Scathing IG Report on BBG Demonstrates Lack of Concern By Obama Administration

The Washington Post of 23 Jan 2013 ran an article (article at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/report-blasts-foreign-broadcasting-board-as-dysfunctional-and-ineffectual/2013/01/22/1f3b1a84-64cd-11e2-9e1b-07db1d2ccd5b_story.html?hpid=z9) about a scathing Department of State IG Report (see http://oig.state.gov/documents/organization/203193.pdf) on the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). 

The BBG “oversees all US Government-supported, civilian international broadcasting”. This includes the Voice of America (VOA), Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB), as well as private, nonprofit corporations: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia and the Middle East Broadcasting Networks. The BBG FY 2013 budget request was $720 million.

The report was classified as “Sensitive But Unclassified” but was redacted in part and released as unclassified. There were a number of “Key Judgments” cited in the report. Among them was a comment praising the commitment of the broadcast entities and professional staff, but that was the only positive comment.

The report blasts the Board from a number of angles. The report indicated that a part time entity such as the board cannot coordinate appropriately especially without a CEO. Dysfunctionality of the board was noted due to “one member”. Systemic issues included chronic vacancies, lack of a logical travel policy, absences of Board members and inadequate by-laws and governance policies.

A review of the entire report reads like a bad Harvard Business School Case Study. The IG provides a number of recommendations including several that appear to be very basic, common sense management. 

This posting will not discuss the recommendations, but will step back and look at the impact of the report. The Department of State is the US voice overseas and the broadcasting companies under the BBG are like the ‘information artillery’ for Public Diplomacy. That is, they should provide consistent support to US objectives and provide their audiences with high quality information comparable to any world class information or entertainment medium.

Public Diplomacy is a cornerstone of today’s influence operations. The MISO Community has a symbiotic relationship with the Department of State. MIS teams may be employed to support embassy staff on one end of the spectrum and on the other MIS Task Forces may be deployed to hostile areas to take on the primary burden of supporting US informational efforts.

It is this symbiotic relationship and the need to depend on our DOS partners that underscores the need for an efficient and effective BBG. As the size of the DOD force shrinks, the need for consistent broadcasting efforts will likely increase thereby exacerbating the need for optimal management of the DOS resources.

The fact that the BBG’s effectiveness has deteriorated so drastically should be of major concern to the President as he shifts his foreign policy gears during his second term. It may also mean that MIS forces may not be able to count on any support from a population that has been listening to US informational broadcasts.

Shoemaker's Children

There’s an old proverb that goes “Shoemaker’s children walk barefoot.” The implication is that the shoemaker is so busy making shoes for sale that he doesn’t have time to take care of his family. 

What does this have to do with PSYOP/MISO?

I’m afraid quite a bit. Like many of you I am a member of a number of on-line groups. While some are part of LinkedIn and generally open to anyone who is interested, others are a bit more selective requiring an introduction by an existing member and a basic vetting process.

This week I was reviewing my correspondence from one of my more selective groups when the subject of “Acronym Check’ attracted my attention. It seems that one of the list members was very confused by the terms PSYOP and MISO and wasn’t sure which was proper or how they are used in today’s doctrine.

Frankly I was a bit taken aback. Given the exposure that MISO has gotten in Afghanistan and elsewhere I was laboring under the illusion that ‘the Big Army’ at least was aware of the current jargon because our operations were integrated into the big picture.

Apparently that is not the case. I drafted a post that included language I had validated by SWC and that ended up on the list shortly after I sent it in. Interestingly enough it did not generate one word of comment.

Admittedly I’m pretty much on the side lines these days, but I would be very interested in hearing what y’all out there in the field are experiencing and what we might want to do if there is indeed a problem.

Photo source: http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-06-26/beauty/31957770_1_nails-tea-tree-oil-clean-water

 

Overturned Propagandist’s Conviction Has Cyber Implications

The January 9, 2013 Washington Post featured an article “Al-Qaeda propagandist’s conviction must be overturned, Justice Department says”  (found at: http:www.washington.post.com/world/national-security/al-qaeda-propagandists-conviction-must-be-overturned-justice-department-says/2013/01/0/2033f464-5aa1-11e2-9fa9-5fbdc9530eb9_story.html)

The US Constitution has two clauses (Article 1 §9 and 10) that prohibit ex post facto laws. Simply ex post facto laws are derived from the Latin “from a thing done afterward” meaning that an individual cannot be prosecuted for a crime that didn’t exist at the time of his act.(http://www.law.cornell.educ/wex/ex post facto)

According to the article the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit overturned the conviction of bin Laden’s driver (Salim Hamdan) because the charge (providing material support for terrorism) was not a crime at the time he committed the act. The ruling in this case set the precedent for the Appeals Court to overturn the conviction of Ali al Bahlul  who according to the government was “a Yemeni propagandist for al-Qaeda who was convicted of material support, conspiracy to commit war crimes and solicitation to commit war crimes”

At the moment the law of cyber war and by extension, cyber influence is evolving. Hostile acts to the nation’s IT infrastructure or unauthorized use of an organization’s IT resources for hostile acts by nation states or non-state actors are not yet specifically defined as ‘war crimes’. They may be computer crimes as defined by state or federal law, but thus far the nature of cyber war crimes has not been codified.

The court’s strict enforcement of the prohibition on ex-post facto laws should be duly noted and appropriate steps taken in Congress to set up the firm legal foundation needed to prosecute the cyber war acts of the future.

Photo source: http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2008/08/06/guantanamo-verdict.html

British On Why The Rand Report Got it Wrong

Much has been written on the May 2012 RAND study of the effectiveness of US IO in Afghanistan (which you can get at: http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monographs/2012/RAND_MG1060.pdf), one of the most quoted is a British paper “The Effectiveness of US Military Information Operations in Afghanistan 2001-2010 (See http://www.da.mod.uk/publications/library/central-asian-series/20121214_Whyrandmissedthepoint_U_1202a.pdf/view).

One of the major conclusions, ‘the fundamental failing’ in their words was stated as:

“A naïve and immature understanding of the very process of communication in non-compliant conflict environments and misplaced confidence and over reliance, upon marketing and advertising principles…. This paper advocates that marketing and advertising must now be considered as an utterly failed model for IO and MISO/PsyOps, one which must now be discarded in favour of a behaviorally-led approach embracing proper, proven, social and behavioural science.”

The paper contends that the International Security & Assistance Force (ISAF) over relied on commercial advertising and marketing strategies and contended that the product was NATO and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (GIRoA) was the product and the Afghans were the ‘consumer’.

As I’ve posted before, I have never been to Afghanistan, but I believe I have a reasonable picture of the environment. Attitudes are deeply rooted and are unlikely to be changed in the short term. Illiteracy is high and in general there is a lack of the information infrastructure we would normally associate with a ‘developed nation’.

This means that behavioral efforts have to be much more focused, targeted and localized. The nature of the country means that there can be no top down MISO rather the approach is a bottom up one that likely starts with extended families/tribes and moves up to the provinces recognizing that a ‘national’ or corporate approach is not likely to work. 

The paper identified a number of key issues. 

The absence of a narrative that Afghans can believe and trust. To me this is the key. At the risk of pointing out that a fundamental principle of selling is that the prospect has to be listening to you first, unless the ISAF messages are believable and credible in the first place they will be going no where.

Target Audience Analysis is essential and as I’ve noted above as to be bottom up. 

Complex C2 at every level of command breed ineffectiveness and generally yields the too many cooks in the kitchen problem.

Readers are invited to review the source documents themselves add their own personal experience and contribute to the on-going debate.