Week 3 forum INTL200

Forum entries need to be submitted using an essay-type format. Students will cite the work in their forum and provide references. Forums need to have an introduction with thesis sentence, 2-3 supporting paragraphs, and conclusion. The conclusion needs to summarize your key points. Forum discussions should include: substantive 250+ words.

In this weeks forum you are asked to address one of two different questions. This is intended to allow you to have some control over what you want to focus on and learn this week. Strategic analysis is a vexing problem for the intelligence community. While useful and accurate in the vast majority of cases, the failures tend to be spectacular. Exploring the issues and problems in analysis and production is important to understanding the overall nature of strategic intelligence analysis and the products.

This week you will be introduced to a variety of points of view related to the purpose, problems, and issues facing strategic intelligence products and analysis.

For the Forum assignment choose one of the two topics:

1) Why is the development and presentation of finished strategic analysis products, primarily the NIE and PDB so complex, and often fraught with contradictions and nuanced conclusions?

-or-

2) What are the impediments to strategic intelligence analysis and why have they persisted for so long?