According to an article published in the most recent edition of Rolling Stone magazine, the U.S. Army deployed a "psychological operations" team to convince individual members of Congress to support increased military spending and troop deployments. According to Lt. Colonel Michael Holmes,the goal of psy-ops (as it is called in the military) is "to play with people's head's, to get the enemy to behave the way we want them to behave." For Lt. Colonel Holmes, the problem was that your fellow citizens should not be considered your enemies. "I'm prohibited from doing that to our own people. When you ask me to try to use these skills on senators and congressman, you're crossing a line." Heading up this operation was Lt. General William Caldwell, who is in charge of training Afghan troops. The targeted senators included John McCain, Joe Lieberman, Jack Reed, Al Franken, and Carl Levin as well as Admiral Mike Mullen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
What's interesting about this breaking story is that it shows the darker side of rhetoric at work. Psy-ops call for manipulation of the audience through propaganda, preying on doubts or fears, and threatening messages. We tend to cast a blind eye toward such tactics in war zones because it is yet another instrument that will aid our troops in goal that is set before them. However, U.S. law prohibits the military from using psy-ops on Americans. A veteran member of a psy-ops team told Rolling Stone, "Everyone in the psy-ops, intel... know you're not supposed to target Americans. It's what you learn on day one." While strong-arming and bargaining is commonplace in both Houses of Congress, the use of extreme style of manipulation is quite concerning. Is the War in Afghanistan in such dire straits that the leading commanders would endorse hostile tactics to convince Congress to increase military spending? Serving in the U.S. Armed Forces is an honorable charge but such disparaging news casts a poor reflection on those who lead our noble troops in war.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41753749/ns/world_news-south_and_central_asia/
Instances such as these are what give rhetoric the negative connotation it sometimes carries in our society. It's sort of scary to think that politicians may be convinced to make such an important decision based on manipulation and other malicious tactics.
ReplyDeleteThe tactics employed by the "psy-ops" seem outlandish and extreme. It is definitely crazy to think that our own military, who are supposed to be protecting us, are employing such manipulative tactics against our own people.
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