An inflection point for Australian intelligence : revisiting the 2004 Flood Report / Chris Taylor

In an Australian context, the [Iraq War], and more particularly the intelligence failure around WMD, begat a parliamentary committee inquiry, and, in response to that inquiry's recommendation, the Howard government commissioned its own broad-ranging inquiry. Rereading the Flood Report in 2023, one is struck by the insightfulness and enduring relevance of his observations on the business of intelligence. Those included reflections on the utility and limits of intelligence; as well as the need for Australia to be a 'global leader' on intelligence in Southeast Asia and the Pacific, 'exceptionally good' on intelligence in Northeast Asia, and 'very good' on South Asia.5 Although Flood's report didn't foresee the degree to which agencies would necessarily need to trim their approaches to those core missions in the light of counterterrorism, combatting people smuggling and SMO (support to military operations) imperatives.