The long-playing Iraq tragedy combined the miscalculations and misperceptions of many governments. Washington had a deformed picture of Iraq and Saddam certainly had a deformed picture of Washington. Both sides acted on their misperceptions.

The costliest mistake of the Bush Administration was not the mistakes based on incorrect intelligence about WMD. The costliest mistake was the decision to ignore CIA judgments about the internal politics and dynamics of Iraq. That decision led to the post war chaos and the insurgency which cost so many lives and billions of dollars.

The new Obama administration should learn from the past and should understand that the government cannot perform brain surgery. The tools Washington has are the equivalent of an axe and a sledge hammer. If Obama wants the government to do something, he better want to do it very badly—-because that is how the government will do it—very badly.

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Saddam was a ruthless dictator who controlled a wealthy country and its disparate population to suit his vision. After several years of trying to contain the postwar insurgency, Washington now appreciates the challenge in running Iraq. A top Saddam security official told Duelfer that to run Iraq, "you will have to become Saddam."

Duelfer's team debriefed Saddam and his top lieutenants. He analyzed how Saddam ran Iraq and led his people. There are elemental lessons—good and bad—that can be drawn from the Saddam techniques.

This is powerful, but also amusing, presentation of how management techniques can work and not work. Saddam's worked—for a while. Now he is dead.

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Duelfer studied how US intelligence and Iraqi intelligence both made catastrophic mistakes. There are common systemic problems that confront any analyst trying to gather data and interpret it for a government, business, or as a citizen trying to decide who to vote for. Analytic faults are highlighted with examples. For example, the US fell victim to "confirmation bias" where you tend to see and collect data that supports your current mindset or hypothesis (e.g. Saddam must have WMD). Likewise, information source bias affects assessments. Among spies, information which is stolen is treated with more credibility than something that is found in the public.

Another key intelligence problem was not being aware of your own assumption. An Iraqi general asked Duelfer, "Why do you always blow-up buildings?" This was an excellent question…that highlighted an American assumption—things of value would be in buildings. Iraq learned how Americans behaved and simply put valuable things out in fields—where US intelligence analysts would not be looking in their satellite pictures.

Duelfer highlights the risks of these failure modes with concrete examples. Anyone doing corporate competitive analysis will immediately see the relevance of US intelligence failures regarding Iraq to their own business or market assessments.

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The path that Iraq and the US took that ended in the current war is filled with misperceptions and miscalculations. It shows the limits of government policy-makers and intelligence collection and analysis. Duelfer reviews from first-hand experience the actions of leaders in the US, UN and Iraq. He relates the problems and experiences of intelligence work.

Duelfer lines up theory with reality in ways that entertain, but also provide memorable lessons to guide students and future practitioners on government and intelligence. The lessons of Iraq will apply to the range of other international issues that confront both our government and our businesses.

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