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January 20, 2008

Roberta Wohlstetter's Writings (1958-1991)

Roberta Wohlstetter
The Bibliography Project. This latest installment provides a list of Roberta Morgan Wohlstetter's published (and a few unpublished) writings from 1958 to 1991.

Although Roberta Wohlstetter is best remembered for Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision, her 1962 Bancroft Prize-winning examination of the failures of intelligence and imagination that preceded Imperial Japan's December 1941 surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, many of her other writings also remain relevant.

For example, insights from The Buddha Smiles: Absent-Minded Peaceful Aid and the Indian Bomb, Roberta Wohlstetter's 1976 study of how American and Canadian civil nuclear assistance unwittingly furthered India's military efforts to build and detonate a nuclear explosive device, are still worth considering today, especially as the US contemplates carving out an exception in American and international law that would enable nuclear suppliers to export to India. (I aim to make The Buddha Smiles available for download within the next few weeks.)

In an earlier entry, I revisited the historical background, and meditated on the continuing relevance of Swords from Plowshares: The Military Potential of Civilian Nuclear Energy (1979), an edited volume by Roberta and Albert Wohlstetter, Henry Rowen and others. Suffice to say, so long as nuclear proliferation continues to be a problem, Swords from Plowshares should remain as required reading.

Last, in December 2005 James Johnson and I wrote about the contemporary importance of Roberta Wohlstetter's concept of "slow Pearl Harbors":

.... another problem that concerned her deeply has received less attention--namely, what she termed "slow Pearl Harbors." Wohlstetter developed this concept in a 1979 essay in the Washington Quarterly, "The Pleasures of Self-Deception," and in a later, unpublished manuscript. Unlike the dramatic surprises of December 7, 1941, and September 11, 2001, slow Pearl Harbors unfold when "the change at any given time seems innocent enough," but, over time, "the changes add up and can ultimately spell disaster." Here, she elaborated, "the problem is that after each small change even hindsight is not very clear. In fact, one can sometimes argue interminably even about the cumulative disaster."
The cumulating changes of a potential adversary present severe challenges not only to the intelligence analyst who must try to recognize them, but also to the decision-maker who may have to craft firm yet proportional responses to them. For while under-reaction to such changes risks one sort of disaster, over-reaction risks quite another.

I should close by observing that, throughout her writings, Roberta Wohlstetter displayed a deep respect for the intelligence analyst. She understood that the intelligence analyst's task is one not only of retrospective explanation, but also, and perhaps more critically, of prospective anticipation; it is a formidable task in which the analyst faces everyday the real risk of failure, even catastrophic failure. Indeed, that is why Wohlstetter concluded her Pearl Harbor study with the following sober words: "We have to accept the fact of uncertainty and live with it. No magic, in code or otherwise, will provide certainty."

Roberta Mary Morgan Wohlstetter died in New York, NY, on January 6, 2007. She was 94.

Roberta Wohlstetter's Writings (1958-1991)

Posted by Robert on January 20, 2008 11:57 PM