Picture a sprawling organisation with an annual budget of $50 billion. As in all organisations, its executives make decisions based on what they think will happen in the future-forecasts, in other words-but forecasting is particularly important for this organisation, because much of its money is spent generating forecasts which it shares with others. This is America's intelligence community, consisting of 17 government agencies. One might assume, given its vast resources and experience, that its forecasts are as accurate as humanly possible. Or perhaps, given its high-profile mistakes, one might think its forecasts are hopeless. The truth? Until recently, nobody really knew.
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