U.S. military considers special operations to influence foreign public opinion

New York Times

Published Dec. 16, 2002
PENT16

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Defense Department is considering issuing a directive to the U.S. military to conduct covert operations aimed at influencing public opinion and policy-makers in friendly and neutral countries, senior Pentagon and administration officials say.

The proposal has ignited a fierce battle throughout the Bush administration over whether the military should carry out secret propaganda missions in friendly nations such as Germany, where many of the Sept. 11 hijackers congregated, or Pakistan, still considered a haven for Al-Qaida's militants.

Although Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is among those pushing the administration to come up with a bolder strategy for getting out a pro- American message worldwide, he has not yet decided whether the military should take on those responsibilities, the officials said.

Such a program could include efforts to discredit and undermine the influence of mosques and religious schools that have become breeding grounds for Islamic militancy and anti-Americanism across the Middle East, Asia and Europe. It might even include setting up schools with secret U.S. financing to teach a moderate Islamic position laced with sympathetic depictions of how the religion is practiced in the United States, officials said.

Many administration officials agree that the government's broad strategy to counter terrorism must include vigorous and creative propaganda to change the negative view of the United States held by many countries. The officials cite the public relations effort that played an important role in World War II.

The fight, one Pentagon official said, is over "the strategic communications for our nation, the message we want to send for long-term influence, and how we do it."

One military officer said: "We have the assets and the capabilities and the training to go into friendly and neutral nations to influence public opinion. We could do it and get away with it. That doesn't mean we should."

It is not the first time that the debate over how the United States should marshal its forces to win the hearts and minds of the world has raised difficult and potentially embarrassing questions at the Pentagon. A more open parallel effort at the State Department, which refers to its role as public diplomacy, has not met with so much resistance.

In February, Rumsfeld had to disband the Pentagon's Office of Strategic Influence, ending a short-lived plan to provide news items, and possibly false ones, to foreign journalists to influence public sentiment abroad.

Senior Pentagon officials said Rumsfeld is deeply frustrated that the U.S. government has no coherent plan for molding public opinion worldwide in favor of the United States in its global campaign against terrorism and militancy.

Many administration officials said they agree there is a role for the military in carrying out what it calls information operations against adversaries, especially before and during war, as well as routine public relations work in friendly nations such as Colombia, the Philippines or Bosnia, whose governments have welcomed U.S. troops.

In hostile countries like Iraq, such missions are permitted under policy and typically would include broadcasting from airborne radio stations or dropping leaflets like those the military has printed to undermine morale among Iraqi soldiers.