reasonable. Military and intelligence departments and agencies were created for different purposes, and each has distinct expertise. The unit that carries out a strike operation doesn’t have the right personnel, tools, or resources to conduct an independent assessment afterward. For missions like a strike on Iranian nuclear sites, it is established policy and doctrine to have the CIA or DIA perform the assessment, in order to ensure objectivity and credibility.
DoD BDA Doctrine (JP 3-60):
“Battle damage assessment shall be conducted by independent analysts with access to ISR (intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance) data sources, not by the strike unit itself.”
