The more I hear and read the more it looks like there may not have been any weapons of mass destruction. So what happened. Aside from the comment that the administration used WMD as a way of getting the Bush team to agree on a single reason for going to war, I am beginning to suspect that a social psychological phenomenon called group think happened in the Bush administration.
Here's the definition of Group think taken from Hilgard's Introduction to Psychology Necessary Conditions A cohesive group. Isolation of the group from outside influences. No systematic procedures for considering both the pros and cons of different courses of action. A directive leader who explicitly favors a particular course of action. High stress. Symptoms Illusion of invulnerability, morality, and unanimity. Pressure on dissenters. Self-censorship of dissent. Collective rationalization. Self-appointed mind guards. Flaws of Decision Making Process Under Groupthink Incomplete survey of the group's objectives and alternative courses of action. Failure to examine the risks of the preferred choice. Poor and incomplete search for relevant information. Selective bias in processing the information at hand. Failure to reappraise rejected alternatives. Failure to develop contingency plans in case of failure. Going over this list it would appear that the Bush administration fits the conditions, symptoms and decision making process flaws very well. There have been numerous accounts of this decision, and when I read over them (taken from the Washington Post etc), I was struck by how much it does apply to this situation, a very cohesive group, a leader who very much wanted to invade Iraq, high stress (almost goes without saying). As for the remaining points a lot of it we cannot determine simply due to the secretive nature of the Bush administration, but the media accounts of parts of the process also note that there may have been poor and incomplete searches for relevant information (the recent controversy about the intelligence on Iraq for instance), the selective biases are probably quite obvious, and the failure to develop contingency plans and the lack of reappraisals of alternatives. I hazard a bet that in 10 years or so the Iraq war and the WMD decisions involved with it will probably be used as very good examples of group think. regards, larry >Anyone with a sense of balance should take any single sentence extract from >large report with a degree of skepticism, unless that sentence was in the >summary. Even then, why only one sentence, not a paragraph or a sentence >with some supporting details? Perhaps it is because all of the other >sentences diminished the impact or in fact completely changed it's meaning. >Frankly, if the report was all that much in support of Bush shenanigans, >more would have been leaked out. A wonderful part of our system of >government is that it is incredibly hard to hide things. Not impossible, >just hard. > >Hopefully, I have/had have the same approach even when it is/was convenient >to do otherwise. > >Andy > >-----Original Message----- >From: Dana Tierney [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >Sent: Sunday, June 08, 2003 10:53 AM >To: CF-Community >Subject: Re: US Intelligence report analysis.. > > >A reasonable position. I thought the "one sentence" was the one Gel quoted, >but you are saying the story only quotes one sentence of the report? I >guess if I were an agnostic leaning pro Bush rather than an agnostic >leaning to not believiing Bush I would not rush to change my position based >on that either. > >Dana > >On Sun, 8 Jun 2003 07:06:41 -0500, Andy Ousterhout <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >wrote: > >> Dana, >> The Chicago Trib had an article on this as well and unfortunately, only 1 >> sentence of the report was released. For the record, my opinion is that: >> >> 1. We had no "hard" intelligence that they had WMD's. By hard meaning >> our >> own people on the ground who saw the stuff. I believe that the > > administration said something similar in the September time frame. >> >> 2. We had intelligence that indicated that they didn't have WMD's as >> well >> as intel that indicated that they did >> >> 3. That only the supporting information was either filtered up or was >> believed by the administration >> >> The fundamental question for me is did the administration properly >> question >> the information that it received to create a balanced view and go into >> this >> situation with a solid understanding. If the information that they >> received >> was balanced in that it had both supporting and dissenting views and the >> supporting views outweighed the negative then I'm ok with the way they >> sold >> the war (I am using this approach to try to isolate the repetitive >> discussion on whether the war was right even without WMD's). If they did >> not get a full picture from which to base there decision, either they >> weren't asking or the intelligence community wasn't was passing up all of >> the information at hand or asking enough why's. In this case, we need a >> thorough analysis of the intelligence community and the Bush >> administration >> should be held responsible for a lousy decision making process. If Bush > > believed that there were no WMD's but decided not to tell us because he > > believed we still needed to overthrow Saddam, then he also needs to be > > held >> responsible for lying to the American people. Fundamentally, I do not >> believe that the ends justifies the means. >> >> I just try not to react as each side in the political battle leaks out >> one >> thing or another. We just don't know yet what really happened and may >> not >> know until latter when an insider decides to speak out about the process. >> >> Andy >> >> -----Original Message----- >> From: Dana Tierney [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Sent: Saturday, June 07, 2003 9:31 PM >> To: CF-Community >> Subject: Re: US Intelligence report analysis.. >> >> >> Andy >> >> If you follow the link there is a whole special feature there. The >> initial >> story looks substantial and to my eye fairly balanced. You and I disagree >> about balance however :) Anyway, I haven't read the whole thing so I am >> not >> prepared to discuss it, but I think it says somethng when MSNBC starts >> questioning the process. Likewise the Albuquerque Journal, which as I >> have >> previously noted is pro business, pro war and pro Bush, recently came out >> against a nuclear production facility in NM, the stated reason being more >> or less distrust of the feds and of the current administration in >> particular... >> >> Dana >> >> Andy Ousterhout writes: >> >>> Gel, >>> >>> Interesting sentence. Not saying that this isn't important, it is just >>> unfair to pull out one sentence and then define it's meaning in the >> context >>> of the whole. This is just one item that is helping create the picture >> of >>> the decision making process. Not saying the process isn't flawed. Just >>> saying that we don't know enough to say it was. >>> >>> Andy >>> >>> -----Original Message----- >>> From: Angel Stewart [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >>> Sent: Saturday, June 07, 2003 3:42 PM >>> To: CF-Community >>> Subject: US Intelligence report analysis.. >>> >>> >>> "The Pentagon's intelligence agency had no hard evidence of Iraqi >>> chemical weapons last fall but believed Iraq had a program in place to >>> produce them, the agency's chief said Friday. The assessment suggests a >>> higher degree of uncertainty about the immediacy of an Iraqi threat - at >>> least with regard to one portion of its banned weapons programs - than >>> the Bush administration indicated publicly in building its case for >>> disarming Iraq, with force if necessary." >>> >>> http://msnbc.com/news/923165.asp?0si=- >>> >>> Well there ya go. >>> >>> -Gel >>> >>> >>> >> >> > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/index.cfm?forumid=5 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/index.cfm?method=subscribe&forumid=5 Host with the leader in ColdFusion hosting. Voted #1 ColdFusion host by CF Developers. Offering shared and dedicated hosting options. www.cfxhosting.com/default.cfm?redirect=10481 Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
