Posted on 12/06/2015 9:48:16 AM PST by rdb3
My training company, Threat Knowledge Group, wrote a report for the US military called, The Islamic State and Information Warfare: Defeating ISIS and the Broader Global Jihadist Movement. The Army has posted the report and now we are making the report available for download for you to read.
ISIS, or the Islamic State (IS) as it now calls itself, is a far deadlier enemy than Al Qaeda, especially in its understanding and use Information Warfare and Psychological Operations (PSYOP).
A fully fledged insurgency which has recruited tens of thousands of fighters and controls large parts of Iraq and Syria, IS is especially skilled in the exploitation of global social media networks to radicalize, indoctrinate and recruit.
While the use of force-such as airstrikes-against IS targets may have a positive effect in the short term, victory in the long term will only come when the “lifestyle of the jihadi†is effectively delegitimized. This will require America to draft and execute a national-level Information Operations campaign against the Islamic State. Currently the true center of gravity of this group lies in its Threat Doctrine of Global Jihadism. That ideology cannot be destroyed kinetically.
In order to defeat the Islamic State and eventually the broader Global Jihadist Movement, the US government must recognize the five following truths of Information Warfare:
One can only win a war if one has clearly defined the political end-states of that conflict. This is not clear with regard to the threat of both IS or the broader Global Jihadist Movement. Once the US has defined the political end-state of this war and declared it publicly, Information Operations and PSYOP must be positioned at the head of the fight, not treated simply as a “supporting†function of the kinetic war. PSYOP should be built into the US national strategy to defeat the Islamic State at the highest level. (Note a precedence already exists for exactly this with the Psychological Strategy Board created by President Truman at the opening of the Cold War).
In order to make tangible progress against IS and other Islamist threat groups the US policy of Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) should be jettisoned as it prevents us from tackling the threat from extremists who aren’t currently violent but who do share the ideology of jihad and who may turn violent in the future. As a result we should replace CVE with CGJ: Countering Global Jihadism. Additionally DoD should build education on the Enemy Threat Doctrine of the Global Jihadist Movement into all combat arms, not just ARSOF or Civil Affairs and PSYOP units, so that we can understand and undermine the mobilizational force of such groups effectively.
In the end, the Islamic State can only be defeated by America and her allies if we understand and then undermine Abu Bakr al Baghdadi’s claims to moral legitimacy. The members of the Global Jihadist Movement represent themselves as on the side of all that is holy and just, and they recruit on the basis of their moral rectitude. That is why tens of thousands of young men have enlisted in the jihad. The Islamic State will only cease to be a threat if we can show it and its leaders for what they truly are and depict them as amoral and unworthy of support. America must work with its allies to completely discredit the modern jihadi enterprise.
Superlative summation of our Threat Knowledge Group report on ISIS from none other than Lt General HR McMaster:
The Army Operating Concept observes that future armed conflict will be complex, in part, because threats, enemies, and adversaries employ traditional, unconventional, and hybrid strategies to threaten U.S. security and vital interests. War remains fundamentally a contest of wills and enemies will continue to develop and employ sophisticated strategies to operate beyond physical battlegrounds and advance their efforts on the battlegrounds of information, perception, and political subversion. To seize, retain and exploit the initiative as well as consolidate military gains, Army forces must understand how threats, enemies, and adversaries fight on the battleground of perception and use that understanding to clarify our intentions, counter enemy disinformation, discredit the enemy (often by exposing enemy brutality and criminality), and bolster the legitimacy of our partners.
As stated in the AoC, “Conventional and special operations forces work together to understand, influence, or compel human behaviors and perceptions. Army commanders understand cognitive, informational, social, cultural, political, and physical influences affecting human behavior and the mission. Leaders exert influence on key individuals, organizations, and institutions through cooperative and persuasive means.†These efforts must be “a fundamental part of campaign design.â€
This week’s professional reading emphasizes military information support operations as part of a comprehensive strategy to defeat the Islamic State. In “The Islamic State and Information Warfare: Defeating ISIS and the Broader Global Jihadist Movementâ€, Editor Dr. Sebastian Gorka pulled together four important essays that:
Gorka and the contributors make clear that defeating ISIS on the physical battlefield is necessary but insufficient to win. Winning requires a strategy that combines physical and psychological activities to deny the enemy the ability to influence the perceptions and behaviors of relevant populations and governments.
In his summary, Dr. Gorka identifies five fundamentals essential to defeating the Islamic State:
These fundamentals are useful for developing required capabilities in the current and future force. As part of Force 2025 Maneuvers, TRADOC recently completed a Unified Quest seminar entitled “Fighting on the Battleground of Perception.†The seminar identified problems in our ability to understand and integrate information operations. Seminar participants developed the following near-term recommendations:
To present enemies and adversaries with multiple dilemmas across all domains, battlegrounds and contested spaces, the Army Operating Concept introduced the idea of Joint Combined Arms Operations: an expansion of the traditional concept of combined arms to include the integration of not only joint capabilities, but also the broad range of inter-organizational and multinational efforts necessary to accomplish the mission. Joint combined arms operations allows joint force commanders to operate consistent with the tenet of initiative, dictating the terms of operations and rendering the enemy incapable of responding effectively. Additionally, consistent with the tenet of simultaneity, Army forces present the enemy with multiple dilemmas to overwhelm them psychologically as well as physically.
Read the Report: The Islamic State and Information Warfare: Defeating ISIS and the Broader Global Jihadist Movement
Our civilized world is under attack by these monsters, and they will win unless we understand that this is a war for our very existence. People should reflect and personally prepare to protect your families, and vote for people who are willing to protect American citizens and uphold The Constitution.
This ISIS Recruiting Video will tell you all you need to know about the kind of sub-human monsters who are attracted by this video:
Click Below- Under 5 Minutes Long
8 minutes of DYNAMITE and TRUTH about the QURAN.
PLEASE SHARE THIS EVERYWHERE or there’s a good chance you’ll LOSE YOUR HEAD. If we fail to get the real story about islam out there and WE LOSE AMERICA, MILLIONS OF US WILL LOSE OUR HEADS!
That MURDERESS in California SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN ALLOWED IN THE COUNTRY!
If you think obozo’s minions will carefully vet the 100,000 “refugees” (INVADERS) he plans to import, you’re as delusional as he is.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur7Ttz0q0o4
4.Focus efforts on the objective of causing the enemy to give up the ideas that animate their struggle. Win by making the enemy accept the illegitimacy of their ideology or crushing those who hold it, or, as is most often the case, through a combination of both.
First part is not going to happen, so you’d better be prepared to crush.
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