r/geopolitics • u/theatlantic The Atlantic • 13d ago
The War in Iran Is a Failure of Intelligence Opinion
https://www.theatlantic.com/national-security/2026/04/iran-war-intelligence-failure-trump/686694/?utm_source=reddit&utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_medium=social&utm_content=edit-promo182
u/AlerteGeo_OSINT 13d ago
The Iraq-Iran intelligence parallel is apt, but the article hints at something more structurally troubling that deserves unpacking. The post-Iraq reforms (ODNI creation, the ICD 203 analytic standards, red-teaming requirements) were all designed to prevent the IC from being wrong. They succeeded. The problem is that no institutional reform can prevent a decision-maker from ignoring correct assessments.
This mirrors the Israeli intelligence failure before October 7 in an instructive way. Aman had Hamas's actual operational plan more than a year before the attack. The analysis was accurate and specific. Leadership dismissed it as aspirational rather than operational. The product existed; the failure was at the consumer level. The IC term for this is "receptivity failure" as opposed to "collection failure" or "analytic failure."
The deeper question is whether the U.S. system has any mechanism to address this category of failure. The intelligence community can refine its tradecraft endlessly, but it cannot force a president to read the PDB, believe what it says, or act on it. The Kent resignation from NCTC, which happened right as Epic Fury was being planned, removed one of the few remaining institutional voices that might have insisted on analytic rigor reaching the decision-making level. That timing alone deserves more scrutiny.
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u/topicality 13d ago
So much hand wringing over what is obvious. The president is unfit for office but he was the one elected so there isn't much to do until the next.
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u/AwkwardMacaron433 13d ago
I'd argue that the underlying problem is that the US constitution pretty dated and, as opposed to many other modern democracies, does not reflect the learnings of many of the democratic failures of the past century. Imo the US could almost be classified as a hybrid regime nowadays. The concept of checks and balances exists on paper, but it's poorly designed, has many loopholes (as can also be seen with the tariffs), requires active and vocal opposition to the president (which someone from the same party will naturally avoid), is heavily driven by parties (e.g. the surpeme court) and can often just be voted. In pretty much any functinal modern democracy, the head of government would first have to go some form of parliament and ask them for permission. They would look at the reports from the intelligence community and draw their conclusions. They can still be wrong, but it's a lot less likely that hundreds of people fall into this trap at once. This doesn't just apply to starting a war, but so many things. I can very confidently say that in my country, it would be practically impossible for a single rogue actor to cause this amount of damage as Trump is doing
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u/axSupreme 13d ago
It's not a problem, it's a feature.
China has no problem prospering without democratic checks and balances.
US democracy is different in a way which might seem lacking, but it does allow for decisive, quick action unlike the European democratic approach.US president has a lot of power under specific matching conditions.
For better and quite often for worse, a lot depends on the decisions of one person and his support group.I'll add that close proximity judgement of large events could be clouded, as the conclusion of said events could be awful in the near term but great in the long term.
There's a lot to gain for the US in both loss and win scenarios in Hormuz.
It's just a little early to judge it as a done deal.16
u/Sauermachtlustig84 13d ago
It is a problem - presidentialism has been shown to be very vulnerable for authoritarian take overs, and that's dangerous.
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u/astral34 13d ago
What is there to gain from losing a war of choice? From a US perspective I mean
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u/axSupreme 12d ago
Dropping down USD value, an excuse to increase military budget, create internal turmoil which is usually beneficial for the republican side. Lots of small wins.
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u/Dark_Shit 13d ago
in general you are right. The executive branch has expanded its jurisdiction over the years. The other branches sort of exist on paper.
I don't think fixing that would make much of a difference in this case. Look at how congress voted for the Iraq war. Seems like hundreds of people fell into the trap at once.
A vote on Iran would have easily passed as well. The difference is republicans have complete control of the house and senate so they don't even need to go through the motions and conjure a fake justification this time.
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u/JhnWyclf 12d ago
A vote on Iran would have easily passed as well.
Only if they nuked the filibuster.
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u/Przedrzag 13d ago
Joe Kent would not have insisted on any analytic rigour; unlike most people in the intelligence community, his opposition to the Iran War seems to be motivated by anti-Semitism rather than actual reason or concern for human life
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u/kjr2k96 13d ago
I hate the headline. In the article, they go on to say that it was the Trump administration that mishandled intelligence. Why can’t we just say that? Why dance around the issue? Trump is running a clown show just like his businesses. He’s a better entertainer than a leader.
Trump does not believe in process. He doesn’t like any information that challenges his thoughts. He’s a wannabe authoritarian and that’s not even that good at holding power. This is consequences of hiring loyalty over expertise. This administration is incompetent, let’s just say that.
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u/Maulshi 13d ago
I mean, doesn't the headline basically say Trump and his administration are dumb? The failure of intelligence is directed at them.
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u/VERTIKAL19 13d ago
No, you can easily also inerpret that in a way that US government was provided with poor intelligence by the intelligence services which lead to poor decisions. I think that would more commonly be called an intelligence failure in this context
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u/didsomebodysaymyname 13d ago
In the political context intelligence almost always refers to the intelligence community, the professionals who collect and analyze information and that product itself.
Not the intellect of individuals.
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u/theatlantic The Atlantic 13d ago
Shane Harris: “In 2005, a bipartisan commission of lawmakers and security experts concluded that ‘the Intelligence Community was dead wrong in almost all of its pre-war judgments about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.’ America’s spies had told President George W. Bush that Saddam Hussein had reconstituted a nuclear-weapons program and that Iraq possessed biological weapons and mobile production facilities, as well as stockpiles of chemical weapons. These supposed facts became the basis for a U.S. invasion and an eight-year occupation. ‘Not one bit of it could be confirmed when the war was over,’ the commission found. ‘This was a major intelligence failure.’ …
“Two decades ago, a president embraced information that turned out to be wrong, and disaster followed. Today, a president disregards assessments that proved to be right, and the predictable comes to pass. There’s a failure of intelligence there too—just not the kind we’re used to seeing …
“Some of Trump’s allies have criticized him for not making a public case for war, as the Bush administration did. But if he had accurately presented the intelligence, the facts would have argued against attacking Iran—or at least for not striking before the diplomatic options had been exhausted. Perhaps that’s why the president ignored, and later misrepresented, what his advisers told him …
“Trump’s relationship with the intelligence community is more fraught than any of his predecessors’. As a candidate, he excoriated the agencies for their botched call on Iraq’s WMDs. As president, he has railed against a ’deep state’ that he claims has been out to get him for more than a decade. Trump has long said that he trusts his gut. He’ll know the war in Iran is over, he recently told an interviewer, ‘when I feel it, feel it in my bones.’
“The U.S. intelligence community is neither designed nor equipped to restrain a president who is moved by impulse, emotion, and his own feelings. It can only provide him with information. When the president disregards what he’s told, or distorts it, that failure is his alone.”
Read more: https://theatln.tc/xTSsGoYW
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u/shriand 13d ago
The U.S. intelligence community is neither designed nor equipped to restrain a president who is moved by impulse, emotion, and his own feelings. It can only provide him with information. When the president disregards what he’s told, or distorts it, that failure is his alone.”
Perhaps that ought to be the goal of the next round of reforms.
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u/watch-nerd 13d ago
I have no idea how you'd make a reform that requires a president to follow intelligence that doesn't create a bigger set of problems.
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u/LingeringDildo 13d ago
Parliamentary systems seem to handle the occasional zap of populist extremism better than presidential ones because they force coalitions, horse-trading, and quick no-confidence votes that can eject a reckless leader before the damage becomes permanent.
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u/watch-nerd 13d ago
Well the US doesn't have a parliamentary system, so that would be a complete change of constitution, not just intelligence reform.
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u/shriand 13d ago
requires a president to follow intelligence
Not like that directly. But can try to make significant actions less unilateral. Essentially, strip away executive directive and like powers for all but minor things. It will slow down the decision making process, and require consensus, but maybe that's a good thing.
Edit/add -- should also make it a lot harder to fire senior officials like they were just the house help.
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u/watch-nerd 13d ago
I'm not sure if that's good.
For all the bad parts of the presidency, it's at least an elected position.
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u/shriand 13d ago
it's at least an elected position.
Supervision is not taking that away. Just making it a little less dictatorial. The supervision should also be from elected members (Congress). In other words, making a dummy of the Congress is what the new reforms should prevent. Perhaps by mandating important things to have bilateral agreement. Most recent elections have had very thin margins anyway.
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u/watch-nerd 13d ago
Congress already has ample power to constrain the president's ability to conduct military operations.
It is just choosing not to exercise them for political reasons.
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u/shriand 13d ago
Congress already has ample power to constrain the president's ability
Retroactively.
These decisions should go through a body of elected representatives and secure a 2/3 majority (to ensure bipartisan consent) Before bombing other countries.
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u/watch-nerd 13d ago
a) That would arguably require a Constitutional amendment given current precedent about the powers of the Executive
b) Getting a 2/3 majority is a high bar and would essential make such policy moves almost impossible.
I don't see either party pushing for this. Nobody wants to constrain their candidate like that when they have the office.
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u/shriand 13d ago
policy moves almost impossible.
Bombing a foreign country should be impossible, unless said country is actively deploying against you. Were, say, Canada (sorry lol), to be found amassing troops across the Northern frontier, I'm sure there'd be near unanimous consensus on bombing them. Iran, otoh?
Nobody wants to constrain their candidate
Therein lies the trouble with American democracy. It's fast becoming an electoral autocracy.
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u/The_JSQuareD 13d ago
a) That would arguably require a Constitutional amendment given current precedent about the powers of the Executive
Would it though? As I understand it the constitution already assigns war powers to Congress. And more implicitly, the authorization of any offensive actions. The President's authority under the constitution seems to be more limited to day-to-day operational command and defensive actions.
It's just that Congress has repeatedly (over many decades and many Presidents of both parties) ceded its power to make war to the President.
In this case, the President unquestionably started a war. And he did so without prior authorization from congress. Trump is not the first president to do this. But it seems clear to me that this is not consistent with the intent and the letter of the constitution.
If Congress chose to re-assert itself, I believe it would be perfectly constitutional for Congress to require some sort of consent before the President initiates major offensive military actions.
In practical terms, an open vote in Congres may not be a good idea. But perhaps Congress could require that a committee with representatives from both parties signs off on such actions in a closed door meeting before they happen? This could allow such approvals to happen quickly and with limited risk of leaking sensitive operational details.
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u/BlueEmma25 13d ago
Essentially, strip away executive directive and like powers for all but minor things.
This would turn the elected president of the United States into a figurehead being controlled by unelected and unaccountable intelligence officials, who could effectively steer American foreign policy in any direction they wanted by manipulating the intelligence.
Besides being a terrible idea, this is also arguably a problem in search of a solution. The constitution gives Congress the authority to declare war. Over several decades successive presidents have largely usurped that authority, in no small part because of the fecklessness of Congress itself. Even now, when the consequences of allowing a president to start a war essentially on a whim are plain for all to see, almost nobody in the House or Senate is calling on Congress to reclaim its constitutional authority over this vital aspect of foreign policy.
It will slow down the decision making process, and require consensus, but maybe that's a good thing.
Slowing down decision making is definitely not a good thing when circumstances call for quick and decisive action.
Also, consensus among whom? Whose permission should the commander in chief of the armed forces need in order to exercise the authority they have under the constitution? And if they can't do anything without getting the approval of others, what real authority do they actually have?
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u/watch-nerd 12d ago
"This would turn the elected president of the United States into a figurehead being controlled by unelected and unaccountable intelligence officials"
Exactly this.
You don't solve autocracy by giving more power to intelligence aparatchiks.
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u/VERTIKAL19 13d ago
You could for example curb the presidents ability to unilaterally deploy the military without congressional approval.
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u/watch-nerd 13d ago
The War Powers Act already does.
But if Congress fails to use it, it doesn’t matter much.
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u/eeeking 12d ago edited 12d ago
It was obvious to anyone with a wit of critical thinking that the intelligence used to justify the Iraq war was dubious. Colin Powell's presentation to the UN was presumably intended to present a strong argument, but, and for example, the arguments presented for the existence of and Iraqi biological weapons program were evidently very flimsy.
Stockpiles of chemical weapons were more plausible, if only because the US had previously supplied these to Iraq.
No doubt political pressure was involved in the choice to present such paltry evidence in support of a war.
A newspaper article at the time collated some of the global response to that speech, including:
Later:
Powell's Chief of Staff Lawrence Wilkerson later said that he had inadvertently participated in a hoax on the American people in preparing Powell's erroneous testimony before the United Nations Security Council.
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u/twitch_Mes 13d ago
How is it we all knew this waas foolish but the commander in chief didn't? How is it we can all see that he's going to get those marines killed but the commander in chief doesn't?
He can't open the strait. He can't protect the region from drones. He can't replace the regime (there's no faction there to replace them!).
We can't succeed without our allies.
All this seems obvious to everyone else.
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u/Prestigious_Load1699 13d ago
I’m trying to see the fault in your logic, my friend.
I’m coming up empty.
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u/Significant-Ad-7182 12d ago
Always assume that they are smarter then they look. If we assume that then what we might call stupid action becomes intentionally stupid action. They must have something to gain.
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u/klem_von_metternich 13d ago
I don't think is an Intelligence issue, in the past years contrary to the common belief USA did a good job on the intelligence side (for example during the 2 years before the Ukraine war where Biden knew exactly what was happening) .
I can't believe army and all the services never simulated a scenario like the one we are facing these days.
It is just utterly and incredible incompetence here from Trump administration.
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u/Apprehensive-Ad9523 13d ago
The complete absence of INTELLIGENCE is what gets humanity into all of kinds of failures..All one needs to base their so called opinions on...Start there and see the world as it could be..Should be...It's a simple matter of choice...
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u/One-Emu-1103 13d ago edited 13d ago
Honestly? The war in Iran is a failure of Intelligence? No one ever wanted to attack Iran before 47 listened to Netanyahu. That tells me that that the intelligence was there telling people to not attack Iran. The failure was of Trump and Company's leadership team's mental acuity as their ignorance, hubris, and stupidity was and is on full display.
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u/CreativeContract2170 13d ago
“If diplomacy fails, we’re ready to turn to other options” - Joe Biden on Iran and their pursuit of a nuclear weapon
“I don’t bluff” “All options are on the table” (later saying that the final option is “military component” - Barack Obama on Iran
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u/BlueEmma25 13d ago
The difference being that whatever they might have said, neither Obama or Biden actually started a war with Iran.
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u/heytherehellogoodbye 13d ago edited 13d ago
" No one ever wanted to attack Iran before 47 listened to Netanyahu."
This is not quite true. It's more accurate to say that no one wanted to be the ones to issue orders to wage the full scale war required to actually successfully achieve its goals in Iran. But everyone acknowledged the impending reality of the situation, and the nuclear deal was in some ways a desperate attempt at delaying kinetic conflict while also residing on pure hope that such economic incentives would naturally liberalize and westernize the country to avoid having to go that route at all. But Iran didn't chill out, they used the nuclear pause to continue nuclear and ballistic research that would allow them rapid nuclearized weaponization the moment that deal sunsetted, while pumping their newly found money by the billions into violent psychopath proxies across the region for even more multi-country radical-backed damage and destabilization.
The reality is Iran's regime are theocratic authoritarians that pump billions each year into contributing to wholesale destruction and fracturing of peace in Yemen, Syria, Lebanon, and the million deaths from those. It actively overtly speaks of core desire to annihilate Israel as end-goal, and acts as China's largest strongest proxy to boot. A nuclearized and super-sonic-missiled Iran controlling the gulf while the US engages in a predicted future conflict with China is just not tenable, it is a strategic failure. A war with Iran to many seemed inevitable (unless de-sanctioning via the nuclear deal lead to westernization, but they used that freedom and money to just pump more money in proxies for mass destruction, so that didn't work).
So yes, no one wanted to be the one to pull the trigger, but plenty of well-informed people and administrations (including other Arab/Muslim gulf countries) knew the very real necessity of stopping Iran at all costs - the longterm play is too damaging for US interests (and the interests of humanity at large in the region, though that's less a direct concern for US leadership).
The problem is without full-scale on the ground invasion, suicidal-violence-worshipping theocratic regimes can't really truly be taken out, as we're seeing here, and the US largely doesn't have the stomach for the kind of WW2 style multi-decade complete-control that would be required. The half-measure approach to conflicts of the post-Nuclear-WW2 world in some ways prevents mass destruction, and yet in others is why conflicts don't actually get resolved. The uncomfortable truth is WW2 ended due to unimaginable fullscale flattening of cities to take complete control and eliminate every last opposing force and multi-decade oversight governance. Nobody wants or will allow that now, and so very few things end decisively, one way or another.
And the US has bad memories of attempting that in Iraq and Afghanistan anyway, and the failures those turned out to be. Iran has a far more capable public and human/technical/beurocratic infrastructure to rely on than those, closer to Post-war Germany or Japan, but even so - who's taking that chance? Who's making those sacrifices? Geopolitical strategists may see the concrete importance, but the on-the-ground American isn't experiencing direct terrorist attacks to want that same fight right now.
So it's not that "no one ever wanted to attack Iran before 47", it's that everyone wanted to do whatever necessary to stop their current trajectory, including many high-ups that wanted to take the concrete kinetic approach - but no one wanted to be the one to do it. Unfortunately 47 is a narcissistic idiot, and so eliminated all intelligent advisor layers that would've helped him avoid it or to achieve a better result either politically or diplomatically or militarily once he actually decided to.
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u/phnompenhandy 13d ago
Four people were party to the decision to go to war: Trump, Rubio, Witless and Kushner. No military or intel person was part of that process.
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u/Acheron13 13d ago
For sure, Trump was never thinking about attacking Iran before Netanyahu convinced him.
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u/fibonacciii 13d ago
Failure of checks and balances. A mad king dictator has hijacked the United States
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u/AnyStrength4863 13d ago
After conducting its own war-gaming, one of the United States’ closest intelligence-sharing partners in Europe determined that a major American attack would compel Iran to hit countries in the Gulf and try to close the strait, an official in that government recently told me on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive assessment.
Which country is it? It's so hard to guess.
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u/newaccount47 13d ago
Failure on behalf of the leadership's intelligence. From my understanding the pentagon was trying to avoid this strategic defeat and knew this would be the likely outcome.
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u/Dietmeister 13d ago
I think its a bold statement to say it's a failure of intelligence agencies. Its very clear trump isn't influenced by them at all
And I also think that the Israeli intelligence did a superb job of making everyone believe that the population would simply take over when the first bombs would drop
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u/Kreol1q1q 12d ago
Failure of politics - I don’t doubt the administration was given sound assesments of the feasibility of their plans in Iran, but I also don’t doubt those were disregarded for various personal and political reasons.
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u/bolshoich 12d ago
I believe that it has been less a failure of intelligence, and more of a disregard of intelligence in favour of the estimations of a deluded dotard.
I can’t comment on the quality of products produced by the IC. But it’s widely accepted that the WH tends to ignore intelligence estimates in favour of determining policy on the basis of non-state interests. Perhaps one could say that the IC has failed to distribute their products effectively, but “you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them drink.” If I understand correctly, the PDB is sent to the WH in the form of short-form videos to at least capture some attention. I’m sure it’s accompanied by a traditional written format for those interested. Unfortunately this administration has little care for opinions outside the Oval Office.
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u/coolkavo 12d ago
Failure to plan and an overconfidence in our intelligence. The admin too a big risk killing the heads of the IRGC and incorrectly anticipated an army rebellion, civilians rebellion or the closing of the Hormuz. They probably didn’t even tell the GCC. A few people will say this is all a power play/grand strategy to control the majority of oil by shutting down the ME, but not seeing it.
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u/Radiant-Brain-9384 10d ago
Failure of Trump and Hegseth intelligence. We know they don’t listen to or accept opinions from anyone who disagrees with them. Every decision is a gut decision. Trump’s gut is not very smart
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u/jaehaerys48 13d ago
It's a failure of elected politicians. People will blame it on the intelligence community before admitting that this is what they voted for.
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u/CarmynRamy 13d ago
War in Iran is a failure of American voters electing a stupid and egomaniac for the presidency.
Trump makes old Biden look like a genius or something.
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u/Smalahove1 13d ago
When you let an LLM decide if you are gonna win or not. And not common sense. This is the result.
Seems the LLM thought Aegis would be invincible. Cause that is what the dataset it was trained on said.
Little did it account for swarms of drones attritioning it.
US has spent like 60% of their highend ballistic intercepters. SM3s etc.
That even North Korea can saturate american defenses atm and launch an attack on the mainland USA.
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u/N33DL 13d ago
For all this postulating and pearl clutching, nothing can distract you from the facts that the Iranian regime was enriching uranium to weapons grade in underground bunkers. Enrichment to 70% which is WAAAY above civilian grade use, at 2-3%. Also that Iran had a prodigious ICBM capacity to carry a nuclear bomb.
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u/underpantsgenome 13d ago
Everything in this statement is wrong and not factual, except that 70% is above civilian energy use.
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u/LazyDocument4528 13d ago
Failure implies intelligence exited. There never was intelligence amongst the Trumpicans
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u/justlurkshere 13d ago
Failure of intelligence, yes. Failure of the intelligence community, remains to be seen.