A Controversial Perspective on Intelligence

To what extent did the terrorist attacks of 9/11 constitute an Intelligence Failure?

Introduction

September 11, 2001, remains an unforgettable day in the memory of Americans and the world following the huge human and material losses wrought by the scale of attacks; brazen and undoubtedly sophisticated nature. Viewpoints in academic and policy debates differ on Al-Qaida’s success in the attacks on 9/11 and the US Intelligence Community(IC) inability to prevent it. 9/11 is generally referred to as an intelligence failure, however, there are views that it could have been contained since Islamist extremists had given enough warning of their intention to kill Americans indiscriminately in large numbers. Thus, it is debatable whether 9/11 qualifies as an intelligence failure.

This essay will be in 2 segments. In the first segment, a methodological approach is employed to study failure in the field of intelligence studies. Further, it examines the series of issues that occurred in isolation or combination to create favorable conditions for Al-Qaida terrorists. In doing so, the essay will provide a definition of intelligence failure for the context of this discussion and use the definition as an analytical framework. The second segment uses Richard Bett’s traditional approach, particularly his “paradoxes of perception” which argue that intelligence failure should be viewed as a policymakers' responsibility in discussing the proximate and underlying causes of 9/11. Intelligence failure in 9/11 was therefore not as prevalent as the political failure.

Intelligence Failure: A definition

John Gentry says intelligence fails “if a state does not adequately collect and interpret intelligence information, make sound policy based on the intelligence (and other factors), and effectively act”.This definition comprises the collection, analysis and interpretation, policy-making and successful implementation. It further lends itself to an analytical framework of the 9/11 events.

9/11: The Specific Issues

Failure in watchlisting Khalid al-Mihdharand al-Hazmi, the would-be hijackers made it possible for Al Qaida to successfully carry out the 9/11 attacks. The CIA lost three chances of watchlisting them in January and March 2000, and January 2001. They did not also notify the State Department and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), to prevent their entry into the U.S.

Closely related to watchlisting tardiness was losing Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmiafter after their Malaysia meeting in January 2000 before and after they had entered the U.S. even though they were in contact with many FBI informants and were electronically traceable.

Between December 1999 and January 2000, the IC bungled the pilot training of Mohammed Atta, Marwan al Shehhi and Ziad Jarah who had arrived in U.S to execute

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1. Executive Summary, The 9/11 Report, p.7.
2. Gentry John A (2008).,Intelligence failure reframed, Political Science Quarterly(Vol. 123, Issue 2.)
3. Zegart, Amy, (2005) September 11 and the Adaptation Failure of U.S. Intelligence Agencies, International Security, Vol. 29, No. 4, p1.
4. Ibid, p. 221.

“the plane operation. Despite the FBI agent’s “Phoenix Memo” detailing a number of Islamic extremists enrolled in flight schools, and the 15th, August, 2001 information of a suspicious Arab student (Moussaoui) paying over $6000 in cash for Boeing 747 flight simulator training with no qualifications, it could not be exploited to uncover the 9/11 plot.

Airline (in)security exploited by the terrorist was considered a predictable surprise. At least, for over a decade before September 11, the U.S General Accounting Office (GAO) had warned the government about the vulnerability of the U.S. aviation and airline infrastructure such as flight deck vulnerability of crews, outdated scanning equipment and easily accessible cockpit doors that were exploitable.Unfortunately, these concerns remained unaddressed.

Bureaucratic structures and organizational inefficiencies were one of the broad issues at the heart of the 9/11 attack.Since structure delineates jurisdictions, defining hierarchical structure and procedures, the FBI and CIA's highly decentralized and fragmented Cold-War structure was unsuitable for post-Cold War counterterrorism like surveillance of terrorists who evaded tracking by field office jurisdictions.

The FBI’s “wall”- a set of counterterrorism laws and internal guidelines that delineated and regulated information sharing between criminal investigations for the purpose of prosecution in cases of past attacks, and intelligence investigations seeking information on likely future attacks, contributed to the success of al-Qaida on 9/11. For example, FBI operatives declined to authorize full-scale criminal investigation that could uncover the plot because the tip about the suspects came through intelligence channels.

Unhealthy rivalry and lack of coordination in the U.S IC were enabled by outmoded laws, bureaucracy and organizational structures where stove-piping and a silo mentality prevailed.For example, the CIA was reluctant to share information on domestic terrorism because it believed it was the responsibility of the FBI.

The U.S was not sufficiently aware of its post-Cold War strategic threats as the global environment was too opaque, thus, the threats were numerous and too fluid to be considered electoral issues Moreover, threats posed by Al Qaida were not part of a political campaign agenda from the Clinton to the George Bush era.Complacency made

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5. Zegart, Amy, 9/11 and the FBI: The Organizational Roots of Failure, p.9.
6. Max H. Bazerman & Michael Watkins (2005) Airline Security, the Failure of 9/11, and Predictable Surprises, International Public Management Journal,pp.5-6
7. Zegart, Amy, (2007) ‘‘CNN with Secrets:’’ 9/11, the CIA, and the Organizational Roots of Failure, International Journal of Intelligence and CounterIntelligence,,p.3.
8. Ibid, p.4.
9. The 9/11 Commission Report, pp. 268 cited in Zegart, Amy, p.4.
10. Ibid.
11. ‘Threats and Responses in 2001’, 9/11 Commission Staff Statement Number 10, 13 April 2004, p.5. cited in Zegart, Amy, p.4.
12. Executive Summary, Office of the Inspector General Report on CIA accountability with Respect to the 9/11 Attacks, pp-11-12.
13. Zegart, Amy, September 11 and the Adaptation Failure of U.S. Intelligence Agencies,International Security ( 2005), p.3.
14. Executive Summary, Office of the Inspector General Report, p.12.

the world’s superpower neglect IC organizational reforms and adaptation in the face of a new unpredictable strategic environment.

Former senior FBI and CIA officers had identified HUMINT inadequacies and weaknesses as one of the most important limitations in the U.S. IC noting how easy it was for foreign terrorist organizations to operate in the U.S soil and cause great havoc.Nonetheless, there was less investment in HUMINT but priority to technical collection sources because expensive hardware with high contract values was favored by the Pentagon.

Budgetary inadequacies were also identified as one of the factors hampering the effective performance of the IC post-Cold War. Even though the Bremmer other Commissions and committees had recommended increased funding for counterterrorism operations, only 35 out of 340 were implemented successfully.

9/11: Intelligence Failure Definition as an Analytical Framework

The collection of enough intelligence information that could have prevented 9/11 was not lacking but the lack of exchange, integration, and coordination. For example, a CIA agent covertly monitored the Kuala Lumpur meeting which al-Mihdhar attended, and got all the information about him.Moreover, technical and electronic collection resources were in abundance.

In terms of analysis, the 9/11 attacks showed inadequate capacity of intelligence agencies to connect the dots and string together the isolated cases in order to prevent the attacks more than the failure of strategic analysis.Even though the 9/11 Commission Report viewed the lack of National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) between 1998 and 2001 on the terrorist threat as an intelligence failure, implying that if one was available, it might have enabled preventative actions by decision-makers.On the contrary, policy failure rather than collection and strategic analysis caused 9/11.

First, policymaking encapsulates the most specific and broad issues highlighted earlier because they were all amendable to reforms with political will.

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15. . March, James, “Footnotes to Organizational Change,” Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 26, No. 4 (December 1981), p. 563 cited in Zegart, Amy, September 11 and the Adaptation Failure of U.S. Intelligence Agencies,p.5.
16. Robert Bryant, John Hamre, John Lawn, John MacGaffin, Howard Shapiro, and Jeffrey Smith, ‘‘America Needs More Spies,’’ The Economist, 12 July 2003.
17. . Douglas Jehl, ‘‘New Spy Plan Said to Involve Satellite System,’’ The New York Times, 12 December 2004, cited in Zgart, Amy, p.20.
18. .Zegart, Amy, 9/11 and the FBI: The Organizational Roots of Failure, p.11 .
19. Hill, Eleanor, “The Intelligence Community’s Knowledge of the September 11 Hijackers Prior to September 11, 2001,” testimony before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence [SSCI] and HousePermanentSelectCommitteeonIntelligence, cited in Zegart, Amy, September 11 and the Adaptation Failure of U.S Intelligence Agencies, p.1.
20. Zegart, Amy, 9/11 and the FBI: The organizational roots of failure, ibid, p.3
21. Goodman, Melvin (2003),9/11: The Failure of Strategic Intelligence, Intelligence and National Security,p.5.
22. Marrin, Stephen (2011) The 9/11 Terrorist Attacks: A Failure of Policy Not Strategic Intelligence Analysis, Intelligence and National Security,p.3.

Second, the U.S policymakers from the Clinton era understood the gravity of the terrorist threat to the U.S prompting President Clinton to issue the Presidential Decision Directive 39- ‘US Policy on Counterterrorism urging the U.S to ‘‘deter, defeat and respond vigorously to all terrorist attacks on our territory and against our citizens’’.George Tenet, former CIA director, confirmed as much that he was confident that officials in both the Clinton and Bush administrations understood the seriousness of the threat’.Presidents Clinton and Bush, and their officials on the National Security Council (NSC)all admitted being aware of Bin Laden and Al Qaeda’s threat to the U.S and its citizens.However, they failed to implement policies that would have prevented 9/11.

Lastly, terrorism has both causes and symptoms, and US counterterrorism policies majorly focused on symptoms rather than causes.For example, most discussions in the 9/11 Commission Report focused on U.S efforts in mitigating the symptoms of the terrorist threat prior to 9/11, less were directed to root causes.

The Paradox of Perception: Failure of the U.S Policy-makers to address Proximate and Underlying Causes of 9/11

Prior to 9/11, counterterrorism experts and commentators had discussed specific policy changes that could target the proximate and root causes of 9/11 such as Islamists’ grievances and anger such as troops basing in Saudi Arabia and the disenchantment it caused. Paul Pillar observed that ‘by modifying its policies and postures throughout the world’ the US could ‘become less of a target for terrorism’

The support for Israel in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, which Al Qaeda’s leaders exploited made the U.S a proxy target by Al Qaida. Some of Israel’s actions like the 1996 military targeting of a United Nations refugee camp in Qana, Lebanon, which killed many civilians made extremists propaganda appealing to the larger Muslim world that it was under attack by Israel and required a response that only Al Qaeda could provide.Unfortunately, President Clinton and Bush could not resolve the conflicts in time.

Regarding the underlying causes of 9/11, Al Qaida and the Islamist ideologues also based their resentment on U.S hegemony, and the unwillingness to be challenged for a change of that order.Paul Pillar argues that prior to the 9/11 attacks, as globalization increased in intensity and extensity, spreading American culture and values across the world, the Islamists hated among others, its materialism and the sensual aspects of its

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23. Ibid.
24. Tenet George and Harlow Bill, At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA (New York: Harper Collins( 2007) p.122.
25. The 9/11 Commission Report, pp.342- 349.
26. Marrin, Stephen,p.8.
27. Ibid.
28. .Pillar Paul, Terrorism and U.S. Foreign Policy (Washington: Brookings Institution Press 2001) pp.60, 66., cited in Marrin, Stephen, p.9.
29. .Marrin, Stephen, Ibid, p.11
30. Ibid, p.11.

popular arts and entertainment. These, they perceived as wrecking the traditional moral fabric of the Muslim world with no alternative that offers stability.

The assessment of the underlying causes prior-9/11 has also been reinforced by post-9/11 evaluations. For example, in 2003 Benjamin and Simon described the root causes of terrorism as resentment for US ‘cultural hegemony, global political influence, and overwhelming conventional military power’. The 9/11 Commission Report also acknowledged as much, stating that Bin Laden appealed ‘to people disoriented by cyclonic change as they confront modernity and globalization’.

Arguably, the root causes of 9/11 would have been difficult to address. However, ameliorating some of them, for example, with support for educational and economic reforms in the larger Arab world, engaging mainstream Muslims with effective strategic communications, and providing more economic assistance was possible.

The specific and broad issues discussed earlier represent largely, the tactical level issues required to win the firefight and battles against Islamist terrorism. The primacy of the political issues such as the proximate and underlying causes that are germane to the success of the war and campaign against terrorism are often discounted in the 9/11 debate. Were the policy-makers more strategic in decision-making and implementation, perhaps 9/11 would have been averted?

Intelligence Failure: The Policy maker’sResponsibility

Scholarship in Intelligence and national security policymaking is steep in the assumption that intelligence analysis enables subsequent decision-making. Suggesting that 9/11 was an intelligence failure based on the notion that good collection and analysis of intelligence information equals good policymaking and effective action is flawed. Contrarily to this assumption is that if intelligence analysis is lacking on a particular subject, it precludes a good decision from being made. This thinking is simplistic for a number of reasons.

First, while the performance of intelligence agencies may have shortcomings, such inadequacies are insignificant if the policies they support are replete with even greater flaws.

Second, collection and analysis lacked utility yet the real problem at the heart of the 9/11 intersection of intelligence analysis and decision-making was the failure to implement effective policy despite a warning.

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31. Pillar Paul, Terrorism and U.S. Foreign Policy (Washington: Brookings Institution Press 2001),p.64.
32. Benjamin, Daniel and Simon Steven, The Age of Sacred Terror: Radical Islam’s War Against America (New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks 2003) pp.221– 222, cited in Marrin, Stephen, p.11.
33. 9/11 Commission Report, p.48.
34. . Marrin Stephen, p.12, 9/11 Commission Report, pp.375–378.
35. .Marrin Stephen, p.20.

Third, a strategic surprise conceptual framework for understanding why intelligence analysis fails to influence decision-making lends itself easily to this analysis. Ariel Levite distinguishes identification and warning about a threat from the response to it, and Byman argues that if a policymaker recognizes a problem but does not prepare properly for it or takes no action to counter it, the resulting crisis is not a strategic surprise but a failure of the decision-maker.

Lastly, decision-makers' receptivity to warning may be impeded by constraints inherent in the process and the political context that shapes it. Instant action on information provided was their main obstacle.

Conclusion

The U.S counterterrorism policy across was inadequate to prevent 9/11 because the threats were viewed from the tactical prism without a focus on the strategic issues- proximate and underlying causes. Without strategic vision and engagement at that level imperiled these efforts. Had the collection and analysis process enabled the disruptive approach and succeeded in preventing 9/11 in the short term, it would not have served in the longer term, and if it would not have just been a postponement of the doom’s day. 9/11 was less of intelligence failure but more of political failure because understanding of the policy and the environment that enables or constrains it comes first before the influence of collection and analysis on decision-making. The policy agencies of government were responsible for the failure of effective counterterrorism policies in preventing 9/11.

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36. Ariel Levite, Intelligence and Strategic Surprises (New York: Columbia University Press 1987) pp.1–3. , cited inByman‘Strategic Surprise and the September 11 Attacks’, p.146.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books

Tenet George and Harlow Bill, At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA (New York: Harper Collins( 2007) p.122.

Journal Articles

Amy Zegart (2007) 9/11 and the FBI: The organizational roots of failure, Intelligence, and National Security, 22:2, 165-184.

Zegart, Amy, September 11 and the Adaptation Failure of U.S. Intelligence Agencies, International Security (2005), Vol. 29, No. 4 pp. 78–111.

Zegart, Amy, (2007) ‘‘CNN with Secrets:’’ 9/11, the CIA, and the Organizational Roots of Failure, International Journal of Intelligence and CounterIntelligence,20: 18–49.

Max H. Bazerman & Michael Watkins (2005) Airline Security, the Failure of 9/11, and Predictable Surprises, International Public Management Journal, 8:3, 365-377.

Stewart, Mark and Mueller John, (2013) “Terrorism Risks and Cost-Benefit Analysis of Aviation Security.” Risk Analysis, Vol. 33, No.5.

Gentry John A (2008)., Intelligence failure reframed, Political Science Quarterly (Vol. 123, Issue 2.).

Goodman, Melvin A (2003) 9/11: The Failure of Strategic Intelligence, Intelligence and National Security, 18:4, 59-71.

Goodman, Melvin (2003) 9/11: The Failure of Strategic Intelligence, Intelligence, and National Security, 18:4, 59-71.

Marrin Stephen (2011) The 9/11 Terrorist Attacks: A Failure of Policy Not Strategic Intelligence Analysis, Intelligence and National Security, 26:2-3.