Stray Voltage: War in the Information Age by Wayne Michael Hall. Naval Institute Press (http://www.usni.org/press/press.html), USNI Operations Center, 2062 Generals Highway, Annapolis, Maryland 21401-6780, 2003, 272 pages, $36.95 (hardcover).
This book, written by a retired brigadier general with 30 years’ experience in Army intelligence, points out that asymmetrical warfare is really about gathering knowledge and applying information in such a way that one defeats an unconventional enemy. Although the text has something of a homeland-defense flavor, it discusses at length the requirements for winning in the arena of information operations. The twenty-first century has changed the face of warfare. Because no current enemy of the United States is willing to confront it in terms of conventional warfare, we must prepare to fight on the battleground of Ethernet fibers that link the modern world. Hall believes that information may have the greatest leverage in warfare in this century.
Both homeland-defense and military commanders confront the challenge of enabling decision makers to act on knowledge—by its nature a transient commodity. Analysts, key to any successful information operation but in short supply, make mistakes by mirror imaging rather than studying underlying cultural events. America will also have to do a better job of preparing itself for attacks by opponents who are more capable and better equipped than the ones it now faces. Furthermore, we must come to understand the constantly shifting realm created by technological change, just as we must become familiar with two overlapping environments: national security coupled with asymmetrical warfare and a global competitive environment populated by transitory friends or allies. The latter, currently participants on an economic battlefield, will soon move to access water and power resources.
Hall lays out the task of understanding what information operations constitute and how asymmetrical foes will manipulate data. If US command and control personnel begin to doubt the validity of information contained within the system, asymmetrical foes will have won, since this country and its forces will find themselves paralyzed. Today, the have-nots of the world have access to the same information as we do and can manipulate that information to their own ends. Clearly, we need to develop new forms of analysis and data synthesis. To function in this environment, cyberstrategists and other information-operations specialists must find people who have in-depth knowledge of an opponent’s thinking, perceptions, decision making, feedback mechanisms, and information-support apparatus. Furthermore, these predictive analysts must not mirror-image our opponents but think and act as they do, skills that require much training and that are currently in short supply.
Knowledge weapons include software or other implements of warfare that deny the opponent data. The new challenge will take the form of manipulating data and information, coupled with knowledge of what the opponent may possess. Disrupting the flow of information is a central theme of information operations. Hall points out that we lack strategy and doctrine for such operations, especially those dealing with new and emerging asymmetrical threats.
The book’s chapter on knowledge management, which covers all of the current “computerspeak,” shows how we need to integrate each part of the process into the bigger information-operations picture. Search engines, retrieval of data, and data mining are all presented in such a way that the nonpractitioner can understand and grasp the importance of knowledge-based warfare. Data mining, networks, and database management are vital parts of this type of war, in which security is paramount and in which defensive and offensive information operations go hand in hand. Hall argues that the US military needs a new cadre of cyberwarriors—people comfortable with technology, capable of creating man-machine interfaces currently found only in research institutions, and accustomed to operating differently than the mainstream military.
The military community needs to read Stray Voltage. This is especially true of personnel outside information operations, who must understand the types of changes in doctrine and strategy that we will have to undertake. Moreover, members of the intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance community should study Hall’s book closely since its subject—a battleground we must conquer to defeat the asymmetrical foes we face—may well be their bread and butter of the future. Envy, religious fanaticism, and economic inequity motivate America’s opponents, who will adapt quickly and manipulate information flows. We must be ready to respond.
Capt
Gilles Van Nederveen, USAF, Retired
Fairfax, Virginia
Disclaimer
The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression, academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, the United States Air Force or the Air University.
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