Information Warfare: An Old Operational Concept with New Implications

Conclusions The new balance of information and energy (as well as the degree of coupling between them) is changing the conduct of warfare. Expect to see much more intensive use of deception, stealth and redundancy as well as much smaller and stealthier platforms in order to neutralize the impact of highly accurate PGMs. Taken in aggregate, these changes call for fundamentally different approaches to the design and development of weapon systems, which, in turn, will inevitably lead to basic changes in strategy, tactics and doctrine. Key assets of the national civilian infrastructure may, under certain circumstances, become highly lucrative military centers of gravity for an adversary, blurring the traditional dividing line between the combatant and civilian domains. Even more disturbing is the nature of this critical vulnerability--involving asymmetry of forces, arduous tracing of information warfare attacks, and the bypassing of the military. These conditions, and their interrelationships, may radically alter the role of the military as well as our definition of war. A Fundamental Question Information warfare has recently captured the attention of the news media. Numerous articles on the subject have appeared in the popular press--a cover story in Time, a major article in Scientific American, and many op-ed pieces in major newspapers. Yet information warfare is virtually as old as warfare itself. For example, Joshua used information warfare (as feigning tactics) three thousand four hundred years ago in the capture of 'Ay; the Greek city--states conducted information warfare (in the form of deception) two hundred years later in their conflict with Troy; and during the Absalom Rebellion three thousand years ago, King David succeeded in overloading Absalom's decision-making process with unnecessary information--precipitating the reversal of a critical military decision--thus saving David from virtually certain destruction and assuring ultimate victory. So what's new about information warfare? Is it just the latest buzz word? Is it merely the consolidation of a large set of incremental increases in the role of information in warfare during the last three decades--primarily in the areas of precision guided munitions (PGM) as well as in command, control, communications and intelligence--or is it the leading edge of a step--function change having enormous implications on how wars will be fought in the future? Many unbiased, analytical thinkers are skeptical about any dramatic change. Unfortunately, current literature on information warfare contributes to this skepticism. An examination of the open literature on information warfare shows that recent attempts to address this issue suffer from two major shortcomings. Authors either (1) get involved in attempts to predict technology, thus incurring a loss of credibility with many readers (history is replete with examples of how technology predictions can make fools of some of the brightest minds), or (2) they wrap information warfare up in the broader issues of a revolution in military affairs, thereby losing focus and becoming diverted by irrelevant controversies. A radically different approach to the subject is obviously in order. Energy and Information In his book On the Psychology of Military Incompetence (published almost half a century ago), Brigadier General Norman Dixon makes this interesting observation: War is primarily concerned with two sets of activities--the delivery of energy and the communication of In other words, in its most basic form, war boils down to two dimensions, energy and information. Drawing on Dixon's work, the 'information-energy' lens provides an excellent vehicle for addressing the issue of what's new about information warfare, because it allows us to maintain the same paradigm while examining warfare throughout human history--from the days of the caveman, to the agrarian age, to the invention of gunpowder, to the industrial age, to the information age. …