Psych Ops - Psychological Warfare

Psychological Warfare
1. military warfare by propaganda: tactics that use propaganda to try to demoralize an enemy in war, usually including civilian populations
2. nonmilitary psychological undermining: the use of psychological tactics to disconcert and disadvantage an opponent in an everyday or a business context, for example, causing fear or anxiety

(Microsoft Encarta 2003.)

I'd love to post the titles of the exact threads...but, don't wanna start no danged flame war.

You'll just have to flame me in ignorance.

:evilgrin:


adding a link: http://www.soulwork.net/Systemic/psych-ops.htm

Why mention it?

some of the threads on this forum are being posted by people whos interests are not those of the Democrats or the progressive movement. In cognito! Scary. Probably true...

forget to be forever vigilant.

I was hoping a little reminder might help.

We have to be a little vigilant, but not too much.

We have to question each other, but not enough to undermine our sense of community.

A tight line to walk. Now is a time for strength.

D5E:destruction, degradation, denial, disruption, deceit, and exploitation

CONCEPT PAPER


Working Group on Preventive and Preemptive Military Intervention


William W. Keller and Gordon R. Mitchell1
Project Coordinators

<Snip>

U.S. Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, called for an FBI investigation into the forgery of documents cited by President Bush and Secretary Powell as proof of Iraq’s nuclear transactions with Niger. As Rockefeller explained in a letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller: "There is a possibility that the fabrication of these documents may be part of a larger deception campaign aimed at manipulating public opinion and foreign policy regarding Iraq."26

The timeliness of Rockefeller’s proposed inquiry was underscored by the appearance of official documents that lay out official American deception plans: "In a document last autumn, the joint chiefs of staff stressed the need for strategic deception and influence operations as tools of war. The army, navy and air force have been directed to devise plans for information warfare."27

According to defense analyst William Arkin, the Bush strategy lays out goals for information warfare that pursue D5E: "destruction, degradation, denial, disruption, deceit, and exploitation." Arkin notes that the wide array of sites and ractices of information control brought into the range of this policy "blurs or even erases the boundaries between factual information and news, on the one hand, and public relations, propaganda and psychological warfare on the other."28

This fusion of military deception programs with media propaganda efforts enabled the Office of Strategic Influence to commission officers from the U.S. Army's Psychological Operations Command to work as interns in the news division of CNN.29

Eventually, the Bush Administration was burned by the political heat generated when the Office of Strategic Influence was leaked to the media. The ensuing firestorm of controversy prompted Secretary Rumsfeld to close the propaganda unit. Yet less than a year later, Rumsfeld stipulated that his action had only been symbolic, and that information warfare missions were still underway at other Pentagon offices: And then there was the Office of Strategic Influence. You may recall that.
And "oh my goodness gracious isn't that terrible, Henny Penny the sky is going to fall." I went down that next day and said fine, if you want to savage this thing, fine, I'll give you the corpse. There's the name. You can have the name, but I'm gonna keep doing every single thing that needs to be done and I have.30

The political implications of blurring military strategic deception and public sphere propaganda are worth exploring, given Arkin's concerns about military deception that "while the policy ostensibly targets foreign enemies, its most likely victim will be the American electorate."31

<More>

and a little self-aggrandizing

:kick:

.

US prosecuted Nazi propagandists as war criminals

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/apr2003/nure-a16.shtml


:yourock:

viciously anti-semitic. The lawyers at Nuremberg used his newspaper as evidence. They hung him.

around the heads of all of the DUers that accuse our current media of propaganda?

We'd go from talking heads to swinging heads.

Wow, I am in a strange and unusual place today.

:silly:

We are going to have to hit every thread that furthers the rove propaganda.

Since this board is moving so fast -- it will take a lot of us to keep on this and help people see the "brain washing" attempts.

Some people have common sense and are born skeptics -- and some of us are trained in various social science disciplines and can know what to look for. Others are recovering cult members and are very attuned to any form or psychological manipulation.

This is one of the most important threads I've seen here.

politics, critical thinking and women's studies. Wait, wait, that's redundant.

I've been trying to point out things without starting an all out flame war within the threads. Making them hot topics isn't the best response.

:(

of his poison is leaking in.

Blech!

ferchrisakes, i could do it, and i'm not even a repuke! carl rove is a 'swine' as old jewish people called men who sold their souls for some damn thing, and became therefore meat puppets for the devil

Here are some questions I ask myself but hopefully you guys will have even better ones.

Is the information ACCURATE or can it be verified from reputable sources?

Does the information EMPOWER me and enable me to feel solidarity with others?

Does the information ask me to question my own ASSUMPTIONS in a way that brings further clarity to light?

How about this,

Does the information make me feel helpless? This is the reverse of yours since propaganda aims to put one "down." For some reason, I notice this first.

Does it insult my intelligence? I think that one's good for the media.

And I keep seeing people buying into the mass disinformation.

1. It is our fault that we lost the election -- we have bad morals and are there for not worthy blah blah blah -- variations -- several.

2. More variations.

What we are seeing is the biggest Psyops in the history of the world. And many (some -- a few?) of the posters here on DU seem to be listening to too much TV -- media whores.

It is probably easier to believe that the election was lost because we just didn't do enough -- didn't work hard enough -- didn't give enough time or money.

It is hard or impossible for some people to believe that they could be manipulated this way.

I'm not sure how much is intentional psyops crap, and how much is the result of psyops spreading fear and disinformation throughout.

Google search him.

I'm tired of posting about the former Church of Satan Priest that took over that cult/religion and replaced it with his own "Temple of Set" while listed on active duty with U.S. Army and the DIA.

:puke:

:puke:

Do you know what they mostly do?

They distribute leaflets or use loudspeakers to communicate various things to the local populace. This can range to where to get food/water to telling civilians to get out before a major offensive.

They are the military mouthpiece, but I think their role is generally overstated here.

for not always enlightening means has been practiced in the U.S. since at least "Rosie the Riveter" and the marketing of "conspicuous consumption" immediately following WWII.

It's also been used very effectively by many rabid talk show hosts, in more recent memory.

I totally agree with you, but the point I was making is that I think the military PSYOPS role is generally overstated here.

provided.

at DU are more aware of military psyops than they are of the general manipulation of public discourse brought to us by our government, marketers, etc., as was the case with "Rosie" and marketing "conspicuous consumption" post WWII.

I used a phrase most would associate with the idea if not the fact; in short, I used a propaganda tool.


Ooooo, scary me.



:silly:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Operation+Mockingbird

Why do you suppose the Army PSY-OPS people went to work as interns at all of those news organizations?

When the "Office of Strategic Influence" released their first press release stating that they were 'disbanding the office of Strategic Influence', did you believe them or was it 'disinformation'?

Remember what Rummy said, "I went down that next day and said fine, if you want to savage this thing, fine, I'll give you the corpse. There's the name. You can have the name, but I'm gonna keep doing every single thing that needs to be done and I have."

I see nothing subversive about military PSYOPS personnel learning to be effective mass media communicators. That is their job, as I've described above.

OSI has nothing to do with what happens on the battlefield, which is what I was discussing. I'm sure programs like OSI have existed for a long time and will always exist.

assembly lines and then post WWII women were manipulated to return to the home with the little white picket fence.

You know it is happening with nearly ALL of the talking heads are repeating nearly identical memes.

I had to stop watching TV 2 1/2 years ago -- because the psyops was so overpowering that I almost could not cope.

My degrees are in Psychology (mostly soc-psy, and ethology), Sociology (Mass Soc, Social Disorganization etc), Anthro (cultural), MA. Group Dynamics -- and post grad work in personality structures.

AND a whole lot of my family are members of fundamentalists churches -- so I've seen the effects of cult brain washing -- up close and personal.

But I also was also a born cynic.

I've seen several posters here talk about family members who were previously Democrats and/or some other stripe of progressive thinker. At some point, said family member started listening to rush (I don't know why) and/or attending church regularly. Said family member is now rabid, fanatical, fundamentalist type (according to the poster).

Any ideas? Is rush truly that effective? I just don't see that.

My mother falls into this category -- and I've met many others others.

They start out being empathetic -- open minded -- what we might call liberal. But then they are faced with so many choices that they give up and want someone else to tell them what to think and how to feel about current events.

They also seem to be trusting -- and people can lie repeatedly to them and they will keep on coming back.

According to one of my professors -- the next step is often a complete break with reality.

I was absolutely shocked when I learned that the Neocons supposedly came out of a liberal tradition. But then I remembered a lecture in one of the personality development classes I took YEARS ago -- the overly empathic, fickled person can upon aging turn to a rigid personality coping style. This might explain Nader going to the dark side. AND some rigid types can break out of that coping mechanism and learn to be open, accepting and empathetic. McNamara -- could be an example of that second type. David Brock could be an example of a Rigid personality type -- waking up and seeing the light.

My background is primarily concerned with group dynamics rather than individual personality types.

Geez, guess I'll have to start guarding myself now. I tend toward trusting; well, okay, when I'm not being paranoid and cynical.

sounds like you'll grown into a nice liberal old lady!

:evilgrin:


A long time friend of mine worked as a paramedic for about 20 years. He said the survivors were the most obnoxious people. If he ran a call and the person was being ever so nice, he knew they usually didn't make it. Referring to life threatening events here, of course.

DU seems to be suffering from a severe case of weshouldbemorelikerepublicansitis today :D

in the "English" language.

Yeah, it's funny all over DU these days. Can't tell the disruptors from the permanently panicked.

So true -- I just alerted on someone who started another panic thread.

Reminds me of a nut case who was on a small sailboat and she started screaming that they were going to die when the weather got rough (heavy weather sailing for you sailors out there). She was endangering the rest of the people on the boat -- no one was able to handle the sails etc required in order to get the boat back to the harbor. They had to tie her to the mast -- in order for everyone to survive.

They did get back to port -- no one was injured. And the storm was really no big deal.

Point is that one panicked person (or a small group of frightened people) can sink a boat or a Nation or a party.

but lots of permanently panicked with computers.

I'd love to see a video of that moment. There were many times I wished I could tie a boss to a "mast."

is open to fraud.

Every computer Pro I've talked to is adamant that voting should be paper based and hand counted.

someone knows how to do it.

I wouldn't mind computer based voting with several exceptions to what we have now.

we vote by computer, it's stored in computer, it prints out paper, we deposit paper in box, it prints us a receipt as to how we voted; yep, a duplicate of our ballot which we take home with us.

Imagine the morning after around the water cooler as we all compare our votes with what happened the day before.

They can do a quick count based on what's stored in the computer which can be compared with what's printed on the paper which we have our own copy of to see if any votes "accidentally" were mis-cast.