U.S. Plan To Fight The Internet Revealed

geniese writes "The BBC is reporting on a recently declassified document that details the U.S. Military's intentions regarding warfare and the Internet." From the article: "Perhaps the most startling aspect of the roadmap is its acknowledgement that information put out as part of the military's psychological operations, or Psyops, is finding its way onto the computer and television screens of ordinary Americans. 'Information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and Psyops, is increasingly consumed by our domestic audience,' it reads."

Comments

Are you sure *I* didn't submit this?

[Philip K Dickhead]

It could have been a JE

eh

[jotok]

From TFA:

The US military seeks the capability to knock out every telephone, every networked computer, every radar system on the planet.

This makes more sense if you replace "every telephone" etc. with "specific devices in order to accomplish tactical objectives," and append "knock out" with "manipulate" or "eavesdrop upon."

Which is not to say that it's necessarily a good thing...but it's probably not even likely to happen. The US military establishment spends a lot of time talking about doing things like this, but rarely actually takes the proper steps to accomplish its goals.

Why is this a surprise to anybody?

[Androclese]

We have plans on how to invade and conquer Canada. The Military has battle plans for every single contingency. That is how they work.

Truth be told, I would be worried if they *didn't* have plans for the Internet.

Re:Why is this a surprise to anybody?

[Vellmont]

The Military has battle plans for every single contingency. That is how they work.

I don't think it's the fact that the military has a plan for using the Internet, I think it's the plan itself of trying to prevent the militaries own propoganda from appearing in the US. That sounds a lot like government control of a free press, so it makes a lot of us who believe in democracy nervous.

Re:Why is this a surprise to anybody?

[abb3w]

The Military has battle plans for every single contingency

Yes, but do they LOOK at them?

I can't find a source on line, so this is my recollection of a newspaper article circa 2003. In it, a retired some-star general said he had been in charge of the contingency planning for Desert Storm, which basically consisted of the scenario: "What if a SNAFU results in our infantry accidentally overrunning Baghdad, and we conquer the country by mistake?" Bush I team came up with a detailed plan for an interim government, police forces, etc... and, since it was never needed, filed it somewhere in the bowels of the Pentagon, in a clearly marked file. The Clinton administration pulled it a couple times when contemplating Saddam, but shrugged and put it back. And then the general retired, shortly before the Dems got booted. (Dumbasses: yes, Bush Won.)

He got worried around the time of the 2nd Iraq war, because press from the pentagon suggested no-one seemed to have the slightest awareness of what they would do after they were in charge. "But there's a detailed plan. Clearly filed, there's a detailed plan." So he asked about it on running into an non-retired buddy. And was told by his blank-faced bud: "What plan?" They had never looked for it.

THWACK!

This claim may have been disproven, but I don't know. Anyone have a source on-line about this?

Re:Translation...

[Call Me Black Cloud]

1. I don't see where the article says the government is "surprised" by anything. In fact, it's a planning document, not a report, so there are no revelations. Since it was declassified only 3 years after it was written it's clearly not an important document.

2. Having been in the military for many years, I'm not surprised that the document does not contain specifics. It's a strategic overview (and pretty high level since Rumsfeld signed off on it). The details are left to those who handle the implementation (at the tactical level).

3. You needed some document to tell you this? Telegraph wires were tapped or cut back in the day. Radio jamming has been around for as long as there's been radio. VOA has been around for nearly 70 years. The surprise here is that you are surprised the Internet is of interest as well.

Re:Wow, and update of the leaflet idea

[Animats]

This is like the old dropping the leaflets out of the planes with the "Surrender or you will be attacked" in different languages.

An upgrade of the leaflet idea is actually in the document. There is a requirement for a precision-guided leaflet canister. (That's easy to do. The "smart bomb" kit, the Joint Direct Attack Munition, is actually a strap-on unit for dumb bombs. All that's needed is a compatible leaflet can.)

"This message has been delivered by a precision-guided leaflet bomb aimed at you. If this had been a real bomb, you would now be dead. If you want to surrender, drop your weapons and walk east. Have a nice day."

Re:Wow, and update of the leaflet idea

[Tiger4]

"we shortcircut their right to freedom of the press?"

Disagree. We aren't short cicuiting anything. Every major enterprise in the world has a public relations function of some kind. The isn't just governments, that is large corporations, small buisnesses, and individuals. At least the ones that have any money to gain or lose based on popular opinion. They do these things called "Press Releases" that put the organization's spin on events. Why the refinery explosion isn't as bad as it seems, how the layoffs are going to help the economy, why discovering the tainted baby formula shows the system really works. The US government is no different in that respect at all.

The only "legs" in this story is that it somehow offends US media sensibility to find out that newsies in other countries accept money for stories. It wasn't so long ago in the US that newspapers and radio were radically and obviously partisan (W R Hearst anyone? How about Rupert Murdoch?). If you walk into some strugling paper in Iraq or elsewhere and plunk down $1000 and say "run this", most will bite. I suspect you can still do it in the US too, but the Gods of Media have decreed it to be impossible and immoral and therefore nonexistent.

Looks like our government screwed up this time.

[mmell]

Ordinarily, when we create a military technology, we either: 1) classify it and keep it to ourselves as much/long as we can, or 2) ensure that we have another technology capable of disabling/defeating it before we allow our allies to share in the (probably still classified) technology.

1) Create a new inter networking protocol to allow our many disparate computer systems to seamlessly share data across a unified "internetwork". Check.

2) Ensure that the networking protocol is robust enough to withstand forseeable battlefield attacks while still providing seamless data access. Check.

3) Share the technology with the world, knowing that we can disable that technology when we need --

NO! DON'T SHARE THE TECHNOLOGY UNTIL AFTER WE KNOW HOW TO DISABLE IT!! Damn! I knew we missed something!

Witness the fact that when we invaded Iraq, our first target (as always) was the Command and Control infrastructure. Sure, we were able to knock their radio, television and telephonic communications down, but we were never able to fully disable their internet, which was used against us in that instance.

Now we have to deal with excessive blowback from Psyops. I'd be happy to help - d'you suppose they'd give me one of those fancy Psi-badges and let me wear gloves like the other Psi-cops? Oh, wait . . . wrong reality.

Re: ex-CNN anchor: Yeah we lie - So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

CNN ANCHOR SAYS WHAT WE ALL KNOW - THE 'NEWS' IS A GAME THAT DOESN'T WANT SUBSTANCE

... "Truth no longer matters in the context of politics and, sadly, in the context of cable news," said Aaron Brown, whose four-year period as anchor of CNN's NewsNight ended in November, when network executives gave his job to Anderson Cooper in a bid to push the show's ratings closer to front-runner Fox News. Brown said he tried to give viewers a balanced diet of light and serious news with NewsNight. "But I always knew when I got to the Brussels sprouts, I was on thin ice," he said."... ..."Many Americans on the left and the right aren't interested in the truth, but simply want news that confirms their viewpoints, he said. "You'd think that it's no more complex than good vs. evil," he said"...

http://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/news/content/new s/brown0126.html

Re:Wow, and update of the leaflet idea

[tenchiken]

A couple of quick notes,
a) Al Jazeera.net is not the same as Al Jazeera broadcast.
b) Al Jazeera is popular in the states with corrupt govenments because it points thoose out.
c) Al Jazeera is not popular in Iraq. Iraqi's often complain that Al Jazeera encourages terrorists.

Protest.

[Irvu]

I think you underrate the significance of this. The NSA may or may not field interns to learn how telcos work. So long as they do not a) listen in on any calls, b) change any calls, and c) give bias in any way then this is different.

CNN is a news organization whose role is to disseminate fair and accurate news. As such their role as a neutral player means that they must or should present the news accurately and without bias. We the American Taxpayers turn to them to learn, among other things what it is our military is doing and how well they are doing it so that we may make informed decisions as voters.

They included, during wartime, people whose sole job is to present false or misleading information to support specific ends. Their specic role is to bolster public perception of the military in order to boost their ends. This is entirely orthagonal to the role of a news organization.

The U.S. Military is not, or should not be allowed to propagandize the American People. Restrictions were put in place following the revalations about lies that led to and sustained the Vietnam war (see the Pentagon Papers). Accurate information is necessary for democracy to function without it abuses of power cannot be recognized and checked. If the U.S. Military is lying to the American people then this represents a fundamental danger to our democracy and cannot be tolerated.

If CNN was biased or even gave the appearence of bias in any way then they have surrendered their status as an unbiased source of news. They cannot be trusted and should not.

Re:Protest.

[Irvu]

I don't care about CNN. It's the idea that my tax dollars are being spent on sending military personnel to influence "news" that I might read and be swayed by. If people are taking my tax dollars and then spending them on advertising dedicated to making me give them more tax dollars. In this case it would be spending tax dollars to convince me that the war, war in general, is good, going well, should continue, etc.

Any bias in the information, especially bias placed by those who should answer to me clearly is unacceptable.

Re:So what?

[sbrown123]

Actually, you can target the internet very easily. We will take Slashdot or any other web medium that allows users to comment on news. Psyops officers and paid contractors could work daily to post counter-messages to any discenting view about , say, the War in Iraq. This includes lying, spreading FUD, and posting links for people to "go get their facts straight". The links go to sites that, guess what, support their view 100%. It is very easy for them (the Pyops officer or contractor) to find these sites since they are owned or contracted by the DoD (often through various sub-contractors).

The GOP did something similar a few years back for the presidental elections. Howard (the Scream) Dean had this supposed huge following by people on the internet. Suddenly, out of nowhere, hundreds of blogs showed up supporting Bush/Cheney. This would, under normal circumstances, seem nothing odd except for the fact that many of these blogs were owned by only a handful of "special interests" groups. Now why the hell, as an individual, would you want more than one blog? The GOP, unlike their Democrat rivals, also do not use the idea of the "cosistant message". This is a message that all senators, talk show hosts, and radio personnel who support the GOP have to say on a given day or event. By spreading a similar message it gives the appearance to common folk that a majority of people feel one way on a given topic.

Now, we must understand that this is not new for the DoD to be engaged in propoganda wars on its own people. This was done, what, like every war? I think it stinks and if weren't for Bush breaking the law with the wiretapping crap, I think this would be just water under the bridge. But I think people are really starting to wonder if our government is taking it just a little too far...

Re:Psyops and CNN.

[monkeydo]

Yes, CNN has plenty of experience as a mouthpiece for propaganda.

Re:Wow, and update of the leaflet idea

[typical]

c) Al Jazeera is not popular in Iraq. Iraqi's often complain that Al Jazeera encourages terrorists.

For all I know, you are familiar with the issues involved; however, I remember when the Bush Administration cherry-picked some Baghdad poll to claim that the majority of Iraqis were grateful that we were occupying them and enthusiastic about Saddam being kicked out.