intelligenceThe skills of the British intelligence community are a great national asset. John Scarlett In my professional work with the Agency, by the late ’70s, I had come to question the value of a great deal of what we were doing, in terms of the intelligence agency’s impact on American policy. There are so many things a large intelligence espionage organization can do to justify its existence, that people can get promotions for, because it could result in results. I found that our Soviet espionage efforts had virtually never, or had very seldom, produced any worthwhile political or economic intelligence on the Soviet Union. To lack intelligence is to be in the ring blindfolded. The resistance of policy-makers to intelligence is not just founded on an ideological presupposition. They distrust intelligence sources and intelligence officials because they don’t understand what the real problems are. We had periodic crises in this country when the technical intelligence didn’t support the policy. We had the bomber gap, the missile gap. I am not a member of the CIA or any other intelligence agency. I wasn’t privy to all of the intelligence that was coming in about Guatemala, but I did see the traffic that was coming in from Guatemala City, because it was very relevant to me, and of course I exchanged what I had with the chief of station in Guatemala City. Our Soviet espionage efforts had virtually never, or had very seldom, produced any worthwhile political or economic intelligence on the Soviet Union.
In my professional work with the Agency, by the late ’70s, I had come to question the value of a great deal of what we were doing, in terms of the intelligence agency’s impact on American policy.
There are so many things a large intelligence espionage organization can do to justify its existence, that people can get promotions for, because it could result in results.
I found that our Soviet espionage efforts had virtually never, or had very seldom, produced any worthwhile political or economic intelligence on the Soviet Union.
The resistance of policy-makers to intelligence is not just founded on an ideological presupposition. They distrust intelligence sources and intelligence officials because they don’t understand what the real problems are.
We had periodic crises in this country when the technical intelligence didn’t support the policy. We had the bomber gap, the missile gap.
I wasn’t privy to all of the intelligence that was coming in about Guatemala, but I did see the traffic that was coming in from Guatemala City, because it was very relevant to me, and of course I exchanged what I had with the chief of station in Guatemala City.
Our Soviet espionage efforts had virtually never, or had very seldom, produced any worthwhile political or economic intelligence on the Soviet Union.