Fukoku Kyohei
Japan's isolation gave it one great benefit over all other nations in the advance of civilization. It allowed Japan to study how other nations advanced. It them assimilated what worked for them, and avoided their mistakes. When it finally took advantage of what it had learned from careful observation, it seemingly overnight turned from an agrarian society to an industrial power. With the Meijei Restoration of 1868 the Japanese began building their society around one focused vision: "Fukoku Kyohei". This literally means "Rich Home, Strong Arm", understood to mean a rich country and a strong military. Engineers, generals, and diplomats alike visited other nations and brought back notes. Then they quickly and willfully created a modern industrial power out of their old nation. Leaders redeployed Forces built to protect boundaries, and social vehicles that for centuries had secured isolation, toward outward expansion instead.
Fukoku Kyohei may have been but a slogan anywhere else in the World, but with Japan's cultural foundations it carried the weight of religious duty. In the first of two phases opening to the outer world (globalization) the Samurai culture kept Japan isolated and delayed modernization. However, because of ancient social protocols, the tenets of Samurai culture, "imbued the society with an ethos for integration that, coupled with the geographical isolation from the quarrelling western powers, allowed Japan to modernize and innovate in the Second Period of Globalization." (Taylor, 2011, p. 70). Gen. Douglas MacArthur made it a point to understand how the Japanese mind worked, and he overtly used that to sublimate Fukoku Kyohei with ideals of democracy and private enterprise following the Japanese surrender. Allowing the Japanese to save face even as the accepted losing the war would be crucial to successful postwar transition. His psychological appeal to Japanese values shows in his careful choice of words during the surrender on the U.S.S. Missouri: But rather it is for us, both victors and vanquished, to rise to that higher dignity which alone befits the sacred purposes we are about to serve, committing all our people unreservedly to faithful compliance with the understanding they are here formally to assume. (MacArthur, 1945)
Spanish Civil War
For the Great powers of Europe, the Spanish Civil War served as a dressed rehearsal for the Cold War. The nations that had fought World War I had signed an armistice for a war to end all wars. They still maintained secret alliances and enmities, and prepared secret strategies -- but for the time they remained committed to not fighting each other. The results of having done so once lingered too fresh in their memory. When the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, the great powers converged and took sides, but did not confront each other outright.
Stalin supported the established government, and in doing so opposed Mussolini and Hitler, who supported the Rebels. With British authorities openly promoting neutrality but covertly supporting the established government, and Hitler and Mussolini making deals to facilitate invading France, it was already World War II by proxy. It had the charactersitics of what military theory came to call Fourth Generation Warfare before the charactersitics of Third Generation Warfare had even manifested. New technology introduced new tools into psychological warfare. Gen. Francisco Franco didn't need to dump propaganda leaflets from planes. He had loudspeakers, and could blast his message into the Republican zone. Eyes could ignore messages on leaflets, but blaring loudspeakers forced his enemy's ears.
Media also converged upon Spain, with largely biased opposition to Franco's politics and methods. This became a tool for generating American and further British opposition to Franco. Psychological manipulation worked to generate anti-Franco sentiment, but only generated individual calls to action. American scholar and satirist Tom Lehrer pegged the psychological significance of the Spanish Civil War perfectly, writing, "Remember the war against Franco?/That's the kind where each of us belongs./Though he may have won all the battles,/We had all the good songs!" (Lehrer, 1965)
Germany during WWII
Adolf Hitler's rise to power benefitted from the same technological tools that helped Franco in Spain. The Versailles Accords at the end of World War I had left Germany as a despised stepchild among the brotherhood of nations. Hitler actually had the audacity to wail his improbable vision from a prison cell, and but a few years later see it achieved. He found the platform to reinforce German feelings that they not only did not deserve their oppressed status, but that they were better than their oppressors. He offered scapegoats up for his people, and convinced his people they deserved the land they took. Among the more elite, he shared the cultic vision of realizing some supernaturally decreed empire. During World War II he made certain that Germans heard only the news he wanted them to.
Radios that picked up broadcasts from elsewhere in Europe were generally illegal, but returning soldiers occasionally brought them as souvenirs. Underground organizations -- some very loosely organized -- that gained access to them used the broadcasts they overheard to inform other Germans the truth about the war's course, but risked their lives doing so. Joseph Goebbels took propaganda places that Hitler himself may never have imagined. A genuine media genius of his day, Goebbels took charge of all German media and coordinated all information. Anything broadcast had to both reinforce compliance within the Fatherland, and hinder efforts of the enemy without. A dynamic movie industry served as a social indoctrination tool to reinforce anti-Semitic sentiments and the power of the National Socialist Party.
China
Large and isolated for most of history, China's story is almost an alternative history to what happened everyplace else on Earth. It lived out its own history, complete with wars and political social upheaval, all within its own boundaries. Even with the Maoist revolution, its roots of self-learned psychological warfare stretched into antiquity. While the inspirational "Art of War" by Sun Tzu may be the best known Chinese work on war, it is not the most direct -- or most unapologetically ruthless -- regarding psychological warfare. That honor goes to "Thirty-Six Strategies". With thousands of years of history behind it, it summarizes all lessons learned into 36 proverbs that concisely summarize psychological strategies. Most of these martial proverbs existed by the First century B.C.E. As early as the 3rd Century A.C.E, when Romans were still killing Christians just for fun, two Chinese dynasties already accepted that psychological warfare was better than actual combat -- though later dynasties dispensed with that notion (Thomas, 2005).
Understanding the 36 Strategies is essential for negotiating even in today's Chinese business world. If a negotiator does not apply some of these strategies, he or she may be certain that they are being applied against him (Brahm, 2003). "The 36 Strategies" are simply expressed in brief sentences, like, "Deceive the Sky (Emperor) to cross the Ocean." (Man Tian Kuo Hai). This describes a still recognized strategy of hiding in plain sight, having open activities that distract from a hidden agenda. Another is, "Create something from nothing," (Wu Zhong Sheng Yo) which psychologial warfare does well when it creates a weakness where none previously existed.
In modern times Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong both knew these strategies. The open-endedness keeps them as valid for politics and finance as they are for war. They also figure centrally in the expected future of Chinese psychological warfare. In the 1990s when NATO fought wars in the Persian Gulf and Kosovo, the Chinese watched and learned. As the age of Information Warfare (IW) advanced, China began cultivating greater interest in Psychological Operations (which -- contradicting Western definitions -- the Chinese military mind equates with any psychological warfare).
From 2002-2005 its prominent journal China Military Science published six articles related to psychological warfare (Thomas, 2005). As recently as August 18th, 2012, "the Sunzi Research Association of Shandong and the Military Psychology Committee under the Chinese Psychology Society"(Xue & Lu, 2012) hosted a symposium on the topic. Altogether 45 professionals attended. They considered psychological warfare in general and the specifically the monograph Conquest without Combat - Ancient Chinese Psychological Warfare Thought and Usage, a required textbook for People's Liberation Army students. (ibid.)
----------------------------------------------------
James Scott is the CEO of Princeton Corporate Solutions, a corporate globalization and political strategies firm, PCS offers a unique blend of think tank, corporate and governmental communication strategies to expedite the facilitation of long lasting relationship building in these necessary sectors. http://princetoncorporatesolutions.com
EasyPublish this article: http://submityourarticle.com/articles/easypublish.php?art_id=291399
No comments:
Post a Comment