A comprehensive information and influence campaign is one of the most important things the ROKG supported by the ROK/US Alliance can do to prepare for unification.  We have wasted the past 20 years not doing this effectively as I have argued here (http://bit.ly/1MAPxS1) in 1996 and here (http://bit.ly/1CWA5vm) in 2004.  We have not taken this seriously enough and we have not invested the intellectual capital, time, and resources to do this and do it well.  But it is not too late to start especially because there are so many more opportunities to achieve effects and influence the multiple target audiences from the elite to the second tier leaders to the Korean people living and suffering in the north.

Breaking The North Korean Information Blockade

Updated February 21, 201610:05 AM ETPublished February 21, 20167:57 AM EThttp://www.npr.org/2016/02/21/467365354/breaking-the-north-korean-information-blockade

NPR STAFF

Visitors look at the military wire fences at the Imjingak Pavilion near the border village of Panmunjom, which has separated the two Koreas since the Korean War, in Paju, South Korea, Feb. 14, 2016.

Lee Jin-man/AP

North Korea is considered the most reclusive country in the world. Outsiders know very little about what happens inside the Hermit Kingdom.

North Koreans, in turn, know very little about the outside world. The regime of dictator Kim Jong Un bans nearly all forms of outside media. North Koreans are only exposed to what their government tells them, giving a them skewed view of their own country.

A group of nonprofits in the U.S. is trying to change that with USB drives. They are asking Americans to donate thumb drives, which are then loaded with Western TV and movies and smuggled into North Korea.

The idea for Flash Drives for Freedom was started by the Human Rights Foundation. Sharon Stratton is the U.S. program officer with the North Korean Strategy Center, one of the groups involved. She spoke with NPR's Rachel Martin about what goes on the flash drives and what the risks are for the people involved.

(Continued at this link)

http://www.npr.org/2016/02/21/467365354/breaking-the-north-korean-information-blockade

I would call this political and unconventional warfare.   Actions speak louder than words and the Russian use of propaganda is backed by action.

But this is an interesting idea - Russian reinvents reality. we have seen this before so I think Putin may be a student of Mein Kampf and the big lie:

All this was inspired by the principle—which is quite true within itself—that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.

—Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, vol. I, ch. X

But I think the discussion of Putin and Greenwald and his "anti-establishment drive" in this conclusion is very interesting as well.

The pressure on reality from capitalism and Capitol Hill coincides with an anti-establishment drive in the U.S. that likewise claims that all truth is relative. In a Prospect magazine review of Glenn Greenwald’s No Place to Hide, for instance, George Packer writes, “Greenwald has no use for the norms of journalism. He rejects objectivity, as a reality and an ideal.” (Similarly, RT’s managing director once told me that “there is no such thing as objective reporting.”) Examining the sins of omission, biased value judgments, and half-truths in Greenwald’s book, Packer concludes that “they reveal a mind that has liberated itself from the basic claims of fairness. Once the norms of journalism are dismissed, a number of constraints and assumptions fall away.” The ties that bind Greenwald and the Kremlin consist of more than a shared desire to ensure Edward Snowden’s safety. In some dark, ideological wood, Putin the authoritarian gay-basher and Greenwald the gay, leftist-libertarian meet and agree. And as the consensus for reality-based politics fractures, that space becomes ripe for exploitation. It’s precisely this trend that the Kremlin hopes to exploit.

Ultimately, many people in Russia and around the world understand that Russian political parties are hollow and Russian news outlets are churning out fantasies. But insisting on the lie, the Kremlin intimidates others by showing that it is in control of defining ‘reality.’ This is why it’s so important for Moscow to do away with truth. If nothing is true, then anything is possible. We are left with the sense that we don’t know what Putin will do next—that he’s unpredictable and thus dangerous. We’re rendered stunned, spun, and flummoxed by the Kremlin’s weaponization of absurdity and unreality.

Peter PomerantsevThe Atlantic6:59 PM ET

How Russia Is Revolutionizing Information Warfare

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http://www.defenseone.com/threats/2014/09/how-russia-revolutionizing-information-warfare/93635/

At the NATO summit in Wales last week, General Philip Breedlove, the military alliance’s top commander, made a bold declaration. Russia, he said, is waging “the most amazing information warfare blitzkrieg we have ever seen in the history of information warfare.”

It was something of an underestimation. The new Russia doesn’t just deal in the petty disinformation, forgeries, lies, leaks, and cyber-sabotage usually associated with information warfare. It reinvents reality, creating mass hallucinations that then translate into political action. Take Novorossiya, the name Vladimir Putin has given to the huge wedge of southeastern Ukraine he might, or might not, consider annexing. The term is plucked from tsarist history, when it represented a different geographical space. Nobody who lives in that part of the world today ever thought of themselves as living in Novorossiya and bearing allegiance to it—at least until several months ago. Now, Novorossiya is being imagined into being: Russian media are showing maps of its ‘geography,’ while Kremlin-backed politicians are writing its ‘history’ into school textbooks. There’s a flag and even a news agency (in English and Russian). There are several Twitter feeds. It’s like something out of a Borges story—except for the very real casualties of the war conducted in its name.

 

AUTHOR

Peter Pomerantsev is a TV producer based in London. He is the author of Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible, a forthcoming book about working inside Vladimir Putin’s postmodern dictatorship. Full Bio

The invention of Novorossiya is a sign of Russia’s domestic system of information manipulation going global. Today’s Russia has been shaped by political technologists—the viziers of the system who, like so many post-modern Prosperos, conjure up puppet political parties and the simulacra of civic movements to keep the nation distracted as Putin’s clique consolidates power. In the philosophy of these political technologists, information precedes essence. “I remember creating the idea of the ‘Putin majority’ and hey, presto, it appeared in real life,” Gleb Pavlovsky, a political technologist who worked on Putin’s election campaigns but has since left the Kremlin, told me recently. “Or the idea that ‘there is no alternative to Putin.’ We invented that. And suddenly there really was no alternative.”

“If previous authoritarian regimes were three parts violence and one part propaganda,” argues Igor Yakovenko, a professor of journalism at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, “this one is virtually all propaganda and relatively little violence. Putin only needs to make a few arrests—and then amplify the message through his total control of television.”

We saw a similar dynamic at work on the international stage in the final days of August, when an apparent Russian military incursion into Ukraine—and a relatively minor one at that—was made to feel momentously threatening. Putin invoked the need for talks on the statehood of southeastern Ukraine (with language that seemed almost purposefully ambiguous), leaving NATO stunned and Kiev intimidated enough to agree to a ceasefire. Once again, the term ‘Novorossiya’ made its way into Putin’s remarks, creating the sense that large territories were ready to secede from Ukraine when, in reality, the insurgents hold only a sliver of land. (For an earlier example of these geopolitical tricks, see Dmitry Medvedev’s presidency from 2008 to 2012, when Russia’s decoy leader inspired American faith in the possibility of a westward-facing Russia while giving the Kremlin time to cement power at home and entrench its networks abroad.)

* * *

The belief in the absolute power of propaganda has roots in Soviet thinking. Jacques Ellul, in his classic 1965 study of the subject, wrote, “The Communists, who do not believe in human nature but only in the human condition, believe that propaganda is all-powerful, legitimate (whenever they employ it), and instrumental in creating a new type of man.”

But there is one great difference between Soviet propaganda and the latest Russian variety. For the Soviets, the idea of truth was important—even when they were lying. Soviet propaganda went to great lengths to ‘prove’ that the Kremlin’s theories or bits of disinformation were fact. When the U.S.government accused the Soviets of spreading disinformation—such as the story that the CIA invented AIDS as a weapon—it would cause howls of outrage from top Russian figures, including General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev.

(Continued at the link below)

http://www.defenseone.com/threats/2014/09/how-russia-revolutionizing-information-warfare/93635/

Kim Jong-eun should fear Sunshine

There is of course the theory that a fully executed Sunshine Policy could unhinge the regime because so much aid and more importantly information would get into the north and it would undercut regime legitimacy and thus lead to collapse.  Under such a theory the end state would be regime collapse and unification of the peninsula.  Unfortunately the Sunshine Policy is based on the flawed assumption that aid to and engagement with the north  will lead to a change in regime behavior.  We should know after the 12/12/12 missile launch that the regime has no intention to (nor can it) change its behavior.  

In addition, it would be quite a policy shift by the ROK and the US to actively attempt to undermine the regime to cause it to collapse.  Ironically no one in the region really wants that to happen because 1) it could lead to war and 2) the financial and economic (and not to mention the humanitarian) burden will be so great as to overwhelm the ROK and others potentially destabilize the region.  So while it is in everyone's interest to maintain the status quo we face the moral dilemma of 22, 995,000 people living in a virtual prison suffering on a scale that has little rival in history.

But I would offer this strategic assumption: There will be no change on the Korean peninsula as long as the Kim Family Regime exists.

V/R

Dave

COMMENT Kim Jong-eun should fear Sunshine By Andrei Lankov  http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/NL15Dg01.html Whatever policy towards North Korea will be chosen by the new South Korean government following the December 19 presidential election, it seems clear that it will be significantly softer than that followed by the Lee Myung-bak administration.  Right now it appears that Park Geun-hye, the candidate of the moderate right, has better chance of winning, but it is unlikely that she will continue with the hardline policy of her predecessor.  This looming dovish turn is likely to annoy some people on the political right in South Korea. They often vilify aid to, and cooperation with North Korea as "appeasement", and they point to the obvious lack of reciprocity in North-South relations. It is stated that the money earned by Pyongyang through exchanges with the South is used to strengthen North Korean leader Kim Jong-eun's rule.  These accusations have within them a kernel of truth. In few, if any, cases have interactions between North and South Korea been equal. Much of these interactions are officially termed "economic exchanges", but in most cases they are heavily subsidized by the South Korean government. To be blunt, without direct or indirect subsidies neither the Kaesong industrial complex, nor the now defunct Keumgang and Kaesong city tours would be viable economically.  It is also true that the North Korean government takes the lion's share of all the "profits" from such "economic cooperation" projects, then re-distributing this income as it sees fit. It is indeed likely that many secret police in North Korea have been paid indirectly by the South Korean taxpayers.  However, things are not so simple as all that. Economic exchanges do not merely fill the coffers of the regime, but also introduce dangerous knowledge about the outside world to North Koreans who are involved.  A North Korean seamstress in a Kaesong textiles factory has a South Korean manager to whom she has to talk every day. When the Kaesong city tours were in operation, the entire city of Kaesong could see busloads of South Koreans whose behaviour and dress clearly demonstrated that they were not merely the enslaved, downtrodden pawns of US imperialism. The same can be said about virtually any interaction between North and South Koreans.  (Continued at the link below) http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/NL15Dg01.html

Winning Without Fighting: Chinese Public Opinion Warfare and the Need for a Robust American Response

Anyone with any interest in trying to understand China should study and know the "three warfares."  When my good friend Dean Cheng talks about China, I listen.

V/R
Dave

Winning Without Fighting: Chinese Public Opinion Warfare and the Need for a Robust American Response

By Dean Cheng
November 26, 2012

http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/11/winning-without-fighting-chinese-public-opinion-warfare-and-the-need-for-a-robust-american-response

Abstract : Over the past decade, the People's Republic of China has exhibited a growing interest in waging asymmetrical warfare. The purpose of this interest is chilling: to enable the PRC to win a war against the U.S. without firing a shot. To this end, the PRC is expanding potential areas of conflict from the purely military (i.e., involving the direct or indirect use of military forces) to the more political. Such expansion will be fueled by manipulation of public opinion, legal systems, and enemy leadership. It is essential that the United States counter the PRC's new soft-power surge not only by rebutting political attacks, but also by taking the offensive and promoting America's positions to a global audience.

Over the past decade, the People's Republic of China (PRC) has exhibited a growing interest in waging asymmetrical warfare. To this end, the PRC released an initial set of regulations regarding political warfare in December 2003, before updating them in 2010. These "political work regulations" for the People's Liberation Army (PLA) address the importance of waging "the three warfares": public opinion warfare, psychological warfare, and legal warfare.

The "three warfares" represent the PRC's commitment to expanding potential areas of conflict from the purely military (i.e., involving the direct or indirect use of military forces) to the more political. Such expansion will be fueled by manipulation of public opinion, legal systems, and enemy leadership. But unlike more traditional military conflict, the foundation for political warfare must be established during peacetime so as to create beneficial conditions and context for the military conflict and, in turn, precipitate an early end to a conflict on terms favorable to the PRC. Indeed, if waged successfully, political warfare allows one side to win without fighting.

In hopes of being able to alter the strategic context of any future U.S.-PRC confrontation, the PRC is improving its ability to influence both global and Chinese public opinion. If the United States does not counter Chinese political warfare efforts, it may well find that its access to the Western Pacific is endangered by a lack of regional support—long before American forces even begin moving toward the area. In order to avoid being outmaneuvered by a PRC intent on winning without firing a shot, the U.S. must strengthen its strategic communications, public diplomacy, and media outreach capabilities.

(Continued at the link below)

http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/11/winning-without-fighting-chinese-public-opinion-warfare-and-the-need-for-a-robust-american-response