Military intelligence is a contradiction in terms.

[Kenny同志]

Folks, am I right in saying that "intelligence" here doesn't mean secret information, but instead means something similar to wisdom? And if so, is「軍事智慧」一詞，自相矛盾 (assuming that war is a folly) an accurate translation?

 

Thanks in advance for your help.

[anonymoose]

I think here, this is a bit like a 双关. The proper meaning of "military intelligence" is 军事情报, but here "intelligence" is also used to mean 智慧. So I guess the overall meaning is something like 军事情报不智慧.

[Kenny同志]

Thanks Anonymoose.

 

I think so. But "軍事情報不智慧" does not make much sense because "wise" can only be used to modify a person.

 

Is it a safe assumption to make from the sentence that the writer implies war is foolish?

[aone]

I won't insult your intelligence by explaining it to you.

[Guest realmayo]

He's not saying war itself is foolish, but that the system of 军事情报 (or the people behind it) are not intelligent. It's a play on the word "intelligence" and is a reasonably well-known phrase I think.

 

Other uses of "...contradiction in terms" don't have to rely on such puns.

[Kenny同志]

還是麻油熱心，比阿旺好多了。謝謝。

[anonymoose]

I don't think he means war is foolish, but rather that military intelligence is not very reliable.

[Kenny同志]

Now I get it. Thanks Anonymoose.

[edelweis]

My understanding is that military people are often said to be dumb, perhaps it's because some people join the military because they don't have any other option (maybe they are uneducated or mentally challenged), or perhaps it's the military system which is perceived as encouraging people to dumbly obey orders.
So with this background, some people would jokingly say "Military intelligence is a contradiction in terms" because "Military" is considered a synonym of "dumb", and one of the meanings of "intelligence" is the opposite of dumbness.
But whether "intelligence" actually refers to information gathering or to mental aptitude would depend on the context.

 

(I am not a native speaker of English so the above interpretation might only be a product of my imagination.

Also I have no personal opinion regarding the general intelligence level of military personnel as I don't know any. I don't imagine it's very different from the general intelligence level of civilians.)

[Lu]

As Edelweis says, it's a joke playing on the double meaning of the word 'intelligence'. I hope you don't have to translate it and if you do, I hope you have the freedom to make a nice Chinese pun.

[Kenny同志]

Edelweis 言之有理，謝謝。

 

露：

 

Thanks. Fortunately I don't have to translate it - it's something I found on proz.com. If I had to, I might go with something along the line of （軍事）情報單位和（軍事）蠢寶單位二者名雖異而義實同, and replace "單位" with 機構, 部門, 局, 處, or 室 where the context so requires.

 

蠢寶 is a dialectal term meaning idiots.

 

 

PS: If it's a quote from someone who lived a few hundred years ago, I might try 情報處, 蠢寶處, 名異而義一也.

 

P.PS: The original English is quite formal so I changed the style of the translation accordingly. My initial translation was "情報單位和蠢寶單位是一個意思", which seemed kind of informal.