Friday, January 14, 2005
THE FUTURE AT THE AMERICAN FUTURE
Marc Shulman has a summative post on the contents of the NIC Report Project 2020 up at the American Future. An important post to read about an important report that should also be read. For general information, Dr. Barnett presented to the NIC on the future of war prior to the writing of this report.
I will have comments as soon as I read the PDF file. My preliminary remark after reading Marc's post is that I think the NIC may have missed some significant considerations but I will hold my opinions in abeyance for now. The devil is often in the details.
UPDATE:
I've read several sections already but I'm still not finished;Dr. Barnett on the other hand,had these comments on Project 2020:
"Quick note to one emailer: yes, I did read the National Intelligence Council's latest futurist offering on 2020. As always, very solid work, and very short on hyperbole (almost none). But strangely unvisionary. Can't tell if the NIC felt it needed to be more careful now that whole intell community is under fire, or whether the world has just changed so much that such futurism is fairly tame. In short, it was a good piece, but it held no surprises for me, and that disappointed just a bit. NIC is still the best in the government business, so I think it's more that we (or maybe just me) need something a bit more visionary to grasp our imaginations. Of course, NIC to be congratulated on avoiding the dark nonsense so prevalent in such things coming out of Pentagon, but I looked at their futures and saw only floors, not ceilings. We can do much better--so much better--than this report posits.
And maybe that is the NIC feeling beaten down by the Bush Administration."
¶ 10:16 AM
Marc Shulman has a summative post on the contents of the NIC Report Project 2020 up at the American Future. An important post to read about an important report that should also be read. For general information, Dr. Barnett presented to the NIC on the future of war prior to the writing of this report.
I will have comments as soon as I read the PDF file. My preliminary remark after reading Marc's post is that I think the NIC may have missed some significant considerations but I will hold my opinions in abeyance for now. The devil is often in the details.
UPDATE:
I've read several sections already but I'm still not finished;Dr. Barnett on the other hand,had these comments on Project 2020:
"Quick note to one emailer: yes, I did read the National Intelligence Council's latest futurist offering on 2020. As always, very solid work, and very short on hyperbole (almost none). But strangely unvisionary. Can't tell if the NIC felt it needed to be more careful now that whole intell community is under fire, or whether the world has just changed so much that such futurism is fairly tame. In short, it was a good piece, but it held no surprises for me, and that disappointed just a bit. NIC is still the best in the government business, so I think it's more that we (or maybe just me) need something a bit more visionary to grasp our imaginations. Of course, NIC to be congratulated on avoiding the dark nonsense so prevalent in such things coming out of Pentagon, but I looked at their futures and saw only floors, not ceilings. We can do much better--so much better--than this report posits.
And maybe that is the NIC feeling beaten down by the Bush Administration."
¶ 10:16 AM
