Report Rips Intel Community in Afghanistan

(Jan. 5) -- The American intelligence community's work in Afghanistan received a devastating critique from a top military intelligence official only days after the second deadliest incident in the history of the CIA.

The report was released Monday by the Center for a New American Security and written by Maj. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, the deputy chief of staff for intelligence in Afghanistan, and two other military associates. It calls intelligence analysts "[i]gnorant of local economics and landowners, hazy about who the power brokers are and how they might be influenced, [and] incurious about the correlations between various development projects and the levels of cooperation among villagers."

"Fixing Intel: A Blueprint for Making Intelligence Relevant in Afghanistan" recommends ways to overhaul how intelligence analysts collect and disseminate information. One of the major problems now, the report contends, is that analysts don't collect intelligence from those working in the field. It recommends that analysts should act more like journalists, collecting information first-hand from sources.

The report doesn't address the role of the CIA but raises questions about the overall effectiveness of the U.S. intelligence effort in Afghanistan. It is garnering attention in light of new information about last week's bombing, which killed seven CIA employees and a Jordanian intelligence official. According to intelligence officials, the bomber was a Jordanian double-agent who was providing the CIA with information on al-Qaida.

"Eight years into the war in Afghanistan, the U.S. intelligence community is only marginally relevant to the overall strategy," the report states. "Having focused the overwhelming majority of its collection efforts and analytical brainpower on insurgent groups, the vast intelligence apparatus is unable to answer fundamental questions about the environment in which U.S. and allied forces operate and the people they seek to persuade."

The authors recommend, among other measures, combining intelligence with information collected from social scientists working with the military as part of human terrain teams, aid workers and others soldiers, among others. The report even recommends recruiting "seasoned print journalists" for one-year intelligence assignments in Afghanistan.

That recommendation, given the mistrust between journalists and the intelligence community, is likely to spark debate.