Since the conclusion of the Cold War—and notably after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001—the United States has increasingly embraced the idea that collecting more information about adversaries necessarily produces greater security. This assumption underlies the expansion of intelligence authorities such as Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), one of the most consequential surveillance programs in contemporary American history.
Supporters of Section 702, including Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, argue that modern threats cannot be addressed using twentieth-century intelligence methods. Terrorist organizations communicate across encrypted platforms, hostile governments conduct cyber espionage, and proxy organizations operate through decentralized international networks. Under these conditions, intelligence agencies require broad legal authority to intercept foreign communications quickly before threats materialize. This perspective is rooted in a long-standing realist tradition within international relations. Realist scholars from Hans Morgenthau to Kenneth Waltz have argued that international politics is characterized not by harmony but by competition among sovereign states operating in an anarchic international system. Because no global authority guarantees security, states seek power, military superiority, and intelligence advantages to survive. From this perspective, surveillance is not simply a law-enforcement tool; it is an instrument of state survival. Senator Cotton has consistently defended this philosophy. During congressional debates surrounding the renewal of FISA Section 702, he argued that weakening surveillance authorities would unnecessarily handicap American intelligence professionals confronting increasingly sophisticated adversaries such as China, Russia, Iran, and international terrorist organizations. The premise is straightforward: governments that possess better information make better strategic decisions.
Yet this assumption deserves careful examination. Political science distinguishes between tactical success and strategic success. Tactical success refers to preventing a specific attack, identifying an individual operative, intercepting weapons shipments, or exposing espionage networks. Strategic success, by contrast, concerns whether these tactical victories produce broader political objectives such as regional stability, long-term deterrence, or lasting peace.
These two outcomes are frequently confused. An intelligence agency may successfully identify hundreds of terrorist operatives while simultaneously failing to prevent the emergence of entirely new organizations. Intelligence may uncover an imminent missile launch without altering the political circumstances that produced the conflict itself. Information can improve decision-making without changing history’s broader trajectory. This distinction becomes increasingly important when evaluating twenty-first century American foreign policy. Following September 11, the United States dramatically expanded both domestic and foreign intelligence capabilities. Congress enacted the USA PATRIOT Act, increased surveillance authorities, reorganized the intelligence community under the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and invested hundreds of billions of dollars into signals intelligence, cybersecurity, satellite reconnaissance, drone surveillance, and counterterrorism operations. Section 702 became one component within this larger architecture. Authorized in 2008 and repeatedly renewed by Congress, Section 702 permits the collection of communications involving non-U.S. persons reasonably believed to be located outside the United States without obtaining individualized warrants. Intelligence officials argue that the authority has been indispensable for identifying foreign terrorist networks, disrupting espionage operations, combating cyber threats, and monitoring adversarial governments. The governments defenders frequently note that many successful intelligence operations remain classified, making public evaluation inherently incomplete. According to this reasoning, the absence of visible evidence should not be interpreted as the absence of effectiveness.
This argument possesses genuine merit.

Intelligence differs fundamentally from conventional public policy because its greatest successes are often invisible. Successful prevention produces non-events. A bombing that never occurs generates no headlines. A spy arrested before transmitting classified information rarely becomes front-page news. Historians therefore face an unusual methodological challenge: proving the effectiveness of events that never happened. Yet acknowledging this limitation does not end democratic inquiry. Democratic societies necessarily grant intelligence agencies extraordinary powers under the assumption that these powers produce extraordinary public benefits. If surveillance authorities expand continuously while global instability persists or worsens, citizens retain both the right and the responsibility to ask whether tactical intelligence successes are translating into strategic political achievements The modern international environment presents an especially difficult test of this proposition. The United States possesses arguably the most technologically sophisticated intelligence apparatus ever constructed. Its agencies collect satellite imagery capable of identifying military installations across continents. Signals intelligence intercepts communications across global digital infrastructure. Artificial intelligence increasingly assists analysts in identifying patterns across immense datasets that would have been computationally impossible only decades ago. Despite these unprecedented capabilities, however, international security has not become proportionately more stable. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq consumed nearly two decades of American military involvement. Syria descended into prolonged civil conflict despite extensive intelligence monitoring. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine demonstrated that major interstate warfare remains possible in Europe. Iran continues to expand regional influence through proxy organizations operating across Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. China increasingly contests American influence throughout the Indo-Pacific. North Korea continues developing ballistic missile capabilities. Terrorist organizations have evolved rather than disappeared.

Perhaps most strikingly, Hamas successfully conducted the October 7, 2023 attacks against Israel despite Israel maintaining one of the world’s most sophisticated intelligence services, supported by close intelligence cooperation with the United States. The attacks shocked observers precisely because they challenged assumptions regarding the predictive capabilities of modern intelligence systems. None of these observations demonstrate that intelligence is ineffective. Rather, they suggest something more nuanced: information alone cannot overcome the political, ideological, economic, and historical forces that generate conflict. Intelligence can reveal intentions, estimate capabilities, and reduce uncertainty. The concept cannot independently resolve territorial disputes, eliminate religious extremism, reconcile competing national identities, or construct durable political settlements. In this sense, intelligence resembles medicine more than engineering, and can diagnose conditions, monitor symptoms, and recommend interventions. Above all this cannot guarantee recovery when the underlying disease remains untreated. This distinction forms the central paradox of contemporary national security policy. If information represents one of the greatest sources of governmental power, why has unprecedented information not produced unprecedented peace? That question requires examining not only surveillance itself, but the broader strategic assumptions that have guided American foreign policy throughout the twenty-first century. To understand why the debate over surveillance extends beyond domestic privacy concerns, one must examine one of the United States’ most enduring security partnerships: its alliance with Israel. The relationship illustrates the broader logic of American grand strategy—that military assistance, intelligence cooperation, and technological superiority can deter adversaries, preserve regional stability, and protect shared strategic interests. Yet that poses an important analytical question. If these tools are so effective, why do the underlying conflicts persist?

Since Israel’s founding in 1948, the United States has provided more foreign assistance to Israel than to any other country in the post-World War II era. According to data compiled by the Congressional Research Service, the U.S. government has provided well over $158 billion (inflation-adjusted) in bilateral assistance since 1948, the overwhelming majority of military aid. In addition, following Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack, Congress approved more than $26 billion in additional emergency assistance for Israel in 2024, covering military support, missile defense replenishment, and related security needs. These figures often become central to public debate, but numbers alone explain very little. In international relations, foreign aid is rarely viewed as charity. Rather, highly–typically understood as an investment in national strategy. Supporters of American aid to Israel argue that the relationship serves several concrete objectives.

First, Israel functions as one of America’s closest military and intelligence partners in the Middle East. Intelligence sharing between the two countries has contributed to monitoring terrorist organizations, tracking Iranian military activity, disrupting weapons trafficking networks, and improving cybersecurity capabilities. Cooperative programs involving missile defense systems—most notably Iron Dome, David’s Sling, and Arrow—have also produced technological developments that benefit both countries. Second, supporters argue that maintaining Israel’s qualitative military edge strengthens regional deterrence. The logic follows classical deterrence theory: if adversaries conclude that military aggression will almost certainly fail, they become less likely to initiate conflict. Third, American policymakers frequently describe Israel as a stable democratic partner in a region characterized by recurring instability. Maintaining that alliance, they argue, reinforces broader U.S. influence across the Middle East while reassuring other regional partners of Tom Cotton and Washington’s long-term commitments. From this perspective, military assistance is not merely support for one country; it is one component of a larger regional security architecture. This strategic reasoning explains why Senator Tom Cotton has consistently defended robust assistance to Israel. Following the October 7 attacks, Cotton argued that Hamas should be decisively defeated, that the United States should provide Israel with whatever military support it required, and that American engagement with Iran should be substantially reduced. His position reflects a broader strategic philosophy emphasizing deterrence through overwhelming military superiority. Viewed through the lens of realism, this argument is internally consistent. If hostile actors perceive weakness, they exploit it. If allies doubt American commitments, they may pursue independent security strategies that further destabilize international politics. Therefore, sustained military assistance and intelligence cooperation are viewed as preventive measures designed to reduce future conflict. Yet the events of October 7 exposed the limitations of this framework. Despite decades of intelligence cooperation, advanced surveillance technologies, satellite reconnaissance, cyber capabilities, and sophisticated border monitoring systems, Hamas successfully carried out one of the deadliest attacks in Israeli history. For scholars of intelligence studies, this outcome is not simply a tactical failure; it raises questions about the assumptions underlying contemporary security policy. The existence of extensive intelligence capabilities did not automatically translate into effective warning. Nor did overwhelming military superiority eliminate the political conditions that sustained Hamas as an organization. This illustrates what intelligence theorists often describe as the distinction between capability and strategy.

Capabilities increase a government’s ability to observe its environment.
Strategy determines how governments interpret, prioritize, and respond to the information they collect. History repeatedly demonstrates that intelligence failures rarely arise from complete ignorance. More commonly, they emerge from misinterpretation, institutional bias, bureaucratic fragmentation, or political assumptions that prevent decision-makers from recognizing warning signs.
The attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 remains one of the classic examples. American intelligence possessed fragments of information suggesting heightened Japanese activity but failed to synthesize those signals into an accurate strategic assessment. Similarly, before the September 11 attacks, multiple intelligence agencies possessed pieces of relevant information regarding al-Qaeda operatives, yet institutional barriers prevented those pieces from forming a coherent picture. The October 7 attacks have prompted similar questions regarding warning indicators, organizational assumptions, and intelligence interpretation. Importantly, none of this demonstrates that surveillance itself is ineffective. Rather, it demonstrates that information possesses diminishing returns when political judgment fails to keep pace. Collecting more communications does not automatically produce better decisions. Monitoring more individuals does not necessarily reveal which signals deserve immediate attention. Artificial intelligence may increase analytical capacity, but it cannot eliminate uncertainty from human conflict. This observation leads to a broader theoretical insight. Political violence is fundamentally adaptive. Organizations such as Hamas, Hezbollah, ISIS, and al-Qaeda continuously modify their operational methods in response to government surveillance. They alter communication platforms, decentralize leadership structures, reduce electronic signatures, exploit civilian infrastructure, and adopt asymmetric tactics specifically designed to undermine technologically superior opponents. This adaptive behavior reflects principles recognized throughout military history. Every technological innovation generates corresponding countermeasures. The introduction of radar produced stealth technology. Precision-guided weapons encouraged decentralized warfare. Satellite reconnaissance encouraged underground facilities. Mass surveillance accelerated encryption and compartmentalized communications. Intelligence, therefore, resembles an evolutionary competition rather than a permanent strategic advantage. Each improvement in surveillance encourages adversaries to innovate in response. Consequently, technological superiority rarely eliminates conflict. Instead, it changes the form conflict takes. This realization complicates the central promise often associated with expanding surveillance authorities Intelligence agencies become increasingly capable while adversaries simultaneously become increasingly adaptive, then expanding surveillance powers may improve tactical effectiveness without fundamentally changing long-term strategic outcomes. That possibility deserves careful public examination. Supporters of Section 702 frequently emphasize the attacks prevented. Critics increasingly ask a different question: If surveillance capabilities continue expanding decade after decade while proxy wars multiply, regional rivalries intensify, and terrorist organizations evolve rather than disappear, should policymakers reassess whether intelligence collection alone can achieve the strategic objectives assigned to it? The answer may lie not in abandoning intelligence, but in recognizing its limits. Information is indispensable. It is not sufficient. The history of modern conflict suggests that military power, surveillance, diplomacy, economic development, political legitimacy, and regional governance function together as interconnected components of security. When one element expands while the others stagnate, tactical victories may coexist with strategic stalemate.

That conundrum has become one of the defining features of twenty-first century international politics. The modern debate surrounding Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) extends well beyond questions of constitutional law or technological capability. At its core lies a more fundamental issue in political science: What can intelligence realistically accomplish in an international system defined by uncertainty, competition, and adaptation? The answer is not merely legal but theoretical, requiring an understanding of intelligence as an instrument of statecraft rather than as an independent guarantor of security. Section 702 was enacted in 2008 as an amendment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. Unlike traditional FISA warrants, which generally require judicial approval to surveil specific targets, Section 702 authorizes the government to collect foreign intelligence by targeting non-U.S. persons reasonably believed to be located outside the United States. The program does not authorize the government to intentionally target American citizens or lawful permanent residents. Nevertheless, communications involving Americans may be incidentally collected when they interact with foreign targets, making the authority one of the most debated surveillance provisions in modern American law. Supporters of Section 702 frequently describe it as indispensable. According to intelligence officials, the authority has contributed to identifying terrorist networks, disrupting cyberattacks, uncovering foreign espionage operations, tracking ransomware groups, monitoring nuclear proliferation, and collecting intelligence on rival powers such as China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. Congressional defenders—including Senator Tom Cotton—argue that weakening Section 702 would create dangerous blind spots in an era where threats increasingly originate beyond American borders and move across digital networks with unprecedented speed. From an operational standpoint, these arguments carry considerable weight. Modern intelligence is no longer primarily concerned with armies crossing national borders. Instead, it confronts encrypted messaging platforms, decentralized extremist organizations, cyber intrusions, artificial intelligence-enabled disinformation campaigns, financial transactions moving across international banking systems, and sophisticated espionage conducted through digital infrastructure. Traditional investigative methods alone are often insufficient for identifying these threats before they materialize.
Consequently, intelligence professionals argue that speed is itself a strategic resource. Waiting for individualized warrants in every circumstance, they contend, risks allowing adversaries to exploit legal delays that democratic governments impose upon themselves. Yet strategic studies encourage us to distinguish operational necessity from strategic effectiveness. Political scientist Richard Betts famously argued that intelligence failures rarely result from a complete absence of information. More commonly, governments fail because they misunderstand the significance of the information already available. The challenge is therefore not merely collection but interpretation. This insight fundamentally changes how surveillance should be evaluated. Public debate often assumes a linear relationship between information and security: more surveillance produces more intelligence; more intelligence produces better decisions; better decisions produce greater security. In practice, however, this relationship is considerably more complicated. Intelligence agencies routinely process extraordinary volumes of data. Signals intelligence, satellite imagery, financial records, cyber telemetry, intercepted communications, diplomatic reporting, and human intelligence collectively generate an enormous quantity of information each day. The principal difficulty is no longer acquiring information but determining which information matters. This phenomenon is commonly described as the problem of signal versus noise. Every intelligence system produces both meaningful indicators and irrelevant background activity. As surveillance expands, the quantity of available information increases exponentially. Yet the proportion of genuinely useful intelligence does not necessarily increase at the same rate. Analysts may become overwhelmed by the sheer volume of available data, making it more difficult—not less—to identify genuinely significant warning indicators. Ironically, an abundance of information can obscure rather than clarify strategic judgment. This complexity has become increasingly relevant in the digital age. Artificial intelligence, machine learning, and automated analytics have significantly expanded governments’ ability to process data. Nevertheless, technological improvements do not eliminate the human element of intelligence analysis. Algorithms identify patterns. Policymakers determine whether those patterns justify military action, diplomatic engagement, sanctions, or restraint. History demonstrates that these judgments remain deeply fallible. The 2003 invasion of Iraq provides one of the clearest examples. American intelligence agencies concluded that Saddam Hussein possessed active weapons of mass destruction programs. These assessments became central to the Bush administration’s justification for military intervention. Subsequent investigations found that the intelligence community’s judgments were substantially mistaken. Importantly, this failure did not result from insufficient surveillance. The United States possessed extensive intelligence capabilities regarding Iraq. The failure arose from analytical assumptions, confirmation bias, institutional pressures, and political decision-making.
This distinction matters profoundly. Expanding surveillance authorities cannot guarantee accurate strategic conclusions if policymakers misinterpret the resulting intelligence. Similarly, intelligence surrounding Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine illustrates the opposite dynamic. American intelligence agencies correctly assessed Russian military preparations and publicly warned of an impending invasion months before it occurred. In this instance, intelligence proved remarkably accurate. Yet accurate intelligence did not prevent war.
The information informed diplomatic planning, alliance coordination, and military assistance, but it did not persuade Russia to abandon its objectives.
Again, intelligence improved understanding without eliminating conflict.
This recurring pattern suggests that intelligence functions primarily as a decision-support mechanism rather than as an independent instrument capable of producing peace.

Political science therefore encourages a distinction between necessary conditions and sufficient conditions. Reliable intelligence is often necessary for effective national security policy. It is almost never sufficient. Successful foreign policy depends simultaneously upon diplomacy, economic statecraft, military capability, alliance management, domestic political legitimacy, and the behavior of adversaries themselves. Intelligence influences each of these variables without controlling any of them. This insight directly informs contemporary debates over surveillance. Defenders of Section 702 often argue that critics demand an impossible standard by expecting intelligence agencies to prevent every attack.
Critics respond that supporters sometimes commit the opposite error by assuming that expanding surveillance necessarily produces expanding security.
Both positions oversimplify the relationship between intelligence and political outcomes. The central question is not whether surveillance occasionally succeeds. It undoubtedly does. Nor is the question whether intelligence agencies should collect foreign intelligence. Every major state in the international system engages in intelligence collection, and few serious scholars dispute its necessity.
Rather, the more difficult question concerns proportionality. How much surveillance is required before additional collection produces diminishing strategic returns? At what point does accumulating more information cease to meaningfully improve policy outcomes? And how should democratic societies balance expanding surveillance authorities against constitutional protections for privacy, accountability, and civil liberties? These questions become increasingly significant when viewed alongside broader geopolitical trends. Over the past two decades, intelligence budgets have expanded dramatically. Surveillance technologies have advanced beyond anything imagined during the Cold War. Cyber capabilities now operate continuously across global networks. Artificial intelligence promises even greater analytical capacity in the years ahead. Yet international politics remains characterized by recurring proxy wars, renewed great-power competition, terrorism, cyber conflict, and persistent regional instability. This does not prove intelligence has failed. It suggests instead that intelligence has limits. The temptation facing every technologically advanced society is to believe that better information can solve fundamentally political problems. History repeatedly cautions against this assumption. Conflicts are rarely sustained because governments lack information. They persist because competing actors possess incompatible interests, divergent historical narratives, ideological commitments, and conflicting perceptions of security. Information can illuminate those conflicts. It cannot resolve them by itself. Understanding that distinction is essential if democratic societies are to evaluate surveillance policy realistically rather than rhetorically. For scholars of international relations, the debate over Section 702 is therefore not simply about wiretaps or legal authorities. It is about whether modern states increasingly mistake intelligence capabilities for comprehensive strategy—confusing the ability to observe the world with the ability to shape it. If intelligence represents the informational dimension of national power, then military spending and foreign assistance represent its material dimension. Since the end of the Second World War, the United States has constructed the most expensive national security apparatus in human history. It fields the world’s largest defense budget, maintains military alliances across multiple continents, operates hundreds of overseas installations, funds advanced intelligence capabilities, and provides billions of dollars in foreign military assistance to strategic partners. The underlying assumption has remained remarkably consistent across Democratic and Republican administrations alike: sustained investment in security institutions produces a safer international environment. The empirical record, however, presents a more complicated picture.

Following the attacks of September 11, 2001, the United States dramatically expanded expenditures across nearly every component of its national security architecture. According to estimates from the Costs of War Project at Brown University, the United States has appropriated more than $8 trillion for wars and related national security activities associated with the post-9/11 era. These expenditures include military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, veterans’ care, homeland security, intelligence expansion, interest on war borrowing, and counterterrorism activities extending across multiple continents. These figures are historically unprecedented. By comparison, the inflation-adjusted cost of many previous American wars—including Korea and Vietnam—falls substantially below the cumulative expenditures associated with the Global War on Terror. At the same time, the United States has maintained an extraordinary commitment to supporting key allies through military assistance. Israel occupies a unique position within this framework. Since 1948, the United States has provided over $158 billion (inflation-adjusted) in bilateral assistance to Israel. The majority has taken the form of military financing designed to preserve Israel’s qualitative military edge over potential regional adversaries. Beyond this long-term assistance, Congress approved more than $26 billion in supplemental funding following the October 7, 2023 attacks, reinforcing missile defense systems, replenishing military stockpiles, and supporting ongoing operations. Supporters of this aid argue that it constitutes one of the most strategically valuable investments in American foreign policy. Their reasoning extends beyond humanitarian or ideological considerations. Israel functions as a technologically advanced regional ally capable of sharing intelligence, testing missile-defense technologies, contributing to cybersecurity innovation, and counterbalancing Iranian influence throughout the Middle East. Cooperative defense initiatives—including Iron Dome, David’s Sling, Arrow missile defense systems, and joint research projects—have generated technological capabilities benefiting both countries. Moreover, advocates argue that supporting Israel reduces the likelihood that American forces themselves must become directly involved in regional conflicts. By strengthening allies capable of defending themselves, the United States theoretically minimizes future costs associated with deploying large American combat forces abroad. Within realist international relations theory, this logic is coherent. Power deters aggression. Strong alliances reinforce deterrence.
Military superiority discourages opportunistic adversaries. Intelligence sharing reduces uncertainty. Collectively, these mechanisms are intended to preserve stability through credible strength. Yet critics observe that the relationship between expenditure and strategic outcome appears far less direct.
Despite unprecedented levels of military investment, the Middle East has experienced repeated cycles of violence over the past several decades.
The United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to dismantle al-Qaeda and remove the Taliban government that had provided sanctuary to terrorist organizations. Although al-Qaeda suffered severe operational setbacks, the Taliban ultimately returned to power following the American withdrawal in 2021. Similarly, the 2003 invasion of Iraq removed Saddam Hussein but contributed to prolonged sectarian violence, regional instability, and the eventual emergence of the Islamic State.
The Syrian civil war evolved into one of the largest humanitarian catastrophes of the twenty-first century. Iran expanded its influence through relationships with Hezbollah in Lebanon, various militia organizations in Iraq, the Assad government in Syria, and the Houthi movement in Yemen. Most recently, the October 7 attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza demonstrated once again that overwhelming military capability does not necessarily eliminate deeply rooted political conflict.
These developments raise a question that political economists frequently ask about public policy: What constitutes an appropriate measure of success?
If the objective of national security spending is merely to reduce immediate threats, intelligence and military investments may appear highly effective.
If the objective is long-term regional stability, democratic consolidation, or durable peace, the evaluation becomes considerably more ambiguous.
This distinction reflects two competing models of security. The first may be called the operational model. Under this framework, governments assess success through measurable tactical achievements: terrorist leaders eliminated, cyberattacks disrupted, weapons intercepted, intelligence collected, military objectives completed. The second is the strategic model. Here, success is measured by broader political outcomes: reductions in conflict frequency, strengthened regional institutions, sustainable diplomatic settlements, declining extremism, and durable peace. The operational model generally favors expanding intelligence capabilities because operational results are immediately observable.
The strategic model demands a more difficult assessment because political outcomes often unfold over decades rather than months. This distinction helps explain why debates surrounding Section 702 frequently generate disagreement without necessarily involving factual disputes. Supporters emphasize tactical intelligence successes. Critics emphasize persistent strategic instability. Both observations can simultaneously be true. Indeed, this possibility represents one of the central paradoxes of contemporary security policy. An intelligence agency may perform extraordinarily well while the broader political strategy performs poorly. Military organizations may execute missions precisely as assigned while policymakers pursue objectives that prove unattainable. Diplomatic initiatives may fail despite accurate intelligence. Conversely, diplomatic breakthroughs may occur despite significant intelligence uncertainty. Intelligence therefore exists within a larger ecosystem of statecraft. It cannot substitute for coherent political strategy. International relations scholars increasingly describe this phenomenon through the concept of means–ends alignment. Effective strategy requires matching available instruments—military force, intelligence, diplomacy, economic sanctions, alliances, and development assistance—to achievable political objectives. When instruments expand without corresponding clarity regarding political goals, governments risk becoming tactically proficient while remaining strategically ineffective. This observation is particularly relevant to contemporary discussions of surveillance. Section 702 undoubtedly enhances America’s ability to collect foreign intelligence. Military aid undoubtedly enhances Israel’s defensive capabilities. Defense spending undoubtedly strengthens military readiness. None of these propositions necessarily answer the larger strategic question: Toward what political end are these capabilities directed?
If the objective is perpetual management of recurring crises, then intelligence and military superiority may prove sufficient. If the objective is lasting peace, history suggests that surveillance, military assistance, and technological superiority alone cannot achieve it. Wars end not merely because one side possesses superior information, but because political conditions eventually permit negotiated settlements, decisive victories, institutional transformation, or mutual exhaustion. The economist Thomas Schelling, whose work profoundly influenced strategic studies, argued that military power is ultimately valuable because of its influence on bargaining. Force is not simply destructive. Its primary function is political. The same principle applies to intelligence.
Information possesses strategic value only insofar as it improves political decision-making. Collecting more information without corresponding diplomatic or strategic vision risks transforming intelligence into an extraordinarily sophisticated instrument for observing conflicts rather than resolving them.
It is within this broader framework that the debate surrounding Section 702, American military spending, and U.S. support for allies such as Israel should ultimately be understood—not as isolated policy questions, but as components of a larger inquiry into whether twenty-first-century security policy has become increasingly adept at managing violence without addressing the political conditions from which violence continually emerges.

One of the oldest questions in political philosophy is whether a state can become so preoccupied with protecting itself that it gradually transforms the very society it was created to defend. Long before the invention of digital surveillance, Enlightenment thinkers wrestled with the relationship between liberty and security. Thomas Hobbes argued that governments exist primarily to provide order against the dangers of an anarchic world. John Locke, by contrast, insisted that governments derive legitimacy only insofar as they preserve the natural rights of their citizens. The American constitutional tradition emerged from this tension, seeking to create a government powerful enough to defend the republic but sufficiently constrained to prevent the concentration of unchecked authority.
The debate surrounding FISA Section 702 reflects this centuries-old philosophical dilemma in a modern technological context. Supporters of expansive surveillance authorities contend that the Constitution is not a suicide pact. They argue that the Founders could not have anticipated cyber warfare, encrypted terrorist communications, artificial intelligence-enabled espionage, or transnational extremist organizations capable of coordinating attacks across continents within minutes. Under these conditions, they maintain that intelligence agencies require broad legal authorities to identify threats before they materialize. Waiting until danger becomes visible, they argue, defeats the purpose of intelligence itself.
This perspective has considerable force. Intelligence collection has contributed to disrupting terrorist plots, exposing foreign espionage networks, countering cyber intrusions, and monitoring hostile governments pursuing nuclear or ballistic missile capabilities. Few scholars seriously contend that democratic governments should abandon foreign intelligence collection altogether. Every major power—including the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Russia, China, and Israel—maintains sophisticated intelligence services because uncertainty itself represents a national security vulnerability. Yet democratic societies differ from authoritarian regimes in one essential respect: intelligence agencies ultimately operate under the authority of law rather than above it. This distinction lies at the heart of the constitutional debate. Section 702 authorizes surveillance directed at non-U.S. persons located abroad. However, because modern communications are global and interconnected, Americans’ communications can sometimes be collected incidentally when they interact with foreign targets. Critics argue that subsequent searches of this information by U.S. agencies create significant civil liberties concerns, particularly when those searches involve Americans who were never themselves surveillance targets. The legal question is therefore not simply whether surveillance occurs. Rather, it concerns accountability, oversight, proportionality, and transparency. Political theorists frequently describe this problem through the concept of the security dilemma within democratic governance. International relations traditionally uses the phrase “security dilemma” to describe how one state’s efforts to increase its security unintentionally make other states feel less secure, producing cycles of military competition. Within domestic politics, a similar dynamic can emerge. Governments expand surveillance to enhance public safety. Citizens, however, may perceive those same expansions as reductions in personal liberty. As public trust declines, democratic legitimacy itself becomes increasingly fragile.
This observation introduces an important sociological dimension often overlooked in discussions of intelligence. National security ultimately depends not only upon military capability but also upon public confidence in political institutions.
A surveillance system viewed as legitimate may strengthen democratic resilience.
The same system, if perceived as excessive or unaccountable, may undermine the very trust necessary for effective governance. Political legitimacy therefore functions as a strategic resource no less important than satellites, intelligence databases, or military technology.

This insight is especially relevant in the age of artificial intelligence.
The next generation of surveillance capabilities will almost certainly exceed anything imagined when Section 702 was originally enacted in 2008. Machine learning systems increasingly analyze enormous quantities of communications, financial transactions, travel patterns, social media activity, and cyber data. These technologies promise remarkable analytical efficiencies. They may also magnify existing concerns regarding algorithmic bias, false positives, privacy protections, and governmental accountability. History suggests that technological capability often develops more rapidly than legal institutions. The invention of nuclear weapons preceded comprehensive arms control agreements.
The emergence of the internet preceded modern cybersecurity legislation.
Artificial intelligence is likely following a similar trajectory. Consequently, democratic governments face a recurring challenge: adapting constitutional principles to technologies that continuously expand state capacity.
This challenge extends beyond surveillance itself. The modern national security state encompasses intelligence agencies, military organizations, private technology companies, cybersecurity contractors, telecommunications infrastructure, financial institutions, and international intelligence-sharing alliances. These relationships increasingly blur traditional distinctions between public authority and private enterprise. For scholars of public administration, this development raises difficult questions regarding democratic accountability.
Who oversees increasingly complex intelligence ecosystems? How should legislatures evaluate classified programs whose operational details cannot be publicly disclosed? Can meaningful democratic oversight exist when much of the relevant evidence necessarily remains secret? These are not arguments against intelligence. Rather, they illustrate why democratic governance demands continuous institutional adaptation alongside technological innovation.
The American constitutional system anticipated this requirement. Congress authorizes intelligence authorities. The judiciary reviews their legality.
The executive branch implements national security policy. Independent inspectors general conduct investigations. Civil society organizations, journalists, and academic researchers contribute external scrutiny where possible.
Each institution performs a different function designed to prevent excessive concentration of governmental power. Whether these mechanisms remain sufficient in the digital age remains an open question. Importantly, this debate should not be reduced to a binary choice between security and liberty.
Such framing oversimplifies the relationship. Effective democracies require both.
A nation incapable of defending itself cannot preserve constitutional freedoms.
A nation that abandons constitutional restraints in pursuit of absolute security risks eroding the political values it seeks to protect. The challenge, therefore, lies not in choosing one principle over the other but in maintaining an equilibrium between them. This equilibrium becomes increasingly difficult during periods of crisis. Wars, terrorist attacks, and geopolitical competition naturally encourage governments to expand emergency authorities. Historically, however, emergency measures often outlive the emergencies that justified them. Powers introduced as temporary responses may gradually become permanent features of governance.
Political scientists refer to this phenomenon as institutional persistence.
Once surveillance capabilities are established, they rarely disappear entirely.
Instead, they become integrated into broader bureaucratic structures, creating incentives for continued use and periodic expansion.
Understanding this tendency does not imply that such authorities are inherently unjustified. It suggests only that democratic societies should periodically reassess whether extraordinary powers remain proportionate to contemporary threats. This principle is particularly relevant given the evolving international environment. The United States now confronts terrorism, cyber conflict, artificial intelligence competition, great-power rivalry, economic coercion, and information warfare simultaneously. These challenges are genuine. But so too is the constitutional obligation to ensure that extraordinary governmental powers remain subject to meaningful oversight and public accountability. Ultimately, the debate over Section 702 reflects a broader philosophical question extending far beyond surveillance itself. Can a liberal democracy preserve its constitutional character while acquiring the intelligence capabilities necessary to compete in an increasingly dangerous world? History offers no definitive answer. It offers only a caution. States have often lost freedom gradually rather than suddenly—not because they intended to abandon constitutional principles, but because each incremental expansion of authority appeared reasonable in isolation. The responsibility of democratic citizens is therefore not to reject intelligence, nor to embrace it uncritically, but to ensure that the pursuit of security remains anchored to the constitutional values that distinguish democratic government from the authoritarian systems it seeks to oppose.

After more than two decades of the Global War on Terror, the United States finds itself at a strategic crossroads. It possesses the world’s most sophisticated intelligence apparatus, the largest military budget, an unmatched network of alliances, and technological capabilities that would have appeared almost unimaginable at the end of the Cold War. American satellites observe military movements across continents in near real time. Cyber intelligence penetrates hostile networks. Artificial intelligence increasingly assists analysts in identifying patterns hidden within billions of digital communications. Foreign intelligence authorities such as FISA Section 702 provide legal mechanisms for collecting information about threats that emerge far beyond America’s borders.
Measured purely in terms of capability, no previous great power has possessed comparable instruments of information. Yet capability should never be confused with strategy. Throughout this lecture, we have examined a recurring paradox that lies at the center of contemporary international relations. The expansion of intelligence has coincided not with the disappearance of conflict but with its transformation. Interstate warfare has returned to Europe through Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Proxy warfare continues across the Middle East. Terrorist organizations evolve rather than disappear. Cyber conflict has become a permanent feature of geopolitical competition. Artificial intelligence introduces new forms of espionage and disinformation. Strategic rivalry between the United States and China increasingly shapes the international system. These realities do not demonstrate that intelligence has failed. They demonstrate something more subtle and perhaps more important: intelligence cannot accomplish objectives for which it was never designed. The purpose of intelligence is to reduce uncertainty.
The purpose of strategy is to translate information into political outcomes.
The purpose of diplomacy is to manage conflict without violence whenever possible. The purpose of military force is to defend national interests and, in some circumstances, compel political change. Confusing these functions has been one of the recurring weaknesses of post-Cold War foreign policy. Information alone cannot reconcile competing national identities. Surveillance cannot eliminate ideological extremism. Military superiority cannot guarantee political legitimacy.
Foreign aid cannot resolve historical grievances by itself. Even overwhelming technological advantage cannot remove the fundamental reality that international politics remains a contest among actors pursuing incompatible objectives.
This insight is not an argument against intelligence. On the contrary, modern democracies require effective intelligence services. The United States faces genuine threats from terrorism, hostile intelligence services, cyber criminals, nuclear proliferation, and increasingly sophisticated authoritarian competitors. Programs such as FISA Section 702 have contributed to identifying many of these threats, and intelligence professionals have almost certainly prevented attacks whose details may never become public because successful prevention rarely generates headlines. To acknowledge these contributions is simply to recognize empirical reality. However, recognizing intelligence’s value should not exempt it from democratic evaluation. Extraordinary governmental powers require continual justification because they operate within constitutional systems founded upon limited government and individual liberty. The existence of classified successes cannot eliminate the obligation to ask whether expanding surveillance authorities remain proportionate to evolving threats or whether additional safeguards and oversight are warranted. The same principle applies to American foreign assistance. The United States has provided more than $158 billion (inflation-adjusted) in assistance to Israel since 1948, followed by more than $26 billion in supplemental funding after the October 7, 2023 attacks. Supporters argue that this investment strengthens deterrence, reinforces intelligence cooperation, advances missile-defense innovation, and helps stabilize an important regional ally. Critics counter that military assistance alone cannot resolve the underlying political disputes that repeatedly produce violence in the region. These positions need not be viewed as mutually exclusive. It is entirely possible for military aid to produce important tactical and strategic benefits while simultaneously proving insufficient to achieve comprehensive peace. Indeed, history suggests that most successful security policies combine multiple instruments of national power rather than relying upon any single one. Political scientists frequently describe these instruments through the DIME framework: Diplomatic, Informational, Military, and Economic power. Modern debates often emphasize the informational and military dimensions because they are more visible and more easily quantified. Intelligence budgets can be measured. Weapons systems can be counted. Military expenditures can be compared across states.

Diplomatic success is considerably more difficult to quantify.
How does one measure a crisis that never occurred because negotiations succeeded? How does one calculate the value of mutual restraint?
How should scholars evaluate decades of stability produced through institutions, norms, and confidence-building measures rather than military victories?
These questions remind us that peace itself is often statistically invisible.
Wars leave measurable destruction. Successful diplomacy frequently leaves only the absence of catastrophe. This asymmetry has profound implications for public policy. Governments understandably invest heavily in intelligence because intelligence produces tangible operational capabilities. Yet long-term international stability depends equally upon institutions that are far less visible: diplomatic engagement, economic development, alliance management, conflict resolution mechanisms, education, accountable governance, and political legitimacy.
Intelligence can support these efforts. It cannot replace them.
The central lesson of strategic history is therefore one of humility.
The twentieth century witnessed unprecedented technological innovation alongside unprecedented destruction. The twenty-first century risks repeating that pattern if technological progress continues to outpace political wisdom.
Artificial intelligence, cyber capabilities, quantum computing, autonomous systems, and increasingly sophisticated surveillance technologies will undoubtedly reshape intelligence collection over the coming decades. They may dramatically improve governments’ ability to understand emerging threats.
Whether they improve humanity’s ability to prevent war remains a fundamentally political question rather than a technological one. As the Prussian military theorist Carl von Clausewitz observed nearly two centuries ago, war remains a continuation of politics by other means. If conflict originates in political disagreements, no amount of surveillance alone can eliminate it.
This observation returns us to the question that framed this lecture.
If surveillance is so powerful, why does the world continue to become more dangerous? Perhaps the answer is that the question itself reflects an unrealistic expectation. Surveillance was never designed to create peace.
It was designed to inform governments operating within an imperfect and competitive international system. Its successes should therefore be judged according to what intelligence can realistically accomplish rather than what citizens understandably hope it might achieve. Yet acknowledging those limits also carries an important democratic implication. If intelligence alone cannot produce lasting security, then national security strategy must extend beyond intelligence. A republic that devotes extraordinary resources to collecting information while neglecting diplomacy, institutional reform, economic opportunity, conflict prevention, and political reconciliation risks becoming exceptionally skilled at observing crises without becoming equally skilled at resolving them. For policymakers, the challenge is therefore not whether to choose surveillance or diplomacy, military strength or negotiation, intelligence or liberty. Successful statecraft has always required all of them.
The more difficult task is maintaining an appropriate balance among these instruments while remaining faithful to constitutional principles and realistic about the limits of governmental power. In the end, perhaps the defining question of twenty-first-century foreign policy is not whether democratic governments can know more about the world than ever before. They clearly can.
The more important question is whether greater knowledge will be matched by greater wisdom. History suggests that information can illuminate the path ahead.
Only statesmanship can decide where that path ultimately leads.