The National Defense Strategy is Not

[flagg]

The digital domain enables more than information/influence dominance, it will enable economic dominance, and perhaps security dominance. Collectively this unfortunate, because it has so much promise to change the world for the better. Norming the use of the digital domain globally is desirable, but I question if it is possible?

Further to my last Bill:

The Xuexi Qiangguo “Study the Great Nation” app is now the most downloaded item on Apple’s App Store in China(More than WeChat and TikTok):

https://www.scmp.com/tech/apps-socia...inping-thought

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...to-your-pocket

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-a8859511.html

Seems like Mao’s Little Red Book(published by PLA General Political Department) mashed up with behavioural economics “nudging”, likely observed by tireless evolving AI/ML Google Analytics-like tools of State Security.

Probably more George Orwell’s “1984” than Shoshana Zuboff’s “Age of Surveillance Capitalism”.

I tend to think our potential digital future is a blend of the two, with the spoils going to the network/platform that iterates the best value proposition for both citizen “users” and government “enterprise/admins”

[Bill Moore]

Xi is using Mao's methodology to brainwash his citizens. The similarity between Xi and Mao is both embrace oppressive governance; the difference is Xi comes closer to embracing Confucius thought (as Xi calls it, socialism with Chinese characteristics) than foolishly embracing communism as Mao did. The results economically are night and day, but increasingly similar when it comes to oppressive governance. Like Mao in the 60s and 70s, Xi is now exporting this model of governance, and the means (IT, AI, etc.) for other nations to implement it. Xi infiltrates economically, then gains control of the various media outlets to the point of controlling country's media may publish, etc. With Huawei, artificial intelligence, facial recognition technology increasingly available, I think it is possible that Xi will gradually assert control over social media in other nations. If you control the information, then you can control the populace.

This thread started with the claim that our NDS is not a strategy. In the traditional sense it is a strategy, but one that clings to outdated Clausewitzian views of power. I'll refer back to a post I made a couple of years ago that is relevant here.

http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...l=1#post202760

Connectography: Mapping the Future o...y Parag Khanna

I'm quoting reviewer on Amazon below:

The author of this book has done something no one else has done – I say this as the reviewer of over 2,000 non-fiction books at Amazon across 98 categories. For the first time, in one book, we have a very clear map of what is happening where in the way of economic and social development; a startlingly diplomatic but no less crushing indictment of nation-state and militaries; and a truly inspiring game plan for what we should all be demanding from countries, cities, commonwealths, communities, and companies, in the way of future investments guided by a strategy for creating a prosperous world at peace.

This is a nuanced deeply stimulating book that makes it clear that China’s grand strategy of building infrastructure has beaten the US strategy of threatening everyone with a dysfunctional military that crushes hope and destroys wealth everywhere it goes; that connectivity (cell phones, the Internet, roads, high-speed rail, tunnels, bridges, and ferries) is the accelerator for wealth creation by the five billion poor that most Western states and corporations ignore;

Parag makes the following arguments:
- Infrastructure is destiny
- Connectography proves why past is no longer prologue
- Why China’s “One Belt, One Road” project is a winning strategy that outflanks the U.S. rebalance (Go) by integrating all of Eurasia’s economies under China’s auspices.

For those that think proxy wars are the way to compete, he offers a counterview. I am reading more and more thought pieces that propose we revert to Cold War proxy wars to compete, but to what end? It is hard to break from the past when our doctrine clings to it.

a tour of the new geopolitical marketspace in which military superpowers competed for influence in regions strife with instability and divisions. Colonies were once conquered; today countries are bought. Smart states practice a shrewd multi-alignment strategy, friendly with all great powers to extract max benefit without committing to deep alliances.

I think our national leadership has awakened to this fact (there are exceptions of course), but too late and we don't have a strategy to compete effectively for connectivity. We also have a White House that messages it is opposed to connectivity, creating opportunities for China to exploit.

Geopolitical competition is evolving from war over territory to war over connectivity. A tug of war over global supply chains, energy markets, industrial production, and flows of finance, technology, knowledge, and talent. Shifts from a war between systems (communist versus capitalist) to war within one collective supply chain system. Military war is a real threat, while tug of war is a perpetual reality. Won thru master economic planning

.

If the overarching of our national strategy is to advance an international order that facilitates achieving our security and economic objectives, then the following should be considered.

Mega-infrastructure overcame hurdles of pol-physical geography. How we divide the world legally (geo-pol) is giving way to how we organize its functionality versus political space. The lines that connect us supersede the borders that divide us.
Systems only want one thing, connectivity, doesn’t care which power is most connected. Is PRC building the new system?

[Bill Moore]

Supporting links to Xi's use of technology to oppress and export the same.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...ce-prison.html

https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/08/asia/...tl/index.html?

https://www.cfr.org/blog/exporting-r...ce-push-africa

[flagg]

Supporting links to Xi's use of technology to oppress and export the same.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...ce-prison.html

https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/08/asia/...tl/index.html?

https://www.cfr.org/blog/exporting-r...ce-push-africa

Unlike the “surveillance capitalism”-like WeChat, Xi’s App feels far more “littleredbook.com” forced.

But if we look at them both thru a geodigital export “product” lens:

WeChat is for citizen users (consumers) who desire opportunity
Xi’s App is for sovereign users(enterprise) who desire continuity

[Bill Moore]

Flagg

Which network operating system(China or US) will offer individual users(consumers) and sovereigns(enterprise) the best respective value proposition?

The network operating system is part of a greater competition that ultimately focuses on who will be primary in shaping the international order. I think your description of Geo-digital strategy will likely be one of the most crucial areas in this overall competition. The winner as you state will be determined by who provides the best value proposition. We must offer more than saying don't buy into Huawei. I have yet to see our value proposition?

IÂ’ve been grounded in Metcalfe and learning how to apply Clausewitz.

IÂ’m hoping those that are grounded in Clausewitz start applying Metcalfe.

Don't get over-enamored with Clausewitz on strategy, too many people shut their mind down to new ideas by focusing on one strategist. Obvious to most people, the world has changed significantly since the early 19th Century. I still recommend reading "On War," but study it with a critical eye.

If you haven't read it yet, I highly recommend reading NSC-68. It is close to 70 years old, but some relevant strategic themes can be modified and brought forward into the 21st Century.

https://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistl...s/pdf/10-1.pdf

IÂ’ve been looking at two very sobering comparisons:

1) (E-commerce/mobile payments), Chinese > USA .....by 50x

2) (Relative spend in 2018 dollars), One Belt One Road > Marshall Plan .....by 50-90x

Please explain bullets 1) and 2) above.

Advancements in disrupting & destroying insurgent networks is a useful capability(McChrystal et al), but how are we at amplifying friendly/coalition commercial network effects and deterring/disrupting adversary commercial networks via non kinetic means?

Disrupting adversary commercial networks is potentially a dangerous path to go down. We already over leverage trade as a weapon, which in my opinion sets a bad precedent for an international order that should focus on promoting prosperity. We risk pushing allies and partners away from us with this approach, and perhaps into China's camp if we're not careful. There are already increasing calls to replace the dollar as the global currency. If that happens, then we may have to live with the norm we imposed being imposed upon us. American strategists have never been particularly good at thinking about effects over time.

The best way to disrupt adversary commercial networks is to offer a better product/service. If the commercial networks are illicit, then that is another matter.

The GWOT expression “we can’t kill our way to victory” can also be recycled and repurposed for peer threats to “lethality doesn’t create positive geodigital network effects.”

This war, or hyper-competition, over the international order is being waged non-lethally currently. Having the world's most powerful military accomplishes little in addressing the competitive space below armed conflict. At best it denies an adversary an overt military option (deterrence), but if our adversaries are achieving war-like objectives without overt military aggression how do we achieve our aims? That is the strategic question our nation and allies must wrestle with now.

[flagg]

Flagg



The network operating system is part of a greater competition that ultimately focuses on who will be primary in shaping the international order. I think your description of Geo-digital strategy will likely be one of the most crucial areas in this overall competition. The winner as you state will be determined by who provides the best value proposition. We must offer more than saying don't buy into Huawei. I have yet to see our value proposition?

Agreed.

Pressuring our coalition allies to ban Huawei is not a strategy.

Creating an alternative that our coalition allies and their respective citizens want, is.

Don't get over-enamored with Clausewitz on strategy, too many people shut their mind down to new ideas by focusing on one strategist. Obvious to most people, the world has changed significantly since the early 19th Century. I still recommend reading "On War," but study it with a critical eye.

Agreed. I needed to understand Clausewitz for when it is the default reference.

However, I have found an adaptation of friction to be relevant.

If you haven't read it yet, I highly recommend reading NSC-68. It is close to 70 years old, but some relevant strategic themes can be modified and brought forward into the 21st Century.

https://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistl...s/pdf/10-1.pdf

Thanks for that. On first pass I’m finding the most relevant part in applying it to today being a bit of role reversal.

We are currently a very rough analog to the Soviet Union’s excessively heavy military economy, China is a very rough analog to the US economy with considerable scope for economic warfare.

Please explain bullets 1) and 2) above.

1)

Alibaba’s Singles Day generated more revenue that Amazon Prime Day(China’s and US’s respective artificial e-commerce holidays).........in just 10 minutes

China’s mobile payments in 2018 were $12.8 trillion, US equivalent was $50 billion so a comparative 256x differential

2)

US Marshall Plan, as well as being the last industrial/financial power standing post WWII, is widely regarded as a significant success worthy of a Nobel Prize for it’s architect/proponent beyond the influence and economic/financial integration that could be monetised thru US Dollar exorbitant privilege.

At an estimated price in 2018 dollars of $100 billion

One Belt One Road looks to have an estimated price tag of $5-9 Trillion over a decade+( 50-90x differential)

Even if the former is the greatest ROI of all time, and the latter is the worst, we have a significant problem in terms of economic competition for relative global influence.

Throw in the digital domain with Zipf’s Law and we are increasingly seeing the likelihood of a decisive winner and an increasingly distant second place network competitor.

3) Huawei has double the combined revenue of Cisco/Juniper, and far more than double R&D spend(hence 5G superiority).


Disrupting adversary commercial networks is potentially a dangerous path to go down.

Completely agree.

And it could become the next mutually assured destruction(MAD) option.

We already over leverage trade as a weapon, which in my opinion sets a bad precedent for an international order that should focus on promoting prosperity. We risk pushing allies and partners away from us with this approach, and perhaps into China's camp if we're not careful.

Exactly, hence competitive value proposition perspective.

There are already increasing calls to replace the dollar as the global currency. If that happens, then we may have to live with the norm we imposed being imposed upon us. American strategists have never been particularly good at thinking about effects over time.

Do we run the risk of reacting too late, and being viewed as the ruling Alawites, then as Tutsis?

The best way to disrupt adversary commercial networks is to offer a better product/service.

Absolutely. Build something citizens and sovereigns want..

If the commercial networks are illicit, then that is another matter.


This war, or hyper-competition, over the international order is being waged non-lethally currently. Having the world's most powerful military accomplishes little in addressing the competitive space below armed conflict. At best it denies an adversary an overt military option (deterrence), but if our adversaries are achieving war-like objectives without overt military aggression how do we achieve our aims? That is the strategic question our nation and allies must wrestle with now.

I think the threshold of detectability matters.

Do citizens and governments detect the non kinetic jockeying for strategic position? But do they care beyond immediate needs and the next election cycle?

Are we able to shift away from “deter, disrupt, and destroy” and incorporate “attract, build, create”?

[davidbfpo]

Citing one line by Kevin23:

China’s mobile payments in 2018 were $12.8 trillion, US equivalent was $50 billion so a comparative 256x differential

Whilst China may not have a street crime problem like many Western nations have, it does have a problem with dishonesty - which is seen in everyday theft of property e.g. electric motorcycle batteries. Let alone the widespread corruption within officialdom; one spin-off is the neglect of industrial health & safety procedures, which can be lethal.

The Chinese economy as Kevin23 pointed out uses mobile payments on a scale not seen in the USA and I expect elsewhere too. Quietly in international crime-fighting forums acknowledges that fraud poses a big problem. Even only for example 0.5% is stolen, that is a lot of money.

[flagg]

Unlike the “surveillance capitalism”-like WeChat, Xi’s App feels far more “littleredbook.com” forced.

But if we look at them both thru a geodigital export “product” lens:

WeChat is for citizen users (consumers) who desire opportunity
Xi’s App is for sovereign users(enterprise) who desire continuity

Another timely article, this time on Chinese geodigital exports for “enterprise” customers.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/t...overnment.html

[flagg]

The hits keep coming, now in 5 Eyes partner NZ:

One Belt One Road sales pitch by China’s Ambassador to NZ Wu Xi, in our biggest national news source:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/...ectid=12225605

NZ Trade Minister firmly committed to One Belt, One Road:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/...ectid=12225644

Huawei/5G issue sidestepped, but increasingly likely to mirror UK accessibility to Huawei/5G

[Bill Moore]

The following article discusses the cybersecurity threat that 5G will present regardless of who provides the hardware infrastructure. The software presents the most significant cybersecurity threat. It goes on to argue that Trump administration's race to win the 5G race has resulted in security shortcuts. The former FCC director explains 5G designs need to address security as a forethought, not an afterthought. Makes me wonder if 5G could empower individuals to create mass chaos and disruption if they can hack into the system? Super empowered actors?

The article points out that many 5G capability claims are hyperbole based on the limitations of the 5G wavelength to penetrate buildings and the limited range of the wavelength; thus it would require 5G antennas on almost every building in a city to make the IOT effective. I'll watch the experts debate it over the next few months and years.

https://www.newyorker.com/news/annal...the-5g-network

[Bill Moore]

Another timely article, this time on Chinese geodigital exports for “enterprise” customers.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/t...overnment.html

The video in this article was interesting, but not convincing in my view. Xi uses surveillance technology, not just cameras, but comprehensive monitoring of its citizens, to maintain party control. Xi is exporting this technology to other autocrats who hope to do the same. It will assist in creating a new world order where Arab Springs are less of a threat to autocratic rulers. However, the Ecuador example wasn't convincing. Not a great comparison, but I liken it to a police officer using an automatic rifle to protect citizens to a criminal using an automatic rifle to terrorize or murder citizens. Surveillance technology can be used to protect citizens or oppress them, and in high crime areas it may protect them. We should have enough data by now to see if the UK's use of surveillance technology has reduced crime or at least enabled law enforcement to capture the culprits.

Reference the articles on New Zealand, I can understand the desire to reject protectionism, but I think they're buying into Xi's web of deceit, no country promotes protectionism of its businesses more than China. They can put lipstick on a pig, but it is still a pig. Reference the articles on Germany and UK ignoring U.S. pressure not to purchase Huawei; I think the U.S. is coming to terms that it has reduced power to influence in a multipower world order. Diplomacy and economic incentives are more important than having the preponderance of military power.

[davidbfpo]

Replying to Bill:

We should have enough data by now to see if the UK's use of surveillance technology has reduced crime or at least enabled law enforcement to capture the culprits.

Bill,

The impact of the often pervasive use of CCTV, whether by public agencies or private operators and now increasingly private individual's homes, is very moot. It did have an effect on some crimes, such as vehicle crime in car parks and street robbery in city centres. The police have almost come to the point "no CCTV, no investigation" IMHO and for serious "high end" crime, such as murder or terrorism, it is essential part of the investigative picture that can be assembled.

For multiple reasons, with reduced budgets to the fore, crime is now growing - particularly vehicle crime and violent street crime. Property crime and in particular fraud (some assess it as a third of all crime) even if CCTV exists is not being investigated. One big urban force admitted 40% of all reported crime is filed upon submission.

Crime is not static, those committing it change and the victims do too. Hence the widespread use of CCTV inside and outside private homes. So the burglar(s) simply wear masks and hats, let alone gloves to ensure no prints are left behind.

I would argue that CCTV is no longer a deterrent to most crimes, even more so when there is little prospect of an investigation. All the other technological options for "high end" crime, such as financial data and movement data stumble when there is no useful imagery.

It is difficult to find public examples of the value of LPR (ANPR in UK parlance) and a huge amount of data is collected every day. Here is one, a long running series of non-violent house burglaries in London and eventually a Manchester unknown suspect was identified. "Reading between the lines" he was finally caught in a surveillance operation. The national detection rate for house burglary is 3% and has been static for thirty plus years.
Link:https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/04/24/wimbledon-prowler-finally-admits-raids-decade-burglaries/

[flagg]

Xi is using Mao's methodology to brainwash his citizens. The similarity between Xi and Mao is both embrace oppressive governance; the difference is Xi comes closer to embracing Confucius thought (as Xi calls it, socialism with Chinese characteristics) than foolishly embracing communism as Mao did. The results economically are night and day, but increasingly similar when it comes to oppressive governance. Like Mao in the 60s and 70s, Xi is now exporting this model of governance, and the means (IT, AI, etc.) for other nations to implement it. Xi infiltrates economically, then gains control of the various media outlets to the point of controlling country's media may publish, etc. With Huawei, artificial intelligence, facial recognition technology increasingly available, I think it is possible that Xi will gradually assert control over social media in other nations. If you control the information, then you can control the populace.

This thread started with the claim that our NDS is not a strategy. In the traditional sense it is a strategy, but one that clings to outdated Clausewitzian views of power. I'll refer back to a post I made a couple of years ago that is relevant here.

http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...l=1#post202760

Connectography: Mapping the Future o...y Parag Khanna

I'm quoting reviewer on Amazon below:



Parag makes the following arguments:
- Infrastructure is destiny
- Connectography proves why past is no longer prologue
- Why China’s “One Belt, One Road” project is a winning strategy that outflanks the U.S. rebalance (Go) by integrating all of Eurasia’s economies under China’s auspices.

For those that think proxy wars are the way to compete, he offers a counterview. I am reading more and more thought pieces that propose we revert to Cold War proxy wars to compete, but to what end? It is hard to break from the past when our doctrine clings to it.



I think our national leadership has awakened to this fact (there are exceptions of course), but too late and we don't have a strategy to compete effectively for connectivity. We also have a White House that messages it is opposed to connectivity, creating opportunities for China to exploit.

.

Hi Bill,

Connectography looks interesting and is now in my Kindle queue.

At a glance, it aligns quite nicely with my recent Mad Scientist submission.

Which network operating system(China or US) will offer individual users(consumers) and sovereigns(enterprise) the best respective value proposition?

I’ve been grounded in Metcalfe and learning how to apply Clausewitz.

I’m hoping those that are grounded in Clausewitz start applying Metcalfe.

I’ve been looking at two very sobering comparisons:

1) (E-commerce/mobile payments), Chinese > USA .....by 50x

2) (Relative spend in 2018 dollars), One Belt One Road > Marshall Plan .....by 50-90x

Advancements in disrupting & destroying insurgent networks is a useful capability(McChrystal et al), but how are we at amplifying friendly/coalition commercial network effects and deterring/disrupting adversary commercial networks via non kinetic means?

The GWOT expression “we can’t kill our way to victory” can also be recycled and repurposed for peer threats to “lethality doesn’t create positive geodigital network effects”.