that talking thing... smith-mundt edition

I thought that two interesting points which came out of the last week's discussion of Presidential candidates and public diplomacy deserve more discussion. 

First, a number of commenters argued that I gave too much credit to McCain's public diplomacy initiatives.  For one example, Donna Marie Oglesby, counseler for USIA in the Clinton Administration, argued that "McCain appears less interested in public diplomacy than in what we used to call advocacy and is now called strategic communication. His interest is in the “war of ideas” and advancing American objectives in the global information battle-space." That's probably true, though I thought that my point about his overly-militarized understanding of the problem captured many of the points raised.  But whether or not his ideas are any good, it's undeniable that his Foreign Affairs essay (if not his more recent campaign speeches) had a fairly lengthy discussion of the problem - which Clinton's did not.   I think it's fair to expect that I'll be giving more scrutiny to McCain's ideas come summer, should I still have a stake in the outcome.

Second, and much more substantive, Matt Armstrong has offered a powerful and pointed case for the abolition of the Smith-Mundt ban on the domestic dissemination of propaganda designed for foreign audiences.  Here's a taste of his critique:

First and foremost, we must revisit and discuss the purpose and intent of the prohibitions of Smith-Mundt Act of 1948. Debated and enacted to improve the quality of our responses to adversarial propaganda during the communications revolution of the 1940s, it was based on the communications market of the time.  It is now invoked to prevent any potential communication that might possibly be heard or seen by Americans.  This fear of being overheard in America has done more to neuter U.S. responses and to encourage the creation of new information functions than anything else.  We have created an information architecture that cares more about how a broadcast, flyer, or message will play in Iowa than in the primary center of gravity of the fight: the minds of the support base of our adversary.  The result is timid responses and artificial self-containment out of touch with the virtual geography of today’s psychological landscape.
...

Sixty years ago, the elements of America’s national power – diplomacy, information, military, and economics, or DIME – were retooled to meet an emerging threat with the National Security Act of 1947 and the Smith-Mundt Act of 1948.  Then as it is today, the U.S. was engaged in a war of ideas and perceptions both globally and domestically, however the importance and impact of Smith-Mundt is ignored despite its influence, often negative, on every aspect of America’s informational arsenal.

This year the Defense Department will look into how the National Security Act of 1947 should be modified to adapt to 21st Century conflict.  The candidates should be bold and argue for a more holistic self-analysis.   

Our information systems suffer from inflexibility and internal resistance rooted in a misunderstanding of Smith-Mundt that requires updating to conform to a reality that makes separating audiences by geography both impractical and undesirable.  This will not be a conflict over hearts and passions, but a psychological struggle over minds and wills.  We must stop telling foreign publics what we want our own people to hear. Unless we get our information house in order, the United States will remain virtually unarmed in the battles that shape our future.

I have mixed feelings about this.  On the one hand, Armstrong's enthusiasm to improve the quality of American international information operations somewhat clouds his recognition of the basic point that the ban on domestic dissemination is there for a reason.   I admit to finding it somewhat alarming when a leading public diplomacy guy in the current administration tried at some length to convince me that Smith-Mundt didn't legally apply to DoD efforts at all.  I'm no lawyer, nor a bureaucrat, so I have no idea if he's right - but the principles behind Smith-Mundt, of protecting the American democratic system from manipulation by the military or intelligence agencies, seem to me to be far more important.

The temptation to manipulate American public opinion has always been there, and has only grown more potent in an age where counter-insurgency practitioners and "Long War" planners openly view the American domestic arena as a vital strategic arena.  I'd go so far as to suggest that a not-insignificant portion of General Petraeus's information operations efforts have been directed towards shaping American public discourse.  It isn't an accident that he has been so available to so many journalists, or that the flow of "good news" about the Anbar Awakening and the surge into the American media has expanded so dramatically.  And why wouldn't he, when at the heart of the new counter-insurgency doctrine lies the recognition that maintaining domestic public support for a long, drawn-out military presence is one of the most important single factors? 

Recognizing this reality could draw one of two responses.  The first is to recoil in horror and attempt to strengthen, broaden and enforce Smith-Mundt's principles.   This position would focus on the dangers to American democracy posed by the military or intelligence agencies manipulating information and disseminating propaganda.  The impulse to get this under control is exceptionally strong, and well-justified.  This is particularly the case with propaganda which falls clearly into the realm of the political, conventionally defined:  selective release of information intended to make the current President look good (or bad).   It's less obvious, but in some ways more important when the propaganda is conceived of as part of the war effort itself, and building domestic public support is incorporated into the military's mission.  This should worry everyone, liberals and conservatives alike, since it erodes some fairly core commitments and assumptions underpinning our democracy.

At the same time, I've become somewhat fatalistic about the ability to actually control this or to enforce Smith-Mundt's principles in any serious fashion.  Preventing the domestic reception of propaganda released abroad is simply impossible given the globalization of the media and the incredibly fast movement of information from one public to another, from one language to another, from one media form to another.  Suppose, in a purely hypothetical example, that the US military does some PsyOp work in the field in Iraq to persuade Iraqis of the brutality of al-Qaeda and the nobility of the Awakenings rising up against it:  say, that AQI used a pregnant woman as a suicide bomber.   Even if the intention was purely local, meant only for Iraqi consumption, and that the US forces did everything in their power to prevent its dissemination in the US (both unlikely assumptions),  the odds that this story would filter through a local stringer into the American media are overwhelming.   It would be discussed in one of the forums or picked up in an Iraqi newspaper or Iraqi government outlets, and almost immediately translated and disseminated through the English-language distribution chain - and if the mainstream media didn't immediately bite, blogs would quickly fill the gap.

I honestly don't know what to do about all of this.  Smith-Mundt's principles are important, but both current practice and the realities of the information age make it nearly impossible to realize them.  Once again, constructive commentary - on either my thoughts or Armstrong's - very much encouraged!

Comments

[Solomon2]

the principles behind Smith-Mundt, of protecting the American democratic system from manipulation by the military or intelligence agencies, seem to me to be far more important.

On what basis do you make that judgment, Mr. Lynch? The U.S. can't do much in the PD sphere because of S-M restrictions. Unlike the 1940s, American media operates using worldwide sources, so the likelihood the American democratic system could be snowed by PD work if low - far lower, in my opinion, than the opportunities for manipulation demonstrated by members of the U.S. intelligence community through the use of selective and anonymous leaks.

On the other hand, a democracy like France which, to my limited knowledge, has no domestic dissemination restrictions, is much better regarded worldwide than the U.S.

Finally, it is difficult to dispute that there is no value at all to PD officers speaking up in the domestic sphere. Currently the only counter available to gross misinformation spouted by errant politicians to ordinary Americans is to resign one's post and write a book, or maybe run for Congress. I wonder how America could have developed such statesmen as Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, or John Quincy Adams (all of whom served abroad) had Smith-Mundt's provisions be in effect.

In short, it is worth pondering whether or not the restrictions of Smith-Mundt have damaged, are damaging, or may damage American democracy more than S-M's repeal or modification.

[JHM]

(Not the world's happiest acronym, that S-M!)

If Rear-Colonel Mountainrunner has any solution to the problem that he himself announces as having afflicted PubDip in the past, he does not mention it:

"... weak attempts to explain policy, but with a partisan bent. Truth is obfuscated or sterilized to be almost worthless." [Emboldenment added]

How would "a seat in the cabinet, .. a staff, and a substantial budget" improve the partisanship situation? Mightn't the militant Republicans just insist on some equivalent bureaucratic plaything for themselves?

Happy days.

[luci]

"We have created an information architecture that cares more about how a broadcast, flyer, or message will play in Iowa than in the primary center of gravity of the fight"

I have no idea one way or the other, but is this true? Is it common knowledge that our international propaganda efforts are hamstrung because of this prohibition?

"Suppose, in a purely hypothetical example, that the US military does some PsyOp work in the field in Iraq to persuade Iraqis of the brutality of al-Qaeda"

We all have, long ago, read the Washington Post story on the US military's disinformation campaign to exaggerate al Qaeda's role in Iraq (using Zarqawi, for instance), wherein they specifically stated that the US domestic population was one of the targets for this propaganda. I've been surprised, that even though there are stories periodically claiming that al Qaeda is not what we think it is, that the media goes straight on, uncritically, repeating every unverifiable claim about this group. Every time I read "al Qaeda in Iraq," I think, "yeah. right."

[Zathras]

If we are to, as Matt Armstrong says, stop telling foreign audiences what we want our own people to hear, how to we prevent ourselves from drowning out our own message?

The Bush administration did not create this problem, but it has become notorious over the last several years for sending out senior officials to explain American foreign policy in terms designed to appeal to American audiences. The President himself has made more statements along the lines of "freedom is on the march" than I can count; for some time these struck a chord with Americans, as they were intended to, with language that Americans associate with what we admire in our own country's government and society. Their impact on foreign audiences, if it was not actually an afterthought, might as well have been.

I wrote in an earlier post here about the culture of the permanent campaign. Products of that culture -- of whom President Bush is not just an example but practically a caricature -- will inevitably focus like a laser on addressing domestic audiences. It's what they know. But just as inevitably most of what a President, Vice President, or Secretary of State has to say about foreign policy will find its way before foreign audiences. How does a lowly public diplomacy professional, no matter what department he reports to, compete with that? Can an entire public diplomacy agency compete with that?

Maybe this consideration makes Smith-Mundt moot, and maybe we have to accept that no mere structural change in how we organize American public diplomacy will help much if we keep putting people like George Bush in the White House. At any rate, even a more sophisticated President could easily step on a public diplomacy that attempted to do too much, just because of the way global communications have evolved.

[WW]

What about the role of the private sector? Does Smith-Munt apply to them?

Common PR tactics on US domestic scene today (think rent-a crowds, phony news reports, partisan scientific studies) would have shocked postwar America. These activities are largely handled by private sector PR firms and consultancies that cut their teeth working for corporate America.

I think we need to recognize that much of US information ops (for sure in Iraq and Afghanistan) have been contracted out to private firms that do things like plant stories in newspapers, fund friendly media outlets. Abu Aardvark’s anecdote about the Pentagon believing Smith-Munt doesn’t apply to them points in this direction.

We are now seeing the reverse of the problem Smith Munt was worried about: rather than our foreign propaganda activities coming home to bite us, the US is exporting propaganda strategies it developed in-house.

In this context, US public diplomacy projects like Radio Farda and al-Hurra are largely irrelevant. I’ve watched them. They mostly broadcast recycled wire stories with slightly pro-US framings, bland human interest stories about America, or entertainment programming.

The real hard-core propaganda is being handled in the private sector. Those who worry about this should work on regulating this with new legislation. Those who don’t should rest assured that Smith-Munt is doing nothing to restrain these activities.

[WW]

*smith-munDt*

posted pre-coffee, please excuse.

[john brown]

May I recommend Kenneth Osgood, Total Cold War: Eisenhower’s Secret Propaganda Battle at
Home and Abroad (Lawrence, Kansas: University of Kansas Press, 2006) re the actual relevance of the Smith-Mundt Act in the years following its enactment in 1948. See also
http://www.h-net.org/~diplo/roundtables/PDF/TotalColdWar-OsgoodResponse.pdf , in which Osgood notes that reviewers of his book "see connections between my historical analysis of the Cold War era
and the foreign policy dilemmas facing us today."

[MountainRunner]

Marc et al,
You raise some important issues which I've addressed in my response here.
Matt