmatched power” and was using it to “skew” the American political system for its own narrow ends. Among other things, the Jewish lobby had used its “stranglehold” on Congress and “manipulation” of the mass media to propel the United States into war in Iraq. Continue reading
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Wall Street Journal
Atomic Obsession: Nuclear Alarmism From Hiroshima to Al-Qaeda
By John Mueller (Oxford, 319 pages, $27.95)
Reviewed by Gabriel Schoenfeld
In the years since the first nuclear bomb was tested in 1945, the world’s major powers have acquired vast arsenals of the devastating weapons. Minor powers have been working feverishly to follow suit. Some unstable and menacing ones, like Pakistan and North Korea, have been successful. Among those seeking to join the club, Iran is leading the pack. More than a half-century since the birth of the atomic age, nuclear weapons remain the polestar around which geopolitics revolve.
Is all the worry about them misplaced? John Mueller, a political scientist at Ohio State University, certainly thinks so. In “Atomic Obsession,” he argues that nuclear weapons are far less important both as threats and as deterrents than almost anyone assumes. The weapons have always been nearly superfluous, he says; they remain so today. Continue reading
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New York Post
Another Obama Test on Israel
J-street is a new Washington, DC-based Jewish lobbying group that is seeking a place at the table alongside more venerable organizations like the American Jewish Committee and the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee. Started only a year ago with generous “seed money” from the financier George Soros, its first national conference begins this Sunday. The keynote speaker — if he shows up — will be National Security Adviser Gen. James Jones.
The “if” is an important question, for there is a chance, if the White House pays attention to the controversy it would be stepping into, that Jones won’t show. Continue reading
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Does the United States still have a vital interest in Afghanistan? Are some experts right to compare the war to Vietnam? What should be the military objective and exit strategy? Gabriel Schoenfeld and Brian Katulis debate in the Los Angeles Times.
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