In the Eye of the Beholder: How Leaders and Intelligence Communities Assess the Intentions of Adversaries

2013 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keren Yarhi-Milo
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Selective Attention ◽  
Strong Support ◽  
Ronald Reagan ◽  
Intelligence Community ◽  
Jimmy Carter ◽  
Mixed Support ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
Costly Signals ◽  
The Cold War

How do policymakers infer the long-term political intentions of their states' adversaries? A new approach to answering this question, the “selective attention thesis,” posits that individual perceptual biases and organizational interests and practices influence which types of indicators a state's political leaders and its intelligence community regard as credible signals of an adversary's intentions. Policymakers often base their interpretations on their own theories, expectations, and needs, sometimes ignoring costly signals and paying more attention to information that, though less costly, is more vivid (i.e., personalized and emotionally involving). In contrast, intelligence organizations typically prioritize the collection and analysis of data on the adversary's military inventory. Over time, these organizations develop substantial knowledge on these material indicators that they then use to make predictions about an adversary's intentions. An examination of three cases based on 30,000 archival documents and intelligence reports shows strong support for the selective attention thesis and mixed support for two other approaches in international relations theory aimed at understanding how observers are likely to infer adversaries' political intentions: the behavior thesis and the capabilities thesis. The three cases are assessments by President Jimmy Carter and officials in his administration of Soviet intentions during the collapse of détente; assessments by President Ronald Reagan and administration officials of Soviet intentions during the end of the Cold War; and British assessments of Nazi Germany before World War II.

Introduction

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keren Yarhi-Milo
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Selective Attention ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Ronald Reagan ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Jimmy Carter ◽  
World War ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
And Behavior

This book explores the question of how policy makers gauge their adversaries’ intentions and the implications of such intentions assessment for international relations and world affairs. It advances a framework called the selective attention thesis and compares it to three well-known explanations of perceived intentions: the capabilities thesis, strategic military doctrine thesis, and behavior thesis. All four theses are tested using three cases: British assessments of Nazi Germany’s intentions in the period leading to World War II; U.S. assessments of Soviet intentions under the administration of Jimmy Carter; and U.S. assessments of Soviet intentions in the years leading to the end of the Cold War during the second administration of Ronald Reagan. Drawing on these historical episodes, the book considers which indicators are used or ignored by decision makers and intelligence organizations when making intentions assessments.

The Suggestion

2002 ◽  
Vol 80 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Istváán Réév
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Iron Curtain ◽  
World War ◽  
Real Situation ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Ethnographic Analysis ◽  
Two Sides

THE ARCHIVES THAT HIDE THE DOCUMENTS of the second half twentieth century contain, in large part, lies. The stories that emerge from the depths of the archives describe a world of apocalyptic fantasy.There is no real situation behind most of the archival documents; they are just texts. The testimonies, confessions in most cases, are repetitions of suggested texts, while the suggestions sometimes are themselves but citations of other tainted, verbally suggested works of fiction. These documents do not describe a state of affairs independent of themselves; they create the world they supposedly describe. But the self-referential nature of the documents based on suggestions helps to decipher a world that was firmly based on lies, fearful fantasies, and sheer propaganda. In lies there lies the truth. The images of and imaginations about Cardinal Jóózsef Mindszenty's show trial in Hungary at the end of the 1940s played a crucial role in unleashing the wildest possible mutual speculations about the superhuman capabilities of the enemy on the opposing sides of the Cold War. The case triggered not just presumptions but frantic and fantastic experimentation on both sides. The suppositions and counterassumptions; the mutual fear and efforts at mutual deterrence; and the imagined words that were presumably capable of ''doing things'' all solidified the post-World War II construct, which was in turn experienced as solid and tangible reality.There was a subterranean dialogue between the two sides divided by the Iron Curtain, and the tools of communication between them were credible lies and wild fantasy with direct and fateful consequences. This paper——impatiently,but in minute detail——tries to follow the genesis and fate of a few suggested utterances. It is an effort to reconstruct the scene of the suggestion, arguing that it is not possible to understand its meaning and complexity if the analysis is detached from the scene of the event. In delineating a context for post-Word War II representations and misrepresentations of truth——through a maze of interconnected stories that lead from one side of the Atlantic to the other——history itself becomes the object of the essay's ethnographic analysis.

Containment Strategies in Perspective

2006 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 92-97
Author(s):  
Robert L. Jervis
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Ronald Reagan ◽  
Original Text ◽  
Jimmy Carter ◽  
The Cold War

John L. Gaddis's classic 1982 book Strategies of Containment, now out in a revised and expanded edition, characterizes the Cold War strategies of successive U.S. administrations as either symmetric or asymmetric. The new edition of the book retains this distinction and applies it to the administrations of Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. Gaddis incorporates a few findings from research that has appeared since 1982, but the original text has undergone fewer revisions than one might have expected. Gaddis's general approach, and many of his specific claims, are bound to provoke objections, but historians and political scientists will find his analysis stimulating and provocative.

AYN RAND AND AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN THE COLD WAR ERA

2011 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 253-263 ◽  
Author(s):  
PATRICK ALLITT
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Free Market ◽  
Ronald Reagan ◽  
Conservative Movement ◽  
Ayn Rand ◽  
American Conservatism ◽  
Free Market Capitalism ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The New Deal

An American conservative movement developed rapidly after World War II. It brought together intellectuals and politicians opposed to the New Deal in domestic policy and Soviet communism in foreign policy. The movement's first presidential candidate, Barry Goldwater, lost the election of 1964 but its second, Ronald Reagan, won the election of 1980. It has remained an influential force in American life up to the present, despite strong internal contradictions, which include disagreements about centralized power, about religion, about tradition, about elites, and about the free market. To some of the movement's early luminaries, such as Russell Kirk, free-market capitalism was the antithesis of conservatism since it required perpetual innovation and the sweeping away of traditional forms. To others, such as Ayn Rand, capitalism was the heart and soul of conservatism because it alone preserved the dignity and freedom of the individual.

scholarly journals The Bitburg Controversy from the New Cold War Perspective: Reagan’s Views on WWII Nazi Germany’s Soldiers’ Victimhood

Ad Americam ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 22 ◽  
pp. 33-43
Author(s):  
Grzegorz Nycz
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Public Relations ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Ronald Reagan ◽  
World War ◽  
Great Patriotic War ◽  
War Propaganda ◽  
Harsh Criticism ◽  
The Cold War

The Bitburg Controversy from the New Cold War Perspective: Reagan’s Views on WWII Nazi Germany’s Soldiers’ Victimhood Why to go back to 1985 to discuss present-day key concerns of international relations fromthe perspective of World War II history during the Cold War? The May 5, 1985 Bitburg cemetery celebrations, when US president altogether with German chancellor (Helmut Kohl) paid tribute to WWII veterans (of both sides of the conflict) was an example of the Ronald Reagan administration’s public relations fiasco: the “Great Communicator” failed to refer to WWII history in a manner that would save him from harsh criticism. Importantly, the 1985 debate concerning the Bitburg ceremony and the moral aspects of a homage to German (Axis) WWII soldiers gave an incentive to “Historikerstreit” in Germany, a dispute regarding WWII history in a manner comparable to Holocaust responsibility as a collective burden carried by Germans. The Bitburg cemetery, since the 1930s a monument (Kolmeshöhe Ehrenfriedhof) to WWI German military victims, and then to their younger colleagues during WWII (Wehrmacht and, controversially, Waffen-SS) remained a broadly commented upon focal point of Cold War disputes, allowing such questions that might bring about a possibilityof ground-breaking change in present-day political rivalries caused by failed (or successful) Cold War propaganda related to WWII choices. The Bitburg case as a particularly illustrative one and could also shed more light on the post-Soviet Russian effort to increase its influence by relying on the myths of the “Great Patriotic War”.

The Unassailable Self: Freud's Image Among Post-war American Intellectuals

2017 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine Jenness
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
External Force ◽  
Sigmund Freud ◽  
Human Being ◽  
World War ◽  
The Us ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Way

This paper explores the way American intellectuals depicted Sigmund Freud during the peak of popularity and prestige of psychoanalysis in the US, roughly the decade and a half following World War II. These intellectuals insisted upon the unassailability of Freud's mind and personality. He was depicted as unsusceptible to any external force or influence, a trait which was thought to account for Freud's admirable comportment as a scientist, colleague and human being. This post-war image of Freud was shaped in part by the Cold War anxiety that modern individuality was imperilled by totalitarian forces, which could only be resisted by the most rugged of selves. It was also shaped by the unique situation of the intellectuals themselves, who were eager to position themselves, like the Freud they imagined, as steadfastly independent and critical thinkers who would, through the very clarity of their thought, lead America to a more robust democracy.

New Materials for Studying Preparation and Staging of the 6th World Festival of Youth and Students in 1957

2018 ◽  
pp. 550-563
Author(s):  
Daniel Sawert ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Central Asia ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Soviet Society ◽  
Unique Event ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
Cultural Standards ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Local Traditions

The article assesses archival materials on the festival movement in the Soviet Union in 1950s, including its peak, the 6th World Festival of Youth and Students held in 1957 in Moscow. Even now the Moscow festival is seen in the context of international cultural politics of the Cold War and as a unique event for the Soviet Union. The article is to put the 6th World Festival of Youth and Students in the context of other youth festivals held in the Soviet Union. The festivals of 1950s provided a field for political, social, and cultural experiments. They also have been the crucible of a new way of communication and a new language of design. Furthermore, festivals reflected the new (althogh relative) liberalism in the Soviet Union. This liberalism, first of all, was expressed in the fact that festivals were organized by the Komsomol and other Soviet public and cultural organisations. Taking the role of these organisations into consideration, the research draws on the documents of the Ministry of culture, the All-Russian Stage Society, as well as personal documents of the artists. Furthermore, the author has gained access to new archive materials, which have until now been part of no research, such as documents of the N. Krupskaya Central Culture and Art Center and of the central committees of various artistic trade unions. These documents confirm the hypothesis that the festivals provided the Komsomol and the Communist party with a means to solve various social, educational, and cultural problems. For instance, in Central Asia with its partiarchal society, the festivals focuced on female emancipation. In rural Central Asia, as well as in other non-russian parts of the Soviet Union, there co-existed different ways of celebrating. Local traditions intermingled with cultural standards prescribed by Moscow. At the first glance, the modernisation of the Soviet society was succesful. The youth acquired political and cultural level that allowed the Soviet state to compete with the West during the 6th World Festival of Youth and Students. During the festival, however, it became apparent, that the Soviet cultural scheme no longer met the dictates of times. Archival documents show that after the Festival cultural and party officials agreed to ease off dogmatism and to tolerate some of the foreign cultural phenomena.

The Roots of Global Health Inequity

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joia S. Mukherjee
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Primary Health Care ◽  
Economic Policies ◽  
World War ◽  
The Public ◽  
The World Bank ◽  
Primary Health ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Impact

This chapter outlines the historical roots of health inequities. It focuses on the African continent, where life expectancy is the shortest and health systems are weakest. The chapter describes the impoverishment of countries by colonial powers, the development of the global human rights framework in the post-World War II era, the impact of the Cold War on African liberation struggles, and the challenges faced by newly liberated African governments to deliver health care through the public sector. The influence of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund’s neoliberal economic policies is also discussed. The chapter highlights the shift from the aspiration of “health for all” voiced at the Alma Ata Conference on Primary Health Care in 1978, to the more narrowly defined “selective primary health care.” Finally, the chapter explains the challenges inherent in financing health in impoverished countries and how user fees became standard practice.

Truth to Power

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Policy Issue ◽  
International Terrorism ◽  
Intelligence Community ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Government ◽  
Intelligence Support ◽  
The Cold War

This first-ever history of the US National Intelligence Council (NIC) is told through the reflections of its eight chairs in the period from the end of the Cold War until 2017. Coeditors Robert Hutchings and Gregory Treverton add a substantial introduction placing the NIC in its historical context going all the way back to the Board of National Estimates in the 1940s, as well as a concluding chapter that highlights key themes and judgments. The historic mission of this remarkable but little-understood organization is strategic intelligence assessment in service of senior American foreign policymakers. It has been at the center of every critical foreign policy issue during the period covered by this volume: helping shape America’s post–Cold War strategies, confronting sectarian conflicts around the world, meeting the new challenge of international terrorism, and now assessing the radical restructuring of the global order. Each chapter places its particular period of the NIC’s history in context (the global situation, the administration, the intelligence community) and assesses the most important issues with which the NIC grappled during the period, acknowledging failures as well as claiming successes. With the creation of the director of national intelligence in 2005, the NIC’s mission mushroomed to include direct intelligence support to the main policymaking committees in the government. The mission shift took the NIC directly into the thick of the action but may have come at the expense of weakening its historic role of providing over-the horizon strategic analysis.

Cold War Exiles and the CIA

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Tromly
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
West Germany ◽  
United States Government ◽  
Home Base ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Secret War

During the height of the Cold War in the 1950s, the United States government unleashed covert operations intended to weaken the Soviet Union. As part of these efforts, the CIA undertook support of Russian exiles, populations uprooted either during World War II or by the Russian Revolution decades before. No one seemed better prepared to fight in the American secret war against communism than the uprooted Russians, whom the CIA directed to carry out propaganda, espionage, and subversion operations from their home base in West Germany. Yet the American engagement of Russian exiles had unpredictable outcomes. Drawing on recently declassified and previously untapped sources, Cold War Exiles and the CIA examines how the CIA’s Russian operations became entangled with the internal struggles of Russia abroad and also the espionage wars of the superpowers in divided Germany. What resulted was a transnational political sphere involving different groups of Russian exiles, American and German anti-communists, and spies operating on both sides of the Iron Curtain. Inadvertently, CIA’s patronage of Russian exiles forged a complex sub-front in the wider Cold War, demonstrating the ways in which the hostilities of the Cold War played out in ancillary conflicts involving proxies and non-state actors.

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