General Anthony Charles Zinni, Former Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Central Command (CINCENT):
80% of what I needed to know as CINCENT I got from open sources rather than classified reporting. And within the remaining 20%, if I knew what to look for, I found another 16%. At the end of it all, classified intelligence provided me, at best, with 4% of my command knowledge
This is an important and underappreciated point, but notice that he’s not saying “I could do my job 96% as well—or even 80% as well—with nothing but public knowledge”.
I strongly disagree with your interpretation. The person quoting him is saying that. Maybe the person quoting him is trying to trick the reader, but I haven’t been able to track down the context.
He’s definitely NOT describing how well he could do his job.
Imagine trying to play checkers when you couldn’t see 13 squares (20.3% of the board), or solving a chess quiz when the contents of 2 squares (3.125%) (chosen by a malicious intelligence) are unknown.
The thing about non-public information is that it is selected for value- but it is selected for value to the opponents of the people keeping it secret. If you aren’t the enemy of the people who are concealing information, there’s a good chance that the information they are concealing isn’t interesting to you.
General Anthony Charles Zinni, Former Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Central Command (CINCENT):
This is an important and underappreciated point, but notice that he’s not saying “I could do my job 96% as well—or even 80% as well—with nothing but public knowledge”.
I strongly disagree with your interpretation. The person quoting him is saying that. Maybe the person quoting him is trying to trick the reader, but I haven’t been able to track down the context.
He’s definitely NOT describing how well he could do his job.
Imagine trying to play checkers when you couldn’t see 13 squares (20.3% of the board), or solving a chess quiz when the contents of 2 squares (3.125%) (chosen by a malicious intelligence) are unknown.
The thing about non-public information is that it is selected for value- but it is selected for value to the opponents of the people keeping it secret. If you aren’t the enemy of the people who are concealing information, there’s a good chance that the information they are concealing isn’t interesting to you.