Michaels, Eva2021-11-292022Michaels E. How surprising was ISIS’ rise to power for the German intelligence community? Reconstructing estimates of likelihood prior to the fall of Mosul. Intelligence and National Security. 2022;37(2):157-76. DOI: 10.1080/02684527.2021.19852060268-4527http://hdl.handle.net/10230/49084This article provides a first attempt at evaluating the performance of the German intelligence community when anticipating ISIS’ rise to power in Syria and Iraq and its reach into Europe in 2013–2014. It applies a new analytical framework for postmortem exercises after foreign policy crises, which centres on nuanced discussions of surprise and contextualised assessments of performance. This article finds evidence of partial to significant surprise among German intelligence analysts vis-à-vis four key events. Their performance was hindered by diagnostic difficulties and structural constraints, which affected their ability to identify risks related to underlying vulnerabilities in Iraq and Syria.application/pdfeng© This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Intelligence and National Security on 2022, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/02684527.2021.1985206.Estat Islàmic (Organització)Terrorisme -- Aspectes religiosos -- IslamismeTerrorisme -- Orient MitjàGihadinfo:eu-repo/semantics/articlehttp://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02684527.2021.1985206info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess