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Say It Ain't So:
a meditation on the role of government and intelligence reform
by
Guntram Werther, Ph.D.
Earlier this week, Mr. Ron Reinagel - the webmaster of the Gold Canyon Community
website - requested an article from me on the thin justification that I hadn't
written anything for a while. Considering the matter, I inquired as to what he
would like for a topic, to which, in due course, Ron answered: "something on
government."
Thus constrained as to topic, I am moved to admit that - perhaps much to the
chagrin of my many Republican friends - one can live a perfectly decent and
happy life with either much or little government. Both life ways can be, and
frequently are, successful approaches to achieving individual, societal, and
national happiness; depending likely more on individual, societal and national
tastes and preferences than on some inherent defect or benefit within government
itself.
For example, in my lectures on international political economic systems it is
necessary to explain that our European friends - and I include here, perhaps
much against current American wit, the French - work, by stint of law, heavy
government regulation, and concomitantly high taxation, on average less than 40
hours per week and have also on average 4-5 weeks of vacation per year; an
outcome that I achieve more efficiently in Arizona - which has no law - through
the artful application of sloth.
Having thus spared myself taxes, regulation, and force of law, I see
individually chosen sloth as a major intellectual and theoretical step forward
in the efficient management of human societies. Indeed, one of the things I
positively love about the United States is that it is relatively easier to tell
the government to piss off.
With this preamble then, it is necessary to admit that there are many things
that government ought to do because individuals either will not or cannot
effectively and efficiently do them. National defense and law enforcement are
among these things and perhaps many other things are too.
It is, as I have earlier suggested, largely a matter of taste and preference how
much government one chooses to live under; and which tasks it undertakes on our
behalf at what cost in terms of taxation, regulation, and loss of freedom. For
government is always force and force is always loss of freedom, when seen from a
certain perspective. But still, Japan, the EU member nations, Canada, and other
countries, which have much government, are also decent places; and we need to
admit this and truly know it.
Then too, we must admit that there are other things that government ought NOT do
because it is no good at it. Government applied here is taxation, regulation,
and loss of freedom to no good purpose; it is thus a waste and a mistake.
I am going to argue that core aspects of intelligence gathering and analysis,
more than we care to consider in fact, are this type of government activity;
government ought NOT be doing it because it is so bad at it.
In his book "Secrecy", the late honorable US Senator Patrick Moynihan - a
statesman-scholar respected by Democrats and Republicans alike - believed
something: "The problem with...intelligence was precisely that it was
secret...secret information [was seen by him] as a weakness in decision
making...intelligence agencies relied on secret sources of information. Their
assumptions, calculations, and ways of manipulating data were just as secret.
How impressive." (quoted from "Secrecy" @ page 7).
In sum, Senator Moynihan of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence asked:
If freedom and markets are so good for wealth creation, what makes secrecy and
bureaucracy good for idea and intelligence creation?
We preferred to evade rather than confront that question. We do so still.
Prior to becoming Director of Central Intelligence (CIA), Porter Goss said that
the CIA was a "stilted bureaucracy incapable of the slightest degree of
success." I said much the same thing half a decade earlier with, I must add, a
much less kind effect on my career. I said that these people [international
relations scholars etc.] "couldn't predict summertime in July." (Werther,
Guntram. "The Crisis of Business Intelligence: on the necessity of training
reform." Thunderbird International Business Review. Vol 41(3) 287-290 (May-June
1999) @ page 288).
The many studies, internal and external, on intelligence agency dysfunctions go
back decades and they say about the same thing; too much bureaucracy, too much
secrecy, too little imagination, and too weak analysis.
Likewise, it is useless at this point in time to repeat the list of major world
events and world turnings, let alone emerging future trends, that the
interconnected and increasingly incestuous mass of the "intelligence"
bureaucracies missed. The tale would stun you.
Then some airplanes flew into some buildings; and so we INCREASED secrecy and
INCREASED the intelligence bureaucracy.
Perhaps this is not the best approach.
I have placed one Henrik Fyrst Kristensen of Denmark on my personal list of
world geniuses for pointing out that it makes sense for bureaucracies to mess up
because it generates more funding and thus more jobs. Check out the post 9-11
situation with regard to the intelligence world, and you will perceive the
towering, staggering, awe inspiring gem-like clarity and grandeur of this
observation. One can only genuflect as one reflects on its numerous
implications. [Note to reader: Henrik is my boss - GW].
Well then, where do original ideas come from? From individuals and groups NOT in
tune with the status quo mostly.
Where are these individuals found? Not often in bureaucracies history tells us
because they cannot easily survive there.
Moses, I notice, went alone to the mountain and returned with two tablets
containing ten clear injunctions; not some impenetrable bureaucratic complexity
like the United States' Code or Code of Federal Regulations. Mohammed sought
insight in the desert. Buddha went to the forest; and so it goes. Fundamental
insight, it seems, comes from quiet places.
These fundamental insights are then debated, best openly and for a long time.
This is how it was at America's Founding and for most of its history. We had
some ideas about good government (some argued in secret for a short while, it is
true) but then we talked them over in the public newspapers. The spirit of
secrecy is antithetical to this spirit.
That being understood and admitted, still some things must be and remain secret
for society's safety and other things can only be done via government effort.
This we know. But perhaps these are far fewer than imagined.
To the greatest degree possible, I suggest we try openness, freedom, liberty,
and by extension frankness, flexibility, and blunt discussion among the largest
community practical as to the assumptions, analytical methods, and conclusions
that we assert regarding our intelligence and international directions.
"If you say it, you OWN it" [in the sense that you must convince us by sound
argument] should be our motto. Not "Can't tell you. It's secret."
America will be better for this. We will surrender less freedom. But that is NOT
the only reason - It is simply more efficient to be open. We will likely make
fewer fundamental errors in our foreign affairs.
"Secrecy is a losing proposition. It is, as Senator Moynihan has told us, for
losers" (quoted from "Secrecy" @ page 58).
Copyright Guntram Werther 2005. This essay may be
reprinted for non-commercial purposes so long as attribution of authorship is
given.
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