A Job Well Done

The latest chapter in lack of accountability, courtesy of the WP:

Two Army analysts whose work has been cited as part of a key intelligence failure on Iraq -- the claim that aluminum tubes sought by the Baghdad government were most likely meant for a nuclear weapons program rather than for rockets -- have received job performance awards in each of the past three years, officials said.

The civilian analysts, former military men considered experts on foreign and U.S. weaponry, work at the Army's National Ground Intelligence Center (NGIC), one of three U.S. agencies singled out for particular criticism by President Bush's commission that investigated U.S. intelligence.

The Army analysts concluded that it was highly unlikely that the tubes were for use in Iraq's rocket arsenal, a finding that bolstered a CIA contention that they were destined for nuclear centrifuges, which was in turn cited by the Bush administration as proof that Saddam Hussein was reconstituting Iraq's nuclear weapons program.

The awards were given as part of a government-wide incentive program to recognize high-performing employees with cash or time off. An internal NGIC newsletter listed Norris and Campos as among those who received performance awards, lump-sum cash payments, in fiscal 2002, 2003 and 2004.

So the two individuals responsible in large part for one of the worst intelligence failures in the nation's history--a failure that has resulted in the deaths of almost two thousand U.S. troops and tens of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians--have been rewarded three years running. For some absurd reason, I thought they would have been fired or at least demoted by now. While they're getting bonuses and letters of praise, our troops continue to die in the wake of their mistakes.

Brings to mind this similar Orwellian sham, doesn't it?

I've worked for organizations in which failure was rewarded. For a business, it is debilitating and destructive, and it usually occurs because someone plays golf with the boss better than he performs on the job. When it happens in organizations like the CIA and the Army, it's also because someone is "playing ball" well, albeit for far higher stakes. For a nation, it is no less destructive than for a business.

Because of the systematic rewarding of the individuals who were responsible for botching Iraq both pre and post-invasion, we know that competence--at least as that word is normally defined--is not a priority for this bunch. Kind of makes you wonder what those medals and lump-sum cash payments are for, doesn't it?