The Military and Soft Power

In 2002, when the press reported that the Pentagon had created an Office of Strategic Influence whose mission could include spreading disinformation to our allies as well as enemies, Donald Rumsfeld closed it. But according to a story in yesterday's New York Times, he told reporters that while he had given them a "corpse", he intended to "keep doing every single thing that needed to be done." Now we learn that includes planting paid stories in the Iraq press.

Soft power is the ability to get the outcomes you want by attraction rather than coercion. Military force is hard power, but the military also can generate soft power. When it attracts others by doing its job well, when it engages in military to military education and training, when it provides relief after a tsunami or earthquake, the military contributes to America's soft power.

When it pays to plant stories in Iraqi newspapers, it has the opposite effect. Credibility is the key to success in an information age. Once a message is seen as propaganda, it loses credibility and so does its source. At the same time that the State Department was training Iraqi journalists on the importance of honesty and objectivity in a free press, the Pentagon was undercutting that larger American message. In war, psychological operations are part of the tactics of battle, but the military should define them very narrowly when it comes to winning the peace. Rumsfeld once told a conference of generals that he did not understand soft power. That has been obvious in his bungled conduct of the Iraq war from insulting potential allies while the State Department sought their help to the treatment of detainees to this latest imbroglio. If President Bush is serious about a new strategy for victory, he should start by changing his defense secretary.