Intelligence Failure

I noticed on 60 Minutes last night that the president continues to feel a failure of American intelligence is what led USAers to attack Iraq, thinking to pre-empt any use of WMDs against the USA homeland.

I would think he'd be reassured to know that American intelligence was tracking the UN's progress and coming to the same conclusion as the Blix team and Scott Ritter: there were no noteworthy, ongoing WMD programs in Iraq, just some plans and intentions -- much like you'll find in any military organization.

On the other hand, various constituencies in charge of the machinery of government, had no interest in the public discovering that Iraq was defenseless. This information was apparently concealed from the military as well.

So yes, there was a failure, but only in the sense that the machinery of government had fallen into less intelligent hands. That's why Negroponte was brought in, to help address that situation (mission accomplished).

Today, I don't think we'd be that stupid, although a high level of vigilance is always required, to keep our intelligence community smoothly running on rails, not jumping the tracks.