Strategic Intelligence Failure in a Zoo of Cognitive Biases

The 2025 Robert O'Neill War Studies Lecture will be delivered by Professor Beatrice Heuser.

Join us in a walk through the colourful zoo of wolves, grey rhinos, credulous poultry, tails wagging dogs, incoherent octopuses, monkeys in our midst, elephants in the room, and find out what Heisenberg has to do with intelligence failure.
 

Speaker
Beatrice Heuser is Distinguished Professor at the Free University of Brussels (VUB) and heads the Strategy Section at the General Staff Academy of the Bundeswehr in Hamburg.  She has previously held professorships at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London and at the universities of Reading and Glasgow. From 2020-2022 she held the Jeffrey Grey visiting professorship at the Australian Defence College.  She has also taught at Sciences Po’ Paris, and the Sorbonne, and at two German universities. From 1997-1998, she worked in the International Staff at NATO headquarters in Brussels. Between 2003-2007 she was Director for Research at the Military History Research Office of the Bundeswehr in Potsdam. Heuser has worked primarily on war - see her WAR: A genealogy of Western ideas and practices (2022) – and on aspects of strategy, Reading Clausewitz (2002); Strategy before Clausewitz (2017), and The Evolution of Strategy (2010) which covers the period from Antiquity to the Present; specifically on nuclear strategy, and on strategies of insurgencies and counterinsurgency.  Her most recent book is Flawed Strategy: why smart leaders make bad decisions (Polity 2025).


About Robert O'Neill
Emeritus Professor Robert O'Neill AO was Head of the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre from 1971 to 1982 and remains an active part of the academic community. One of the world's leading experts on strategic and security studies, O'Neill previously served as Director, International Institute for Strategic Studies, London (1982-1987); Chichele Professor of the History of War at Oxford University (1987-2000); Chairman of the Council of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (1995-2001); and Chairman of the Board of Trustees, Imperial War Museum (1997-2001). In remembrance of his invaluable contributions, it is with great sadness that we note the passing of Emeritus Professor Robert O'Neill AO in 2023, leaving behind a profound legacy in the field of Strategic Studies. 


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