Quote Originally Posted by AdamG View Post
Let me put this into another kind of context - alot of 'People's Movements' started out with a gaggle of poorly-armed amateurs, who were first viewed as jokes (I'll spare the Peanut Gallery the laundry list). Granted, Anonymous is a bunch of script kiddies & some talented teenagers (see also my first post, wrt their fizzled attempts to irritate Scientology).

When we here look at the varying levels of unconventional warfare, are there meatspace analogies to Anonymous? What's Anonymous' (or a similar groups') potential? The AK-toting 'child warriors' of Africa were/are notorious for their capacity to orchestrate violence, particularly when they're driven by some adults.
you assume you're dealing with a peoples movement when looking at assange and wikileaks. that is likely an error. I do not see a large population being mobilized I see a few with tools. that though is not necessarily bad or even relevant as technology has a tendency to enhance the power projection of smaller groups. large scale protests in cyber space have little effect in meat space so far. until people are mobilized into the street the effect on society beyond the connected few just doesn't scale. we could talk about zapatista movements, and iranian revolutionaries but most people have no clue there was even digerati involved.

anonymous may not have a kinetic conflict analog. simply they may exist in some new aspect as previously undiscovered. new domains have new elements. there were no submarine analogs taken from the land army. the submarine was something entirely new. i would suggest that the anonymous group is more like a bunch of skateboard punks having fun at the expense of others and just about as dangerous. can they break into your store, ruin your furniture and cause major chaos? absolutely but they aren't going to be taking over third world countries.

the level of cohesion and thought behind wikileaks and anonymous simply does not suggest large scale capability or strategic thinking. that could change. there could be a fagin training the orphans to steal but i'm more inclined to believe they simply steal.