Revisiting the First Salvo: The Importance of Getting the Narrative Out

The Defense Department did an excellent job embedding a CNN reporter and camera crew aboard the P-8 that challenged Chinese territorial claims in the South China Sea back in May. By doing so, the U.S. established an independent and credible record of the flight’s events that could stand up against Chinese propaganda efforts. More importantly, it created a precedent that the U.S. might embed international media aboard any such flight over contested international waters in the region. The Chinese would have every reason to assume that the reactions of their on-scene forces to these flights might be broadcast to the world within hours, and as such might be encouraged to practice the utmost restraint in those reactions.

Not every claims-challenging U.S. Navy flight or warship transit will have embedded media aboard, though. It might be even harder (or perhaps entirely undesirable from an Operational Security standpoint) to embed media in frontline forces during a precipice-of-war crisis. And the issue is hardly isolated to the Far East; there have been applicable incidents within recent memory in Europe and the Mid-East.

Recall, then, what I wrote when I touched on this topic last October:

“…defeating a first salvo also means defeating the attacker’s inevitable diplomatic-propaganda campaign. Attackers within range of their homeland cellular networks, or otherwise using satellite uplinks, can quickly post audiovisual content recorded and edited on smartphones or similar devices to websites such as YouTube. From there, propaganda specialists can work to push the material via social networks to critical audiences; it may not take more than a few hours to become ‘viral’ and make the jump to traditional global media outlets. The side that gets seemingly-credible evidence of what happened out first seizes the initiative, perhaps decisively, in the diplomatically and politically-critical battle for the international and domestic public narratives regarding culpability and justification.

In a first salvo’s immediate aftermath, the defender must be able to quickly collect, process, and disseminate unimpeachable audiovisual evidence of its victimization without harming Operational Security. This would be no small feat, especially aboard a warship that is severely damaged or steeling itself for follow-on attacks. Even harder is developing continuously updated, interagency-coordinated, ‘stock’ narrative outlines in advance of any operation that might expose units to direct first salvo risk, not to mention the doctrine and training necessary to swiftly get an initial narrative out into the global media. Contrary to current public affairs practice, in some scenarios this might require evidence processing and public dissemination by lower echelons to be followed thereafter with amplification and context by executive Navy and national leadership. This will be a vitally important area for exploration through war gaming and fleet experiments.”

Jerry Hendrix makes the same point in his commentary on the Su-24 flyby of the USS Ross in the Black Sea on May 30th:

“We're a bit like lawyers," Hendrix said. “Before we make a response we are going to go back, gather the facts, look at the tape and then issue our response. But by the time we do, 24 to 48 hours later, Russia has already established the narrative: The ship was going to penetrate Russia's sovereign waters and the Russian military gloriously forced it to alter course.”

This dovetails with my ongoing crusade in favor of decentralized command and control doctrine, mission command, and command by negation. We have to start training and equipping our crews at the ‘tip of the spear’ so that they can engage in the narrative battle as an incident unfolds or immediately after it occurs. At bare minimum, we must give our crews what they need so that the U.S. and its allies do not lose the “first narrative salvo.”

Although this requires considerable delegation of “media messaging” authority and is accordingly not without risk, it is not fundamentally different than delegating tactical decision-making authority to the lowest practicable level in accordance with a higher-level commander’s intent. If we trust our trained ship, submarine, and aircraft squadron Commanding Officers and crews with the proper use of weapons systems in a tense situation, then we should also be able to train them so we can trust them with wielding smartphones and internet connections as an incident unfolds.

We could develop specially trained public affairs detachments for embarkation in our forces headed into contested waters; they could serve as Commanding Officers’ dedicated specialists much like any other division or workcenter. Or we could develop training regimes to prepare ship and aircraft crews, themselves, to fill these roles. Either way, if we’re serious about winning narrative battles—or at least not losing them when they matter most—we will have to empower our frontline forces. Our broader strategy in a given crisis or conflict may depend greatly on it.

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and are presented in his personal capacity. They do not reflect the official positions of Systems Planning and Analysis, and to the author’s knowledge do not reflect the policies or positions of the U.S. Department of Defense, any U.S. armed service, or any other U.S. Government agency.

A Japanese View on Conventional Deterrence of China

Sugio Takahashi of the Japan Ministry of Defense’s National Institute for Defense Studies has published an excellent short monograph at the Project 2049 Institute on his government’s conventional deterrence policy evolution with respect to China over the past few years. His explanation of the subtle deterrence policy differences between the 2010 and 2013 National Defense Program Guidelines (Japan’s highest-level defense strategy document) is particularly interesting.

Takahashi notes that the 2010 document defined the Chinese threat as being the opportunistic use of primarily non-military tools of national power to gradually expand the maritime zones under Beijing’s de facto political control. This, he says, led Japan to develop a policy of “dynamic deterrence” that focused more on countering China’s use of low-end salami tactics as it deemed the risk of conventional aggression by the PLA was low. Under its dynamic deterrence policy, Japan sought to use persistent Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) coverage of contested waters such as those surrounding the Senkakus to cue intercepts of Chinese “civilian” platforms by maritime law enforcement assets. Tailored military demonstrations of capabilities and readiness also figured into the policy. As he puts it: 

“…dynamic deterrence is intended to sensitize a challenger to the notion that they are always being watched, and that there are no physical gaps of defense posture, or “windows of opportunity,” for fait accompli or probing.” (Pg. 2)

While the 2013 Guidelines recognized the continuing problem of Chinese salami tactics, according to Takahashi it also recognized China’s increasingly-frequent deployment of maritime law enforcement—and sometimes PLA—assets near the Senkakus following Tokyo’s September 2012 purchase of the islands. As such, the 2013 Guidelines identified the emergence of escalation risks inherent to potential direct contacts between PLA and Japan Self-Defense Force assets in the East China. Maritime ISR still figured in heavily under the new Guidelines, but now had the task of enabling rapid responses by the Self-Defense Force to “deliberate or accidental escalation.” Conventional military considerations also rose in prominence, namely demonstrations of the Self-Defense Force’s ability to quickly and decisively conduct a circumstances-tailored response to any Chinese escalation along the spectrum of conventional conflict. This entailed deployments of Self-Defense Force units to forward positions as deemed situationally appropriate, plus the ability to quickly surge forces forward as required.

Takahashi asserts that the most immediate threat to Japanese interests remains China’s use of coast guard and other “paramilitary forces to challenge the East Asian maritime status quo. With respect to the South China Sea challenge, he correctly observes that:

“…since very few Southeast Asian countries currently have significant coast guard forces, there is a possibility that Southeast Asian countries will mobilize military forces to counter China’s paramilitary force. If that occurs, China can blame those countries as “escalating the situation” and further justify their mobilization of military forces. (Pg. 4)

This is exactly what happened to the Philippines in the 2012 Scarsborough Shoal incident.

Even more interestingly, he implies a Japanese government concern that if the U.S. were to publicly declare that China’s improvements of its nuclear second strike capabilities had led to a state of mutual nuclear vulnerability, it might encourage the Chinese to act more boldly in the conventional sphere. He refers to the stability-instability paradox, or rather the idea that the nuclear equilibrium made possible by a secure second strike capability in turn encourages adventurism at the conventional level.

While I understand Takahashi’s concern, it’s important to note that Cold War deterrence theorists did not believe the paradox was deterministic. As I noted in my SSQ article on conventional deterrence:

Glenn Snyder, an early articulator of the paradox, points out that the interplays between context, specific circumstances, and chance are the keys to its real-world application. In his view, a Soviet conventional offensive against NATO or Japan would have had vastly greater ramifications to US interests and prestige, and therefore more risk of unleashing inadvertent escalatory processes, than one against countries in which U.S. interests were peripheral. Robert Jervis agreed, noting that Schelling’s ill-controlled escalatory process meant nuclear equilibrium hardly created any margin of safety for major conventional provocations or wars.[1] Nevertheless, it is the defender’s inability to confidently know whether the stability-instability paradox will work for or against deterrence efforts at a given point in time that drives the need for a conventional hedging force capable of denying the opponent’s potential fait accompli attempts. (Pg. 154)

And Takahashi does a spectacular job outlining the qualities of such a hedging force. He states that:

“From the perspective of countering the A2/AD threat, however, putting more forces on the frontline would not be wise because these frontline forces could be neutralized or destroyed by Chinese A2/AD capabilities. A light presence on the frontline and a heavier stand-off strike force outside of A2/AD ranges would be better-suited for this environment.”(Pg. 6)

His observation on the need for two forward “echelons,” a “light” one consisting of lower campaign-value assets to fight on the “frontline,” and a “heavy” one consisting of higher campaign-value assets that fight from locations “over-the-horizon,” mirrors my own thinking on this issue. So does his subsequent observation that forward forces must be designed to be resilient against a Chinese conventional first strike, and thereby lower any Chinese incentives to conduct one in a crisis or limited conflict, let alone pursue a major conflict.

Takahashi raises the question of whether the best approach for structuring the “frontline” forces within a peacetime-contested zone is to employ tactical dispersal of lower-campaign value conventional forces in order to counter primarily military threats, employ primarily coast guard assets in order to counter salami tactic threats, or a mix of the two. I frankly believe a mix is the right way to go, with the non-military forces in the “area of contact” and the military forces latently backing them from a distance determined by the specifics of the situation. Takahashi is absolutely right that U.S. and Japanese leaders will need to work together to sketch out the “right capability portfolio and institutional division of labor,” not only between non-military and military forces but also the Japanese and U.S. contingents. His monograph provides a terrific starting point for that exact discussion.

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and are presented in his personal capacity. They do not reflect the official positions of Systems Planning and Analysis, and to the author’s knowledge do not reflect the policies or positions of the U.S. Department of Defense, any U.S. armed service, or any other U.S. Government agency.

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[1] See 1. Glenn Snyder. Deterrence and Defense. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1961), 225-26; 2. Glenn Snyder, “The Balance of Power and the Balance of Terror,” in Balance of Power, ed. Paul Seabury (San Francisco: Chandler Publishing Co., 1965), 199; and 3. Robert Jervis. The Meaning of the Nuclear Revolution. (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1989), 21-22, 105.

The 2015 Pew Global Attitudes Survey’s Findings on NATO Solidarity

Last month the Pew Research Center released the results of a public opinion poll conducted during April and May of this year in the larger NATO member countries, plus Ukraine and Russia, on perceptions of European security issues. The poll highlighted the unsurprising differences across NATO members’ publics regarding the desirability of supporting Ukraine’s ongoing efforts to fend off Russian aggression. It also underscored the Putin regime’s unsurprising depth of popular support at home, notwithstanding the domestic economic difficulties exacerbated by Western sanctions.[i]

The greatest amount of mainstream media attention, though, focused on Pew’s findings on the apparent unwillingness of large NATO member countries’ publics to support the use of military force by their governments to defend a fellow NATO ally from Russian aggression:

“Roughly half or fewer in six of the eight countries surveyed say their country should use military force if Russia attacks a neighboring country that is a NATO ally. And at least half in three of the eight NATO countries say that their government should not use military force in such circumstances. The strongest opposition to responding with armed force is in Germany (58%), followed by France (53%) and Italy (51%). Germans (65%) and French (59%) ages 50 and older are more opposed to the use of military force against Russia than are their younger counterparts ages 18 to 29 (Germans 50%, French 48%). German, British and Spanish women are particularly against a military response.”

This contrasts strongly with the poll’s findings on these publics’ views on Russia as a military threat to its neighbors:

And broad majorities of these publics believe the U.S. would rally to an embattled NATO ally’s aid:

“While some in NATO are reluctant to help aid others attacked by Russia, a median of 68% of the NATO member countries surveyed believe that the U.S. would use military force to defend an ally. The Canadians (72%), Spanish (70%), Germans (68%) and Italians (68%) are the most confident that the U.S. would send military aid. In many countries, young Europeans express the strongest faith in the U.S. to help defend allied countries. The Poles, citizens of the most front-line nation in the survey, have their doubts: 49% think Washington would fulfill its Article 5 obligation, 31% don’t think it would and 20% aren’t sure.”

The German numbers are the most disconcerting. It would be extraordinarily difficult for the U.S. to mount a ground and air defense anywhere in Eastern Europe or eastern Scandinavia if we couldn’t use German bases, air and sea ports, and transportation networks. Even so, the numbers Pew reported for responders in eastern Germany are not surprising given the longstanding and remarkably wide pervasiveness of Ostalgie across multiple demographic groups.

So what gives? And what can policymakers and analysts take away from the results?

For starters, a poll is only as illuminating as its questions are worded. Many of the Pew survey’s questions fall into the popularity contest category of ‘do you have confidence in (fill in the leader’s name) to do the right thing in foreign policy?’ or ‘do you approve of (fill in the leader’s name)’s handling of (fill in the international issue)?’ or ‘do you have a favorable opinion of (fill in name of country or international organization)?’ All this may indicate the probability that a “low-information” individual will follow some leader or embrace some organization based on “likability” alone, but it doesn’t tell us anything about what that individual’s actual policy preferences are (or would be if they had more information about the choices at hand).

And therein lies the weakness of most polls: they’re almost invariably too generally worded to truly help the policymaker and analyst understand what an informed public would or would not support. For example, consider Pew’s ‘rally to a NATO ally’s defense’ question:

“Q52. If Russia got into a serious military conflict with one of its neighboring countries that is our NATO ally, do you think (survey country) should or should not use military force to defend that country?”

People who don’t normally think about how geography or foundational principles of regional security relate to them in their daily lives don’t tend to take those intangibles into account in their gut responses to questions like this. And some might differentiate between an abstract case (e.g., “a neighboring country of Russia”) and an actual named country they can picture relative to themselves. So to further refine the data and better understand what people actually believe or want (as varied across a given country’s regions and demographic groups), a series of follow-on questions might be desirable:

1.      First, two questions to baseline whether responders support the core Helsinki principles at stake, and whether they believe their country’s relationship within NATO should be transactional and self-interested.

a.       “Do you believe your country, all NATO and EU members, and Russia should refrain from threatening or violating each others’ frontiers and territorial integrities?”

b.      “If Russia committed military acts of aggression or coercion against your country, would you want the U.S. and other NATO allies to militarily come to your country’s defense?”

2.      The next three questions would identify the degree to which responders believed NATO’s defensive burden should be shared in a conflict in the responders’ own neighborhoods.

a.       “If Russia committed military acts of aggression or coercion against (name of a fellow NATO ally that bordered responder’s country), would you want the U.S. to militarily come to that country’s defense?”

b.      “Would you support U.S. military use of your country’s territory to defend (name of a fellow NATO ally that bordered responder’s country)?”

c.       “If Russia committed military acts of aggression or coercion against (name of a fellow NATO ally that bordered responder’s country), would you want your country to militarily come to that country’s defense?”

3.      The final three would identify the degree to which responders believed the NATO defensive burden should be shared in a conflict beyond the responders’ own neighborhoods.

a.       “If Russia committed military acts of aggression or coercion against (name of a fellow NATO ally at a distance from responder’s country), would you want the U.S. to militarily come to that country’s defense?”

b.      “Would you support U.S. military use of your country’s territory to defend (name of a fellow NATO ally at a distance from responder’s country)?”

c.       “If Russia committed military acts of aggression or coercion against (name of a fellow NATO ally at a distance from responder’s country), would you want your country to militarily come to that country’s defense?”

We might not like the answers to these questions, but they would tell us a great deal more than what we found in the Pew survey.

Lastly, in digesting the Pew numbers, the slight rebounds in many polled countries regarding Russia’s and Putin’s “favorability” from 2014 to 2015 ought to be examined in terms of the possible effects of Russian propaganda. A good poll question to do this might have been to ask what principal media outlets in a responder's country, including social networks, the responder turned to for trusted news on Russia, NATO, or Ukraine. A pretty good picture of the information war would emerge from that data.

The EU is focusing its efforts to counter Russian propaganda on Russian-speaking populations in former Soviet states, including the Baltics. That’s all fine and good, but it would seem that the domestic information gaps regarding Russian political, informational, economic, and military threats to their own countries are in sore need of being addressed as well. NATO and EU member governments should be reaching out to the independent press within their own borders with hard and verifiable facts that counter the Putin regime’s narratives, highlight the Putin regime’s efforts to influence European politics and policy, and detail the Putin regime’s illiberality at home. National leaders on both sides of the Atlantic owe their citizens a frank and continuous dialogue on how the foundational values of European security enshrined in the Helsinki Final Act are being endangered by the Putin regime’s policies, and what that should mean to them in their daily lives. Those free electorates should then be left to decide whether those values are worth defending.

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and are presented in his personal capacity. They do not reflect the official positions of Systems Planning and Analysis, and to the author’s knowledge do not reflect the policies or positions of the U.S. Department of Defense, any U.S. armed service, or any other U.S. Government agency.

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[i] Given the Putin regime’s authoritarian nature and the pervasiveness of its security apparatus, though, I don’t have much confidence that all the Russian citizens polled gave their true views without fear of repercussions. There is nevertheless more than enough qualitative evidence elsewhere that a majority of the Russian people support the Putin regime and its foreign policies. The resolute depth of that support is what's open to question. I find that Pew’s number highlights the extreme improbability that there will be any mass popular movements taking to the streets throughout Russia in opposition to the regime anytime soon. More importantly, Pew’s findings on the depth of Russian popular irredentism indicate the improbability of Western-leaning classically liberal politicians coming to power if the Putin regime were to fall.