The two greatest intelligence and security failures in U.S. history were the totemic sneak attacks on Pearl Harbor and 9/11.
Separated by 60 years, both failures shared striking similarities. Clues to both were available in the raw intelligence gathered by the U.S. but they slipped through the gaps of multi-agency cooperation, poorly focused resources and a failure of imagination. The failings were profound but at least they were understandable—the security failure on Saturday that allowed a sniper to fire shots at President Donald Trump was just plain dumb.
How on earth could you not secure the single most obvious elevated sniper position directly overlooking the site of a presidential candidate’s speech?
