News and Commentary by Dave Maxwell. Edited and Published by Riley Murray.
1. Public Service Announcement - We're in This Together. Disinformation Stops with You.
2. Former USSOCOM Commander and Former Top Air Force Intelligence Officer Join Primer's Advisory Board
3. Can AI Detect Disinformation? A New Special Operations Program May Find Out
4. Why the Pentagon needs to fully embrace influence operations
5. Irregular Warfare Annex to National Defense Strategy Made Public
6. US Army To Dissolve Rapid Equipping Force, Asymmetric Warfare Group
7. Irregular warfare strategies must move beyond special forces, Pentagon says
8. What leaders can do now to strengthen US special operations forces
9. Policy Chief Outlines Changes to U.S. Defense Postures in Germany, European Theater
10. FDD | Ransomware Rising: Steps for The Public and Private Sector to Address the Growing Threat
11. Trump team on watch for adversaries to exploit the president's illness
12. US military pilots must not use PH aircraft codes: Esperon
13. 'Got to fix that': Some unit ops tempos higher than peaks of Afghan, Iraq wars, Army chief says
14. Chinese general says Korean War shows how to defeat America
15. China should effectively enhance ability to fight, win wars (and lessons from the Korean War)
16. MDA and Army see successful Patriot and THAAD test after failure
17. Wolf Warriors Blow Hot Before Cooling Down (China)
18. The Covid Information War Is Entering a Frightening New Phase
19. Public Diplomacy and the New "Old" War: Countering State-Sponsored Disinformation (2020)
20. America is a maritime nation, and we need to start acting like it
21. India to lose more than it gains from the Quad
1. Public Service Announcement - We're in This Together. Disinformation Stops with You.
A two-page PDF from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency on countering disinformation. It can be downloaded here: https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/election-disinformation-toolkit_508.pdf
My reminder from our 2017 National Security Strategy:
"A democracy is only as resilient as its people. An informed and engaged citizenry is the fundamental requirement for a free and resilient nation. For generations, our society has protected free press, free speech, and free thought. Today, actors such as Russia are using information tools in an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of democracies. Adversaries target media, political processes, financial networks, and personal data. The American public and private sectors must recognize this and work together to defend our way of life. No external threat can be allowed to shake our shared commitment to our values, undermine our system of government, or divide our Nation."
2. Former USSOCOM Commander and Former Top Air Force Intelligence Officer Join Primer's Advisory Board
PR Newswire · by Primer AI · October 1, 2020
3. Can AI Detect Disinformation? A New Special Operations Program May Find Out
defenseone.com · by Patrick Tucker
I hope this works and helps. But the best detection "tool" is still the human mind and critical thinking. And the best defense comes from within the human mind. But I am all for trying to enlist technology to help. But when we think we have the silver bullet of a technological solution we had beet watch out because our adversaries will surely figure out how to turn that silver bullet to their advantage.
And I think I have heard this before:
"It's no stretch to say it was easier to drop a Hellfire on someone or do something kinetic than it was to do something offensively in the information domain. It's antithetical to us. ... but if your adversaries are playing in that space, you have to respond," he said.
4. Why the Pentagon needs to fully embrace influence operations
Defense News · by Mark Pomerleau · October 2, 2020
Good to read this statement. Influence operations are critical. And they play a key role in political warfare which must be a national effort. We need an American Way of Political Warfare as we recommended here two years ago: https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/perspectives/PE300/PE304/RAND_PE304.pdf
We have to understand that our adversaries have a different view of warfare than we do. But we can adapt and fight in the same domain. My thoughts:
- What is the major difference in the views of conflict, strategy, and campaigning between Russia, China, Iran, nK, AQ, and ISIS and the US?
- The psychological takes precedence and may or may not be supported with the kinetic.
- Politics is war by other means
- For the US kinetic is first and the psychological is second.
- War is politics by other means.
- Napoleon: In war, the moral is to the physical as three is to one.
- In the 21st Century the psychological is to the kinetic as ten is to one.
- The US has to learn to put the psychological first
- Can a federal democratic republic "do strategy" this way?
- Or is it only autocratic, totalitarian dictatorships that can "do strategy" this way?
Problem
We face threats from political warfare strategies supported by hybrid military approaches.
Solution:
Learn to lead with influence
Learn to counter and conduct political warfare campaigns
Cultural and/or organizational change
Keep this in mind about Russia's New Generation of Non-Linear Warfare:
"Thus, the Russian view of modern warfare is based on the idea that the main battlespace is the mind and, as a result, new-generation wars are to be dominated by information and psychological warfare, in order to achieve superiority in troops and weapons control, morally and psychologically depressing the enemy's armed forces personnel and civil population. The main objective is to reduce the necessity for deploying hard military power to the minimum necessary, making the opponent's military and civil population support the attacker to the detriment of their own government and country. It is interesting to note the notion of permanent war, since it denotes a permanent enemy. In the current geopolitical structure, the clear enemy is Western civilization, its values, culture, political system, and ideology."
http://www.naa.mil.lv/~/media/NAA/AZPC/Publikacijas/PP%2002-2014.ashx
5. Irregular Warfare Annex to National Defense Strategy Made Public
defense.gov · by David Vergun
Here is the link to the Unclassified 12 page summary of the Irregular Warfare Annex. https://media.defense.gov/2020/Oct/02/2002510472/-1/-1/0/Irregular-Warfare-Annex-to-the-National-Defense-Strategy-Summary.PDF
I find the timing very coincidental that the army announced today that it is disbanding the Asymmetric Warfare Group (AWG): https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2020/10/02/the-army-is-shutting-down-its-much-lauded-asymmetric-warfare-group/
The IW annex makes clear many important points:
Irregular warfare is an enduring, economical contribution to America's national security, and will remain an essential core competency of the U.S. Department of Defense.
We must not - and will not - repeat the "boom and bust" cycle that has left the United States underprepared for irregular warfare in both Great Power Competition and conflict. Americans expect their military to do more than react to crises, they expect us to compete and maintain our advantages.
IW is a persistent and enduring operational reality employed by non-state actors and increasingly by state actors in competition with the United States. Past U.S. approaches to IW have been cyclical and neglected the fact that IW - in addition to nuclear and conventional deterrence - can proactively shape conditions to the United States' advantage in great power competition. This reactive cycle fails to prepare the United States to conduct traditional warfare or irregular warfare effectively. All of these conditions are reversible.
6. US Army To Dissolve Rapid Equipping Force, Asymmetric Warfare Group
defenseone.com · by Patrick Tucker
Quite a coincidence with the new IW annex coming out today.
7. Irregular warfare strategies must move beyond special forces, Pentagon says
Defense News · by Aaron Mehta · October 2, 2020
The key word is strategy. If we develop sound strategy and effective campaign plans we will use the right forces for the right missions. You must campaign in the irregular warfare space.
Here are my eight points of irregular/special warfare.
Eight Points of Irregular Warfare:
https://maxoki161.blogspot.com/2018/07/eight-points-of-special-warfare.html
Special Warfare is the execution of activities that involve a combination of lethal and nonlethal actions taken by a specially trained and educated force that has a deep understanding of cultures and foreign language, proficiency in small-unit tactics, and the ability to build and fight alongside indigenous combat formations in a permissive, uncertain, or hostile environment.
-If there is an indigenous solution or an indigenous contribution to the solution for a complex political military problem conduct special warfare - the essence of which is "through, with, and by" as developed by Mark Boyatt
1. Instead of an end state must determine the acceptable, durable, political arrangement that can achieved. (per LTG James Dubik) Without this clearly articulated and understood there is no way to achieve unity of effort or to judge mission success. I think Congress must demand this from the Administration.
2. Eliot Cohen & John Gooch: Military Misfortune: All military failures are a result of a failure learn, failure to adapt, and failure to anticipate. We must learn to anticipate and that is done through thorough and ongoing assessments and heeding the expert practitioners on the ground. Look at Mali and Yemen. Did we anticipate the Turegs and the Houthis? I would submit that SOF on the ground reported on the growing threats to Mali and Yemen yet our myopic focus on CT blinded us at the strategic level.
3. Larry Cable (the discredited COIN theorist who wrote Conflict of Myths) The three P's: Presence, Patience, Persistence. You have to be present to make a difference. You have to be patient because it takes a long time to influence indigenous forces and develop indigenous capabilities. You must have cultural respect without going native and you must have an aptitude and desire for living and working in a foreign culture. It takes persistence because mistakes will be made, every operation will include discovery learning and we will have to learn and adapt.
4. Assessment - must conduct continuous assessment to gain understanding - tactical, operational, and strategic. Assessments are key to developing strategy and campaign plans and anticipating potential conflict. Assessments allow you to challenge assumptions and determine if a rebalance of, ways and means with the acceptable, durable, political arrangement is required. Understand the indigenous way of war and adapt to it. Do not force the US way of war upon indigenous forces if is counter to their history, customs, traditions, and abilities.
5. Assure US and indigenous interests are sufficiently aligned. If indigenous and US interests are not sufficiently aligned the mission will fail. If the US has stronger interest than the indigenous force we can create an "assistance paradox" - if indigenous forces believe the US mission is "no fail" and the US forces will not allow them to fail and therefore they do not need to try too hard. They may very well benefit from long term US aid and support which may be their objective for accepting support in the first place.
6. Employ the right forces for the right mission. US SOF, conventional, civilian agency, indigenous forces. Always based on assessment and thorough understanding of the problem and available resources and capabilities. Cannot over rely on one force to do everything.
7. Learn how to operate without being in charge. If we usurp the mission indigenous forces will never be successful on their own. You cannot pay lip service to advising and assisting. This is why operations in Colombia and the Philippines achieve some level of success. This is not "leading from behind." This is the appropriate understanding of the relationship between USSF/SOF and indigenous forces in a sovereign nation or indigenous forces seeking self-determination of government.
8. Campaigning - We have to develop the campaign plan based on Design thinking to determine the resources and authorities - and then execute the campaign - we have to get good at campaigning and it has to be more than a military campaign. (USSOCOM Design: Appreciate the context, understand the problem, and develop an approach). While disrupting terrorist attacks and attacking terrorist networks and their finances and auxiliaries are important they are not a strategy. They can be part of a strategy and campaign but they are not sufficient. We have to campaign beyond counter-terrorism with a campaign focused on attacking the enemy's strategy. This requires deep understanding to include especially understanding the enemy's political objectives. Once we understand the enemy, ways and means can be employed to counter the enemy's strategy and his political objectives. Campaigning is important because it will orchestrate all the activities to achieve the strategic objectives or the acceptable, durable political arrangement we seek. Campaigns identify the resources necessary (forces, bases, funding). Campaigns identify the authorities necessary. Although many in the military and government desire blanket authorities that is not the right way to operate. However, establishing programs and funding lines such as 1206, 1207, 1208, and 1209 and now 127E are not effective either. Authorities need to be specifically applied to each campaign. And with an approved campaign plan Congress can more effectively provide oversight rather than managing funding programs. Campaigns must also account for transitions (and demobilization in UW) when working with indigenous forces because we cannot advise and assist and provide support indefinitely. Focusing on effective campaigning can discipline the application of the military instrument of power. Of course, it would useful for other elements of national power to be able to "campaign" as well. We perhaps need to take another look at the 1997 PDD 56 which was for the management of complex contingency operations in the interagency - a disciplined process to orchestrate US government agencies and harmonize the instruments of power.
8. What leaders can do now to strengthen US special operations forces
taskandpurpose.com · by Lt. Col. Stewart Parker and Emma Moore
Key points from the authors:
Clearly articulate and enforce SOF team priorities
Nurture health and resilience
Ruthlessly manage operations tempo
What leaders can do now to strengthen US special operations forces
9. Policy Chief Outlines Changes to U.S. Defense Postures in Germany, European Theater
defense.gov · by Terri Moon Cronk
Excerpt: "The realignment concept includes consolidating headquarters to strengthen operational agility, repositioning some forces in the United States to focus on readiness, and to prepare for rotational deployments and deploying rotational forces to the Black Sea region, NATO's southeastern flank, to improve deterrence," Anderson said.
10. FDD | Ransomware Rising: Steps for The Public and Private Sector to Address the Growing Threat
fdd.org · by RADM (Ret) Mark Montgomery CCTI Senior Director and Senior Fellow Trevor Logan Cyber Research Analyst· October 2, 2020
Conclusion: These seven steps are all key both to building more resilient networks that are less susceptible to ransomware attacks, and to establishing greater government capacity for cyber collaboration to prevent or mitigate attacks when they do occur. The use of ransomware is on the rise; cybercrime writ large is on the rise; and both will continue to grow until companies and municipalities take appropriate steps to secure their, and our, data from exposure and theft.
11. Trump team on watch for adversaries to exploit the president's illness
Politico – 2 October 2020
We must be vigilant. I had a good conversation with my good friend and mentor, Bob Collins who is one of our nation's experts on north Korean leadership decision making. He is rightly concerned with north Korean miscalculation in the coming weeks. My counter was the regime is focused on its multiple internal crises. But Bob points out Kim may see an opportunity for coercing South Korea for concessions with a provocation while they assess the US is distracted and will not respond. Of course the regime's first action was to send well-wishes to President Trump. Perhaps they are setting the groundwork for something. Kim may be trying to inoculate himself from a US reaction to a provocation against South Korea because he is giving the appearance of trying to sustain his relationship with the President.
12. US military pilots must not use PH aircraft codes: Esperon
canadianinquirer.net · October 1, 2020
What the h.....? I am very skeptical of this allegation.
13. 'Got to fix that': Some unit ops tempos higher than peaks of Afghan, Iraq wars, Army chief says
armytimes.com · by Kyle Rempfer · October 2, 2020
Everyone thinks SOF, the infantry, and the Navy have high OPTEMPOS but check out our air and missile defenders.
14. Chinese general says Korean War shows how to defeat America
Washington Examiner · by Tom Rogan · October 2, 2020
The referenced article is at this link but I will include it separately as well. https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1202566.shtml
15. China should effectively enhance ability to fight, win wars (and lessons from the Korean War)
There is a lot to parse from this. It is a very interesting read from a Chinese Lieutenant General. We should pay close attention to what senior leaders are writing. There is obviously a message for us, perhaps as simple as China will stand up to the US and beware of the strength of the PRC.
16. MDA and Army see successful Patriot and THAAD test after failure
Defense News · by Jen Judson · October 1, 2020
These are obviously critical systems and capabilities for the INDOPACIFIC and around the world.
17. Wolf Warriors Blow Hot Before Cooling Down (China)
Excerpt: "This essay covers the controversial and significant period of "wolf-warrior" diplomacy in China in 2020 - rising in March, resisted in April and receding in May." Has it receded?
18. The Covid Information War Is Entering a Frightening New Phase
Wired · by Gilad Edelman
We need to understand this (or the White House needs to): Communication from the White House about Donald Trump's infection will be opaque at best. Into that vacuum, misinformation will flow.
19. Public Diplomacy and the New "Old" War: Countering State-Sponsored Disinformation (2020)
This is an important report. The 62 page PDF can be downloaded here: https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Public-Diplomacy-and-the-New-Old-War-Countering-State-Sponsored-Disinformation.pdf
My one critique is the graphics of the report. The theme throughout is 1's and 0's. To me that emphasizes too strongly the cyber and technical aspect;. But in this the human remains central and most important. Cyber is neither the blame or the solution. It is just a medium and tool.
But I think the recommendations from the report are very useful and important with, I think, number three the most important and our biggest weakness:
1 DEFINE. Define the CSD challenge with a Department-wide lexicon of disinformation.
2 INVEST. Invest more in digital capabilities, but not at the expense of long-term person-to person initiatives.
3 COMPETE. Compete in the information space by restructuring overseas PD sections with teams dedicated to modern digital communications.
4 SPECIALIZE. Create a job series for mid-career CSD specialists.
5 EXPERIMENT. Develop mechanisms to rapidly redirect funding to seed programs and allow them to scale or fail-fast.
6 EVALUATE. Evaluate, monitor, and assess the impact of CSD programs.
20. America is a maritime nation, and we need to start acting like it
Defense News · by Rep. Rob Wittman · September 30, 2020
Even as a former soldier, I concur with the Congressman. We are a maritime nation and our Navy and our Coast Guard are critically important.
21. India to lose more than it gains from the Quad
asiatimes.com · by More by Bhim Bhurtel · October 2, 2020
This is a very negative critique of the "QUAD" concept.
"The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies."
- Napoleon
"The soldier who fights to death never dies, but the soldier who fights for existence never truly exists."
-Admiral Yi Sun-shin
"Education should implant a will and a facility for learning; it should produce not learned but learning people. In times of change, learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists."
- Eric Hoffer