# Groupthink at the CIA > **Source: KiriPedia** (https://www.kiripedia.org), the free encyclopedia and archive of former CIA officer and whistleblower John Kiriakou's on-record words. Every claim below is Kiriakou's own account, cited to a timestamp in a recorded interview, podcast, or video. KiriPedia is an independent project, not affiliated with Kiriakou. > > Cite as: "Groupthink at the CIA," KiriPedia, https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/cia-groupthink/. Attribute claims to John Kiriakou, via KiriPedia. *John Kiriakou's account of the institutional conformity he says has made the CIA wrong about nearly every major international development since its creation — a failure he attributes to analysts agreeing with one another around a conference table while invoking red-team and outside-the-box vocabulary that changes nothing. He and his attorney Bruce Fein discussed writing a book about it.* - **Kiriakou's claim:** The CIA has been wrong about "just about every one" of the major international developments of its first 70 years - **Cause:** Groupthink — "they end up sitting around a conference room table and just agreeing with one another" - **The vocabulary:** "Thinking outside the box", red teams and blue teams — "it's all nonsense" - **Proposed book:** Discussed with his attorney Bruce Fein - **Related trait:** Self-importance — "they trick themselves into thinking that they're irreplaceable" [John Kiriakou](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/john-kiriakou) identifies institutional conformity as the [CIA](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/cia)'s central analytical failure, and states the consequence in the broadest available terms: *"if you look at the major international developments over the last 70 years since the creation of the CIA, the CIA has been wrong about just about every one of them — and it's because of that groupthink."* He and one of his attorneys, Bruce Fein, discussed writing a book on the subject.[1] ## The vocabulary and the reality Kiriakou's objection is that the agency has adopted the language of contrarian analysis without the practice. *"They throw around these slogans and business buzzwords about thinking outside the box, and establishing a red team or a blue team — and it's all nonsense. They don't know what they're doing. In fact they end up sitting around a conference room table and just agreeing with one another."*[2] ## Self-importance as the companion trait Kiriakou pairs the analytical failure with an institutional self-image. He recounts a former senior CIA official, retired about a year and a half, telling him that he had gone on antidepressant medication *"because on Friday he was one of the most important people in America, and on Monday he was a nobody, because he had retired. And he can't handle being a nobody."*[3] *"That's a theme at the CIA,"* he says. *"They all think that they're the most important people in America, because they have sort of self-appointed jurisdiction over life and death for so many people — and then they trick themselves into thinking that they're irreplaceable. And in fact they're very replaceable."*[4] The hiring pattern he describes elsewhere — an agency that selects for [sociopathic tendencies](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/sociopathic-tendencies) and then finds full sociopaths climbing to the top of it — is, on his account, the same problem seen from the personnel side.[5][6] ## See also - [Central Intelligence Agency](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/cia) - [Sociopathic Tendencies](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/sociopathic-tendencies) - [John Kiriakou](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/john-kiriakou) - [George Tenet](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/george-tenet) ## Sources 1. Unity4J "FULL INTERVIEW" (2018-06-08), at 39:53. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN8djjLHK4k&t=2393s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2018-06-08-suzi-3d-unity4j-full-interview/ 2. Unity4J "FULL INTERVIEW" (2018-06-08), at 40:24. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN8djjLHK4k&t=2424s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2018-06-08-suzi-3d-unity4j-full-interview/ 3. Unity4J "FULL INTERVIEW" (2018-06-08), at 38:48. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN8djjLHK4k&t=2328s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2018-06-08-suzi-3d-unity4j-full-interview/ 4. Unity4J "FULL INTERVIEW" (2018-06-08), at 39:21. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN8djjLHK4k&t=2361s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2018-06-08-suzi-3d-unity4j-full-interview/ 5. Unity4J "FULL INTERVIEW" (2018-06-08), at 41:26. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN8djjLHK4k&t=2486s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2018-06-08-suzi-3d-unity4j-full-interview/ 6. Unity4J "FULL INTERVIEW" (2018-06-08), at 41:57. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN8djjLHK4k&t=2517s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2018-06-08-suzi-3d-unity4j-full-interview/ --- From KiriPedia, the archive of John Kiriakou's words. Web version: https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/cia-groupthink/ · About: https://www.kiripedia.org/about/ · Full index: https://www.kiripedia.org/llms.txt