Deception Management?                                January 2005

Tis so, deception management is a budding reality.  The war on terrorism has challenged the Pentagon and our political leaders in ways never before imagined. Historically, the Pentagon has embraced the position that military public affairs offices should put out information to the public that is accurate and timely. Disinformation and propaganda are the proper domain of operational commanders, not public affairs officers. So far so good.

Here's the rub--the war on terrorism is no ordinary war with field size troop divisions or demarcated front-lines. How then does the military combat falsehoods put out over mass media outlets like the Arab news satellite channel Al Jazeera or take other steps to battle anti-Americanism spewing forth from various countries? Perhaps public affairs and information operations (IO--this is the military lingo for managing combat information) should be combined. But would this not risk (a) compromising the credibility of American military leaders and (b) misleading American and world public opinion? And, to take this one step further, should the Pentagon undertake deliberate efforts at misinformation intended to shape the opinions of reluctant allies?

These are serious, indeed frightful questions that the Pentagon is debating. The chief Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita, according to a recent New York Times (12/13/04) story, says: "In the battle of perception management, where the enemy is clearly using the media to help manage perceptions of the general public, our job is not perception management but to counter the enemy's perception management." Is perception management not deception management? And if it is, what's ahead?