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The war in Vietnam has offered no opportunity for a Battle of Midway against an enerny fleet. There is no Mount Suribachi °n which to raise the flag as a symbol of our resolution and power. And, primarily because ^ recoil from another Hiroshima, a war that |*ght have been ended in months now enters lts fifth bloody year.
Increasingly intense military pressure, first exerted in 1947 by the French against the x'et Minh and later by the United States against North Vietnamese forces and Viet t°ng guerrillas, has failed to produce the de- s>red deterioration of the enemy’s will to con- finue the struggle. On the contrary, in the earlier effort, the popular support of the Ifench people was so eroded that they insulted their own returning wounded, refused to unload their own returning dead. More reCently, the popular support of the American People has not been degraded to such an extent, but criticism of the war is commonplace 'u the United States, and acts which in pre- v‘ous wars would have been treason are now eondoned and debated instead of arousing Public ire.
From our acceptance of Panmunjom as the site for negotiation in Korea, symbolically suing for peace by passing over to the enemy’s Slde, through our cessation of bombing North Vietnam without reciprocal action, the acceptance of the Viet Cong as a party to negotiations in Paris, the indignity of haggling over the shape of a table over which to discuss the ending of a terrible war, to our abject admission of false guilt to free the men of the USS Pueblo (AGER-2) from captivity, we have shown an innocent disregard for the consequences of our own acts.
We find ourselves in conflict with adversaries who seem to recognize the significance of psychology in the conduct of their affairs.
How significant, for example, is the age, appearance, and sex of Nguyen Thi Binh as a representative of the National Liberation Front in Paris? An attractive woman, the daughter of a patriot, she is sure to evoke sympathy and respect throughout the world- including our own country—regardless of her considerable talents. Her selection by Hanoi is hardly coincidental.
Our adversaries’ use of psychology has helped them manipulate us, time and again, to our own disadvantage. For example, what is our impression of the North Vietnamese or Viet Cong from the news media? No release from Hanoi, or any of the Sino-Soviet capitals, depicts other than stalwart, happy, dedicated young people—many of them attractive young women—working together for a better world. The Viet Cong are cunning, exper-
ienced jungle fighters, striking with stunning effect and “melting back into the jungle.” The North Vietnamese are altruistic, well-trained, well-equipped volunteers fighting to free their southern brothers from foreign domination. Ho Chi Minh is a saintly, avuncular figure trying to unify his people. Vo Nuyen Giap, victor at Dienbienphu, is a brilliant military leader, surmounting impossible odds with consummate skill.
Compare these with the depiction of our own forces in Vietnam, or those of our allies. How many scenes do we recall, in our own press and television, of American casualties, the horrors of war brought to Vietnamese civilians by the atrocities of U. S. and South Vietnamese forces?
On the other hand, how many Viet Cong atrocities have we learned about from our public media, how much human suffering as a direct product of the enemy? How well recorded is the medical treatment given by Americans to children maimed by the Viet Cong?
Finally, psychology has helped our adversaries sway U. S. and world opinion. Why, for example, is napalm a dirty word? And what is so evil about the United States having a Central Intelligence Agency? And why is there such opposition to educational institutions co-operating with our government in research? And why should American students burn down an ROTC center or forcibly bar military recruiters from a campus?
Moreover, the words of our own leaders are studied for antiwar statements which are culled, repackaged, and delivered to our troops in the field by enemy leaflet and radio. Former Senators Ernest Gruening and Wayne Morse, Senator J. William Fulbright and the late Robert F. Kennedy have been quoted again and again.
Conversely, the words of at least two of the enemy’s leaders need not be taken out of context:
Author Hoang Van An: “The Party has been guided by the principle that it is better to kill ten innocent people than to let one enemy escape.”
General Giap: “Every minute, hundreds of thousands of people die all over the world. The life or death of thousands of human beings, even if they are compatriots, represents really very little.”
Perhaps most of us have never read thoSe chilling words. But, we certainly have read the siege of Khe Sanh, the beleaguered gar' rison of American Marines and South Vie1' namese that supposedly was doomed to be' come the “second Dienbienphu.” We can recall the agony of the American people thousands of their sons, depicted as cut ov from all support, waited for the cunning Giap’s final blow. Yet, the issue dwindled^ “Khe Sanh was of little consequence”—whe11 we won. Would it have been unimportantt0 our enemy’s propaganda effort if those de* fenders had been overrun, killed or in1' prisoned, as the French were?
We can also recall the fight at Hue and the Viet Cong flag flying over the citadel; ho'v ghastly it was that our troops smashed that beautiful old historic monument. It was reported as a cultural atrocity.
Less note was taken, however, of the hundreds of dead Vietnamese civilians'" school teachers, nurses, minor clerks and officials—executed by the North Vietnamese when they entered Hue.
This is warfare. This is a battle for the minds of men, to change their attitudes and manipulate their behavior. What does it mean to a blue water fleet?
Primarily, that fleet is an arm of the people) ; projecting their will. Without that will, the fleet is a mass of steel, peopled by men without purpose.
Further, that fleet today has intruded upon the land and amongst a foreign population at their request.
Each Phantom aircraft is a political and psychological instrument, armed, piloted and enormously versatile. Its mission can deliver to an enemy the harm for which it was designed, or harm to us by misemployment or injudicious use. Each private home, hospital, school or orphanage damaged, each woman or child killed or wounded, is a weapon to be used by the enemy.
When she was operating in Vietnamese waters, the USS New Jersey (BB-62) was invulnerable to any weapon in the hands of the North Vietnamese. Yet, she could not act without restraint, for she could have been banished from the China Sea by popular re-
'vision to her presence, as completely as if she ad been sunk. Had one of her 16-inch shells anded in a fishing village, all her power ^'ght not have prevailed against the pen and tongue.
°f even more direct significance to the *>avy and Marine Corps is their now-constant, ace-to-face presence among the Vietnamese People. Seapower has been projected along entire coast of Indochina and percolated lr>to the densely populated and enormously ^ertile delta area. Here, on the coasts and up '■he tributaries of the Mekong, men meet across a gap of language and culture. A Slngle act, thoughtful or thoughtless, can be both crucial and lasting. Here, man by man, ^ are assessed as either a domineering invader or a protecting friend. Each impression Permeates the population by word of mouth.
This is warfare—psychological warfare—• and it will not end when the Vietnamese convict ends. “Yankee, go home!” scribbled on a ^all is a shot fired in this war, and it will have '^finitely more lasting effect than the bursting °f a shell.
If we were offered a field-tested weapon that cost little, produced enemy casualties without bloodshed or human misery, was self-propagative, gave a substantial side benefit of intelligence information and, at the same time, reduced friendly casualties, would we buy it? We probably would.
The target is always the mind, but it can be the mind of one’s own people or one’s allies as well as one’s enemies. This patriotic poster exhorts the South Vietnamese people to follow the example of their national hero,
Le Loi.
The weapon is already in our hands. All that is required is that we learn how to use it.
Psychological operations (let us call it, as the troops do, “PsyOps”) is just such a weapon. But, unlike other weapons, it should never be used in blind anger. We should know beforehand precisely what we want to accomplish with it. For, like the two-edged sword, it can enormously assist the accomplishment of the mission—particularly in a counterinsurgency situation—or cause irreparable harm to the wielder.
PsyOps, then, may reasonably be regarded as basically an offensive weapon which draws no blood and leaves no lasting scar. If this is true, we hold in our hands a—dare we call it the “ultimate”?—weapon that can be used against an enemy and also against friends and neutrals.
Properly employed, PsyOps can reduce our enemy’s effectiveness as efficiently as any other conventional, casualty-producing agent, and it could prove a major cause of ending the conflict through widespread erosion of our adversary’s will to fight.
Properly employed, PsyOps will cause no harm, lasting or otherwise, to friends or neutrals. For, as our weapon strikes home, allies and neutrals alike will become convinced that our actions are in accordance with their own aspirations—and our enemy’s actions are not.
Admittedly, PsyOps may mean little to the ballistic missile submarine crew or the attack carrier on Dixie Station. It should be enormously important, however, to the Fleet Commander, or the Joint Task Force Commander, and particularly to the Unified Commander.
PsyOps should mean much to the amphibious forces, the Fleet Marine Forces, and the increasingly significant inshore patrol forces and riverine forces of the Navy.
To these military professionals, an enemy defector, or one who hesitates a moment be-
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fore he pulls the trigger, is as much a casualty as a wounded or dead enemy on the battlefield. Even more, the enemy casualty produced by psychological means is often a source of intelligence or a spreading source of disaffection in the enemy ranks. He may even become an ally.
The naval services have given lip service to this weapon—the weapon of words and ideas—for many years. It is included in naval tactical doctrine. Yet, when it came to the actual conduct of these activities—in the Dominican Republic and in Vietnam—it was the Army, not the Marines or Navy, that was ready to be the “first to fight” with psychological warfare. Of all the services, only the U. S. Army has maintained such a capability, and the schools system to support it, through all the lean years.
Nevertheless, each service is responsible for the conduct of PsyOps in connection with its assigned functions. For the naval services, this means either using their existing staff and operational capabilities—or admitting that they do not have these capabilities, which will require a fulfillment of this function by the Army or some other organization, as directed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Too long, the issue has been skirted with vague references to an “inherent capability” within the naval services to conduct such operations. What is this?
There is no question that Navy-Marine Corps forces have substantial assets adaptable to psychological warfare: public address equipment, motion picture projectors, reproduction equipment, cameras, tape recorders, and radio transmitters. But, it must be remembered that each such item is in the inventory for a specific job. None of these items are primarily committed to the PsyOps role, and the very time they are most needed in their prescribed function is precisely that same time when the demands of psychological warfare are most critical. No one is going to wrest a bull horn from a beachmaster for purposes of psychological warfare when he needs it to prevent chaos at the surf line.
But, wresting a bull horn from a burly beachmaster might seem like child’s play compared to obtaining those twin imperatives: command cognizance and staff capability in psychological operations within the fro'11 after more than 30 years service. A veteran of nir\ wars, his last assignment " at Headquarters, U. S. ^. rine Corps as Civil A#3* and Psychological Warfar officer for that Service. A tributor to Naval and M1 * tary magazines for many ye3 as an active duty officer, Colonel Wyckoff has dc' voted his full time to writing and editing since hisrt tirement.
Navy and the U. S. Marine Corps.
Psychological warfare can be learned, bllt only one formal school for its instruction exists in this country —the U. S. Army Scho°* at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
In the academic world, psychological war' fare—propaganda—is not even recognize^ as a subject. Psychology, yes. Advertising creative thinking, pragmatism, sensitivity’ technical skill, intercultural response, cyn1' cism, and dedication required of the prop3' gandist.
Who, then, advises the Fleet Commander’ the Amphibious Task Force Commander, the Landing Force Commander, when next they are committed, as in Lebanon, the Dominican j Republic, and Vietnam?
If, as set forth in doctrine, the commander | at all levels is responsible for weighing the PsyOps that influence the situations he encounters, upon whom does he rely for staff assistance? The N-3, or the G-3/S-3 of the Marine Command? Upon whom do these men depend, or must they develop this skill themselves while wrestling with the many other problems their assignments entail?
There is no one answer, but proper planning is the first step. Because it takes more time than will ever be available to a staff; planning for PsyOps is more than important, it is vital. Somewhere, in the depths of the command, a comprehensive knowledge of each potentially significant area must be developed—information essential to the delicate and sophisticated employment of ideas as weapons. History, ethnology, religions and customs, language, politics, and economics
0rt must include analysis of the mission °ur force and its components and the reton of our psychological operations effort those missions. Further, the policies and
Propaganda is directed at selected audi- ertoes through selected media. If you know V°ur people, you can determine the susceptibility of different groups (leaders, troops, ^Omen, urban or rural dwellers, students, totellectuals, religious sects) to general lines °f persuasion (fear, pride, hunger, deprivation).
Above all, we must be honest. We cannot allow a credibility gap to be created. Whatever we say, it must be confirmable by the People’s own eyes and ears, stomachs, fingers,
not just significant. They are essential to nerstanding the people with whom you communicate.
A simple example: What does a skull and ^°ssed bones signify? Death? Poison? Danger? 'racy? What joes it mean to a man in a^di Arabia or Thailand? i. ” °uld you picture a citizen of Haiti as ack in a simple poster? Would he be of- Crided, or would he identify with it? a An interesting—and actual—example was leaflet prepared in the Orient to depict a esfitute family. Seated on chairs, around the ^e, their food bowls were obviously ■npty jjQ American eyes, their sad faces re- ated to the empty bowls. To Oriental eyes, e sad faces of this obviously wealthy family owed chagrin at their servants for not bringing in the food.
Along with detailed knowledge of the People we are trying to reach, our planning
of'
•ati
to
^jectives of the United States must be care- ully understood—and these are not always Sll)iple or enduring.[1]
^Vith sailor luck, we may be well prepared ,f) Conduct effective PsyOps compatible with 'Jl,r national policies and objectives; more ‘kely, at least in the beginning, we may have to interpret objectives from our assigned tasks and be prepared to adapt to policy shifts as lhey occur. Realistically, if everything were ’•nder control we wouldn’t be there in the first place.
Bloodless Weapon 69
noses or tongues. Our two-edged propaganda sword will surely cut our own legs out from under us if, for instance, we try to tell a well- fed man he’s starving. Such a wild-swinging mistake was made and many a North Vietnamese trooper must have gotten a moralebuilding chuckle while looking at propaganda directed at the Viet Cong. Many of the U. S. leaflets portraying the ragged guerrilla fighter with his obsolete rifle, fell on the well-clothed, superbly equipped NVN soldiers with their excellent new AK-47 automatic weapons.
Our message must reach out and grab the attention of the listener or reader—and sustain this attention once we have it. Ideas are the weapons in this game. But, to be effective, they must be communicated. Here, advertising techniques help. One evening of television, watching the spot commercials instead of the programs, provides a valuable course in this subject.
Primarily, and most effective, there is face- to-face persuasion—not argument, but the words and deeds of our own men. The problem is control over these words and deeds, and the answer is indoctrination. Just as we prepare liberty parties for foreign ports, we must prepare men committed into combat zones. They must be ready to conduct themselves with dignity and restraint, with understanding and compassion. Our men entering a foreign land to fight a war must know who the people of that land are, how they conduct their lives, and why we are there. Such an investment of time and effort is not small, but it promises an enormous return.
We have radios, loudspeakers, printing or reproduction facilities, recorders, cameras, and projectors. How these are used, and for what purpose, is always up to the commander, but it may not always be an easy choice. It may be helpful for him, in such a circumstance, to remind himself that men fight because of ideas, and sometimes fail to fight for the lack of them.
Whenever we hear an enemy broadcast, read his bulletin, and see “Yankee go home” scrawled on the wall, we should perhaps ask ourselves, “If we had done something like that, would things be different now? If we do something like that, can we better accomplish our mission?”
[1] See V. G. Reiling, Jr., and G. W. Scott, “Psycho- bgical Operations in Vietnam,” U. S. Naval Institute Proceedings, July 1968, pp. 122-126.