Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
The Washington Post kicks off an overwrought series today on "Top Secret America," as other posters have noted. It claims that we are wasting billions on redundant intel gathering but at the same time not sharing all that is brought in -- in other words, the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.
This is the very fault of the liberal media and politicians. Remember back to the months after 9/11. The knee-jerk response to the intel failure was to create a new government agency, the Department of Homeland Security. At the same time, one of the principal agencies responsible for the failure, the FBI, was kept intact. 9/11 did not lead to any fundamental restructuring of the way we fight terrorism, but just to more government -- and supporters of more spending in Congress and liberal voices in the media cheered it all on.
Then, to make it worse, the Directorate of National Intelligence, yet another federal agency, was created to try to harmonize and manage all of the existing intelligence agencies. If memory serves, most big spenders in Congress and liberals in the media supported this too.
Rather than combine, the right answer is to split up government intelligence into smaller, more nimble, and more competitive parts. In the financial world, markets identify companies that have become too large and should split up. Investment groups take over such companies and either streamline them or spin off units into new, smaller companies. Federal agencies have no such creative destruction mechanism. Instead, Washington's reaction to every crisis is to encrust already dysfunctional bureaucracies with more layers.
Think of the solution as using free market approaches to fixing government.
Make the intel agencies compete for funding and personnel by showing real success, rather than giving everyone more employees and money. Use money more as venture capitalists do, to fund new ideas and technologies to fight terrorism. Harness our advantages, with technology and computers and high-tech weaponry, rather than focus on process and turf.
A good test case -- why not split up the FBI into two parts, one that continues to catch kidnappers and bank robbers, and the other to focus purely on domestic counter-intelligence and counter-terrorism. (I will got out on a limb and predict now that this will not be the Washington Post's conclusion -- I bet they will demand, oh, yet another agency or more spending to engage in even more coordinating).
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Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
If we make them compete, won't that come at a cost to information sharing?
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
JR has a good point: That's already a huge problem.
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
Maybe this could be a fix:
As part of the competition, the agency who gathers the intel scores points for sharing the info with the other appropriate agencies.
May '10
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
Boy, I read the headline and immediately thought that they had found a fatal flaw in the Atom microprocessor.
May '10
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
I'm suspicious of the increase in folks with secret security clearances. Many are unnecessary, and it only serves to allow abuses and corruption under the notion of preventing "sensitive data" from being compromised. I would agree to trimming the fat. The gov't provides a gravy train to local private companies that contract for a variety of goods and services. Take for instance the background check firms that do interviews, research, etc for all the secret clearances. You think TSA agents at the airport are the weakest link? Not by a long shot. Top Secret America has funded a practical welfare state of under-qualified, under-educated nincompoops to mind the store who just get in the way of the truly qualified folks who try to do their jobs. I would support a free-market approach, if there weren't so many palms to grease in Maryland and Virginia politics. Why don't they cut a bunch of contract and fed jobs and turn it over to the Armed Forces? Take that new Joint-Use Intel Analysis Facility in Charlottesville. They could run that shop out of DC by activity duty folks, not feds.
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
There is a trade-off between integrating everything into one "firm" and using competition among multiple firms. The Beltway response is to assume that coordinating information shoud occur though ever large bureaucracies -- but this is a mistake. The operation of free markets shows that information can be shared and actions coordinated without a single coordinator (this was Hayek's great insight) in a cheaper, more efficient way than through a government. The larger the firm, the greater the distance between the goals and the execution (orders get distorted and take longer to execute, resources are misallocated, management costs increase, employees pursue their own interests -- all of the costs identified by the Post series but well known to students of common bureaucracies).
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
Justified Right: Maybe this could be a fix:
As part of the competition, the agency who gathers the intel scores points for sharing the info with the other appropriate agencies. · Jul 19 at 1:53pm
Exactly. We have to have some competition -- the question is how do we replicate the features of the free market within the government. The chief problem is, as you identify, that it is harder to measure success in intelligence. In the markets, success is measured in profit. In intelligence, success means nothing happened -- no terrorist attack occurred. So how do we create a system of rewards for the creative intelligence analysts. One start would be to allow multiple, smaller agencies access to the same pool of intelligence, and reward those who see the patterns better of potential terrorist activity. Give points to those who share their intelligence more effectively -- those who share intel that leads to the discovery of plots. And take away points from those who did not share the intel or see the patterns -- for example, the reports in the system that pointed to the Christmas Day bomber.
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
I agree -- the bloat depicted in the Post series is typical of organizations, whether they be in the government or the private sector, that have grown too large to serve their purpose.
I am not sure handing everything to the Defense Department is the right answer, though. DOD, in fact, is an example of centralization too -- combining all of the military into one agency, rather than several. It is arguable that this has not been a success. There might be more to be gained if the armed services had to compete for resources and funding by proving that they are better able to carry out certain security missions.
May '10
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
John, thanks for the reply. I think I would make a distinction among active duty, contractors and feds within DoD. I certainly wouldn't suggest giving the largest federal agency everything. But I do think, in general terms, that the various Corps compete for funding or at least fight over it. I think the DoD has gotten too big for its britches, and should cull some fed jobs. This is only from personal observation, so take it as you will, but active duty folks tend to have a greater motivation to get things right. It speaks of the camaraderie and accountability culture that exists within the active duty military that isn't as prevalent elsewhere. I think the new Joint-Use thing in C-ville is a DoD facility. There are no unions, unlike the federal workforce. With contractors, there is no long-term investment. They are fickle. Within the military, wearing your resume on your chest and competing for promotions encourages a certain entrepreneurial sensibility. I guess for me the issue isn't so much how many, but which many. I'm interested in hearing more details about a free-market approach to this issue. More posts to follow?
Re: Fixing Intel Failures with Free Markets?
The hard thing about comparing markets to government is that the "output" is harder to measure. With the market, you can see price for the goods -- the prices represent millions of individual decisions on the supply and demand of the product. The decentralized market will generally ensure that resources are spent on the things that people want. With government, there are no "prices" like that of a market. So maybe, instead, an intel system might work like the armed services once did before Goldwater-Nichols and the creation of the Defense Department. Each service could look at the same body of raw intelligence and problems. They could make predictions and propose operations in response. Those agencies that prove to be right, that can build a track record of success, should get more personnel and funding. Free the services from the costly layers of multiple management above them, but also encourage risk-taking and creativity by allowing multiple agencies to participate. What do you think?