Psychological Warfare Primer

[Jeff Davis <eagle@deeptht.armory.com>]

Since we are engaged in Revolutionary War in Cyberspace, it
would behoove us who are actively participating to have a
delineation of strategy, tactics, and operations of guerilla
warfare eidetic to this medium.  Our Guerilla Warfare Operating
Area, (GWOA), is the internet, with its peculiar strategic
advantages and vulnerabilities.  The genius of Patton's campaign
in North Africa was the result of simple reading comprehension
skills; he read Rommel's book.  This primer on psychological
warfare is prepared for your perusal offering fundamental
intelligence to increase the probability of success in
engagements with the competition.

It's been said that every revolutionary was a patriot.  Our
competition has different ideas about patriotism and vastly
superior resources.  Little is known about the operations of the 
US intelligence community.  If one is going to play hard ball
with the big boys, one needs a general understanding of the game
before the first pitch is thrown.

The DOD view of Vietnam was essentially to train men and test new
weapon systems.  In this respect, the Vietnam War was quite
successful.  This point was reiterated ad nauseam during the Gulf
War on a daily basis via a sharply censored 4th estate for the
duration of conflict.  The contrast of censorship in the interest
of National Security between the Gulf War and Vietnam is quite
marked.

The DOD official statement the day of the initial bombing of Iraq
made no mention of B-52 strategic bombing missions.  Only the
tactical missions were announced publicly.  Bernard Shaw's
awestruck reports from his hotel window in Tehran were broadcast
live on CNN.  With heightened exclamation he reported a new sound
of the ensuing battle, a sustained roar like thunder that refused
to quit.  From the ground, a conventional B-52 strike is a
quarter mile wide, 200 feet high, and travels at 700 mph.  There
is no sound on earth like it.  Having known Pentagon spokesperson
Pete Williams since high school, I found it vaguely amusing that
he saw fit to inform the rest of the world of B-52 involvement in
the bombing several days latter. 

In Vietnam, we had the grunt's down in the #10 latrine stepping
on cockroaches piped into our homes by the US networks nightly.
Occasionally the hands playing Cowboy's and Indian's, (LURP's-
reconnaissance, locate and identify missions, as opposed to
search and destroy), got some air time.  Then there was the
Harvard/Yale game.  The public knew it existed, but heard very
little about it.

Spooks have their own language.  The first principle of
psychological warfare is to dehumanize the enemy.  Everything is
a football game to them.  The Administration's policy decision on
Clipper, 4 February 1994, would be a, "Double Whammy End Around."
The FBI Digital Telephony Bill would be a, "Forward Pass."  These
analogies were expressed to the public by pilots returning from
Persian Gulf combat missions during interviews.  No big deal
folks, just another football game, and we all know what fun
football is!

Surgical is not synonymous with random evisceration of innocent
men, women and children.  Remember the luckiest man in Iraq? 
Swartzkoff stood by a screen with laser guidance cross hairs
centered on a bridge.  As a vehicle entered the picture he drew
our attention to it with his pointer and followed it's path
directly through the center of the bull's eye.  "And in his rear
view mirror-" Stormin' Norman gloated, the entire bridge was
annihilated.  The truth of the Gulf War is just now leaking to
the public.

Let's take a look at the roster of the competition's coaches and
quarterback strings.  The heavy weights are the DIA, NSA, and
CIA, in that order.  The CIA is a central clearing house informed
on a need to know basis.  The NSA obviously has a clearer channel
of classified access.  The Defense Intelligence Agency, as has
been published, is composed of several independent operations
reporting to a specific Admiral or General, each with their own
S-2 sections.  Thus, operations are very difficult to compromise. 
The CIA is prohibited by its charter from engaging in domestic
operations.  The DIA is not.

These folks are the best on the planet.  The other day I was
logged on in a friends account at an educational site showing her
the ropes of Cyberspace.  Out of curiosity I ran an arbitrary
finger on the American Embassy in Moscow.  Unbelievably, it
worked famously.  User names and real names of everybody logged
on scrolled by on the screen.  It's nice to live in an open
society.

Another friend stopped by and I attempted to demonstrate the
phenomenon again.  I swear to God, this time I popped up in the
San Diego State educational computer.  The third time I was dead
in the water.  The last log on in SDSU's computer was "COSOC 
Just Passing Through".

If I remember my history correctly, this whole EFF thing started
over the 911 codes being posted to Usenet.  Instantaneous caller
location identification capability became generally known.  The
idiot kid who threatened the president got an autoresponder
from Whitehouse.gov that traces the message.  Minimal leg work
produced the actual perpetrator.  

The competition is hot, but our apparent vulnerability is our
greatest strategic advantage.  This is like being on Acid in
1964.  We are doing nothing illegal!  Cyberspace, in its present
state, is a very wild and free place, not unlike the Wyoming high
country a few miles from me.  With diligence and fortitude, it
will continue to be free.

The spooks can tie up a tremendous amount of time and resources
gathering intelligence on Cyberians rather easily.  At present,
an analysis of our actions boils down to private citizens well
with in their rights doing nothing illegal.  One would have to be
completely brain dead not to have considered the populist power
of the internet.  It's guaranteed we will pry power from the
intelligence community with much wailing and gnashing of teeth by
minuscule increments.

Our greatest tactical advantages are the speed of light and non
location specificity.  We are highly mobile in the field and
wired as well as the competition.  We are by nature decentralized
and deployed for maximal survivability from nuclear attack.  We
are virtually immune from censorship due to the internal
survivability architecture of the net.

We're on our own turf.  We've chosen our own battle ground,
brought nothing unnecessary with us, and are ready to make our
last stand here and now.  We are defending our homeland from
invasive attack, and the 4th estate is fully aware of this. 
Thomas Jefferson said, "When the press is free and every man able
to read, all is safe."

Our operations are multifaceted and independently organized.  The
CPSR petition and the EFF letter campaigns work in concert, yet
have not the vaguest resemblance to a Civil War Pincer attack. 
They more closely resemble the jump and run tactics of the Viet
Cong and NVA that gave the DOD fits on the battle field and in
the press.  We have the ability to concentrate a great number of
people on a specific operation with the added fluidity of
multiplicity of tasks.

The concept of truly democratizing not only the United States but
the entire planet is a tremendous vision.  The collapse of a
Union that built its SS-18 and SS-20 missile systems on what are
essentially ripped off Pac Man chips has thrown a list to the
global economy.  Homeostasis is a principle of the universe. 
Time will restore a natural balance to everything.  

One small voice in Cyberspace becomes global interpersonal
communication at the speed of light as the net grows
geometrically.  Global interpersonal communication is the
greatest tool for world peace our species has ever known.  We
have the technology to achieve virtual collective consciousness
on a planetary scale.

The potential of the Electronic Revolution is awesome.  Instead
of electing an aristocracy who's choices are packaged by mass
media marketing to govern us, we have the ability to transcend
the physical limitations of deceptive appearance, and illuminate
the truth of being through the digitized reflection of
intelligence.

As it stands now, the Russians pay an information tariff on every
bit they transmit or receive.  Their phone system is archaic. 
The infrastructure is neanderthal in comparison to the US.  The
closest approximation to a backbone they have is an Estonian site
hanging by a 80Km fiber optic thread to Helsinki, and the Glasnet
site in Moscow linked by a T1.

I know what this net is capable of.  Consider the invention of
digitized satellite navigation.  The first bird the Air Force
sent up could simultaneously locate 4K automobiles on America's
highways.  The second bird up could simultaneously locate every
single vehicle on the interstate highway system.

I'm one small voice in Cyberspace speaking only for myself. 
Psychological Warfare is the way to fly in the Electronic
Revolution.  When the competition has been playing hardball with
the big boys globally without equal, we would to well to play
Medicine Ball with the Gods instead.  Keep your personal visions
of justice and reciprocity tempered by altruism in your hearts,
and fare you well, my compatriots.

-- 
PGP PUBLIC KEY via finger!  JAFEFFM  Speaking & Thinking For Myself!
 
* eagle@deeptht.armory.com			email info@eff.org *
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