Mistakes Were Made

Two separate articles published on the very same day about very different incidents follow a similar pattern and form an interesting juxtaposition.

In Afghanistan attack, CIA fell victim to series of miscalculations about informant
By Peter Finn and Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, January 16, 2010

In the long front page story about how security was breached in Afghanistan long enough for a double agent to turn suicide bomber, there is this observation.

Jordanian and U.S. officials have since concluded that Balawi was a committed extremist whose beliefs had deep intellectual and religious roots and who had never intended to cooperate with them. In hindsight, they said, the excitement generated by his ability to produce verifiable intelligence should have been tempered by the recognition that his penetration of al-Qaeda's top echelon was too rapid to be true.

Elsewhere another terrorist attack gets a post-mortum.

Pentagon inquiry: Supervisors discounted Fort Hood suspect's worrisome behavior
By Craig Whitlock
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 16, 2010

Again, dots aren't connected.

The review determined that supervisors of Maj. Nidal M. Hasan, the Army psychiatrist charged in the Nov. 5 attack at the Texas military post, bungled his performance reviews by excluding instances of erratic behavior in treating patients and signs that he might be growing sympathetic to suicide bombers.

Here's the pop quiz: Who said this:

"My words will drink of my blood," he wrote, one of a number of statements suggesting an ambition to move beyond rhetoric.

I'll give you a hint, it was a professionally trained doctor that used his proximity to US troops to kill them. And nobody saw the signs soon enough to stop him.