By Adam Brookes, BBC Pentagon correspondent
http://educate-yourself.org/cn/pentagonfightsnet29jan06.shtml
January 29, 2006
From Louise Zeus <louise@zeusinfoservice.com>
Sent: Sunday, January 29, 2006 8:43 AM
Subject: Pentagon plans to fight the net
Its amazing how they couch this stuff. We are so naive when it comes to
understanding what they are laying the groundwork for. They are getting
it ready for dissidents. Remember the law/executive order signed by the
President about three weeks ago that made it illegal (felony) for anyone
to do emails without their real names and to send "annoying" subjects?
Annoying wasn't defined, so here we are with everything being put in place.
It's really amazing to watch the brilliance of their plan and our reaction--
which is non existant. Good luck all.
A newly declassified document gives a fascinating glimpse
into the US military's plans for "information operations" - from
psychological operations, to attacks on hostile computer networks.
Bloggers beware
As the world turns networked, the Pentagon is calculating the military opportunities
that computer networks, wireless technologies and the modern media offer.
From influencing public opinion through new media to designing "computer
network attack" weapons, the US military is learning to fight an electronic
war.
The declassified document is called "Information Operations Roadmap".
It was obtained by the National Security Archive at George Washington University
using the Freedom of Information Act. Officials in the Pentagon wrote it
in 2003. The Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, signed it. Most computers
will open PDF documents automatically, but you may need to download Adobe
Acrobat Reader.
The "roadmap" calls for a far-reaching overhaul
of the military's ability to conduct information operations and electronic
warfare. And, in some detail, it makes recommendations for how the US armed
forces should think about this new, virtual warfare. The document says that
information is "critical to military success". Computer and telecommunications
networks are of vital operational importance.
Propaganda
The operations described in the document include a surprising range of military
activities: public affairs officers who brief journalists, psychological
operations troops who try to manipulate the thoughts and beliefs of an enemy,
computer network attack specialists who seek to destroy enemy networks.
All these are engaged in information operations.
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.
"Psyops messages will often be replayed by the news media for much
larger audiences, including the American public," it goes on. The document's
authors acknowledge that American news media should not unwittingly broadcast
military propaganda. "Specific boundaries should be established,"
they write. But they don't seem to explain how. "In this day and age
it is impossible to prevent stories that are fed abroad as part of psychological
operations propaganda from blowing back into the United States - even though
they were directed abroad," says Kristin Adair of the National Security
Archive.
Credibility problem
Public awareness of the US military's information operations is low, but
it's growing - thanks to some operational clumsiness. When it describes
plans for electronic warfare, or EW, the document takes on an extraordinary
tone. It seems to see the internet as being equivalent to an enemy weapons
system
Late last year, it emerged that the Pentagon had paid a private
company, the Lincoln Group, to plant hundreds of stories in Iraqi newspapers.
The stories - all supportive of US policy - were written by military personnel
and then placed in Iraqi publications. And websites that appeared to be
information sites on the politics of Africa and the Balkans were found to
be run by the Pentagon.
But the true extent of the Pentagon's information operations, how they work,
who they're aimed at, and at what point they turn from informing the public
to influencing populations, is far from clear. The roadmap, however, gives
a flavour of what the US military is up to - and the grand scale on which
it's thinking. It reveals that Psyops personnel "support" the
American government's international broadcasting. It singles out TV Marti
- a station which broadcasts to Cuba - as receiving such support. It recommends
that a global website be established that supports America's strategic objectives.
But no American diplomats here, thank you. The website would use content
from "third parties with greater credibility to foreign audiences than
US officials".
It also recommends that Psyops personnel should consider a range of technologies
to disseminate propaganda in enemy territory: unmanned aerial vehicles,
"miniaturized, scatterable public address systems", wireless devices,
cellular phones and the internet.
'Fight the net'
When it describes plans for electronic warfare, or EW, the document takes
on an extraordinary tone. It seems to see the internet as being equivalent
to an enemy weapons system. "Strategy should be based on the premise
that the Department [of Defense] will 'fight the net' as it would an enemy
weapons system," it reads. The slogan "fight the net" appears
several times throughout the roadmap. The authors warn that US networks
are very vulnerable to attack by hackers, enemies seeking to disable them,
or spies looking for intelligence.
"Networks are growing faster than we can defend them... Attack sophistication
is increasing... Number of events is increasing."
US digital ambition
And, in a grand finale, the document recommends that the United States should
seek the ability to "provide maximum control of the entire electromagnetic
spectrum".
US forces should be able to "disrupt or destroy the full spectrum of
globally emerging communications systems, sensors, and weapons systems dependent
on the electromagnetic spectrum".
Consider that for a moment.
The US military seeks the capability to knock out every telephone, every
networked computer, every radar system on the planet. Are these plans the
pipe dreams of self-aggrandising bureaucrats? Or are they real?
The fact that the "Information Operations Roadmap" is approved
by the Secretary of Defense suggests that these plans are taken very seriously
indeed in the Pentagon. And that the scale and grandeur of the digital revolution
is matched only by the US military's ambitions for it.
Here are PDF copies of the documents filed on Jan. 18 by Justice
Department attorneys in Gonzales v. Google, Inc.: Motion to Compel, Declaration
of Joel McElvain, and Declaration of Philip Stark.
Over at SearchEngineWatch, Danny Sullivan has an extensive and much-updated
post about news that the Justice Department demanded search records data
from Google....
_________________________________________________________
DoJ search requests: Google said no; Yahoo, AOL, MSN yes.
Update:
Earlier today, I asked a Justice Department spokesperson
which search engines other than Google received requests to provide search
records. The answer: Yahoo, AOL, and MSN were also asked to supply search
records information, and all complied. Google did not, and that is why the
DoJ asked a federal judge on Wednesday to order the company to do so.
Another fact to consider as you sift through news coverage: Justice is not
requesting this data in the course of a criminal investigation, but in order
to defend its argument that the Child Online Protection Act is constitutionally
sound.
It seems apparent that Google objected to the request not for privacy reasons,
but on grounds that the request was too broad and burdensome. Privacy advocates
I spoke to today, including attorney Sherwin Siy at EPIC, say while the
DoJ's request would not identify individual users, the scope and nature
of this request sets a troubling precedent. Today, they argue, only search
strings and urls; tomorrow, perhaps, the IP addresses of all users who typed
in "Osama Bin Laden."
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