Relationship between the political system and causes of war (questions)

[Tom Odom]

At the risk of self-promoting, read my memoirs, especially the final three chapters on Rwanda regarding intelligence reporting, analysis, and strategic warning concerning the prospects for a larger war in central Africa.

Journey into Darkness: Genocide in Rwanda, TAMU press 2005. Your library probably has it.

I also suggest that you read this article in SWJ magazine:
Guerrillas From the Mist: A Defense Attaché Watches the Rwandan Patriotic Front Transform from Insurgent to Counter Insurgent

Best

Tom

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

It’s nice to see that Tom isn’t beneath engaging in a little blatant self-promotion of his many literary accomplishments.

Information overload certainly becomes a by-product of increased collection capability. This may, or may not, "blur" the picture. However, I believe this is more relevant to the utilization of operational intelligence where the LIMFAC is time.

“The method in which state actors collect, evaluate, and apply strategic intelligence will decisively judge their fate” rings true throughout the history of conflict. Within the realm of strategic intelligence more may be better yet also increases the requirement for analysts to determine what is useful information and what may be dis-information. Despite the advances in collection and analysis, we still cannot “see” into the heart and mind of a state leader.

It is not merely a factor of what, or how much, you know; it’s in how you leverage that knowledge into viable action.

[Jedburgh]

If you are looking at the influence of intelligence upon decision making at the national strategic decision-making level, then I highly recommend giving a read of a book I've recommended on this board a couple of times: Knowing One's Enemies: Intelligence Assessment Before the Two World Wars

The book was published by Princeton University Press in '86 and consists of sixteen essays that describe in fair detail intelligence collection, analysis and decision making at the national level in countries about to go to war (Austria-Hungary, Germany, Russia, France, Great Britain and Italy before WWI and Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Japan, and the US before WWII).

And, although they don't go into as much detail on the strategic intelligence feed into national-level pre-conflict decision making, I also recommend Irresolute Princes: Kremlin Decision Making in Middle East Crises, 1967-1973, Chinese National Security Decisionmaking Under Stress, and Who's at the Helm? Lessons of Lebanon. There's more, but that's just an off-the-cuff recommendation before I go get my post-lunch coffee.....

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

Signals of War: The Flaklands Conflicts of 1982 by Lawrence Freedman is pretty good but nothing beats:

The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman

[Tom Odom]

It’s nice to see that Tom isn’t beneath engaging in a little blatant self-promotion of his many literary accomplishments.

It was not blatant. It was flagrant.

[Steve Blair]

It was not blatant. It was flagrant.

Or was that flatulent?

In all seriousness, Tom, your book's on my "to buy" list. Only "Mars Learning" is ahead of it right now.

[Tom Odom]

Or was that flatulent?

In all seriousness, Tom, your book's on my "to buy" list. Only "Mars Learning" is ahead of it right now.

As a southern boy I don't do flatulence

I merely fart

More than ever or so my wife tells me

And tells me...

[CR6]

The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman

Good choice, from the standpoint of how leaders can become locked into the execution of pre-determined plans (Moltke the Younger), despite intelligence that the actual situation is different from the one for which you planned.

I also recommend Stoessinger's Why Nations GO to War, specifically chapter one, for a discussion of how personality and state of mind affect rational thought under stress.

[J Wolfsberger]

One point that hasn't been made yet, is that most of our intelligence sources (SIGINT, ELINT, etc.) tell you about capability and potential. They give no insight into intentions, which are, in any case, changeable as the wind.

With regard to the latter, the only source is human intelligence, i.e. the mistress, cabinet member, bureaucrat, etc. who's been turned and is now feeding information to the other side. (A US capability that was gutted in the late seventies and is only now being rebuilt.) Even then, the intel is only as good as what the source is told. If his own people are lying to him, the best he can do is pass on the lies. On top of which, the source may be lying to us for his own motives.

Our decision to go into Iraq provides a good example of the problems:

1. We knew Saddam would use chemical weapons. (He already had, against Iran in war and Kurdish civilians in "revolt.")
2. We knew he had the capability to produce them. (Anyone who can't convert a fertilizer, pesticide, pharmaceutical, etc. plant to manufacture chemical weapons, and hide the capability, simply isn't trying.)
3. We were getting reports from inside his cabinet that he claimed to still have them. (These apparently were true.)
4. We were told by Iraqi expats that he had them. (These apparently were false, and presented out of personal motives.)
5. We had chatter among his officer corps about the use of their own chemical weapons. ("Do you think he'll really use them?" "Are you ready if he does?")

To summarize, the intel that he had chemical weapons was good. As it turns out, the reason it was good is that Saddam was trying to make it good, running a domestic and international bluff.

Didn't work out well for him.

(WHAT!?! Tom wrote a book!?! Who knew? )

[Jedburgh]

One point that hasn't been made yet, is that most of our intelligence sources (SIGINT, ELINT, etc.) tell you about capabilityand potential. They give no insight into intentions, which are, in any case, changeable as the wind.

With regard to the latter, the only source is human intelligence, i.e. the mistress, cabinet member, bureaucrat, etc. who's been turned and is now feeding information to the other side....

As a career HUMINTer, I have to say that any claim that only HUMINT can provide insight to intentions is false. SIGINT, when collection is targeted effectively, is also a valuable direct source of information regarding intent. When HUMINT and SIGINT are effectively coordinated to collect on a target set, each feeding into the other in a structured collection effort, then the degree to which intentions can be ascertained is greatly expanded beyond the individual capabilities of either. Of course, the other INTs often have significant value in corroborating, invalidating, or simply providing additional indicators of assessed intent - IMINT immediately comes to mind.

You also must understand that capabilities are inextricably linked with intent. Neither intentions without capabilities nor capabilities without intentions pose a threat. A threat only exists when both are manifested together. The statement that "capabilities give no insight into intentions" is false. Capabilities, how they are obtained, structured and used in the context of the collection target, are often an important indicator of intent. So, it is not a question of capabilities vs intentions, but of coming to a logical judgment of intent in light of a host of indicators from the spectrum of collection assets available.

It is rare that a single collection asset, no matter how well placed, will provide stark warning of a clear and unmistable intent (decision made, action about to be initiated) for a specific course of action to be taken at the national strategic level by a potential threat. If only it was that easy.....

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

You also must understand that capabilities are inextricably linked with intent. Neither intentions without capabilities nor capabilities without intentions pose a threat.

It seems to me that it isn’t always true since the Grand Fenwick Expeditionary Force had intentions without capabilities yet still managed to bring the US to its knees.

[wm]

As a career HUMINTer, I have to say that any claim that only HUMINT can provide insight to intentions is false. SIGINT, when collection is targeted effectively, is also a valuable direct source of information regarding intent. When HUMINT and SIGINT are effectively coordinated to collect on a target set, each feeding into the other in a structured collection effort, then the degree to which intentions can be ascertained is greatly expanded beyond the individual capabilities of either. Of course, the other INTs often have significant value in corroborating, invalidating, or simply providing additional indicators of assessed intent - IMINT immediately comes to mind.

You also must understand that capabilities are inextricably linked with intent. Neither intentions without capabilities nor capabilities without intentions pose a threat. A threat only exists when both are manifested together. The statement that "capabilities give no insight into intentions" is false. Capabilities, how they are obtained, structured and used in the context of the collection target, are often an important indicator of intent. So, it is not a question of capabilities vs intentions, but of coming to a logical judgment of intent in light of a host of indicators from the spectrum of collection assets available.

It is rare that a single collection asset, no matter how well placed, will provide stark warning of a clear and unmistable intent (decision made, action about to be initiated) for a specific course of action to be taken at the national strategic level by a potential threat. If only it was that easy.....

To piggyback on this post, I'd add that a failure to use an integrated intelligence effort is more likely to produce a false picture. I submit the August 1968 Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia as a case study in how not to do I & W intelligence. Or at least how not to use the data that assets used for I&W have collected.

[J Wolfsberger]

As a career HUMINTer, I have to say that any claim that only HUMINT can provide insight to intentions is false. SIGINT, when collection is targeted effectively, is also a valuable direct source of information regarding intent. When HUMINT and SIGINT are effectively coordinated to collect on a target set, each feeding into the other in a structured collection effort, then the degree to which intentions can be ascertained is greatly expanded beyond the individual capabilities of either. Of course, the other INTs often have significant value in corroborating, invalidating, or simply providing additional indicators of assessed intent - IMINT immediately comes to mind.

...

Hmm. I understand your points. Let me try to rephrase in way we might agree on: The other forms of intel serve to confirm (through observation of activity) our estimate of intent.

The point I was getting at (perhaps poorly) is that no amount of SIGINT (for example) will inform you whether a telephone reference to "Uncle's birthday present" is to a terrorist event ... or a new tie.