After a decade of war, with many military victories to its credit, the United States continues to struggle with defining and combating ideological adversaries. It has been unable to dominate the psychological battlespace in which America’s enemies – both those practicing violence and those not presently violent – flourish.
Dr. Waller outlines a strategic solution in his November 30, 2012 presentation at the Westminster Institute.
The Department of Defense has expunged the term “psychological” from its official weapons lexicon, replacing it with an uneasy and odd-sounding concept called Military Information Support Operations (MISO).
As the name implies, MISO is purely military, with information serving only as a supporting role and in an operational, not strategic, capacity.
On the civilian side, public diplomacy continues to flounder and strategic communication has become an obsolete catchphrase. Professor Waller describes a high-impact, low-cost, national security approach that employs psychological strategy for all US officials to carry out their sworn oath to defend against “all enemies, foreign and domestic.”