Page:CIAdeceptionMaximsFactFolklore 1980.pdf/9

 Introduction

The past several years have witnessed a substantial growth of interest in the role and efficacy of deception and surprise in military and political affairs. This growth has been reflected in an increased number of scholarly analyses on the subject1 and spurred by the release of some of the most closely held secrets of World War II. 2 As well, political scientists, sociologists, intelligence analysts, and others have explored and codified theory and hypotheses relevant to misperception, failures and cognitive biases in intelligence analyses, and other related topics. 3 It seems appropriate to explore, integrate, and summarize this work into a unified body of knowledge. To help catalyze this synthesis, several hypotheses or maxims relevant to deception and surprise are offered herein. These maxims have been distilled from historical accounts, summarized from analytical expositions, and extracted from conversations with some of the leading deception planners of World War II vintage. They are ventured as hypotheses for further testing and analysis, much in the spirit of Jervis' useful Hypotheses on Misperception (14) a work which influenced both format and content of this paper. The wisdom of some of these