"Information dominance" came of age during the conflict in Iraq. It is a little discussed but highly significant part of the US government strategy of "full spectrum dominance," integrating propaganda and news media into the military command structure more fundamentally than ever before. In the past, propaganda involved managing the media. Information dominance, by contrast, sees little distinction between command and control systems, propaganda and journalism. They are all types of "weaponized information" to be deployed. As strategic expert Colonel Kenneth Allard noted, last year's attack on Iraq "will be remembered as a conflict in which information fully took its place as a weapon of war." \nNor is information dominance something dreamt up by the George W. Bush White House. It is a mainstream US military doctrine that is also embraced in the UK. According to US army intelligence there are already 15 information dominance centers in the US, Kuwait and Baghdad. Both the UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD) and Foreign and Commonwealth Office have staff assigned to "information operations." \nIn future conflicts, according to the MoD, "maintaining morale as well as information dominance will rank as important as physical protection." \nAchieving information dominance according to American military experts, involves two components: first, "building up and protecting friendly information; and degrading information received by your adversary." \nSeen in this context, embedding journalists in Iraq was a clear means of building up "friendly" information. A MoD commissioned commercial analysis of the print output produced by "embeds" shows that 90 percent of their reporting was either "positive or neutral." \nThe second component is "the ability to deny, degrade, destroy and/or effectively blind enemy capabilities." \n"Unfriendly" information must be targeted. This is perhaps best illustrated by the attack on al-Jazeera's office in Kabul in 2001, which the Pentagon justified by claiming al-Qaeda activity in the al-Jazeera office. As it turned out, this referred to broadcast interviews with Taliban officials. The various attacks on al-Jazeera in Kabul, Basra and Baghdad should also be seen in this context. \nThe evidence is that targeting of independent media and critics of the US is widening. The Pentagon is reportedly coordinating an "information operations road map," drafted by the Information Operations Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. According to Captain Gerald Mauer, the road map notes that information operations would be directed against an "adversary." But when the paper got to the office of the undersecretary of defense for policy, it was changed to say that information operations would attempt to "disrupt, corrupt or usurp" adversarial decision-making. "In other words," notes retired US army Colonel Sam Gardiner, "we will even go after friends if they are against what we are doing or want to do." \nIn the UK, according to Major Nigel Smith of the 15 Psychological Operations Group, staffing is to be expanded and strategic information operations "will take on a new importance" as a result of Iraq. Targeting unfriendly information is central to the post-conflict phase of reconstruction, too. The collapse of distinctions between independent news media and psychological operations is striking. \nThe new TV service for Iraq was paid for by the Pentagon. In keeping with the philosophy of information dominance it was supplied, not by an independent news organization, but by a defense contractor, Scientific Applications International Corporation (SAIC). Its expertise in the area -- according to its Web site -- is in "information operations" and "information dominance." \nThe SAIC effort ran into trouble. The Iraqi exile journalists it employed for the Iraq Media Network (IMN) -- at a cost US$20 million over three months -- were too independent for the Coalition Provisional Authority. Within weeks, occupying authority chief Paul Bremer introduced controls on the IMN. He also closed down some Iraqi-run newspapers and radio and TV stations. According to Index on Censorship, IMN managers were told to drop the readings from the Koran, the vox-pops (usually critical of the US invasion) and even to run their content past the wife of a US-friendly Iraqi Kurdish leader for a pre-broadcast check. The station rejected the demands. \nBut this did not stop Bremer and further incidents culminated in a nine-point list of "prohibited activity" issued in June last year. \nBremer would reserve the power to advise the IMN on any aspect of its performance, including matters of content and the power to hire and fire staff. Thus, as Index on Censorship notes "the man in absolute authority over the country's largest, richest and best-equipped media network is also his own regulator and regulator of his rivals, with recourse to the US Army to enforce his rulings." \nAttacks on al-Jazeera continue. In September last year the Iraq governing council voted to ban reports from al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya on the grounds that they incite violence. As evidence of this, one member of the Iraqi National Congress who voted for the ban noted that the TV stations describe the opposition to the occupation as the resistance. \n"They're not the resistance, they are thugs and criminals," he said. \nBut the Iraqi people appear not to share this view of al-Jazeera. Those with satellite access to al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya are more likely to trust them over IMN. As the experience of IMN shows, achieving dominance is not always a straightforward matter. This is precisely why the strategy for "unfriendly information" is to "deny, degrade and destroy." \nDavid Miller is editor of Tell Me Lies: Propaganda and Media Distortion in the Attack on Iraq
EDITORIAL CARTOON
On Monday, Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) spoke during the opening ceremony of this year’s World Health Assembly (WHA). For the first time in the assembly’s history, attendees, including Xi, had to dial in virtually. Xi made no acknowledgement of the Chinese government’s role in causing the COVID-19 pandemic, nor was there any meaningful apology. Instead, he painted China as a benign force for good and a friend to all nations. Except Taiwan, of course. The address was a reheated version of the speech Xi gave at the 2017 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Xi again attempted to step into the
EDITORIAL CARTOON
The World Health Assembly (WHA) held its annual meeting this week; Taiwan was still not represented. Its journalists were also barred from covering the online-only proceedings, despite the nation’s clearly demonstrated pandemic expertise that has set an example for the world. When the SARS epidemic reached Taiwan from southern China in 2003, dozens of lives were lost, but its health experts learned the importance of general testing, masks, technology to locate infected persons, swift decisions and quarantines. The lessons were applied immediately across Taiwan when COVID-19 arrived this year. From 2009 to 2016, Taiwan participated as an observer in the assembly under
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