It is a ring of incompetent yes men, but behind those yes men is a nefarious foreign influence operation. These guys didn't arrive at their bad decisions by accident.
When you listen to the director of counterterrorism explain what happened in the run up to him resigning it fits pretty well the theory that Trump is compromised (possibly with kompromat) by a certain Middle Eastern country.
.. and a substantial domestic influence organization. Lots of US donors with US passports handing over good old US dollars. Lots of pro-regime news stations. More since the CBS takeover.