Improving PSYOP (and CA as a tangent)

[Voodoun]

That's probably a very accurate appraisal of base rates - given that there are around 1500 Tactical PSYOP and probably 10% of our enlisted ranks have post-graduate educations, the odds are high that there's more enlisted 11b's with MA's, MBAs, and PhDs, than PSYOP. But take for intance the E4 I know in PSYOP with an MBA - I don't think he'd argue that his job is going to require him utilize that education in his job. I don't jack squat about being an infantryman - but Reed does - Reed, would you argue that when the #### hits the fan in *your* tactical arena (bullets flying all around) your frontal cortex is fully engaged? I know mine shuts off when dealing with novel fight or flight stimuli.

I think the dynamic situation that was being described to me was not one in which people were being shot at, but one in which the PSYOPer was caught in a delicate social situation that required him to use cognitive function in a manner that the average infantryman (we all assume, and maybe wrongfully so) doesnt generally.

<the fact that the left leaning among hated anything that tried to put the US in a good light. That same combination of bureaucratic turf battles (which you alluded to much earlier...) and ideology will short circuit the goal in the future (never say never but it is unlikely).>

Bingo. Is this acceptable? We have the power to ratchet past the turf wars, but we seem to lack the political will to confront this 'everything America does is bad' mentality.

an updated USIA would be a good start, that's for sure.

As far as do we want to confront the Salafi ideology? Well, that has certainly been the goal of policymakers at this point. Making judgements about whether thats the right or wrong thing to do is beyond my comfort zone.