2. Intro
Content of Presentation:
1. Defining the key terms
2. Explanation of the idea
3. The Opportunities and
Threats associated with it.
4. Taking the case: Cause of
selection
5. Analysis of few case
6. Conclusion drawn.
7. Policy measures.
3. What is it?
❖ Dan Kuehl defined information warfare as the
“conflict or struggle between two or more groups
in the information environment (which is the
aggregate of individuals, organizations, and
systems that collect, process, disseminate, or
act on information)”.
❖ It’s Power?
A nuclear armed country was defeated by this
warfare. Guess?
USSR. CIA used this with considerably least
cost ever and divided USSR into 15 countries.
So, always remember the power it possess.
4. What Constitutes Information Warfare?
● Psychological Operations
● Electronic Warfare
● Physical Destruction.
● Security Measures
● Information Attack
5.
6. ● Huhtinen defines “the use of information or
information technology during a time of crisis
of conflict to achieve or promote specific
objectives over a specific adversary or
adversaries”.
● Huhtinen distinguishes between two types of
information warfare. As the first one, he names
the “soft part” of information warfare
including psychological warfare like media war
and perception management. As second type
he identifies “net” warfare which entails
computer or electronic warfare.
● We focus here on the “soft part” of
information warfare.
7. Psychological operations use information to
affect the enemy’s reasoning.
“We can be sure that the global battlefield of
the 21st century will be over information -- the
dissemination or withholding of facts, the
interpretation of events, the presentation or
distortion of ideas and ideologies, and the
communication of messages and symbols
carefully prepared to provoke a particular
reaction, either conscious or unconscious, from
a target audience.”
8. 1. More information floating on
cyberspace.
2. Social Media penetration
3. Exponential growth in Media
Channels
4. Increased Literacy,
Viewership and Readership.
5. Increased transnational
online interaction.
1. Misinformation can be lurking
within it
2. Anti-Social elements too
3. Political, Corporate and Global
ownership with its own interest.
4. Without proper training to read
between the lines, “rational
fools”* are generated.
5. Public’s vulnerability to believe
in enemy’s propaganda.
Opportunities Threats
9. Weapons used in this warfare:
1. Perception Building
● Striking at the subconscious.
1. Misinformation and Disinformation
● Mistake or Deliberately done to mislead?
1. Half truth
● Mixing of falsehood with facts to convince
the receiver’s socio-cultural ideology.
1. Bonafide Information in Malafide
circumstances - Our info used against us.
12. Propaganda:
Fakes news peddled by Pakistan’s ISPR which many of us
here also share, is 7 lakhs troops of Indian Army are
stationed in Kashmir alone. This is insane to anyone who
knows a little about military strategy.
13. Decoding the propaganda:
● Kashmir is a small valley accounting for 15% of area of
the state.
● Total Armed Active Forces are ~14 lakhs
● From above two facts, Pakistan wants people to
believe half of India’s Armed Forces is concentrated in
15% of the state, where the valley area having 135 km
by 32 km dimension.
● It means 3233-135 km border that India has with
Pakistan and then 3380 km with China is left open,
undertoning the largest border with Bangladesh, and
of Bhutan, Nepal, Myanmar.
14. Information Warfare: Post Pulwama Attacks
•The three-day sequence of events between India’s air strikes on the Jaish-e-
Mohammed camp in Pakistan’s Balakot and the joint press conference by the
Indian Army, Navy and Air Force was a reminder that in today’s world, an
information war is very important.
•In the 60-plus hours between the strikes and the press conference, a lot of
doubts and counter-narratives had already crept in, before the Indian
authorities woke up to the fact that Pakistan was outsmarting them on this front
16. Pakistan initiates the IW offensives and attains First Movers’ Advantage
● The tweet by the ISPR, became the single source of information for Indians and
Pakistanis that something was amiss, as the militaries of the two countries were put
on high alert, in the aftermath of the 14 February Pulwama attack which killed 40
CRPF personnel.
● Ghafoor followed up with another tweet, saying Indian aircraft intruded from the
Muzaffarabad sector.
17.
18. Fake Social Media Handles
● The ISPR is said to operate 20,000 fake social media
handles. These handles, coupled with social media
influencers in Pakistan, managed to rule the narrative
early on.
● A number of videos were also shared in which locals
claimed that the bombs fell in jungles and caused
destruction to only trees.
● Pakistan Army organised carefully-crafted media trips of
local channels, followed by foreign journalists, to the
forest area where they claimed the bombs were dropped.
19. ● Most journalists who went to the spot, did
mention that a JeM madrasa was close by
but none were allowed to go and visit the
place as the roads were blocked by the
Pakistan Army.
● Question Arises : Why were the journalists
not taken to the bombing spot ? Why were
they not allowed to visit the JeM Madrasa?
21. The Second Day: 27th Feb,2019
● This day was a bigger disaster for India as far
as information warfare was concerned.
● We got unlucky: Our pilot was captured and his
capture was made viral on social media by the
Pakistanis.
● This gave the Pakistanis, the perfect
opportunity to unleash it’s propaganda against
India.
23. Pakistan launches it’s aggressive Psy-Ops by weaponising Social Media
● Minutes after the tweet by the ISPR, Wg Cdr
Abhinandan’s video in captivity, is released, is
made viral and Pakistanis launch social media
offensives.
● This resulted in panic and people in India, in their
paranoia started demanding the release of Wg Cdr
Abhinandan, thereby putting Indian establishment
under extreme pressure.
39. Policy Measures
1. Creating Awareness about
Media’s role in Defence and
Strategy in India.
2. Enough avenue creation for
civilian approach to Military
policy issues.
3. Information cannot be and
shouldn’t be restricted, but
disinformation should be dealt
with counter narratives.
4. Deal the enemy’s
disinformation with your own.
40. ‘If the end could be achieved by non-
military methods, even by methods
of intrigue, duplicity and fraud, I
would not advocate an armed
conflict’.
- Kautilya
41. “The supreme art of war is to subdue the
enemy without fighting.”
- Sun Tzu, The Art of War
42. Sources
Coulthart, S. (2016). Review of Propaganda and Intelligence in the Cold War: The NATO Information Service.
Global Security and Intelligence Studies, 1(2).
Huhtinen, A, and J Rantapelkonen. “Perception Management in the Art of War. A Review of Finnish War
Propaganda and Present-Day Information Warfare.” Journal of Information Warfare, vol. 2, no. 1, 2003, pp.
50–58. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/26486889.
Sputnik News, URL : https://sputniknews.com/asia/201902281072828764-india-pakistan-air-strike/
National Interest, URL: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/pakistan%E2%80%99s-long-controversial-love-
affair-f-16-fighting-falcon-47682
The Guardian, URL: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/03/pakistan-denies-indian-claims-it-used-
us-f-16-jets-to-down-warplane
Other Sources; The Dawn News, Geo News, Hindustan Times, Foreign Policy, DGISPR, ANI etc..
Editor's Notes
*-Economic term.
Reading between the lines/ Viewing between the gradients:
The “Indian-administered Kashmir” is a neutral point of view for a foreign player not to anger Pakistan or India. But it takes away the legitimacy of India’s claim of Kashmir being Integral part of it.
The Zooming of the photo at specific point, where “We want Freedom” looks larger than the soldiers who are cornered to the left, creates the contrast which subconsciously appeals the reader to get swayed by the message.
All the images following where the asymmetry of weapons is showcased in order to portray the Armed Forces(Police basically) as oppressors while obfuscating the fact of militancy prevalent in the area which requires Armed Forces.
