Actually, we did. NATO – and especially US intelligence – was remarkably effective at predicting what Putin had planned before he did it, down to predicting the day the assault would begin.<
After Iraq, Afghanistan, etc, there was no reason to trust western intelligence just for 1 second.
Actually, there was, but like with any other intelligence source you'd want some independent verification.
What was special about Iraq was that there was conflicting intelligence, the WMD inspectors had it right, and Colin Powell lost the respect of the rest of the world when it turned out that he'd effectively lied.
As for Afghanistan, that was/is an outright failure, but still not enough to automatically disbelieve everything that comes out of the intelligence services.
The important thing is to realize that intelligence can be wrong.
Actually, we did. NATO – and especially US intelligence – was remarkably effective at predicting what Putin had planned before he did it, down to predicting the day the assault would begin.<
After Iraq, Afghanistan, etc, there was no reason to trust western intelligence just for 1 second.