Former CIA Chief: Underestimating ISIS a Policy Failure, Not Intelligence Failure

Former CIA Chief: Underestimating ISIS a Policy Failure, Not Intelligence Failure

Monday on “CBS This Morning,” former director of the Central Intelligence Agency Michael Morell contradicted President Barack Obama’s claim Saturday that bad “intelligence estimates” were the reason the administration did not anticipate the speed in which ISIS would capture large portions of Iraq.

CBS’s Norah O’Donnell asked, “The president himself admitted over the weekend that this Islamist State militants advance is more rapid than intelligence estimates. Was this an intelligence failure or a policy failure?”

Morell replied, “So I don’t think this was an intelligence failure. This is a classic problem in the intelligence world. There’s a difference between strategic warning and tactical warning. There was strategic warning here in the sense that the intelligence community was saying for over a year, year and a half, two years that this group was getting stronger and stronger and stronger.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN

COMMENTS

Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.