Blaming intelligence community for the Iran war

On last night's episode of Raging Moderates, Scott finally acknowledged he was wrong about the Iran war and it was a mistake, but then goes on to list his issues with the way the war was handled, including: "the fact that the intelligence community did not anticipate this, they didn't get Congressional approval to have some semblance of US support, they did not coordinate with their Gulf allies...etc." The intelligence community point shocked me - they 100% did anticipate just about everything that has happened since this war began. For decades, our experts have anticipated that Iran would try to close the Strait of Hormuz if provoked / attacked to this degree. Have they been more successful than we maybe thought? Sure. Did they go after Gulf neighbors a bit more than we expected? Sure. But the issue is not that the intelligence community gave the President and his advisors bad advice and failed to predict various scenarios and outcomes, the issue is that the President and his advisors consistently ignore good advice and in fact belittle and demean expertise. Anyone who read or watched the news in the last 3 months will have heard from dozens of experts and former intelligence and national security officials who stated point blank that this was all expected and scenario planned, and read well-sourced reporting that points to the Trump administration choosing to ignore the counsel and expertise of diplomats and leaders in the military, national security, intelligence, etc. They appoint sycophants and television hosts to jobs that require expertise, and do exactly the opposite of what reason and experience tell them to do. Pointing the blame to the intel community is such a misreading of the situation and places the blame for this catastrophe on the wrong people - this is Trump's war and Trump's mistake, and suggesting otherwise is foolish and an insult to the civil servants in the intelligence community who are working to keep Americans safe despite this Administration's assault on the core operations of our government.