Cipher Brief Expert View: The IC’s Critical Role

We are living in a more complex world, with more state and non-state actors demanding more of our attention.  When we actively contributed to the defeat of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, the success of the Solidarity Movement in Poland, and the eventual demise of the Soviet Union in 1991 after the Baltic States and the eleven Soviet Republics declared independence, we thought the Soviet Union was a spent power, requiring minimal attention.

When we decisively defeated Iraq during the first Gulf War in 1990, after they invaded and occupied Kuwait, we thought a defeated Saddam would behave.  When we signed the Agreed Framework with North Korea in 1994, agreeing to build two civilian Light Water Reactors and while under construction provide heavy fuel oil as payment for the freezing of North Korea’s nuclear program, we though Kim Jong-il would comply and behave.