ABSTRACT
Accurately determining the nature and likelihood of a terrorist or state actor threat can be very difficult, with high costs for failure. This proposed methodology is a tool to help analysts better provides clear, timely, and well-substantiated warning to key decision makers. When decision making is completed, the testing provides a numerical basis for ranking competing views, enabling more precise and transparent judgments to be made on a threat's probability than is common practice. The testing process incorporating the enhanced analytic techniques requires first zero-based review to assess the strengths and weaknesses of a dominant view on a threat; second, the new amplified inconsistency test to ensure key available data; finally, the missing data test to identify critical missing data for the hypotheses and to detect foreign denial. The culmination is a ranking of the hypotheses based on assessed inconsistencies and missing data needs that constitute overall validation tasks for each competing view.
