PSYOP Award Update

One of the purposes of this Blog is to update the PSYOP community on items of interest. An important issue today is the status of an award for excellence in PSYOP. At the moment there are two different award approaches being explored. (photo from Wikipedia)

For the past year a multi-organizational project, coordinated by USACAPOC has been under way to plan for and grant awards for exceptionally meritorious service or achievement within the PSYOP Community. Championed by the DCG of USACAPOC, the project has involved representatives from the 2nd PSYOP Group, the 7th PSYOP Group, the PSYOP Association (POA - http://www.geocities.com/psyopassociation/), the PSYOP Veterans Association (POVA - http://www.usapova.com/) and the PSYOP Regiment as represented by yours truly, the Honorary Colonel.

The award has been tentatively named the McClure Award in honor of MG Robert McClure who is considered the ‘father’ of modern day PSYOP. The award would be inclusive in nature meaning it could be awarded to a current or past member of any service from any country who excelled in service or achievement for PSYOP. It could also be awarded to civilians, veterans or deceased personnel who were nominated and selected.

It is envisioned that nominations would be submitted to a committee made up of representatives from the organizations noted above under the auspices of the PSYOP Regimental Association (PORA) which would serve as an umbrella organization serving the overall ommunity interest. Both POA and POVA would continue to function independently. POA concentrating on its stated mission of PSYOP education and POVA concentrating on its stated mission of holding reunions.

A US Army centric approach, focusing on excellence with the Army PSYOP branch, is progressing under the championship of the new CG of SWC. MG Thomas Crsnko (see http://www.soc.mil/swcs/MG%20CSRNKO.pdf) assumed command of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg on 28 June 2008. He has directed his staff to initiate a project for awards recognizing Army personnel in the PSYOP branch for their service and achievements. This award, tentatively named the St. Bernadine Medal, would be awarded in three classes: Gold, Silver and Bronze based on nominations processed through an ad hoc committee formed by SWC.

By way of background, the CG of SWC is considered the “Home Base Commander” and as such is the higher HQ for the PSYOP, CA and Special Forces Regiments. Consequently it can be argued that they are indeed the proponent for the PSYOP, CA and SF Branches.

The 4th POG has scheduled PSYOP Regimental week at Fort Bragg for 1 – 5 June 2009 and it is hoped that PSYOP award or awards can be presented during that week.

USACAPOC and SWC are working together to deconflict the issues surrounding the awards.

If you have any input or suggestions regarding awards within PSYOP, please comment on the Blog and I will be glad to pass them along if you would like. Any comment to the Blog must be approved by me prior to posting (so far I’ve posted every one I’ve gotten since the Blog started in 2007), so do not be concerned that your input will be posted automatically. If you’d rather correspond privately, say so in the comment and I’ll get back to you via return e-mail.

PSYOP Surged in Afghanistan?

President Obama has agreed with SecDef Gates that a surge is what is needed in Afghanistan to turn the growing tide of violence and to deal with the annual Taliban spring offensive. Units that were scheduled to go to Iraq are being re-directed to Afghanistan with the popular opinion that “a surge worked in Iraq and by golly it ought to work in Afghanistan also.”

I’m reminded of the expression “ready to fight the last war”. Afghanistan has withstood the efforts of would be conquers for centuries, Pakistan is no more settled on its approach to the tribal no man’s land today than it was years ago. Is more troops the answer? I’m inclined to think not exactly.

Merely increasing the amount of US footprint might increase the security for a while, but unless there are fundamental changes in the Afghani tribal security picture, the economy and the government, a troop surge is like adding more crew to the Titanic.

Some fundamental questions need to be raised – which have hopefully been asked answered. Questions like:

Is there an overall information engagement plan for the country?

Have the vagaries of large numbers of disparate tribes with low levels of literacy or specialty dialects been factored into the overall plan?

Are PSYOP soldiers training with the newly redirected units?

Has the linguistic pool been increased to provide the larger force with the coverage they will need?

What lessons learned in Iraq can REALLY be applied to Afghanistan?

Will the low level of technology and mass media aid or hamper PSYOP and information engagement efforts?

Does it make sense to build up a journalistic infrastructure in Afghanistan? If so, under whose auspices?

Given that Afghanistan is a NATO mission will US training and doctrine easily mesh with other nations’?

Are multi-national exercises or combined-joint pre-deployment training planned?

Strikes me that the mission in Afghanistan is far more dangerous and far more complex than Iraq. Afghanistan lacks the urban clusters of Iraq and it’s ethnic composition is more of a mosaic than a simple bifurcation.

It’s clear to me that adaptation and innovation are key to success in Afghanistan. Perhaps we’ll need to mount some loudspeakers on the local transportation show above. (Photo courtesy of: http://www.defenselink.mil/dodcmsshare/homepagephoto/2008-07/hires_080709-M-6668G-021b.jpg)

PSYOP in Afghanistan: 1 Warlord At A Time

The Philadelphia Inquirer ran an article about Mr. Holbrooke’s visit to Afghanistan to craft President Obama’s ‘new’ strategy there. Having seen the results of Mr. Holbrooke’s efforts in Bosnia I’m sure he appreciates the order of magnitude of the challenge facing him – but even the fractious situation in Bosnia was neat and clean compared to Afghanistan. (http://www.philly.com/inquirer/world_us/20090213_Holbrooke_in_Kabul_to_revise_strategy.html)

Photo: USA Today (Chief Elders of the Korengal Valley, 30 Oct 08)

Training and equipping security forces is a necessary and key part of the equation to success, but it is not the whole equation. Bosnia, like Gaul was divided into three ethnic groups: Bosniac (Moslem), Croat (Catholic) and Serb (Russian Orthodox). While the exact number of tribes is not necessarily know, a USA Today article found in a Google Search pegged the number at 400. (http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-11-06-afghantribes_N.htm)

Assuming that is the case, and assuming that there is a new initiative, not necessarily a new strategy, but a new plan and allocation of resources, we need to go beyond mere messaging. Here are the steps I believe we need to take:

1. Assess The Nature of Tribal Networks
Divide the tribes into ‘nations’ and assess what kinds of concrete actions will enhance the government in the mind of the population in those nations. Actions need to go beyond security (which is a given and the baseline) and include medical, economic and social. Social actions need to be viewed through the eyes of the local population.

2. Develop “Nation” and Tribal Action Plans
Bring to bear all the resources of the USG in a concerted effort to appeal to the needs developed in the assessment. These might include: medcaps, micro-financing projects, agricultural advice and assistance, school or other public infrastructure repair, etc. Earmark the collection of projects by nation and location. Consider using Native American sociology experts to help formulate an appropriately culturally sensitive action plan – rely on successful tribal government models – not local, state or federal as the basis.

3. Preselect and Train The Project Teams
Insure that the project teams are intimately familiar with the culture and geography of their destinations. Include basic language training and if possible immerse interpreters into the training as early as possible. Include security force training and international to give stage front exposure to the Afghan forces.

4. Prepare to Publicize Success
Determine which nations are ‘allied’ with each other. Publicize success through tribal leaders. If appropriate encourage visits among tribal leaders so that they can see successful environments. Once local success has been assured, consider national publicity and of course international. Special attention should be paid to Aljazeera or other regional/international media that can influence the Arab world.

5. Be Flexible
Semper Gumby – always flexible (Gumby was a character made out of clay for those of you not familiar with him). Each tribal project will run into bumps and it follows that the ‘nation’ program (the collection of similar tribes) might have its hiccups as well. The point is that long term solutions require long term commitments and history has shown Afghanistan is one of those places where the race is a marathon – not a sprint.

PSYOP and the 2009 QDR

DOD outlined the three major purposes of the QDR:
1. Increase synergy across the Department’s Components.
2. Improve the effectiveness of joint and interagency operations.
3. Ensure the Department continues to efficiently invest the Nation’s defense resources to meet the asymmetric challenges of the 21st Century. The 2009 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) can be found at:http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2009/QRMFinalReport_v26Jan.pdf.

PSYOP is mentioned twice in the 48 page document. Once in connection with the need to balance Active and Reserve Components for Irregular Warfare (p 12) and again with regard to Strategic Communication ( p 35)

As to the former, “The Department concluded that persistent presence and sustainment of irregular warfare activities require increasing specific capabilities across the Total Force, including civil affairs and psychological operations capabilities in the Active Component force.” (emphasis added by your humble blogger)

On one hand this would appear to be a blinding flash of the obvious, on the other, it’s nice to see recognition of the issue at the highest levels of DOD. Bottom line here is that the “Big Army” needs more CA and PSYOP support – in fact rather than being an add-on requested as needed, DOD has recognized that CA and PSYOP are as important as shooters, and perhaps even more so for irregular warfare. However, there’s not much of a bull pen to meet the increased demand, and the notion of increasing the size of forces amidst the worst financial crisis in decades will likely not sit well with either the new Administration or the voting public.

DOD is faced with the need to mushroom these two vital capabilities without expanding the number of slots. Historically this has meant that the individual soldier has had to learn new skills and add them to their portfolio of talents. While not all soldiers can adapt to irregular warfare, nor can they adjust from being shooters to builders, it is clear that TRADOC will have to incorporate new doctrine into all branch training to insure at least a basic familiarity with CA and PSYOP concepts, principles and operations.

With regard to Strategic Communication, the QDR reinforces and restates “We are committed to using our operational and informational activities and strategic communication processes in support of the Department of State’s broader public diplomacy efforts. This cooperation will better enable the U.S. Government to engage foreign audiences holistically and with unity of effort.”

This lofty goal falls into the easier said than done box. In a world where the actions of a squad on the ground can be literally on the news around the world in minutes, a holistic effort doesn’t seem possible given the organizational constraints and the fact that Department of State influence does not necessarily extend very far beyond Embassy walls in hostile zones.

One way to attack this problem is to develop country and regional Information Engagement (IE) teams. These teams would be run as a joint venture between State and Defense and managed by the senior person on the ground. USAID and other resources would be marshaled in concert with the team’s guidance and the overall goals and objectives would be set by State since they are the President’s Diplomats. DOD personnel would be tasked with providing support to the program through employment of DOD’s considerable PSYOP product development resources, PAO efforts not to mention security and logistics support.

However, prior to embarking on such an ambitious goal, new rules of the road need to be establish that set metes and bounds, yet offer significant product flexibility on the far end so that USG forces can synergize their efforts to capitalize on events as they occur. The guidance offered must recognize that each theater is different so that tactical IE would vary by location, but overall messaging may not.

Recognizing the instant nature of communications, regional and transnational IE must be orchestrated in a similar fashion. As I’ve stated before, IE should consist of a corporate like entity as well as regional and local information emissaries. The multi-national corporate model may be more of a guide than even the newest DOD TO&E.

PSYOP Lessons Learned From Gaza

There have been a couple of very good articles on PSYOP in Gaza published in the last few weeks. USA Today ran “Cellphones Put to 'Unnerving' Use in Gaza” (http://www.usatoday.com/tech/wireless/2009-01-13-gazaphones_N.htm) The photo is by Abdalrahem Khateb, AP . The article addressed how both sides were employing cell phones, SMS and land lines in an effort to influence their opposition. A similar article, “The unreported battle with Hamas: psychological warfare” was published by Haaretz (http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1054916.html).

The third article the Economist, “A war of words and images” (http://www.economist.com/world/mideastafrica/displaystory.cfm?STORY_ID=12953839) claims that Israel had lost the propaganda war at the time of its publishing, 15 January 2009.

What can US PSYOP forces learn from the Gaza conflict that might serve them well in Afghanistan, Iraq and beyond?

Lesson 1 – Be Realistic On Expectations – At least in your own mind.

I don’t have any inside knowledge as to the goals of Israeli PSYOP in Gaza. However I think It is it fair to say that the Israeli PSYOP target was as much the popular opinion in the West as the residents of Gaza. I frankly don’t believe it is reasonable to assume that a cell phone call or a text message will convince anyone to betray their neighbor. In fact I’m doubtful that tactical PSYOP campaigns aimed at civilians during kinetic actions will serve any purpose except to provide information for civilians on how to avoid being killed or injured. The horrific nature of urban close combat and the disruption of the civilian infrastructure are likely to be too big of an obstacle to overcome. Furthermore, the vehemence of beliefs was cemented long before the IDF rolled into Gaza.

Lesson 2 – Technology to Suit The Target

A useful lesson is that media must be varied to suit the target. While I don’t recall if any of the articles mentioned the age of the PSYOP targets, I suspect that the most fruitful target would be those engaged in active combat, smuggling, rocket firing or other acts of or in support of terrorism. This is likely to mean an audience between the ages of 13 and 40. Mobile phones and texting is the medium of choice and must be exploited. However, the product must be credible and appear to be correct in terms of jargon, style and content. Failure to understand the linguistic and local cultural nuances of the messages will instantly destroy their effectiveness.

Lesson 3 – There Are No Secrets

Sooner or later the true sources of all PSYOP will come out. PSYOP planners need to understand this principle up front. Exposure of sources can be OK if the time value of that source has expired, if the source and the medium in question are destined for long term use, than a very prudent perspective – should be employed. The arguments here will likely mirror the arguments used in the intelligence community where one side wants to employ the intelligence and the other does not because it would expose the source and render it useless in the future.

Every conflict yields lessons, let’s hope we learn some of them.

Blogs and PSYOP

An article from the Christian Science Monitor caught my eye today. The January 20 article: Military brass joins wired troops with the sub-head: “Admirals and generals hope to connect with soldiers via their own Facebook pages and blogs. But will they tweet?”http://features.csmonitor.com/innovation/2009/01/20/military-brass-joins-wired-troops/

This got me thinking about the effectiveness of Blogs for communication and coincidentally for PSYOP. The article talks about how the GOFO (General Officers Fleet Officers) are hoping to use Blogs and Facebook to reach down through the depths of their command. Senior leaders almost never get a chance to reach their lower echelons in a regimented top down structure such as the military. These senior officers have recognized that the old “Company Bulletin Board” in the Day Room is no longer the way to reach soldiers, sailors, airman and Coast Guard personnel. Embracing the latest technology will provide a more up to date electronic conduit down the chain of command.

However, since their Blogs and pages are open to all and since the GOFO will be using these mediums to express their philosophy and goals it is reasonable to assume that these ‘transmissions’ will have a PSYOP effect on individuals from outside the chain of command who have an interest in what this senior leadership is doing.

I’ve been writing this Blog for over a year now and while I diligently check Google Analytics to measure activity, I’ve determined it’s very difficult to measure effectiveness. Every once in a while I get a comment in response to a post. Thus far I have posted every comment received. Almost all of them are anonymous – but thus far all have been worth reading.

My take is that if a Blog is to have an effect the reader must have some kind of personal connection with the Blog author. Of course, not a direct one – but a linkage of thought either positive or negative. In many respects I believe the old selling principles apply here. First the ‘buyer’ has to be listening to you and have a positive impression of you (perhaps even ‘like’ you as an individual) before you can hope to present your case.

As for Facebook, I’m still learning that one and I’ve only connected with people I really know. Perhaps the senior officers mentioned in the article such as Adm. James Stavridis, who the article states is an avid blogger (check out: http://www.southcom.mil/AppsSC/Blog.php?id=22 ) and who the article claims has over 240 friends on Facebook.

Bottom line: Blogs can be effective if the author sticks to what he knows and connects with readers.

PSYOP and Mexico

Joel Kurtzman of the Miliken Institute warns “Mexico’s Instability is a Real Problem postulates the possibility of a failed state on our southern border. (see http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123206674721488169.html)

This possibility is supported by no less authority than the Joint Forces Command’s report entitled Joint Operating Environment (JOE) 2008 (found at: http://www.jfcom.mil/newslink/storyarchive/2008/JOE2008.pdf) which says “In particular, the growing assault by the drug cartels and their thugs on the Mexican government over the past several years reminds one that an unstable Mexico could represent a homeland security problem of immense proportions to the United States.”

Let’s explore a hypothetical scenario. Let’s suppose that two drug cartels decide that they have enough fire and economic power to take over a border city each. They target Tijuana, across the border from San Diego, CA and Ciudad Juarez across the border from El Paso, TX. Each city with a population of 1.5 million people and a comprabley large US city across the border. As it turns out San Diego has a large Navy population and Fort Bliss is not too far from El Paso.

Further let’s assume that the two cartels have signed a non-compete agreement with each other and have enlisted a variety of allied thugs who are only too happy to have exclusive territorial rights and are willing to provide men, guns and drugs to defend the newly won turf.

The Mexican forces prove unable to dislodge the cartels and the President of Mexico appeals to the US to help out.

Meanwhile, the cartels have already made forays across the border on both sides with a spike of violent crime reported on both sides of the border.

The following questions jump out:
How quickly could coordinated forces be brought to bear to address the physical threat?
What kind of information engagement would be mounted to attack the drug forces while assuaging and safeguarding the civilian populations on both sides?
How would the information engagement be coordinated so that all elements including CNA and CNE are employed?
How can the friction between PAO and PSYOP be minimized across all the players?

From a PSYOP perspective do you deploy the forces that are closest and most available (the Reserve Force) or do you deploy active forces from Fort Bragg?

If you decide that a combined PSYOP Task Force (POTF) is the right answer, who formulates the TO&E? To whom does its CDR report? Who should command it?

Who is in charge? State? Defense? The Governors of California or Arizona? Or will the newly elected President decide that he needs to be hands on. It certainly would be the first time that an ultra senior official felt they were smart enough and capable enough to direct what might ordinarily be a lower echelon campaign.

I’ll leave y’all to ponder these questions and for my US colleagues, I hope your team wins on Sunday!