Quote Originally Posted by Fuchs View Post
Operational deception is a problem for MI analysts and commanders, not for recce folks in the field. They report what they have.
True -- and they can be and have been fooled by tactical deception...
I'm sure it was possible to learn about Tet in advance as well, but sometimes MI and commanders provoke being fooled by being too fixed in their beliefs.
Totally true -- and a belief that they knew the opponents intent lulled them into not expecting the magnitude of the attacks. Thanks for recalling that...
Nevertheless, recce can yield the opposing commander's intent.
How?
Again - judgment of recce reports is not the problem of recce folks in the field.
True and no one here is saying that it is as nearly as I can tell. However, recall that some Commander, somewhere, is going to make use of those reports to determine capabilities and to try to infer probabilities. He will not in most cases be able to get into the mind of his opponent.

What Wilf and I are saying is that you can ascertain capabilities and even, if you're lucky -- or really good -- probabilities but you can not determine the opposing commanders intentions. Further, that even if you were able to do so, he can change in a second to do something unexpected and you can be working of what was or has become an erroneous conclusion. You have to ass u me intentions, never a good plan...