"American Intelligence"

By Ankush

The Times' lead today is Michael Gordon's story on claims being made within the administration about Iran's supply of "explosively formed penetrators" -- "[t]he most lethal weapon directed against American troops in Iraq" -- to Shiite militias.  For people concerned about the White House laying the groundwork for military action against Iran, this piece represents yet another troubling development, despite protestations from "officials" claiming that they "were not trying to lay the basis for an American attack on Iran."

I hesitate to be too critical of the piece because, first, I don't follow intelligence reporting extraordinarily closely and, second, as Gordon reports, the administration intends to release more specific information in the days ahead (which, for quite obvious reasons, should be treated with extreme skepticism, particularly because they keep delaying the release of evidence about Iran's alleged meddling in Iraq).  But the article does give me an opportunity to gripe about something you see a lot, which comes up here in a very important context and points up what I take to be some potentially serious flaws with Gordon's piece.

On the specific issue of whether the EFPs can be traced to Iran, Gordon variously cites "American intelligence agencies," "American intelligence," "a broad range of government agencies," "military officials," and "some intelligence experts."  There is also, on this point, one attribution to "Marine officials" and references to an "American intelligence report."  While SecDef Gates and Peter Pace also allude to Iran's involvement with these weapons, the rest of the named military officers in the piece speak to the deadliness of the EFPs, not any intelligence linking them to Iran.  In the way of actual intelligence sources, Gordon gives us only the vaguest of descriptions.

It's not only that no one has gone on the record about a matter about which there is supposedly broad agreement, and it's not only that there are no quotations from even unnamed officials claiming a link between the EFPs and Iran, but we don't even know the identity of a single one of the agencies constituting what Gordon paints as a consensus.

Not to be too literal about it, but there's no monolithic entity that can accurately be referred to as "American intelligence."  There are a large number of distinct intelligence agencies with various collaborative relationships that are frequently referred to with this sort of shorthand.  But when you're writing a story like this -- one that will advance a very contentious public debate on possible (and possibly disastrous) military action -- it's probably important to avoid that shorthand considering that it obscures potential interagency disputes.  (For instance, it may put you in the unfortunate position of -- oh, I don't know -- writing as if there's a consensus on an intelligence issue that, days later and six paragraphs into a separate and similarly credulous article, you concede there is actually disagreement on.)

Again, Gordon writes that there will be more to come on this issue, so it's wise to reserve some judgment here, but I for one would like to see some possible follow-up lines of inquiries: Which intelligence agencies are you talking about?  What are their track records and possible interests?  Are mid-level officials in agreement with senior officials in those agencies?   If they're so sure about this, can you get, you know, a person to go on the record?  Are there agencies that are dissenting from these claims?  Which ones and why?

As much as anyone, Gordon and his editors at the Times have been down this road before. Have they learned their lessons?