Originally published by Donald Bishop
Ideas, Concepts, Doctrine . . . 2. Russia . . . 3. Islamism . . . 4. China . . . 5. Egypt . . . 6. North Korea . . . 7. Vietnam . . . 8. Vietnam War . . . 9. Public Affairs . . . 10. Broadcasting . . . 11. Exchanges . . . 12. Olympic Games . . . 13. World’s Fairs . . . 14. Cultural Learning and Intelligence . . . 15. World War II . . . 16. Democracy . . . 17. Professionalism . . . 18. Castor Oil for the Public Diplomacy Officer
IDEAS, CONCEPTS, DOCTRINE
We’re headed for policy changes, notably related to immigration and trade, that will be contentious and will sometimes offend friends in other nations. It is the job of public diplomacy to add context to the policies and talking points. Public diplomacy messaging pivoted smartly after Al Qaeda’s attacks in 2001, and it will no doubt transform again as the new policies emerge. Public diplomacy needs to play a leading role in making official policies understood and in advocating U.S. foreign policy interests.
U.S. Public Diplomacy meets a new challenge
Joe Johnson, Public Diplomacy Council Commentary, November 11, 2016
“The United States disbanded the U.S. Information Agency after the Cold War and currently fields no apparatus to detect and mitigate Russia’s social media influence campaign. As seen in America’s disjointed counter narratives against the Islamic State, efforts to create any kind of U.S. information strategy are plagued by disparate and uncoordinated efforts strewn among many military, diplomatic, and intelligence commands. American cyber operations and hacking reside separately with the National Security Agency. Russia, on the other hand, seamlessly integrates the two efforts to devastating effect.”
Quotable: Weisburd, Watts, and Berger on Russia and the U.S. election
“Strategic communication and public diplomacy are quite small research fields, but by looking at commonalities between them, and with place branding and international development, there is suddenly a much broader market interested in your research.”
Quotable: James Pamment on strategic communication, development, branding, and public diplomacy
“. . . NATO does not do propaganda. Our information operations are designed to convey the truth, which is in stark contrast to what the Russians do.”
Quotable: General Sir Adrian Bradshaw on NATO’s information operation
“ . . . ‘modern insurgency’ [is] ‘… essentially a strategic communications campaign supported by military action rather than a military campaign supported by effective strategic communications.’”
Quotable: “The Ellis Group” Marines on the coming of information warfare
“John Kerry’s looking for help—for technological innovations that could help win the online war with extremist groups like ISIS, find a path between privacy for US citizens (and dissidents abroad) and unbreakable encryption available to terrorists, and maybe even provide energy without damaging Earth’s climate or global economies.”
Quotable: John Kerry on social media, ISIS, and Silicon Valley
. . . for success over the long haul and under the most difficult conditions, one needs some unifying vision that can be used to attract the uncommitted as well as pump-up friendly resolve and drive and drain-away or subvert adversary resolve and drive. In other words, what is needed is a vision rooted in human nature so noble, so attractive that it not only attracts the uncommitted and magnifies the spirit and strength of its adherents, but also undermines the dedication and determination of any competitors or adversaries.
Classic Quotable: John Boyd on a “unifying vision” — “a catalyst or beacon”
“National policymakers struggle to stay relevant and express skepticism that the US government can be an effective actor in today’s information exchange.”
Quotable: Mark Seip on audience, mutuality, free exchange, and conversation
What differs today is the growing number of potential gray zone actors, the tools available to them and the velocity of change. For example, it was far simpler for the State Department spokesperson to respond to the tightly controlled messages from the Soviet-era TASS than to have a ready reply for the thousands of Twitter accounts linked to Daesh and its supporters. The trend towards gray zone conflicts increasingly disadvantages entrenched governmental bureaucracies.
The Gray Zone
Philip Kapusta, Special Warfare, October-December 2015 (pp. 18-25)
. . . our adversaries and potential adversaries do not make this crisp black and white distinction between war and peace. Most of them imagine international relations as a continual struggle, a state of constant competition, with the aspect that varies on a spectrum being the intensity of conflict. Further, not only do our adversaries and potential adversaries not make a binary distinction between war and peace in international competition, they recognize that we do make that false distinction, and they seek to use that to their advantage.
Confessions of a Hybrid Warfare Skeptic
Christopher Paul, Small Wars Journal, March 3, 2016
Since June, some entity has been releasing e-mails and electronic documents obtained via network intrusions and credential thefts of politicians and political party employees. Some of the releases have appeared on sites believed to be associated with Russian intelligence operations; others have appeared on Wikileaks. * * * While WikiLeaks claims “a 100 percent accuracy rate” for its leaked documents, materials provided by Guccifer 2.0 showed signs of alteration. The entity behind Guccifer 2.0 claimed that one document was a file classified Secret and taken from the computer Hillary Clinton . . . . had been modified to include “Secret” in the document’s header.
Agents of influence: How reporters have been ‘weaponized’ by leaks
Sean Gallagher, arstechnica.com, October 20, 2016
. . . to get better at strategic communication, we need to remember that Rome wasn’t built in a day. There are many gaps between what we currently do well in this arena and all the things we’d like to do well. . . I borrow from an often used military training metaphor: the crawl, walk, run progression. . . . When we consider all of things that could go into strategic communication, rather than getting into an argument about which ones are most important, I propose instead we ask: Which ones are easiest and which ones are foundational for, or logically prior to, the others?
The Crawl, Walk, Run Progression for the Integration and Conduct of Efforts to Inform, Influence, and Persuade
Christopher Paul, IO Sphere, Fall 2013
. . . most people in any polity are highly dependent on others for the substance of their opinions on issues outside the scope of their immediate day-to-day experience. A large body of research shows that the key decisions most people make in forming their opinion on public issues generally do not stem from
their independent analysis of the nuanced details of those issues, but rather on their selection of the opinion leaders whom they choose to think for them.
Lenin’s Formula for Agenda Setting
William M. Darley, Military Review, November-December 2016
Though no single feature of the Internet can radicalize an individual, the accumulating effect of extremist propaganda and radical narratives reinforced by an online community can radicalize an individual to the point of violent extremism.
Outsourcing Terrorism: How the Internet radicalizes the next generation of terrorists
Juliann D. Hitt, Marine Corps Gazette, February, 2016
“These lessons learned as a Foreign Service Officer managing five embassies and serving in several others seem still valid today.”
Quotable: William Harrop on Ambassadors and Public Diplomacy
Prior to deployment, Civil Affairs Marines plan civil military operations and build area studies that consider the history, culture, and drivers of instability in the area of operations by engaging with academia, interagency partners (including U.S. Agency for International Development and Department of State), non-governmental organizations, and other Civil Affairs forces. . . . Once deployed, Civil Affairs Marines refine their understanding of the society though civil reconnaissance, civil engagements, and liaison with the Interagency, non-governmental organizations, and host-nation civilians. These Marines then execute the commander’s intent through key leader engagements, mentoring local government officials, and executing projects to promote stability; all of which are ways to co-opt society in support of the mission.
Releasing the Potential of Marine Corps Civil Affairs
Joseph Carelli, Christopher Karwacki, and Alan O’Donnell, Marine Corps Gazette, September, 2016
The ‘attention economy’ is rapidly transforming itself into a misinformation economy in which it is profitable for some players to use widespread lies, conspiracy theories and other propaganda, especially through social media. This article summarises recent media research findings which reveal the risks and collateral damage of modern communication technologies.
Bots, Lies And Propaganda: The New Misinformation Economy
Stephan Russ-Mohl, European Journalism Observatory, October 20, 2016
Is psychological-based IW [information warfare] a panacea for all Marine Corps warfighting problems? No, but not possessing it is a serious gap that prevents Marine commanders from fighting and winning in the IE. Without a robust MISO capability as the fulcrum of all IW efforts, the Marine Corps will be unable to seize the key terrain of the cognitive dimension and our tactical successes will continue to be undermined by our adversaries who consistently overturn our victories at the operational and strategic levels of war.
Psychological-Based Information Warfare
Lieutenant Colonel Rob McGrath, Marine Corps Gazette, February 2016
“Talk is cheap – it is easier to say you will do something than to actually do it. However, it is the result of what we do rather than announcements or promises that counts most. People want to see an outcome, an effect that satisfies their needs or at least meets their expectations.”
Quotable: New Strategic Communications handbook
“Commanders and staff can analyze and describe an operational environment in terms of a mnemonic that employs six interrelated social factors: moral, religious-spiritual, social, political, economic, and aesthetical (MRsSPEA).”
Quotable: Brian Hildebrand on communication in the human terrain
Want to know which universities are most focused on public diplomacy? Where to get degrees in the subject? What kinds of courses form a part of a public diplomacy program? Take a look at our recently revised Academic Study page.
New information about university courses in public diplomacy
Joe Johnson, Public Diplomacy Council Commentary, October 24th 2016
RUSSIA
“Friends and colleagues, I would like to have such a propaganda machine here in Russia, but regrettably, this is not the case,” Putin said. “We do not have mass media outlets such as CNN, BBC and others. We simply do not have this kind of capability yet.”
Putin Claims Russia Does Not Have ‘Propaganda Machine’ Like the West
Damien Sharkov, Newsweek, October 28, 2016
Language is an important instrument of war for the Putin regime in Russia. It helps them create false images in the minds of masses and implement their imperialistic ambitions. Due to the Russian propaganda abroad, including two international channels founded by the Kremlin – RT (the re-branded Russia Today) and Sputnik, the international media has absorbed this manipulative language and started to use it in their own materials. So, Russian propaganda is broadcast not just in Russia, but all over the world.
The civil war hoax: words that fooled the world
Olena Makarenko, Euromaidan Press, October 25, 2016
“Putin has borrowed a page from America’s Cold War playbook and seeks to expose the rot within the West, and especially within the United States, as a means of destroying Western cohesion, diminishing American influence and leadership, and reinforcing Russia. The means employed by Russia are modern, including hacking and cyber-espionage, but, at its core, this is an influence operation of the kind embraced by the United States in the first decade of the Cold War.”
Quotable: James Ludes on Russian political warfare to discredit liberal democracy
“To start, Congress must ensure that America’s future leaders within and outside government possess the deep understanding of Russia required to cope with its newfound assertiveness. * * * Congress should also work to counter Russia’s informational warfare.”
Quotable: Jason Bruder on Russia, Public Diplomacy, and the need for Congressional action
To further influence the domestic political environment, Russia has launched a systemic “war on information” campaign that is designed to confuse, paralyze, and disable its opponents and obscure the truth behind its actions. Russia conducts its disinformation war by generating support for sympathetic parties and its political allies and fomenting nationalist and anti-Western sentiment to justify and deflect attention from its aggressive actions at home or abroad.
Quotable: CSIS Scholars on “The Kremlin Playbook”
Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine Oleksandr Turchynov and International Information Consortium Bastion NGO signed a Memorandum of Understanding aimed at countering Russian propaganda today. * * * “Russian TV channels come first with the Russian tanks following them.”
Turchynov calls to create ‘information troops’ capable to give fitting rebuff to Russian propaganda
censor.net, October 16, 2016
Second, by undermining the very legitimacy of U.S. democracy, Russia’s hacking sought to weaken U.S. legitimacy abroad, dismay its friends, and provide fuel for a global propaganda campaignthat, at its heart, tries to convince people not that the Russian system is better than the rest, so much that it isn’t any worse.
Putin’s Chaos Strategy Is Coming Back to Bite Him in the Ass
Mark Galeotti, Foreign Policy, October 26, 2016
When the Cold War ended in 1991 and the Soviet Union disappeared many Western intelligence agencies thought they had seen the last of Soviet maskirovka (“masking”) and dezinformatsiya (disinformation). That was an unrealistic expectation as the Russians are reviving these deception practices and, as has been noted since the 1990s, several surviving communist government (like China and North Korea) never stopped using the maskirovka and dezinformatsiya techniques they had learned from their Soviet patrons.
Information Warfare: Old Lies in New Bottles
Strategy Page, October 24, 2016
This is the Putin Playbook. Steal, cheat, attack, disrupt, mislead, confuse. If caught, lie and deny.
Putin’s powerful playbook: Hack, steal, disrupt, mislead, confuse
Markos Kounalakis, sacbee.com, October 28, 2016
Kremlin nuclear hysteria is pervasive in Russia, touching nearly all aspects of Russian life. Nuclear war propaganda is everyday fare on Russian TV, with a multitude of programs on the topic of missile defense and nuclear technology. But the intensity of the most recent militaristic rhetoric has reached such a fever pitch that it’s invaded the educational sphere, and not just into colleges or high schools, but into elementary schools.
Kremlin nuclear hysteria: To wage or not to wage nuclear war
Kseniya Kirillova, Euromaidan Press, October 26, 2016
Their results show that InoSMI significant overrepresents positive depictions of Russia’s policies and negative assessments of Western policies among the articles chosen for translation and publication. Similarly, there is an underrepresentation of articles with negative views on Russian and positive views of Western policies. * * * On the level of the actual texts, the scholars found similar politically convenient omissions, twists and changes.
Translating Russian troops out of Ukraine
New Disinformation Digest from the East StratCom Task Force, October 27, 2016
What’s different now, [former assistant attorney general for national security John] Carlin said, is that the Russians are merging their traditional espionage operations with propaganda efforts that have previously been seen mostly in Europe. There, the Kremlin has tried to influence political campaigns and elections through the propagation of false or misleading information online.
Spilled Secrets: We Should’ve Seen DNC Hacks Coming, Says Former NatSec Official
Shane Harris, The Daily Beast, October 27, 2016
Through selective appropriation, shifts in translations and visual strategies, InoSMI produces a discourse that is more in line with the Kremlin’s official viewpoints than the original data set. In the translation process, Russia emerges as a powerful yet honourable player on the global stage, while the West’s morally ambiguous position in the conflict and the divisions within its ranks are brought to the fore.
Translating news discourse on the Crimean crisis: patterns of reframing on the Russian website InoSMI
Annaleen Spiessens and Piet Van Poucke, tandfonline.com, July 4, 2016
All in all, it appears that Russia’s October surprise was largely thwarted. So what will Moscow try next? Given Putin’s penchant for dropping bombshells, both figuratively and literally, further escalation is a given. Western officials should expect to take further countermeasures against Russian propaganda on television and social media, call out Russian efforts to influence elections in the United States (as well as in France and Germany), and send clear signals that cyberattacks on the U.S. political process will elicit a counterresponse, as Vice President Joseph Biden let slip while taping an interview with Meet the Press earlier in October.
Russia’s October Surprise: Its Failed Attempt to Hack the Election
Mitchell A. Orenstein, Foreign Affairs, October 20, 2016
Under the umbrella of paramilitary, nationalistic or orthodox organizations registered in a country like Serbia, Russian special services are able to operate freely all over the region and in neighboring countries – which seems to be an essential moment for Moscow’s hybrid strategy. Beside the direct benefits from working below the radar of public and institutional scrutiny, this approach has so far allowed Moscow to hide its role and sow mistrust in the relations between the countries in the region.
The limits of Russian hybrid power – the story of the failed coup in Montenegro
Ilian Vassilev, Bulgaria Analytica, October 29, 2016
Similarly, we brush off Russian propaganda, believing that our media is invincible and that truth triumphs in the long run. Perhaps, but too much can go wrong in the meantime. Russian media and disinformation outlets stoke conspiracy theories, spread scare stories and corrode our political system with stolen information. * * * Our media prize fairness over truth. If Western sources say that a Russian missile shot down an airliner over Ukraine, and pro-Kremlin voices dispute this, it is easier to give both sides of the story rather than rule out one side as too tendentious.
How the West should punish Putin
By Edward Lucas, capx.co, October 31, 2016
According to the document, all reporting should follow the underlying narrative that the allegedly pro-fascist United States is the root of all evil: “After the Maidan [uprising], power in Ukraine fell into the hands of an oligarchic, pro-American junta – murderers and thieves, villainous, unprincipled people who will stop at nothing to achieve their goals. (…) In reality, power in the Ukraine lies in the hands of the Americans.
Cheerful Propaganda and Hate on Command
Jochen Bittner, Arndt Ginzel, and Alexej Hock, Zeit Online, September 30, 2016
In many ways, Putin has simply built on the principles of Soviet agitation and propaganda, Eidman continues, but the current Kremlin leader has taken these in a new and extremely dangerous direction as can be seen by comparing Vladimir Posner [also spelled Pozner – Ed.] and Vladislav Surkov who are representatives of “two generations of Russian manipulators.”
Putin’s propagandidst complicit in his crimes, Eideman says
Paul A. Goble, Euromaidan Press, October 31, 2016
Would any self-respecting news editor take a call from the head of the GRU or the FSB (Russian military and state intelligence) and accept an offer to publish a cache of emails from the staff of a U.S. presidential candidate? This is essentially what every outlet covering this story has done, in the process placing all of our private means of communication at risk of exposure from illegal invasion by any foreign power or domestic agency.
How the U.S. media fails to defend itself against foreign propaganda
Eric Chenoweth, The Washington Post, November 1, 2016
Russia knows it is locked into a straitjacket and is trying to change its strategic environment. It engages in propaganda campaigns online attempting to influence foreign populations, which will in turn influence their governments. Rather than try to challenge the U.S. globally, it’s easier just to interfere in the upcoming presidential election and help a pro-Russian candidate, Donald Trump, win the election. But the means for it to do so are not so easy to hide, and Russia has already been called out by the U.S. government over its interference.
This is the only way America can win the new Cold War with Russia
Kyle Mizokami, THEWEEK, October 31, 2016
Russian Channel Planeta TV is facing restrictions on broadcasting in Lithuania due to the incitement of inter-ethnic discord and calls for war, the DELFI news portal reported. The Lithuanian Radio and Television Commission began investigating violations of the law on the Russian TV talk show, Duel. The program by Vladimir Solovyov was broadcast on the 16th of October by RTR-Planeta.
Russian TV Channel is facing restrictions on broadcasting in Lithuania
UAWIRE, October 31, 2016
By waging a psychological warfare on the west, by eroding the boundaries of the contemporary rules of international relations, Moscow strives to force western nations in general and the US in particular to agree to a new set of rules. Experts call this set of rules a “new Yalta agreement” . . . .
This is not a new Cold War
Anton Shekhovtsov, opendemocracy.net, November 3, 2016
A group of Ukrainian hackers has released thousands of emails from an account used by a senior Kremlin official that appear to show close financial and political ties between Moscow and separatist rebels in Eastern Ukraine. . . . Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed the published emails as a sham, saying Wednesday that Surkov doesn’t use email.
Russia dismisses hacked emails showing ties between Kremlin and Ukraine rebels as a sham, because Putin aide ‘doesn’t use email’
The Telegraph, October 27, 2016
A Ukrainian hacker group claims to have obtained emails from Vladislav Surkov, a top aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin, which detail a purported Kremlin plan to destabilize Ukraine in the coming months.
Hacked: Putin Aide’s Emails Detail Alleged Plot to Destabilize Ukraine
Reid Standish, Foreign Policy, October 25, 2016
Russia masterfully orchestrated propaganda efforts like dubious on the ground “exclusive-videos,” Cyber trolls, and state run media and comprehensively exploited Russian ethnicity, language, history, values, culture, and identities to fracture Ukrainian populations. The Russians vertically integrated Cyber-disinformation to systematically exploit human nature, resulting in the successful invasion of the Ukraine without the West firing a shot.
Harnessing Cyber-Technology’s Human Potential
Patrick Duggan, Special Warfare, October-December 2015
Putin realizes that in an era when Russia’s internal challenges dramatically limit its ability to project power, Russia’s security depends not on rolling tanks across the borders of the NATO alliance, but instead on fracturing the West and paralyzing decision-making among Western leaders. Russia’s apparent success in exploiting these fissures within the Alliance is thus the greatest threat the United States and its NATO allies face from Moscow.
Putin’s Strategic Aim is to Fracture the West
Rachel Rizzo and Adam Twardowski, Small Wars Journal, October 24, 2016
Russia’s approach to propaganda emphasizes creating first impressions, which tend to be resilient, and then reinforcing them through repetition. In this way Kremlin propagandists have persuaded some of the less informed that Ukraine’s post-Maidan government is fascist.
Russian Propaganda is Pervasive, and America Is Behind the Power Curve in Countering It
Christopher Paul and William Courtney, The RAND Blog, September, 2016
Clearly, the Kremlin is deliberately creating a sense of impending war by having its own media insist that NATO has put Russia under threat — from the military alliance itself and its democratic ethos. Ominously, Mr. Putin loses no opportunity to extol the Russian people’s wartime virtues of heroism and martyrdom. . . . Too often in history, incendiary rhetoric has fed into dangerous policies and catastrophic miscalculations by both its perpetrators and its recipients.
Playing With Fear: Russia’s War Card
Michael Khodarkovsky, The New York Times, October 26, 2016
ISLAMISM
There are 1.5 billion kids in the world who are 15 years old or less, and a large percentage of them are not going to go to school tomorrow . . . . And you’ve got to ask yourselves what happens if those kids are grabbed by the internet and by ISIL’s site that is not stopped from proselytizing? What happens if they think being a lone wolf and walking into a movie theater in Chicago is a good idea and shooting a bunch of people?
Remarks with Students at the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics
Secretary of State John Kerry, Department of State, October 26, 2016
Messaging: . . . . Too often we assume that the Islamic State’s dominance in social media makes it stronger, more enduring. Maybe so, but perhaps not as much as we think. Second, how much effort do we spend on a more effective counter-messaging effort? And third, what role does government play? The United States overrates the war of ideas and the centrality of the United States in waging and winning the propaganda war. . . . the United States does not have much of a competing vision to offer a group of extremists who believe that they have been ordained by God to oppose the West.
Lessons from the Fifteen-Year Counterterrorism Campaign
Andrew Lippman and Philip Mudd, CTC Sentinel, October 25, 2016
Special Operations Command wants the National Military Strategy to specifically name Salafi jihadism as the doctrine that inspires violent Muslim extremists. Salafi jihadism is a branch within Sunni Islam. It is embraced by the Islamic State and used to justify its mass killings of nonbelievers, including Shiite Muslims, Sunnis and Kurds, as well as Christians.
Special Ops pushing Pentagon to define Islamic roots of terrorism
Rowan Scarborough, The Washington Times, September 25, 2016
Our visits [to Islamic high schools in the U.S.] suggest that we have nothing to fear from the influence of Islamic schools on the ability of Muslim youth to make positive contributions to American society. If these contributions include posing challenges to certain aspects of our society, their critical stance will be consistent with a long American tradition of principled reform based on religious convictions.
Muslims in the Melting Pot
Charles L. Glenn, First Things, April 2016
. . . insurgency and counterinsurgency are, at heart, battles for hearts and minds. Whichever side has legitimacy and popular approval on its side has a huge advantage that can only be overcome with genocidal tactics. ISIS actually had popular support in 2014 when it took Mosul. That’s why the Iraqi army fell apart so quickly. It wasn’t because people wanted to live under ISIS’s harsh brand of Islamic law; it was because Sunnis thought that ISIS would protect them from abuse by Iraq’s Shiite-dominated government. But ISIS proved so dictatorial in practice that it lost whatever goodwill it had.
Winning Hearts and Minds in Mosul
Max Boot, Commentary, November 7, 2016
What a shock to discover, from leading scholars and from U.S. diplomats, that almost all of the leaders of the 22 Arab states, most of the people who are loosely described as comprising the “Arab street,” and many hundreds of thousands of Muslims are convinced that when they hear the phrase “U.S. War on Terrorism,” they think that this is action aimed directly at them.
Our ‘War on Terror’ Is Misunderstood and Backfiring in The Mideast
Barry Jagoda, Times of San Diego, October 28, 2016
Military advances against Islamic State-, or ISIS, held territory in Iraq and Syria have produced a welcome byproduct: a marked decline by 70-80 percent in the output of social media propaganda by the terror group.
ISIS Social Media Campaign Falters Under Military Assault
Helle Dale, The Daily Signal, October 26, 2016
As the public grapples with images of violent extremism advocated by the Islamic State group, UCLA students have developed a website and social movement aimed at slowing its spread by countering recruitment strategies. During the fall quarter, students . . . participated in an international competition to stall extremism used by Islamic State . . . . The result is Safe Spot, which is designed to foster ideals of acceptance, safety, community and ultimately discourage isolated individuals from joining extremist groups.
UCLA students seek to counter extremism in a ‘radically different’ public diplomacy course
Jessica Wolf, Newsroom UCLA, December 8, 2015
IS combatants are undoubtedly seeing their number depleted by their adversaries in Syria and Iraq, but while their media presence survives, there will continue to be more would-be militants lining up to refresh the ranks.
A Brief History of Daesh Media Propaganda
Defense IQ, February 2016
. . . killing al-Awlaki did not put an end to his most important role as online recruiter for global jihad. No figure in jihadist propaganda has eclipsed his well-established brand. He remains as relevant to a new generation of American jihadis inspired by the Islamic State as he was to their predecessors whose allegiance was to al-Qa`ida. The author has found evidence of al-Awlaki’s influence in more than half of U.S. jihadist terrorism cases in the years since his death.
The Enduring Influence of Anwar Al-Awlaki in the Age of the Islamic State
Scott Shane, CTC Sentinel, July 27, 2016
CHINA
How are both countries cultivating current and future generations of leaders who can steer this relationship in a constructive direction? Significant efforts are underway. For example, U.S. President Barack Obama has set a goal of having one million Americans learning Chinese by 2020, and growing numbers of Chinese families are sending their children (over 300,000) to the United States to study. The number of Americans studying in China is considerably lower (just over 13,000), but partly in response, Chinese universities have been creating programs to attract them.
Educating China’s Future Leaders: Local Impact of Global Knowledge: Insights from John Holden
Mercy A. Kuo, The Diplomat, August 20, 2016
How should the United States and others adjust our thinking to go beyond the scope of combined arms to one of combined effects? * * * The following combinations of effects are possible. * * * Informational Persuasion: promote liberal values in venues such as summits, conferences, and social media to call for adherence to and enforcement of the rule of law, exposing China’s claims to rigorous scrutiny and global condemnation.
Outmatching Chinese strategy requires bold new US thinking
Thomas Drohan, Pacific Forum CSIS, October 27, 2016
For the Communist Party leadership, China’s constant raids into foreign cyberspace also serve a proactive purpose: to monitor and edit China’s public image abroad by intercepting or disrupting any messages that contradict how the Party wants to be seen, and wants China to be seen. In this sense, Chinese hackers help plug the remaining holes in the most monstrously complex system of Internet censorship and control ever devised. Its nickname is the Great Firewall of China.
The Road to Internet Serfdom: China, Russia, and Orwell’s Boot
Arthur Herman, Commentary, March, 2016
EGYPT
The development of modern ICT infrastructure in Egypt during the 1990s and the boom of Internet users in the first decade of the 21st century bolstered economic and government development efforts. However, the proliferation of computers and Internet access increased the flow of “free information” to Egyptians, complicating the government’s efforts to control discourse in the country.
Information and Revolution in Egypt
Phillip Thorpe, Special Warfare, July-September 2013 (pp. 10-14)
NORTH KOREA
North Korea is conducting online “psychological warfare” against South Korea, with teams of cyber warriors spreading unflattering rumours and malicious tales throughout the internet.
North Korea waging ‘cyber warfare’ against South by spreading malicious rumors
Julian Ryall, The Telegraph, October 25, 2016
VIETNAM
When Mr. Obama visited in May, it was clear that security cooperation and normalization of relations were on the front burner as the United States and Vietnam face an increasingly aggressive China. It is notable that Vietnam also agreed to economic and labor reforms required by the Trans-Pacific Partnership. But these are not sufficient. Vietnam also must free its people to blog, protest and speak out without fear.
In Vietnam, telling the truth is criminal ‘propaganda’
Editorial, The Washington Post, October 21, 2016
VIETNAM WAR
. . . in this article [i] focus on some of the psychological warfare aspects of the fighting, particularly as these involved the Thai People. . . . I will also raise some issues of French mistreatment of the Thai which even today over sixty years later are still not forgotten and which will affect the future.
Battle of Dien Bien Phu, Psychological Operations, and the Thai People
Joseph Patrick Meissner, clevelandpeople.com, 2016
PUBLIC AFFAIRS
“When an agency director has been arrested on drug charges, say, or when there has been a dramatic failure to provide some essential service, the PIO must stretch his expressive gifts to the limit.”
Quotable: Barton Swaim on Public Information Officers
This case study focuses primarily on the use of the public affairs component of public diplomacy for domestic and international audiences in the form of short-term advocacy tools such as official press releases, on-the-record press availabilities, backgrounders with senior officials, press conferences and interviews, as well as speeches and other forms of official communication.
Benghazi: Managing the Message
Vivian Walker, USC Center for Public Diplomacy, April, 2015
PAO has generally taken the view that they must remain and chaste and pure, avoiding any taint of ‘influence’. Having had the opportunity to work Joint Exercises at DINFOS, the DOD school that trains Public Affairs Officers, I’m of the opinion that the ‘new generation’ of PAOs has a much more profound appreciation for social media and the on-line world than their top brass. The inability to integrate PAO efforts into the influence fight dilutes our influence efforts and has to stop, the sooner the better.
How do you influence the PAO?
Lawrence Dietz, PSYOP Regimental Blog, October 25, 2016
BROADCASTING
The spread of outside information played a major role in expediting the fall of the Berlin Wall during the Cold War era. * * * In the first installment of our three-part series on global efforts to boost outside information access in North Korea, our Park Jong-hong wraps up the BBC and VOA’s roles in opening Eastern Europe during the Cold War era.
Role of BBC and VOA in Ending the Cold War
KBS World Radio, September 14, 2016
EXCHANGES
There were 82 countries that sent over 1,000 total students to America in 2015, and 14 that sent more than 10,000. * * * #10, Mexico, Total students: 17,052. #9, Vietnam, Total students:18,722. #8, Japan, Total students: 19,064. #7, Taiwan,
Total students: 20,993. #6, Brazil, Total students: 23,675. #5, Canada, Total students: 27,240. #4, Saudi Arabia, Total students:59,945. #3, South Korea, Total students: 63,710. #2, India, Total students: 132,888. #1, China, Total students: 304,040.
Countries That Send the Most Students to the U.S. for School
Nick Selbe, Tucson.com, October 25, 2016
“The U.S. should revive funding for public and private institutions of higher education in underdeveloped countries, with emphasis on programs pertaining to governance and security, and bring back USAID and private scholarship programs.”
Quotable: Mark Moyar on education in the U.S. as a development strategy
The Fulbright Program was established in 1946 through legislation introduced by Senator J. William Fulbright of Arkansas. The proposal called for the use of proceeds from the sale of surplus war property from World War II to fund the “promotion of international goodwill through the exchange of students in the fields of education, culture and science.” On August 1, 1946, President Harry Truman signed the legislation into law (PL 79-584), creating the Fulbright Program. The first Fulbright Program grantees travelled overseas in 1948.
About Fulbright
Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, Department of State
Over the past decade, the State Department has also pursued new, innovative partnerships with the private sector. The Fulbright-National Geographic Digital Storytelling Fellowship sends five fellows abroad for an academic year to research and create stories on topics that are relevant to both the United States and the host countries. For example, Fulbright alumnus Ryan Bell recently returned from travels through Russia and Kazakhstan, where he documented how American cowboys are helping to rebuild the Russian and Kazakh cattle and beef industries. His stories and photographs are featured on a dedicated National Geographic blog for the program, as well as on the National Geographic food blog, The Plate.
Fulbright Program at 70: The Foreign Service Connection
Jerome Sherman and James Lawrence, Foreign Service Journal, November, 2016
. . . we have not really empirically tested this popular belief that international students leave our country with a positive image of the USA and its foreign policy. To know us is not always to love us. When I had to meet with Muslim students on our campus recently to try and explain the activities of the New York City Police Department on our campus I did not feel those students were going to go home believing civil liberties are well protected in the USA.
Higher Education and Public Diplomacy
Stephen C. Dunnett, Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government, March 6, 2012
“We have a synergistic combination of three disciplines that are the pillars of this organization: global education, international affairs and global communications. We have a powerful and influential board, and we’re on a five-year, controlled growth plan to expand from primarily focusing on the Washington metro area,” he said, adding that Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. is helping WAC-DC promote itself internationally.
Spanning the Globe: World Affairs Council DC Prides Itself as Place ‘Where Learning Happens’
Larry Luxner, The Washington Diplomat, March 1, 2016
Thousands of 18- to 26-year-old foreigners become au pairs annually under a 12-month State Department cultural-exchange program. In 2015, 17,588 au pairs worked in the United States, according to State Department data, with 3,062 of them in the District, Maryland and Virginia.
Are au pairs cultural ambassadors or low-wage nannies? A lawsuit enters the fray.
By Noy Thrupkaew, The Washington Post, November 3, 2016
The United States announced on Tuesday three new educational initiatives that would benefit Palestinians, according to a press statement by the U.S. Consulate General in Jerusalem.The initiatives were announced at the conclusion of the first ever U.S.-Palestinian Higher Education Dialogue held in the United States.
U.S. announces new educational initiatives to benefit Palestinians
WAFA, October 19, 2016
OLYMPIC GAMES
There is a strong relationship between international sporting events like the Olympics and nation brand value. How does the legacy of those events impact the value of a nation brand and the reputation of the host country or city?
Soft power dreams
Brittany Golob, Transform magazine, October 25, 2016
WORLD’S FAIRS
In the search for effective ways to promote the United States abroad, the Department of State has revived some once standard, later abandoned public diplomacy functions such as English-language instruction and American Centers (now American Spaces). Meanwhile, participation in world’s fairs, incubated in the same U. S. Information Agency womb, is treated as an unwanted stepchild by the department. Successful U.S. pavilions at four recent fairs—Milan 2015, Yeosu 2012, Shanghai 2010 and Aichi 2005—welcomed a total of 20 million visitors.
Neglecting World’s Fairs Doesn’t Make Them Go Away, So Let’s Do It Right
Beatrice Camp, Foreign Service Journal, September, 2016
CULTURAL LEARNING AND INTELLIGENCE
We must fight the conservative nature of many Marines that inhibit immersion in new and exotic surroundings. Be a good guest and exuberantly ingratiate yourself to the host. * * * The natural tendency for many Marines to button up and bust out the Xbox One and Pabst Blue Ribbon must be fought at every turn. We must be—and must be seen to be—excited about where we are and what we are doing. We must show our appreciation for those with whom we train.
A Picture Is Worth a Thousand Rounds: The company in the Phase Zero fight
Dale M. Swift, Marine Corps Gazette, Februry 2016
The point for military planners is that cultural intelligence or regional knowledge and experience can prove invaluable, and formally integrating cultural intelligence into the planning process can make a difference between success and failure.
Cultural Intelligence: To the Shores of Tripoli: A Case Study
Michael M. Walker, Marine Corps Gazette, February 2016
WORLD WAR II
12 Steps On The Road to WWII In Vintage Propaganda Posters!
Damian Lucjan, War History Online, October 30, 2016
What did the British government learn from Mein Kampf? And how did they deal with the idea of ‘the enemy within’? Fiona Macdonald finds out from a new book about British propaganda.
The psychological tricks used to help win World War Two
Fiona Macdonald, BBC, October 24, 2016
DEMOCRACY
US forces will have the advantage if they face a mutual disabling of battle networks during a future conflict with a near-peer adversary, Deputy Defense Secretary Robert Work said Friday at a Center for Strategic and International Studies event in Washington, D.C. “Our assumption is that a young man or woman who grows up in a democracy in the iWorld, will have an inherent advantage over young men and women who grow up in an authoritarian regime because we expect the network to disassemble, and we rely on our people under mission-type command to continue to operate,” he told the audience.
Democracy’s Tactical Advantage
Will Skowronski, Air Force Magazine, October 31, 2016
PROFESSIONALISM
Consider three controversial issues: the national debt, our anti-terrorism efforts in the Middle East, and climate change. To get a broad general understanding of the competing policy agendas touching any one of those issues requires a considerable amount of work; to gain a real command of any one of those issues at anything approaching real expertise requires a commitment of years of study and discipline; to truly master any one of those issues is not an avocation, but a career.
This is not the end
Kevin D. Williamson, National Review, November 4, 2016
Dealing with the “traditionalists” in a well-established organization is a challenge for innovators. Innovation itself is disruptive because it often makes the previously established structure, relationships, and procedures of an organization irrelevant. This is an even bigger problem for successful organizations that tend toward an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” attitude. Orthodoxy always confronts innovation. An organization must allow its people to question accepted method, structure, and doctrine. It must have tolerance for the “heretic” . . .
Disrupt or Be Disrupted
Jeff Tlapa, U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, August, 2016
To Fight the Battle, You Must Be Bold and Decisive: . . . . Do not allow yourself to be held hostage to commanders, operations officers, and planners. . . . . Develop a plan that gives you tactical flexibility in responding to [the enemy’s] later decisions. Take the initiative to develop a plan before he ever expects one of you. Then you are the one in the staff meetings and planning sessions offering well-developed planning considerations and constraints. By being bold, decisive, and having initiative, you are able to shape the battlefield by shaping his view of the mission and the problem. . . . Your adversary will be forced to respond to you.
The Art of Communications Planning: Sun Tzu and communicators
Brandon Newell, Marine Corps Gazette, April 2016
CASTOR OIL FOR THE PUBLIC DIPLOMACY OFFICER
. . . the concept of democratic values as worthy aspirations for modern society certainly is under serious threat globally from a totalitarian state-capitalist model that is dangerously attractive in what it is producing for its populations, while American democracy is offering a choice between a crook and a clown.
1776: Would You Like to Reconsider?
Andrew Roberts, The Wall Street Journal, October 28, 2016
[Quotables, 511-524; Seen on the Web, 494-567; November 12, 2016]
Filed under: Information operations, Information Warfare, Strategic Communications Tagged: information operations, information warfare, Strategic Communications 
