Reply #3: It was exaggerated on purpose [View All]

[htuttle]

Look up the 'Team A/Team B' analysis exercise of the Soviet Union's military capabilities that was conducted in the 70's.

On one side, Team A was full of CIA analysts. They concluded that the Soviet Union was falling apart economically, and could not last another 10 years on their current track. However, even they overestimated the health of the Soviet economy.

On the other side, Team B was full of 'private' analysts. They concluded that the Soviet Union was a growing threat, and that we needed to increase defense spending to keep them in check or all was lost.

Not surprisingly, Reagan took the advice of Team B when he came into office, and our defense spending (and our national debt) skyrocketed.

Who was on Team B?

The Team B leader was Prof. Richard Pipes. Associates were Prof. William Van Cleave; Lt. Gen. Daniel Graham, USA (Ret.); Dr. Thomas Wolfe, RAND Corporation; and Gen. John Vogt, USAF, (Ret.). The Team's Advisory Panel was comprised of Ambassador Foy Kohler; The Honorable Paul Nitze; Ambassador Seymour Weiss; Maj. Gen. Jasper Welch, USAF; and Dr. Paul Wolfowitz, Arms Control and Disarmament Agency.
http://intellit.muskingum.edu/analysis_folder/analysissovteams.html

Any names you recognize in there?

Here's a good comparison from Newsweek between the Team A/B exercise, and the lead up to the invasion of Iraq:

Iraq is part of a pattern. In each of these cases, arguments about the threat posed by a country rest in large part on the character of the regime. The Team B report explains that the CIA’s analysis was flawed because it was based on too much "hard data"--meaning facts--and neglected to divine Soviet intentions. The Chinese regime is assumed to be a mortal danger because it is Leninist. Saddam was assumed to be working on a vast weapons program because he was an evil man.
http://www.fareedzakaria.com/articles/newsweek/061603.html