Abram Shulsky
Encyclopedia
Abram Shulsky is a neoconservative scholar who has worked for U.S. government, RAND Corporation, and the Hudson Institute
. Shulsky served as Director of the Office of Special Plans
, a unit whose function has been compared to the 1970s Team B
exercise. In the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq
, Shulsky approved OSP memos with talking point
s about Iraq and weapons of mass destruction
and terrorism. Shulsky is critical of the traditional intelligence analysis
, which is based upon the social-scientific method, and of independent intelligence agencies. Shulsky favors a military intelligence
model which can be used support policy as, in Shulsky's words, "truth is not the goal" of intelligence operations, but "victory".
. Shulsky earned his doctorate under political philosopher Leo Strauss
. He is a neoconservative scholar and Straussian.
Shulsky served as staff for the Senate Intelligence Committee
in the early 1980s. He worked under Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle
during the Reagan Administration and later worked for the RAND Corporation. He worked as a consultant for the Office of Net Assessment
, a Pentagon
think-tank. In the run up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq
, Shulsky was the Director of the Office of Special Plans
(OSP), which served as a source of intelligence. He was hired and overseen by Douglas Feith and William Luti
, but Shulsky's "real boss" may have been higher up than Feith. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz advocated the creation of the pro-war OSP as he "was impatient with the C.I.A.
" Gordon R. Mitchell, writing in the Quarterly Journal of Speech
, stated,
After the OSP took control of providing "intelligence" to justify the invasion of Iraq, many veteran intelligence officers were forced into retirement or transferred to other positions despite years of service. Shulsky developed the "intelligence" received by the White House. According to Lt. Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski
, Shulsky ran the OSP with a clear agenda, to support the efforts of his fellow neoconservatives. In his position at OSP, Shulsky "directed the writing of Iraq, WMD, and terrorism memos according to strictly supervised talking point
s" and granted them approval. Insider Karen Kwiatkowski
characterized the talking points in depth:
To further the plot to keep Americans unaware of the nonexistent WMDs in Iraq a small unnamed team was charged with interviewing Iraqi intelligence officers to find evidence of the WMDs. A UN source said that the team came to Iraq during the summer of 2003 to interview Iraqi intelligence officers. The Iraqi intelligence officers were unable to assist the team in finding any evidence as none existed. The lack of evidence did not deter Shulsky's OSP as they were interested in the truth, but in justifying the war.
George Packer
, Franklin Foer
of The New Republic
, and Mitchell all compare the OSP failures to the problems in the mid 1970s Team B
competitive intelligence analysis, with Mitchell noting Shulsky "worked on the staff of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee that reviewed the original Team B exercise during the Cold War."
In 2006, Shulsky was working in the Pentagon at the Iran desk
as "senior advisor to the undersecretary of defense for policy, focusing on the Mideast and terrorism." Mary Louise Kelly of NPR noted some concern from C.I.A. officials that he was in this position. Paul Krugman
of The New York Times
asked "Why would the Pentagon put someone who got everything wrong on Iraq in charge of intelligence on Iran?"
In 2010, Shulsky was working as a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute
.
, a former Yale History professor and member of the WWII-era Office of Strategic Services (the predecessor to the C.I.A.)". Shulsky critiques the social-scientific method for its potential to err by mirror-imaging
. In Silent Warfare Shulsky and Schmitt write, "social science can provide the facts ... but policy makers have a monopoly on choosing the values to be pursued".
Shulsky favors the military intelligence model, "in which the intelligence officer works for the commander rather than an independent intelligence agency". "He can scour the intelligence agencies for information his commander needs and represent the commander's priorities with respect to the collection and dissemination of intelligence", write Shulsky and Schmitt in Silent Warfare. Additionally, "In a supportive role, intelligence must concentrate its efforts on finding and analyzing information relevant to implementing the policy" as "truth is not the goal" of intelligence operations, but "victory". By contrast, in a paragraph discussing Shulsky's views, Dr. Michael Warner of C.I.A.'s History Staff states "the goal of intelligence is truth" but concurs with Shulsky's idea that secrecy is endemic to intelligence.
In a 1999 paper, "Leo Strauss and the World of Intelligence (By Which We Do Not Mean Nous
)," also co-authored by Schmitt, Shulsky writes that "Strauss's view certainly alerts one to the possibility that political life may be closely linked to deception. Indeed, it suggests that deception is the norm in political life, and the hope, to say nothing of the expectation, of establishing a politics that can dispense with it is the exception."
Hudson Institute
The Hudson Institute is an American think tank founded in 1961, in Croton-on-Hudson, New York, by futurist, military strategist, and systems theorist Herman Kahn and his colleagues at the RAND Corporation...
. Shulsky served as Director of the Office of Special Plans
Office of Special Plans
The Office of Special Plans , which existed from September 2002 to June 2003, was a Pentagon unit created by Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, and headed by Feith, as charged by then-United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to supply senior George W. Bush administration officials with...
, a unit whose function has been compared to the 1970s Team B
Team B
Team B was a competitive analysis exercise commissioned by the Central Intelligence Agency in the 1970s to analyze threats the Soviet Union posed to the security of the United States. Team B, approved by then Director of Central Intelligence George H. W. Bush, was composed of "outside experts" who...
exercise. In the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq
2003 invasion of Iraq
The 2003 invasion of Iraq , was the start of the conflict known as the Iraq War, or Operation Iraqi Freedom, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 21 days of major combat operations...
, Shulsky approved OSP memos with talking point
Talking point
A talking point in debate or discourse is a succinct statement designed to persuasively support one side taken on an issue. Such statements can either be free standing or created as retorts to the opposition's talking points and are frequently used in public relations, particularly in areas heavy...
s about Iraq and weapons of mass destruction
Iraq and weapons of mass destruction
During the regime of Saddam Hussein, the nation of Iraq used, possessed, and made efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction . Hussein was internationally known for his use of chemical weapons in the 1980s against Iranian and Kurdish civilians during and after the Iran–Iraq War...
and terrorism. Shulsky is critical of the traditional intelligence analysis
Intelligence analysis
Intelligence analysis is the process of taking known information about situations and entities of strategic, operational, or tactical importance, characterizing the known, and, with appropriate statements of probability, the future actions in those situations and by those entities...
, which is based upon the social-scientific method, and of independent intelligence agencies. Shulsky favors a military intelligence
Military intelligence
Military intelligence is a military discipline that exploits a number of information collection and analysis approaches to provide guidance and direction to commanders in support of their decisions....
model which can be used support policy as, in Shulsky's words, "truth is not the goal" of intelligence operations, but "victory".
Education and Career
Shulsky did undergraduate work in mathematics at Cornell and graduate work in political science at the University of Chicago, earning M.A. and Ph.D. degrees. At Cornell and Chicago, he roomed with Paul WolfowitzPaul Wolfowitz
Paul Dundes Wolfowitz is a former United States Ambassador to Indonesia, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense, President of the World Bank, and former dean of the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University...
. Shulsky earned his doctorate under political philosopher Leo Strauss
Leo Strauss
Leo Strauss was a political philosopher and classicist who specialized in classical political philosophy. He was born in Germany to Jewish parents and later emigrated to the United States...
. He is a neoconservative scholar and Straussian.
Shulsky served as staff for the Senate Intelligence Committee
United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence
The United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence is dedicated to overseeing the United States Intelligence Community—the agencies and bureaus of the federal government of the United States who provide information and analysis for leaders of the executive and legislative branches. The...
in the early 1980s. He worked under Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle
Richard Perle
Richard Norman Perle is an American political advisor, consultant, and lobbyist who began his career in government, a senior staff member to Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson on the Senate Armed Services Committee in the 1970’s...
during the Reagan Administration and later worked for the RAND Corporation. He worked as a consultant for the Office of Net Assessment
Office of Net Assessment
The United States Department of Defense's Office of Net Assessment was created in 1973. The Director of Net Assessment is the principal staff assistant and advisor to the Secretary and Deputy Secretary of Defense on net assessment matters...
, a Pentagon
The Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
think-tank. In the run up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq
2003 invasion of Iraq
The 2003 invasion of Iraq , was the start of the conflict known as the Iraq War, or Operation Iraqi Freedom, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 21 days of major combat operations...
, Shulsky was the Director of the Office of Special Plans
Office of Special Plans
The Office of Special Plans , which existed from September 2002 to June 2003, was a Pentagon unit created by Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, and headed by Feith, as charged by then-United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to supply senior George W. Bush administration officials with...
(OSP), which served as a source of intelligence. He was hired and overseen by Douglas Feith and William Luti
William J. Luti
William J. Luti served a Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Defense Policy and Strategy for the National Security Council in the administration of President George W. Bush....
, but Shulsky's "real boss" may have been higher up than Feith. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz advocated the creation of the pro-war OSP as he "was impatient with the C.I.A.
Central Intelligence Agency
The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian intelligence agency of the United States government. It is an executive agency and reports directly to the Director of National Intelligence, responsible for providing national security intelligence assessment to senior United States policymakers...
" Gordon R. Mitchell, writing in the Quarterly Journal of Speech
Quarterly Journal of Speech
The Quarterly Journal of Speech is the academic journal of the National Communication Association. It is peer reviewed and published in February, May, August and November. The journal contains articles, original research reports, and book reviews relating to the field of Communication Studies...
, stated,
After the OSP took control of providing "intelligence" to justify the invasion of Iraq, many veteran intelligence officers were forced into retirement or transferred to other positions despite years of service. Shulsky developed the "intelligence" received by the White House. According to Lt. Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski
Karen Kwiatkowski
Karen U. Kwiatkowski is an American activist and commentator. She is a retired U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel whose assignments included duties as a Pentagon desk officer and a variety of roles for the National Security Agency. Since retiring, she has become a noted critic of the U.S....
, Shulsky ran the OSP with a clear agenda, to support the efforts of his fellow neoconservatives. In his position at OSP, Shulsky "directed the writing of Iraq, WMD, and terrorism memos according to strictly supervised talking point
Talking point
A talking point in debate or discourse is a succinct statement designed to persuasively support one side taken on an issue. Such statements can either be free standing or created as retorts to the opposition's talking points and are frequently used in public relations, particularly in areas heavy...
s" and granted them approval. Insider Karen Kwiatkowski
Karen Kwiatkowski
Karen U. Kwiatkowski is an American activist and commentator. She is a retired U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel whose assignments included duties as a Pentagon desk officer and a variety of roles for the National Security Agency. Since retiring, she has become a noted critic of the U.S....
characterized the talking points in depth:
To further the plot to keep Americans unaware of the nonexistent WMDs in Iraq a small unnamed team was charged with interviewing Iraqi intelligence officers to find evidence of the WMDs. A UN source said that the team came to Iraq during the summer of 2003 to interview Iraqi intelligence officers. The Iraqi intelligence officers were unable to assist the team in finding any evidence as none existed. The lack of evidence did not deter Shulsky's OSP as they were interested in the truth, but in justifying the war.
George Packer
George Packer
George Packer is an American journalist, novelist and playwright.-Biography:Packer's parents, Nancy Packer and Herbert Packer, were both academics at Stanford University; his maternal grandfather was George Huddleston, a congressman from Alabama. His sister, Ann Packer, is also a writer...
, Franklin Foer
Franklin Foer
Franklin Foer is an American journalist and editor-at-large for The New Republic. Foer is a 2012 Bernard L. Schwartz fellow at the New America Foundation as of Sept...
of The New Republic
The New Republic
The magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...
, and Mitchell all compare the OSP failures to the problems in the mid 1970s Team B
Team B
Team B was a competitive analysis exercise commissioned by the Central Intelligence Agency in the 1970s to analyze threats the Soviet Union posed to the security of the United States. Team B, approved by then Director of Central Intelligence George H. W. Bush, was composed of "outside experts" who...
competitive intelligence analysis, with Mitchell noting Shulsky "worked on the staff of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee that reviewed the original Team B exercise during the Cold War."
In 2006, Shulsky was working in the Pentagon at the Iran desk
Iranian Directorate
The Iranian Directorate or Directorate for Iran is a unit of The Pentagon created in 2006 to deal with intelligence on Iran in the context of diplomatic and military tensions between the United States and Iran...
as "senior advisor to the undersecretary of defense for policy, focusing on the Mideast and terrorism." Mary Louise Kelly of NPR noted some concern from C.I.A. officials that he was in this position. Paul Krugman
Paul Krugman
Paul Robin Krugman is an American economist, professor of Economics and International Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University, Centenary Professor at the London School of Economics, and an op-ed columnist for The New York Times...
of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
asked "Why would the Pentagon put someone who got everything wrong on Iraq in charge of intelligence on Iran?"
In 2010, Shulsky was working as a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute
Hudson Institute
The Hudson Institute is an American think tank founded in 1961, in Croton-on-Hudson, New York, by futurist, military strategist, and systems theorist Herman Kahn and his colleagues at the RAND Corporation...
.
Worldview
Shulsky, a Straussian, argues that Leo Strauss would have attacked the dominant method of U.S. intelligence analysis "known as the "social-scientific method," an approach advanced by Sherman KentSherman Kent
Sherman Kent, , was a Yale University history professor who, during World War II and through 17 years of Cold War-era service in the Central Intelligence Agency, pioneered many of the methods of intelligence analysis...
, a former Yale History professor and member of the WWII-era Office of Strategic Services (the predecessor to the C.I.A.)". Shulsky critiques the social-scientific method for its potential to err by mirror-imaging
Cognitive traps for intelligence analysis
Intelligence analysis is plagued by many of the cognitive traps also encountered in other disciplines. The first systematic study of the specific pitfalls lying between an intelligence analyst and clear thinking was carried out by Dick Heuer....
. In Silent Warfare Shulsky and Schmitt write, "social science can provide the facts ... but policy makers have a monopoly on choosing the values to be pursued".
Shulsky favors the military intelligence model, "in which the intelligence officer works for the commander rather than an independent intelligence agency". "He can scour the intelligence agencies for information his commander needs and represent the commander's priorities with respect to the collection and dissemination of intelligence", write Shulsky and Schmitt in Silent Warfare. Additionally, "In a supportive role, intelligence must concentrate its efforts on finding and analyzing information relevant to implementing the policy" as "truth is not the goal" of intelligence operations, but "victory". By contrast, in a paragraph discussing Shulsky's views, Dr. Michael Warner of C.I.A.'s History Staff states "the goal of intelligence is truth" but concurs with Shulsky's idea that secrecy is endemic to intelligence.
In a 1999 paper, "Leo Strauss and the World of Intelligence (By Which We Do Not Mean Nous
Nous
Nous , also called intellect or intelligence, is a philosophical term for the faculty of the human mind which is described in classical philosophy as necessary for understanding what is true or real, very close in meaning to intuition...
)," also co-authored by Schmitt, Shulsky writes that "Strauss's view certainly alerts one to the possibility that political life may be closely linked to deception. Indeed, it suggests that deception is the norm in political life, and the hope, to say nothing of the expectation, of establishing a politics that can dispense with it is the exception."
Publications
- The United States and Asia: Toward a New U.S. Strategy and Force Posture, Project Air Force Report with Zalmay KhalilzadZalmay KhalilzadZalmay Mamozy Khalilzad is a counselor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and president of Khalilzad Associates, an international business consulting firm based in Washington, DC. He was the United States Ambassador to the United Nations under President George W. Bush...
and David T. Orletsky (RAND Corporation, 2001) - Deterrence Theory and Chinese Behavior (RAND Corporation, 2000)
- Patterns in China's Use of Force: Evidence from History and Doctrinal Writings with Mark Burles (RAND Corporation, 2000)
- The US and a Rising China: Strategies and Military Implications with Zalmay M. Khalilzad, Daniel L. Byman, Roger Cliff, David T. Orletsky, David Shlapak, and Ashley J. Tellis (RAND Corporation, 1999)
- Leo Strauss and the World of Intelligence (By Which We Do Not Mean Nous), with Gary J. Schmitt in Leo Strauss, the Straussians, and the American Regime edited by Kenneth L. Deutsch and John Albert Murley (Rowman & LittlefieldRowman & LittlefieldRowman & Littlefield Publishing Group is an independent publishing house founded in 1949. Under several imprints, the company offers scholarly books and journals for the academic market, as well as trade books. The company also owns a book distributor, National Book Network...
, 1999) - The "Virtual Corporation" and Army Organization, with Francis FukuyamaFrancis FukuyamaYoshihiro Francis Fukuyama is an American political scientist, political economist, and author. He is a Senior Fellow at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford. Before that he served as a professor and director of the International Development program at the School of...
(RAND Corporation, 1997) - Preparing the U.S. Air Force for Military Operations Other Than War, with Vick Alan and John Stillion (RAND Corporation, 1997)
- Silent Warfare: Understanding the World of Intelligence, with Gary J. Schmitt (1991)
External links
- Profile: Abram Shulsky History CommonsHistory CommonsThe History Commons is a web site and organization that documents events and issues of social and political importance, focusing primarily on events and issues from the 1970s to the present day. The History Commons operates under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike license...
- Abram Shulsky Right Web Profile
- The Neocon Philosophy of Intelligence by Tom Barry of Foreign Policy in Focus