Category: Public Diplomacy

Not Afraid to Talk: our adversaries aren’t, why are we?

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 3 Comments

For an unabridged version of the below post, go here. Otherwise read on.

GWU professor Marc Lynch, perhaps more commonly known as Abu Aardvark, revealed the positions on public diplomacy of the current presidential candidates:

I came across something interesting while doing some research on public diplomacy for an unrelated project.  Since at least the 9/11 Commission Report, almost every foreign policy blueprint or platform has for better or for worse mentioned the need to fix American public diplomacy and to engage with the "war of ideas" in the Islamic world.   I expected all three remaining Presidential candidates to offer at least some boilerplate rhetoric on the theme.  What I found was different.

Marc highlighted the differences between the presidential candidates on what is arguably the most important and yet least understood element of our national security. At the end of his post, he challenged John Brown, Patricia Kushlis, and this blogger to offer our thoughts.  Patricia at Whirled View responded, as did John Brown and a few others. I suggest you read their responses.

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Measuring “Public Diplomacy”?

~ Matt Armstrong

What "nine annual and long-term outcomes" would you use to measure America’s public diplomacy apparatus?  State has apparently found them. 

The American concept of "public diplomacy" is a strange one.  As Americans, we seek a return on our investments.  It’s in our blood.  If there is no clear payback, then there’s no clear value and there’s no reason to continue.  Public diplomacy is no different as we, unique to perhaps the rest of the world, view it as discrete cylinder of excellence that must be measured to prove its worth.  Numerous reports as well as historic and recent prominent officials have noted, public diplomacy is presented as something that lacks a domestic constituency and thus support for its programs must be somehow explained.

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The psychological struggle of today is unique only in the details

~ Matt Armstrong

The psychological struggle of today is unique only in the details.  The need to shape the perceptions of individuals did not materialize after 9/11 or after the Cold War.  Below are two quotes, a factoid, and then a third quote.  The first is from the period of the last great re-org of the American national security apparatus and the second by a man who helped, if indirectly, shape the culture of America’s information capabilities to our detriment today.  The third quote is perhaps the most interesting of the three.

Speaking in 1949, Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs George V. Allen, later Director of USIA (1957-1960), said in speech at Duke University:

Propaganda on an immense scale is here to stay.  Technological advance may have made this as important to diplomacy as the invention of gunpowder to the military. … We still write diplomatic notes, but we try to reach directly into as many foreign homes as we can.  Every other major power is doing the same. … I am convinced that unless the United States continues to utilize this new method we shall be left at the post by other countries which are becoming skilled in the use of mass media.

New methods in government, like new discoveries in science, can be used for good or ill.  Direct radio contact with foreign individuals may be taken advantage of to proclaim falsehood as well as truth.  But the potentialities of the direct approach are very great in both directions, and we must understand and perfect the techniques to protect and advance our interests.

Further back, George Creel (see also Espionage Act of 1917) wrote in 1917:

Back of the firing line, back of the armies and navies, back of the great supply depots another struggle [was] waged with the same intensity, and with almost equal significance attaching to its victories and defeats.  It was the fight for the minds of men… and the battleline ran through every home in every country.

Separately (and not related to either of the above speakers), private cooperation in public diplomacy included filling the shelves of overseas libraries. 

Probably USIA’s most successful program of cooperation with private agencies has been with donated books…. Starting in 1963, an arrangement was worked out with the Post Office Department whereby books reaching the dead-letter office were made available for shipment overseas.  In 1964, 250,000 volumes came from this source.

Finally, Edward R. Murrow speaking to a Congressional committee in 1963 as Director of USIA, said his agency’s effectiveness, in spite of quotes from a North Vietnamese newspaper and a Chinese magazine that were similar to recent Iranian warnings to its people, was still very hard to measure:

No computer clicks, no cash register rings when a man changes his mind or opts for freedom. … And above all, it is what we do — not what we say — that has the greatest impact overseas.  USIA can explain, interpret, clarify, synthesize, and project, but we cannot change the unchangeable or do the undoable.  The United States of America cannot and should not try to please everyone on this planet; we have, and will always have, some policies that are unpalatable to some people.  We are, then, and properly so, prisoners of policy. … But given intelligent and effective American policies, supported by Congress and the American people, we can make an important contribution to the achievement of our objectives.  In my judgment, we are today making such a contribution.

See also

Iraq Perceptions Not Wrong Just Out of Date

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 6 Comments

From Dipnote:

John Matel serves as Team Leader of the Al Asad Embedded Provincial Reconstruction Team in Iraq.
Public perceptions of Iraq are not wrong; they are just out of date. Media coverage of Iraq has dropped in almost perfect correlation with progress made toward peace and stability. As a result, the picture persists from pre-surge 2006 but it is not 2006 anymore. It is post-surge in Anbar Province where a significantly more secure Iraq exists rebuilding, learning, governing, producing and starting to make huge strides along the road to prosperity.

Yes, and?  What are you going to do about it?  What can you do about perception overcoming fact?  Probably go on DoD’s Blogger Roundtable because, besides Dipnote, there really aren’t any channels for you to use to get your word out…

When riding a dead horse, you should dismount

~ Matt Armstrong

Infer what you wish from this shamelessly stolen borrowed set of options to the question: When riding a dead horse, what do you do?

1.Buy a stronger whip.

2.Assert “This is the way we always have ridden this horse.”

3.Arrange to visit other sites to benchmark how they ride dead horses.

4.Provide additional training to increase riding ability.

5.Outsource to private contractors to see if they can ride the dead horse cheaper.

6.Harness several dead horses together to increase the speed.

7.Declare that, as the dead horse does not have to be fed, it is less costly, carries lower overheads, and therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line of the economy than do some other horses.

8.Commission a study to identify ways to improve dead horses through incremental enhancements, such as adding wheels.

9.Rewrite the expected performance requirements for all horses.

10.Promote the dead horse to a supervisory position.

Or, as Ted Knicker’s presentation on public diplomacy goes, follow tribal wisdom "passed on from generation to generation, [that] says that when you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount."

The Clean Team: cleaning the image

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 3 Comments

In the Washington Post about the six Gitmo prisoners to be tried over 9/11: 

The Bush administration announced yesterday that it intends to bring capital murder charges against half a dozen men allegedly linked to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, based partly on information the men disclosed to FBI and military questioners without the use of coercive interrogation tactics.

The admissions made by the men — who were given food whenever they were hungry as well as Starbucks coffee at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba — played a key role in the government’s decision to proceed with the prosecutions, military and law enforcement officials said.

FBI and military interrogators who began work with the suspects in late 2006 called themselves the "Clean Team" and set as their goal the collection of virtually the same information the CIA had obtained from five of the six through duress at secret prisons.

To ensure that the data would not be tainted by allegations of torture or illegal coercion, the FBI and military team won the suspects’ trust over the past 16 months by using time-tested rapport-building techniques, the officials said.

Such decadence.  No wonder people fear us. 

H/T Noah

 

Three Upcoming Conferences (Updated)

~ Matt Armstrong

There are two three upcoming conferences this week that might interest you.  All should be interesting.  Hopefully at least one of them will be useful. 

The first conference is Stability Operations and State Building: Continuities and Contingencies in Tennessee February 13-15, 2008.  This part of the conference description threw me:

…we will look at theoretical, intellectual, and moral foundations of state-building as derived from the Age of Enlightenment, ethical norms, and religious values from various societies… we will examine contemporary practices as related to us by serving military officers.

This sounds like a colonial mindset even when throwing in "various societies."   Will they truly look at the socio-political-economic structures of target territories and will local systems take primacy over our "superior" systems? 

That said, a friend is presenting at paper at the conference.  Read it and read a discussion about it at Small Wars Journal. 

Tom Barnett and John Robb will be bookending the Valentine’s Day session with Tom in the morning, 8-9:30a, and John in the evening, 8-8:40p.

The second conference is The Challenges of Integrating Islam: Comparative Experiences of Europe and the Middle East at GWU’s Elliott School in DC.  Friend of MountainRunner Marc Lynch announced this event on his blog today:

The morning panel looks at the headscarf issue in Turkey, while the lunch address is being given by Jakob Skovgaard-Peterson, director of the Danish-Egypt Dialogue Institute (which must be one of the most thankless jobs in the world, but one which must offer some interesting perspectives on inter-faith relations).  Two outstanding anthropologists are slated to speak as well:  Jon Anderson (American University) and John Bowen (Washington University – St. Louis).   I’ll be rushing over from a morning workshop across town to speak at the 1:45 panel.  I was slated to talk about "The social and the political: Islamist views of reform", but now I’m planning to work up some remarks on the fascinating controversy which has erupted in the UK over remarks by Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, over the application of sharia law in Great Britain. Stay tuned.  

The third conference is Public Diplomacy: Reinvigorating America’s Strategic Communications Policy at the Heritage Foundation tomorrow, February 13, noon – 1:30p.

Strategic communication has long been essential to furthering American foreign policy goals, especially during times of war. Recently, the government has taken numerous steps to improve its wartime strategic communication capacity. However, it is evident that the current system is not working as well as during the Cold War, and the United States still lacks an integrated public diplomacy strategy capable of bolstering America’s image overseas. This panel will address the efficacy of the current administration’s strategy and give recommendations for the next administration, whether it is Democrat or Republican.

I won’t be at any of these.  If you go, I’d appreciate sharing your thoughts on the events.

Comic Book Hero Spreads Counterterrorism Message

~ Matt Armstrong

Stew Magnuson at National Defense wrote a short article on an apparently successful PSYOP product. 

The comic book focuses on Ameer, who left his home island to work overseas, but returns to find it racked with violence. Ameer is a practitioner of kuntao, which is a local form of martial arts. Like Zorro or Batman, he dons a mask and vows to protect the downtrodden and innocent victims of terrorists.

The Philippines military are also portrayed in a positive and heroic light while the villains are the terrorists or “bandits.” The creators were careful to accurately illustrate the Sulu region, and use character names, clothing and mannerisms that reflect the culture of the Tausug ethnic group. There are versions in English and in the local dialect.

It depicts real events that took place on the islands and at neighboring Basilan — specifically the Sulu Co-Op bombing in March 2006, which killed five and injured 40 and the Basilan hostage crisis when members of the Abu Sayyaf Group took school children and used them as human shields against Filipino troops.

Psychological Operations, now apparently known at Military Information Support Team (MIST), focused on all the details to create a quality product that seems to be successful.

It was important that the series be reproduced on high-quality paper as slick as any graphic novel found in U.S. bookshelves, he said, because that shows respect to the culture.

Lopacienski said there is anecdotal evidence of the comic book’s popularity. When some areas missed delivery due to security concerns, children “were ripping out the pages and trading them like baseball cards,” he said.

It’s worth a read and worth studying from not just a PSYOP point of view but a public diplomacy & strategic communications POV.  The difference being……

(H/T SWC… might be a discussion there as well)

Another example of why we need to get our info house in order

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 2 Comments

Kip at AM says what I’ve been saying: what the hell are we doing?  While the presentation of the child videos is better than the sterile mil-speak that announced the Zarqawi blooper reel, the separation of public affairs from information operations from strategic communications from public diplomacy certainly affected how the videos were released, the audiences, and ultimately the impact. 

Over a month to release those videos?  That’s better than other video and audio material that took longer or were never released at all that would have put a bright and disturbing light on the roaches.  

At some point you’d think we’d learn and move away from the zero-defect mentality.  The enemy has weaponized information and has maintained — by design — their version of public affairs approval very close to the point of collection that provides tremendous agility in turning around and distributing a media product.  We, the home of Madison Avenue and exploiter of global comm networks for internal comms, have so burdened our approval process that it takes over a month to release the kids video. 

Why the length of time?  Barring some other delay for synchronicity with another operation (which I doubt considering the sloppy and still sterile delivery here), three reasons: a) Information effects isn’t a priority; b) Information can’t be contained, in other words, fear of blowback; and c) A failure to grasp the value of information throughout the chain of command. 

Not only that, but because of a confused and flat wrong interpretation of a sixty year old law that intended to create a voice to speak to the world while working with domestic news agencies, the DoD has little to no creativity in disseminating this important information.  If IO was involved, it was a targeted whisper and not part of a collaborative effort with foreign speakers to shout this from the roof tops. 

Perhaps next time we should enlist UNICEF to help us with the next juicy opportunity to expose al-Qaeda for what they really are. 

Propaganda by UNICEF

~ Matt Armstrong

A model propaganda film?  Or a hidden pleasure for those who never liked the little blue communists?

The story behind the video:

Designed as a UNICEF advertisement, and with the approval of the family of the Smurfs’ late creator Peyo, the 25-second episode was shown on the national evening news after the 9pm timeslot to avoid children seeing it. The scene starts with happy peaceful Smurfs and butterflies, who are then bombed by warplanes, ending with a lone Baby Smurf surrounded by dead Smurfs. The final frame bears the message: "Don’t let war affect the lives of children."

H/T NPR

They are throwing the slow pitch… (UPDATED w/ AQ and kidnapping children)

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 4 Comments

…but we have little to nothing in the way of strategic batters.  From Abu Muqawama:

Abu Muqawama was reading the Economist’s review of Marc Sageman’s new book [Leaderless Jihad] yesterday when he came across this passage (which also refers to Daniel Byman’s new book):

Both authors believe that in the war of ideas Americans should focus on jihadist brutality rather than trying to burnish their own image.

Abu Muqawama then glanced down at the front page of Saturday’s Times of London:

Baghdad’s fragile peace was shattered yesterday when explosives strapped to two women with Down’s syndrome were detonated by remote control in crowded pet markets, killing at least 91 people in the worst attacks that the capital had experienced for almost a year.

Iraqi and American officials blamed al-Qaeda, and accused the terrorist organisation of plumbing new depths of depravity. Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, said that al-Qaeda’s use of mentally-handicapped women as bombers showed that it had “no political programme here that is acceptable to a civilised society and that this is the most brutal and the most bankrupt of movements”.

Ryan Crocker, the US Ambassador, said: “There is nothing they won’t do if they think it will work in creating carnage and the political fallout that comes from that.”

It’s too bad the U.S. and its allies have only a primitive IO campaign, because stories like this should be a goldmine.

Yup.

UPDATE: AM’s timely message is followed by news and video of al-Qaeda’s use of kidnapped children.  Of the many reasons children are used in war and crimes, popular support for the cause isn’t one of them.  Releasing this information through Public Affairs channels isn’t adequate.  DoD Information Operations isn’t adequate either.  

Missing, of course, is a mechanism for us to intelligently and effectively and aggressively (as required here) counter enemy ideology and propaganda.  If only we had the capacity to do so.  A global full court press to highlight the badness of AQ and its cause is required for a new containment and new rollback.  History doesn’t repeat in its entirety, but it does repeat enough that lessons can be learned from the past.

MNF-I video of AQ training of kids "for kidnapping, assassination, and terrorism against Iraqis."

MNF-I video of Iraq and U.S. forces rescuing kidnapped children in Dec 2007:

H/T OpFor and DoD

Talk: The Militarization of Diplomacy

~ Matt Armstrong

From Life After Jerusalem:

John Naland, the president of AFSA, the State Department’s employee association, will be giving a talk on "The Militarization of Diplomacy."
February 7, 2008
Time: 5-6:30 p.m.

Description: The Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law presents "The Militarization of Diplomacy" with John Naland, President of the American Foreign Service Association. Naland will speak about the challenges of staffing posts in combat zones and other aspects of representing the Foreign Service during a period of significant change.

Naland became President of the American Foreign Service Association on July 15, 2007. This is his second term as AFSA President, having also served from 2001 to 2003.

A career Foreign Service Officer, Naland joined the Department of State in 1986. His most recent foreign assignment was as Principal Officer of the U.S. Consulate in Matamoros, Mexico (2003-2006). He also served in Colombia, Costa Rica, and Nicaragua.

The Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law works to engage the best minds in academia, government and the private sector in developing practical solutions to the pressing problems of an increasingly globalized world.

For more information on the Strauss Center, please visit www.RobertStraussCenter.org.

Location: Sid Richardson Hall 3.108, University of Texas at Austin
Sponsor: Robert S. Strauss Center
Admission: Free

For more information, you can visit their website.

Understanding the failure: what’s really wrong and why new agencies or doctrine won’t be enough to fix it

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 1 Comment

There is a serious problem with America’s communication abilities.  It isn’t just a problem of capacity, but constraints created by misunderstanding. 

Sixty years ago, the elements of America’s national power – diplomacy, information, military, and economics, or DIME – were retooled to meet an emerging threat with the National Security Act of 1947 and the Smith-Mundt Act of 1948. Like today, U.S. was engaged in a war of ideas and perceptions both globally and domestically, however the importance and impact of Smith-Mundt is ignored despite its influence, often negative, on every aspect of America’s informational arsenal. It is time to retool for the future fight.

Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s recent suggestion to recreate the United States Information Agency for the modern conflict really stirred things up. Setting the tone was Sharon Weinberger of Danger Room with a post that didn’t hide her disdain for the idea. Following her lead was Mike Nizza of the New York Times blog The Lede with a post that closed with “[d]efenders of Mr. Rumsfeld’s proposal have yet to emerge in the blogosphere.”

Then there was William Arkin’s post on WaPo lamenting that “Pentagon feels it is its responsibility to fill in a vacuum” of the war of ideas but doing so in ways that are “hopelessly confused.” But, as Arkin pleads it, it is not the job of the military to “wage the nation’s information wars.” True, but who else will do it, Mr. Arkin?

What is the real issue here? Steve Corman suggests we should be talking about a missing approach and not a missing tool.  He recalls that USIA relied on a field driven approach that understand the local audiences and shaped communication and discourse accordingly.  The independence of the agency was one thing — not a small thing — but how did its job was the key.

Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates, speaking this past weekend at CSIS, said the key problem preventing effective America participation in the war of ideas today is one of capacity.  It is certainly a problem, but it is not the only problem and it may not shape our abilities as much as the Smith-Mundt Act.

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In case you missed it…

~ Matt Armstrong

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held the confirmation hearing today, Wednesday, at 11:15a. CNN so far is the only one reporting on it, but to say they "reported" on it is a stretch.

The man nominated to head public diplomacy at the State Department said Wednesday that al Qaeda is doing a better job than the Bush administration in winning friends over the Internet….

"Our enemies are eating our lunch in terms of getting the word out in digital technology," said James Glassman….

Glassman said the United States must overturn a misconception in the Muslim world that it is a military threat, that it wants to weaken and divide the Muslim world and spread Christianity.

One member of the committee, Sen. Bob Menendez, D-New Jersey, asked Glassman, "Do we broadcast what people want to hear or what they need to hear?"

Glassman replied, "We have to be honest. If we tell them lies they are going to figure that out very quickly."

Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Connecticut, introduced Glassman to the committee, saying the public diplomacy post is "the closest thing to a supreme allied commander in the war of ideas and one of the most important posts in Washington."

Glassman’s prepared remarks are here. Light highlight:

Since I was nominated as Under Secretary on December 11, many friends have congratulated me and perhaps just as many have offered condolences. They were half-joking, I suppose, in their reference to how difficult this job must be.

From the VOA reporting on the hearing:

"OK, what can you do? You have only got a year to do this," asked Senate Democrat Bill Nelson.

In response Glassman said the United States must aggressively fight misinformation and work to counter a perception that it doesn’t care or take into account views of other nations.

That won’t be easy, he says, in the face of an ideology based on a distortion of Islam. He adds that "You Tube" and a new State Department blogging site are among tools now being employed, and urges greater use of what he calls credible Muslim voices. "That is an area we need to do better in encouraging Muslim voices to step forward and say exactly what you are saying, that you have built an ideology which is a violent and vicious ideology on top of a religion that is not like that at all," he said.

When Senate Democrat Robert Menendez asked whether U.S. public diplomacy should "tell it like it is", Glassman said "we have to be honest" adding "we don’t do propaganda."

Senator Russ Feingold, a committee Democrat, pointed to criticisms of U.S. public diplomacy efforts. "As you are well aware however, this bureau [public diplomacy effort] has been criticized for having a weak communications strategy which obviously raises questions about its ability to meet its important mission," he said.

See also:

What would you ask Jim Glassman? (Updated)

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 3 Comments

If you had the opportunity to ask a question of James Glassman at his upcoming Senate confirmation hearing as Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, what would it be?

My questions, below, are still in draft form, so feel free to hack, jack, and ridicule:

Today the United States is engaged in a war of ideas and perception. A war we are barely participating in. Sixty years ago, Public Law 402: The United States Information and Educations Exchange Act of 1948, commonly referred to as the Smith-Mundt Act was passed to formalize the institutions needed to fight the last war of ideology and understanding. Today, far removed from its original purpose and the crafters intent, Smith-Mundt is broadly interpreted to apply not just to certain elements of public diplomacy, specifically those of USIA and VOA, now both rolled into the Department of State, but to the operations of the Defense Department while at the same time ignoring other U.S. government communications for both overseas and domestic consumption.

The communications revolution of the 1940s that in part spurred Representative Karl Mundt (R-SD) and Senator Alexander Smith (R-NJ) still shapes our communication with the world. But the simple communications models of the 1940’s have been replaced by global networks of formal and informal media. Careful deliberation by both media and the consumers of media is gone. Today, perception too often trumps fact. By the time the truth comes out, the audience and media have moved on.

Question #1: Mr. Glassman, what are your thoughts on Smith-Mundt? Does it apply to the whole of the United States government? To a part or all of the State Department? What about the Defense Department or the President’s Press Secretary or other departments or agencies in the Executive and Legislative Branch? Are they covered under Smith-Mundt?

Smith-Mundt institutionalized the often recalled United States Information Agency. The Smith-Mundt committee made it clear the USIA must, to be effective, tell the truth; explain the motives of the United States; combat misrepresentation and distortion by our adversary; and aggressively interpret and support American foreign policy.

Question #2: Is it time to have another agency, insulated from the whims of the Oval Office and Congress to become a credible and trusted voice for news and information to replace the haphazard solutions put forth by various parts of the United States Government today?

When speaking with those who practice public diplomacy or strategic communications, the distinction is for another question, frequently heard is how conversations with foreign audiences are shaped more by how our own people will interpret the discussion than the listener standing in front of us.

Question #3: Given the way the media environment has evolved since Smith-Mundt was enacted, how realistic is it to think we can separate messages according to the audiences they’re supposed to influence (or not)?  Whoever you think the law applies to, doesn’t it give them an impossible assignment?  Should we just get rid of it or rewrite it to provide more realistic regulation, given modern media conditions?

These are wordy but I’ve listened to these confirmation hearings before and in that context, the above might actually be too brief ;). Post your questions and suggestions in the comments below or email me directly.

In the spirit of collaboration, the questions have been enhanced by a suggestion from Steve.

Update: Jim Glassman was confirmed 4 June 2008. The office was vacant for 172 days…

“Get Me the Defence Department, Entertainment Division!”

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 3 Comments

I didn’t come up with the title of this post. No, I stole it from a Canuck writing the Queen’s English. Besides enjoying the slight accuracy of title (I’m thinking of the Pentagon’s Hollywood liaison, a position a friend of mine is aiming for… a good use of his Ranger tab, don’t you think?), this bit caught my eye (as well as John Brown’s):

One of the problems that [RAND’s Enlisting Madison Avenue by Todd Helmus, Chris Paul, and Russell Glenn (see this post and this post)] aims to address is the military’s general failure to project a unified message about their product (euphemism=war) to their consumer (euphemism=foreign civilian). The book’s authors suggest more coordination between Public Affairs and Information Operations, but cites “legal barriers” as an obstacle. The book’s treatment of this issue is rather delicate, but it does cite the 1948 Smith-Mundt Act as one of these barriers. Here’s what the book says:

PSYOP suffers from additional barriers to successful shaping. First, Public Law 402, the U.S. Information and Educational Exchange Act of 1948 (the Smith-Mundt Act), prohibits DoD from targeting U.S. audiences. With the reach of the Internet and 24-hour news, however, many of the Pentagon’s information efforts can wind up in the U.S. media. Currently, PSYOP forces need to obtain the direct permission of the Secretary of Defense before distributing material on the Internet, even in a foreign language.

(On a side note, this is interesting because the book has a section dedicated to military use of blogs as a means of persuasion. The book notes that blogging, like word of mouth advertising, is an extremely credulous medium because the reader generally believes that the opinions are presented honestly, without ulterior motives.)

While the book was fairly cautious about this issue, there are other voices that are less so. The Mountain Runner, a blog with the subtitle, “Public diplomacy, unrestricted warfare, privatization of force, and civil-military relations”, has been a vocal opponent of the Smith-Mundt act, and has something of a following in the military community.

I have two big concerns about this. First, this law, though it seems very [important] to me, is very obscure, and it seems that the only people who really know about it are trying to get rid of it. Second, I wonder how such a law could even be enforced.

If a military is caught lying outright to its own people, presumably a law against propaganda could be enforced. But what’s tricky about public relations, or PYSOP, or propaganda, is that it’s often very hard to identify it as such. We’ve come a long way since reefer-mad red scares, and these early propaganda campaigns now seem ridiculous precisely because the persuasion industry has become so sophisticated. Operation Sterling Silver – the Canadian Forces’ grey cup stunt – is particularly brilliant from a PSYOP perspective because it makes no propositional assertions at all. It simply presents a series of images for the spectator, and these images resonate on a pre-rational, emotional level.

I am unaware of any Canadian law prohibiting the dissemination of domestic propaganda, and even if there is, Operation Sterling Silver obviously flew well below the radar.

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