The Convergence - The Army's Mad Scientist Podcast

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28. The Next Ten Years of Tech with Eli Dourado Feb 04, 2021

Show notes

Eli Dourado is a senior research fellow at the Center for Growth and Opportunity (CGO) at Utah State University. He focuses on the hard technology and innovation needed to drive large increases in economic growth — speeding up infrastructure deployment, eliminating barriers to entrepreneurs operating in the physical world, and getting the most out of federal technology research programs. He has worked on a wide range of technology policy issues, including aviation, Internet governance, and cryptocurrency. His popular writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and Foreign Policy, among other outlets.

In today’s podcast, Mr. Dourado discusses technology opportunities in the next decade, the economic impact of shifting technology trends, and their impact on global security. The following bullet points highlight key insights from our interview with him:

According to economic statistics, technological growth has stagnated since 2005. While some claim that the economy has fully matured and further growth will be limited, others argue that there is still room for growth, but U.S. culture and complacency has prevented further growth.
In the next two decades, geothermal energy will have the biggest impact on economic development. Cheap, unlimited geothermal energy will enable the use of more expensive materials like silicon carbide by significantly reducing the cost to create them, produce energy without carbon emissions thus mitigating the effects of climate change, and reduce food security concerns via indoor growing models.
The United States is now energy independent, which could incentivize a shift away from intervention in the Middle East. Conflict in the region could still significantly impact U.S. supply chains, given Asian reliance on Middle Eastern energy flows.
While genetic enhancements are still decades away, brain computer interfaces (BCI) could allow soldiers to command technology at the speed of thought in the next ten years. Related bioethical concerns, while important, may also be limiting the growth of beneficial technologies.
Decreasing launch costs are facilitating both commercial and governmental expansion in space. High resolution earth sensing technology could soon enable a “live Google Earth,” in which viewers could watch scenarios unfold in real time (e.g., Uyghur camps), impacting social movements.
Augmented reality will be widely adopted by the middle of the decade. However, systems will still require the development of ‘contextual awareness’ to prevent overloading users with information. In a conflict situation, a balance will need to be found that does not distract soldiers, but provides critical information in real time.
The U.S. military should use its procurement power to stimulate private investment in developing hard technologies. Currently, talent is pulled into app design and software development due to higher capacity financing.

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next episode of “The Convergence,” featuring Mr. Shawn Steene (OSD Policy) and Mr. Michael Meier (HQDA OTJAG), discussing the ground truth on regulations and directives regarding lethal autonomy and what the future of autonomy for the force might mean in a complex threat environment on 18 February 2021!

27. Hybrid Threats and Liminal Warfare with Dr. David Kilcullen Jan 21, 2021

Show notes

David Kilcullen is Professor of Practice at the Center on the Future of War and the School of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University, a Senior Fellow at New America, and an author, strategist, and counterinsurgency expert. He served 25 years as an officer in the Australian Army, diplomat and policy advisor for the Australian and United States Governments, in command and operational missions (including peacekeeping, counterinsurgency and foreign internal defense) across the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Europe. In the United States, he was Chief Strategist in the State Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau, and served in Iraq as Senior Counterinsurgency Advisor to General David Petraeus, before becoming Special Advisor for Counterinsurgency to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. He is the author of a number of influential books including The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One, Counterinsurgency, Out of the Mountains, and Blood Year: The Unraveling of Western Counterterrorism — based on an essay that received the Walkley Award, the Australian version of the Pulitzer Prize. His newest book is The Dragons and the Snakes: How the Rest Learned to Fight the West.

In today’s podcast, Dr. Kilcullen discusses the future of conflict, changing concepts of victory, and achieving decisive advantages. The following bullet points highlight key insights from our interview with him:

Different actors (state and non-state) are converging on a set of tactics: small teams, modular, urban, use of cyber kinetics.
This convergence is an adaptation to US and Western dominance in a small sub-set of warfare characterized by high tech, connected, exquisite systems of systems. We describe this as conventional or regular warfare because we are the best in the world at this type of conflict.
These different actors are the Dragons (states) and Snakes (non-state actors). Dragons are back, but acting more like Snakes. Snakes are more capable due to the democratization of technology which makes them more lethal and capable of operating regionally and globally.
The War on Terror is not over, but the period of large occupations has ended. Simultaneously, the possible resurgence of Great Power Conflict means the US must be capable of fighting both near peer competitors and capable non-state actors.
The defining characteristics of future warfare include:
Liminal Warfare – Our adversaries will seek to operate below the West’s response threshold, executing covert operations that may be detected, but whose sponsorship remains cloaked and unattributed; and ambiguous actions, where both the operation and sponsor may be suspected, but remains unproven.
Tactical Concepts employing small teams, modular, swarming, empowered by advanced communications and (in the future) artificial intelligence.
Blending cyber-kinetic operations. Cyber can no longer be viewed as a stand-alone tactic. Adversaries are using cyber to achieve lethal effects and using kinetic operations to degrade cyber, data, and communications infrastructures.
What are we missing?
Bio-weapons – adversaries have watched the impact of something like COVID on aircraft carriers, cruise ships, and aviation. Ground forces are less susceptible because they operate dispersed.
Fighting unplugged – this should be the norm for U.S. Army training and exercises. BeiDou, China’s own GPS capability, is now fully operational and the PRC has developed a sophisticated Space warfare concept.
Nuclear battlefield – with great power conflict comes the possibility of use of nuclear weapons on future battlefields. The Russians have a range of nuclear weapons that include sub-tactical munitions.

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next episode of “The Convergence,” featuring Eli Dourado — an economist and Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Growth and Opportunity at Utah State University — discussing significant technology areas in the next decade, the economic impact of shifting technology trends, and their impact on global security on 4 February 2021!

If you enjoyed this episode, watch Dr. Kilcullen’s presentation on Sub-threshold conflict in a new age of Great-Power Competition in our Operational Environment and Conflict Over the Next Decade Webinar video and his associated slide deck.

26. Changing Mindsets for the Future with Dr. Lydia Kostopoulos Jan 07, 2021

Show notes

Dr. Lydia Kostopoulos is the Science and Technology subject matter expert at the U.S. Special Operations Command’s (USSOCOM’s) Joint Special Operations University where she is working on developing technology related education for the Special Operations Force Professional. Previously, she was a Strategy and Innovation Advisor conducting forecasting work on technology and the future operating environment for the J5 at USSOCOM. She has addressed the United Nations member states at the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons Group of Governmental Experts (CCW GGE) meeting on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems (LAWS) and participates in NATO Science for Peace projects. Check out her website at www.lkcyber.com and follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/lkcyber.

In today’s podcast, Dr. Kostopoulos discusses the future of competition and conflict and steps the Army can take in preparing for it. The following bullet points highlight key insights from our interview with her:

I think about the future from a point of tech abundancy. If you think about the availability, accessibility, and benefits of emerging technologies, you can study the flip side of this to identify the associated threats. Examples include the use of technologies by protestors or the use of drones and loitering munitions in small conflicts like Nagorno-Karabakh.
There is no shared reality of what competition and conflict is or will look like. In a recent speech, LTG (R) McMaster said that we needed “more strategic empathy” and “less strategic narcissism.” This isn’t about preparing for the war we want to fight because our adversaries will probably not provide us that opportunity.
You see this difference in the view of future warfare by studying the growing role of the cyber threat space. Our adversaries seek to influence and attain their objectives in the competition and crisis phases via Information Operations. They are more focused on limiting our C4ISR and less on big platform conflict.
This threat to our C4ISR capabilities and the speed of the future battlefield means we will have to find ways to preserve decision space for our political and military leaders.
We need to focus on gaining a competitive advantage in situational understanding and rapidly conveying this information to our leaders.
Emerging technologies like hypersonic weapons present additional challenges, making it difficult to manage escalation and political off ramps. Eventually they might gain the same deterrent value as nuclear weapons.
The stress of speed, time, and decision making will impact our cognitive capabilities. Improving human performance will become a critical aspect of preparing for future conflict. This will start with diet and sleep to build neuro protection.
What is the U.S. Army missing? The focus on reducing bureaucracy and the opportunity to improve/change decision processes and doctrine to be more resilient on this faster battlefield. I recently heard a senior leader state, “Never too Senior to be wrong!” and “Never too Junior to have the best idea!”
What keeps me up at night? Lack of imagination and resistance to change

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next episode of “The Convergence,” featuring Dr. David Kilcullen, bestselling author, leading researcher in the field of unconventional and guerrilla warfare, former professional soldier and diplomat, and President and CEO of Cordillera Applications Group, on 21 January 2021! Dr. Kilcullen will discuss the future of conflict, changing concepts of victory, and achieving decisive advantages.

25. Reading and Leading in the Future with Joe Byerly Dec 17, 2020

Show notes

In this episode of “The Convergence,” we discuss reading and its implications on leadership and forecasting, the future of command selection, and cultivating effective communicators and thinkers in the future force with LTC Joe Byerly, an active duty armor officer in the U.S. Army who has served in both conventional military and Joint assignments. In 2013, LTC Byerly started From the Green Notebook to share this thoughts on self-development — “I’m passionate about leader development and want to help others to lead with the best version of themselves. I created this site to provide a platform for leaders to help each other by sharing lessons learned. Lessons that come from our own green notebooks.”

The following bullet points highlight key insights on leadership and reading from our interview with LTC Byerly:

Leaders can learn and prepare for the future by reading and understanding how we got to where we are, studying economics and the social sciences, and focusing on what the classics tell us about human behavior.
Reading science fiction as part of our personal study program serves as a mental laboratory to push our thought and help us break from linear projection (now) into the future.
To understand the possibilities of the future, you have to connect disparate things and bring them together. Reading broadly and connecting these dots improves strategic thinking.
Ideal Soldiers in the future will love to learn, demonstrate empathy, and have the ability to fight and win.
Communication is a key skill for the future to describe vision and intent. A favorite quote – “If the people can’t see your vision, then it is a hallucination.”
Talking to future Soldiers, we must convince them to own their personal development.
The tech that scares me the most in the future? “Altering bio and genetic engineering – really, anything that makes me wear a mask for seven hours at Disney World.” [Editor’s Note: this response is similar from those of Soldiers from the 1980s when confronted with the daunting prospect of having to fight buttoned up in MOPP IV for prolonged periods of time!]

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next episode of “The Convergence,” featuring Dr. Lydia Kostopoulos, Science and Technology (Emergent Tech) subject matter expert at the Joint Special Operations University, U.S. Special Operations Command, on 7 January 2021!

If you enjoyed this post, check out:

The Convergence: The Future of Talent and Soldiers with MAJ Delaney Brown, CPT Jay Long, and 1LT Richard Kuzma and the associated podcast

Fight Club Prepares Lt Col Maddie Novák for Cross-Dimension Manoeuvre, by proclaimed Mad Scientists LTC Arnel David, U.S. Army, and Major Aaron Moore, British Army; The Convergence: UK Fight Club – Gaming the Future Army; and the associated podcast

Winning Future Wars through Developing the Intellectual Component of Fighting Power: The Australian Army’s Approach to Professional Military Education, by LTCOL Greg Colton, Australian Army

24. Bringing AI to the Joint Force with Ms. Jacqueline Tame, Ms. Alka Patel, and Dr. Jane Pinelis of the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center Dec 03, 2020

Show notes

The Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC) is the Department of Defense’s (DoD) Artificial Intelligence (AI) Center of Excellence that provides a critical mass of expertise to help the Department harness the game-changing power of AI. To help operationally prepare the Department for AI, the JAIC integrates technology development with the requisite policies, knowledge, processes, and relationships to ensure long term success and scalability.

The mission of the JAIC is to transform the DoD by accelerating the delivery and adoption of AI to achieve mission impact at scale. The goal is to use AI to solve large and complex problem sets that span multiple services, then ensure the Services and Components have real-time access to ever-improving libraries of data sets and tools.

In this episode of “The Convergence” we discuss how the JAIC is bringing AI to the Joint Force (and the associated challenges!) with the following panel members:

Jacqueline Tame, Acting Deputy Director, Chief Performance Officer
Alka Patel, Head of AI Ethics Policy
Jane Pinelis, Chief, Testing and Evaluation, Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML).

The following bullet points highlight the key insights from our interview:

We have not seen a reorganization of the DoD since the Goldwater–Nichols Act in 1986. AI offers a catalyst for what is next.
The DoD has a temporal split in how to integrate AI. AI is now ready to start tackling Phase I objectives to alleviate redundant and repetitive work, but legacy processes and cultural barriers remain as obstacles in starting this work.
Phase II objectives of integrating AI on the battlefield present additional obstacles that are measurable. Getting AI ready requires improved open mindedness at the individual level on what is possible and a willingness to accept risks, improve data readiness, modernize information technology, recruit the requisite talent, and implement the necessary policies.
Phase II represents AI integration at a level that could redefine what it means to be Joint. Moving from doctrinal definitions and incredible effort to operate jointly to the technical ability to accomplish this at speed and scale.
The human capital to implement AI at scale requires a diverse workforce and achange in culture.
We need to broaden our aperture and think about adding psychologists, cognitive behavioral scientists, education and learning experts, and just more analytical thinkers to our AI workforce.
Changing our culture and messaging is more important than compensation when attracting this type of workforce. Retention requires a culture that encourages professional development and work on side projects (Google 20%).
Integrating AI on the battlefield will require some level of run time monitoring to identify emergent negative behaviors. This idea is not new as humans are the biggest autonomous systems on the battlefield and sometimes they act in an unethical manner.

What keeps these experts up at night?

The failure of DoD to recognize the potential in distributed ledger tech that could solve many current challenges.
Adversarial AI: beyond an adversary turning “a panda into a toaster.” Visually tricking AI may be a popular discussion point, but it’s a niche problem that is diverting valuable R&D resources from easier and more problematic attack vectors like patching and data poisoning. We need to dedicate our resources to building resiliency into our AI-enabled systems or risk being vulnerable or too late.
How do we make sure that the tools developed are used by moral agents? Having the right humans operating these systems will become even more important.

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next episode of “The Convergence” — Reading and Leading in the Future with LTC Joe Byerly on 17 December 2020!

23. Disinformation, Revisionism, and China with Doowan Lee Nov 12, 2020

Show notes

Today’s episode of “The Convergence” podcast features a conversation with Mr. Doowan Lee, Senior Director from Zignal Labs. Mr. Lee is a National Security expert in influence intelligence, disinformation analysis, data analytics, network visualization, and great power competition. Before joining Zignal Labs, Mr. Lee served as a professor and principal investigator at the Naval Postgraduate School, where he executed federally funded projects on collaborative information systems, network analysis, and disinformation analysis. His article, entitled The United States Isn’t Doomed to Lose the Information Wars, explores Russian and Chinese disinformation campaigns and was featured in Foreign Policy last month.

The following bullet points highlight key insights from our interview with Mr. Lee:

Our adversaries see disinformation as just an effective tool that provides strategic and global reach. We see it as irregular warfare when it is anything but irregular.
Disinformation, or the historical term propaganda, has been around forever. COVID-19 has accentuated this threat vector or surface.
The Chinese government outlined their national information operations policy in “The Communiqué on the Current State of the Ideological Sphere” (also known as Document #9):

– Nations talking about the spread of open societies are attempting to undermine the CCP.

- The CCP will maintain positive control of all media.

- The CCP will professionalize information operations.

This policy resulted in the development of the “Great Firewall,” the “Golden Shield“ project, and the PLA’s Strategic Support Forces.

The CCP and the Kremlin are increasing their coordination on national security activities and, in some cases, are increasing their collaboration. This resulted in a recent joint statement that stated the two governments would work together to undermine disinformation that seeks to destabilize the Russian and Chinese governments.
How is our Great Competition strategy working to prevent Chinese and Russian collaboration?
Slaughtering the “Golden Calf”
Information Operations are not irregular DROP THE ADJECTIVE! There is nothing irregular about these operations and they are probably the most regular or everyday form of competition we face.

Embrace our doctrine. We are not using our tools such as international or bilateral exercises for advantage, while our adversaries are using these exercises, oftentimes in the same contested space, to their information advantage.
Stop trying to make perfect decisions. Instead, work to perfect decision making using rapid experimentation, learning, and implementation.
When engaging the younger generations, we need to discuss data and civil liberties, the philosophy of science or acquiring knowledge, ethics, and critical thinking.
What keeps me up at night? Technologies that create strategic latency between offense and defense. Deep fakes is one of these technologies. It has a high first mover advantage and identification tools do not prevent them from getting into the “wild” and impacting our society.

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next podcast with three panelists from the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC) — Ms. Jacqueline Tame, Acting Deputy Director, Chief Performance Officer; Ms. Alka Patel, Head of AI Ethics Policy; and Dr. Jane Pinelis, Chief, Testing and Evaluation, Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML) — as we discuss the ethics of AI and ML, integrating these emerging technologies into the Joint Force, and the future of talent management in this space on 3 December 2020!

22. The Future of Software with Maj. Rob Slaughter Oct 29, 2020

Show notes

In today’s podcast, Major Rob Slaughter discusses Platform One (P1), an official DoD DevSecOps Enterprise Services team. P1’s vision is to create an innovative, collaborative, and unified Defense Department that delivers freedom through continuous software integration and deployments. Its mission is to guide, empower, equip, and accelerate DoD program offices and weapon systems through their DevSecOps journeys by:

Helping to deploy mission code to the Warfighter quickly and securely.
Accelerating deployment capabilities by providing an 85% solution to jump start coding.
Providing a common code base for reusability.
Creating a collaborative environment to break down silos and enable government-wide cross-functionality.

The following are highlights from our interview with Major Slaughter:

Platform One solves two simultaneous DoD problems, usually seen as polar opposites:

– DoD systems are not secure enough.

– DoD struggles to quickly deliver software capabilities.

The current limitation on software is the age of our systems. The average USAF aircraft is older than our airmen.
The future is “everything software,” but to realize this future, we will need new hardware. An AI beat an F-16 pilot in air-to-air combat, but that same F-16 could not incorporate that AI onboard without major hardware upgrades.
The “everything software” future means every Soldier and Civilian should be able to write software wherever they are. The greatest immediate potential is with the new Space Force, as 100% of their fight will be through a console.
Mobility is an enabling trend — being able to access the necessary software tools and work with agility in any environment.
In this future, the #1 risk to combat systems is software. Rapid software development and accreditation, and sharing what works across the force is critical to mission success. Platform One can be the “Easy button”– using a trusted process to mitigate risk.
DoD has over 100,000 software developers, which makes it one of the largest “software companies” in the world. With all of this capability, we still have the reputation of not being able to produce fast and secure products.
Use of open source produced software offers a way to bring the most secure solutions to DoD. Thousands of contributors on a software solution will always beat 50 contributors on a black box project.
Not all open source code is created equal. A tipping point occurs when an open source product is not well supported or is primarily supported by known adversaries.
The software advantage is a future competition which will equate to battlefield advantage. We are missing a key trend — a dearth of Mandarin language proficiency could lead to an AI disadvantage for Western AI scientists who cannot keep abreast of Chinese scientific progress and breakthroughs.

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next podcast with Doowan Lee of Zignal Labs, discussing disinformation, changes over time in approaches to information warfare, and revisionism and the Chinese Communist Party on 12 November 2020!

21. The Future of Talent and Soldiers with MAJ Delaney Brown, CPT Jay Long, and 1LT Richard Kuzma Oct 15, 2020

Show notes

In today’s podcast, the following Army officers discuss Soldiering and talent management in the future force:

MAJ Delaney Brown is a strategist with the Army Talent Management Task Force. She has deployed in a variety of roles ranging from intelligence platoon leader to regional foreign aid coordinator and served as an Assistant Professor of American Politics in West Point’s Department of Social Sciences. MAJ Delaney holds a Bachelor of Science in Comparative Politics and Systems Engineering from the United States Military Academy and a Master of International Development Policy from Georgetown University where she used quantitative methods to evaluate the efficacy of government policies. She is currently a term member at the Council of Foreign Relations and active with the Aspen Institute’s Socrates Program.

CPT James “Jay” Long is an Army Reservist serving as an innovation officer at Joint Special Operations Command. Previously, he served in various infantry assignments on active duty and was a National Security Innovation Network Startup Innovation Fellow. He is based in Washington, DC.

1LT Richard Kuzma is a data scientist and technical program manager at the Army Artificial Intelligence Task Force, where he applies machine learning to Army problems and helps the Army build its digital workforce. Richard is an alum of the Defense Innovation Unit and the Harvard Kennedy School, where he wrote his thesis on structural changes needed to facilitate AI adoption within the Department of Defense. He is a member of the Military Writers Guild and writes about the DoD’s machine learning transformation in War on the Rocks, The U.S. Naval Institute, and The Strategy Bridge.

The following are highlights from the Podcast’s panel discussion:

At a fundamental level, the Army is still looking for the same future leaders: People who find fulfillment in service, enjoy working on hard problems, learn fast, and like to work hard.
Future Soldiers need to be capable of learning fast; possess the emotional intelligence to rapidly build, lead, and be assimilated into effective mission-oriented teams; and have the curiosity to continually learn.
The Army cannot focus on specific technical knowledge. We cannot predict the tech in five years, but we know which tech competencies will be important.
We need to re-weight the importance of physical and intellectual skills. Culturally accepting that technical fluency might outweigh the importance of a Ranger tab is difficult.
Before the Army can realize the benefits of Manned-Unmanned Teaming (MUM-T), we will need Commanders that understand networks, data, and workflows.
To paraphrase Napoleon Bonaparte — Amateurs talk tactics, masters talk logistics, and the leaders of the future will need to talk ecosystems.
We are facing a war for talent as the Army seeks similar technical skills as the civilian sector.
The Army is not effectively communicating the value proposition of serving in uniform versus working in Silicon Valley. We are not communicating what our hard problems are and allowing the talent to serve at a level where they can solve them.
Elite talent will leave the force if they cannot work on these hard problems and are not provided the tools (e.g., AI, big data, networks) available to them in the civilian sector.
The Army’s force structure management and human resources policies should allow technical and cultural experts direct entry to Army service at middle management and senior leader levels. Why shouldn’t an Amazon warehouse manager be able enter the Army as a logistics Major?

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next podcast with Major Rob Slaughter, Director of DoD Platform One, discussing approaches to agility in DoD modernization, leading Millennials and Gen Z’ers, and the future of software on 29 October 2020!

20. Strategic Foresight and Shifting Paradigms with Dr. Amy Zalman Oct 01, 2020

Show notes

Dr. Zalman is a global futurist who helps leaders and organizations explore the implications of critical global trends and prepare their organizations for transformative change. She is a part-time professor of Strategic Foresight at Georgetown University and the CEO of the foresight consultancy Prescient, LLC, which she founded in 2017 after over a decade of hands-on experience accelerating change in public, private, and non-profit organizations. In today’s podcast, Dr. Zalman discusses forecasting and strategic foresight, paradigm shifts in thinking, and the nature versus the character of warfare:

Strategic foresight is a way of thinking to develop an effective strategy that is appropriate for the moment.
How to think like a futurist — If you can tell a compelling story that engages someone else in a shared aspiration (e.g., the American Dream), then you have a higher probability of realizing that vision.
The point of foresight is to avoid being surprised. The key to marrying foresight and strategy is maintaining global situational awareness – remaining constantly vigilant and attuned to trends and events occurring around the world – and then using this knowledge to shape and affect strategically advantageous decisions.
Avoiding surprise is a central tenet in the Army — so why do we feel surprised after an event like COVID? Because unpredictable events with major effects are either not taken seriously or are willfully ignored; consequently, they are not factored into institutional planning.
Organizational culture must be receptive to discussing strategic foresight ideas that run counter to mainstream thought.
What are the Army and DoD missing regarding the future? The power of the individual. Even in Great Power Conflict, individuals are able to wield inordinate influence and shape events via their phones, cameras, drones, and global social media platforms.
All institutions are involved in national security, including the relationships between companies and their people.

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next podcast addressing The Future of Talent and Soldiers with CPT Jay Long, Richard Kuzma, and MAJ Delaney Brown, on 15 October 2020!

19. The Psychology of Terrorism and Disinformation with Dr. Aleks Nesic Sep 17, 2020

Show notes

In today’s podcast, Dr. Nesic discusses how humans remain at the center of great power competition — “everything else are simply mechanisms being used to influence the human element” — and how we must understand the human domain and synchronize social science in the non-kinetic, non-lethal space if we are to successfully out-compete our adversaries:

The Global War on Terror (GWOT) is far from over. In the hybrid / asymmetric space, anything can be an instrument of war. We have to be realistic and understand the human element, which we do not yet fully grasp or comprehend.
We tend to look at technology as a problem, not at the people using the technology [with evil intent] as the problem. Advances in technology have allowed our adversaries to become disruptive anytime, anywhere. The so-called ‘technological disruption’ should be accepted as the new status quo, as a modus operandi, and no longer be viewed as something extraordinary.
Anthropology describes, but does not explain, the cultural lenses in the way that psychology does. Understanding the “why” of how people and groups act is important for operationalizing influence.
How do populations change over time? Look at the brain, the most complex organ that is still not fully understood. The brain is wired for resilience and trained for adaptation. We need to invest in the brains of our target audiences and use knowledge to build resilience against our adversaries’ bad influences.

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