“Iraqi society had disintegrated into a vortex of terror, corruption and fear...It was only capable of rape, pillage and the worst kinds of fraud,” he said.

Kay also said he fears the effects of the intelligence failures on the long term fate of the United States.

“The cost of our mistakes—and I think we made fundamental mistakes with why we went to war—are far greater than Iraq itself,” said Kay. “We are in danger of destroying our capability to warn about future problems.”

Kay said that he believed the United States faced the danger of not being able to warn the world about potential threats.

“Now, if a [U.S.] President or Secretery of State warns about country X, the immediate response is going to be, ‘Why should we believe you?’” he said.

In addition to citing the failures of the current intelligence community, Kay made suggestions for future improvement.

“The real challenge today is to make sure that we can make inspections effective,” said Kay. “We have to find a way to make inspectors smarter and more capable. Do I believe the U.N. inspection mechanism could have gotten rid of Saddam? No.”

Jordan S. Fox ’07, however, thought Kay could have offered more suggestions.

“I agreed with everything he said, but I wish he had offered more solutions,” he said.

But Fox said that he felt Kay’s remarks were refreshing.

“It’s nice to hear more facts than politics,” he said.

Sandy Alexander, a student at both the Kennedy School of Government and Harvard Law School, agreed.

“He was definitely less political than he could have been,” he said. “And I feel like his greatest usefulness is his intimacy with the situation.”