Thursday, February 09, 2006
The Islamic Cartoons - EXTRA
More posting than normal today because some of the most important words yet written on the cartoon kerfluffle appeared at Strategy Page, courtesy Austin Bay.
I am reminded of how the Soviets used to control their populace. Those grand parades of seeming military might through Red Square. That too was information warfare. In that case they projected the image of a strong vibrant nation covering how rotten it was at its core. Here istead of disguise they use misdirection, "Don't look here, look there."
Don't be duped. Don't help them by publishing stupid stuff either.
Related Tags: Islam, cartoons, Islamic cartoons, information warfare, Autin Bay, riots
In May 2005, Newsweek ran its phony Guantanamo prison "Koran flushing" story -- a story designed to embarrass the Bush administration as well as sell copies of Newsweek. A good sales ploy? When riots began in Muslim countries, the world got a lesson in information warfare. Indian military analyst Bahukutumbi Raman claimed that in Afghanistan the riots were incited by "well-organized agents of the Hizb ut-Tahrir terror gang."Spontaneous and violent riots are rare, at least violence on this level and this targeted. That is suggestive of something.
[...]
Four months after their publication, however, we witness waves of orchestrated, coordinated violence -- war and information war directed at the West but also designed to deflect domestic challenges to Middle Eastern dictatorships. Vicious anti-Muslim cartoons -- not published by the Danes -- now circulate with the originals (suggesting a calculated act of propaganda designed to further inflame). Syria's secular dictatorship made cynical use of the cartoons. Mobs burned the Danish and Norwegian embassies in Damascus. The attacks would not be possible without the tacit permission or connivance of the Syrian government. At the moment, Syria faces U.N. censure for its role in the murder of Lebanon's Rafik Harari.
I am reminded of how the Soviets used to control their populace. Those grand parades of seeming military might through Red Square. That too was information warfare. In that case they projected the image of a strong vibrant nation covering how rotten it was at its core. Here istead of disguise they use misdirection, "Don't look here, look there."
Don't be duped. Don't help them by publishing stupid stuff either.
Related Tags: Islam, cartoons, Islamic cartoons, information warfare, Autin Bay, riots
