Hearing of the House Armed Services Committee's Terrorism, Unconventional Threats Subcommittee - Countering Ideological Support for Terrorism
Interview
Hearing of the House Armed Services Committee's Terrorism, Unconventional Threats Subcommittee - Countering Ideological Support for Terrorism
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REP. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND (D-NY): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I have two areas of enquiry that I want to cover, if I can.
The first is, you are here to talk about a communication strategy. And I want to talk about the use of language because one concern I have is that this administration has painted all terrorists as "Islamo-fascists." And if we look at this article, "How to Win the War of Ideas," by Robert Satloff, he calls them "Islamists."
Now if we're trying to win a war of ideas using the fundamental tenet of "Islam" in the middle of a word that connotes terrorists, is that an effective communication strategy? It seems to me that, when we're creating our foreign policy to deal with various elements that we're concerned with -- they have different leadership, they have different values, they have different goals, they will require a different attack strategy.
And so to paint them with one brush, I would find -- as if you painted a Christian group with a Christian label, and framed it as a terrorist group, I would be offended. So have you heard, or is there any feedback from your expertise that his broad brush is actually counterproductive?
MR. MACINNES: Yes. Two things: One of the things that we look at when we do messaging on -- in counterterrorism communications under -- with DOD is we have to continually be aware of what we say. What we say may not be what they hear, okay; and that you want to be saying things, that they hear it the way you want to be hearing it.
When we say "Islamo-fascism," whether that term has a meaning or not, what they hear is war on Islam, okay -- "attacking my religion."
REP. GILLIBRAND: I would think --
MR. MACINNES: When you say "Islamist," they hear -- they don't make -- they hear "Muslim," you know. And as one of my friends said once, "You don't start a conversation by sticking -- poking a stick in your person's eye you're going to try to talk to." And that's -- when you say "Islamo-fascism," it's equivalent, it's a verbal equivalent of poking a stick in somebody's eye. And they do not -- and that -- bin Laden has been very good at taking or words and turning them to his advantage by saying, "See, they're actually at war with Islam."
REP. GILLIBRAND: Correct.
MR. MACINNES: And we fall into the trap of, you know, of having to answer that question. And like, "Have you stopped -- (inaudible) -- ?" You can't answer it, well -- yes, no.
REP. SMITH: Mr. MacInnes, if I could interrupt, because I want to draw a point on this. So I think what you're saying basically is, the word "Islam," "Muslim," should be no part of how we describe al- Qaeda, and who we're fighting against.
MR. MACINNES: You can --
REP. SMITH: And that's something we've struggled against, the "Islamo-fascist" comment, "Islamist," no matter how you put it -- and I've been through this over the years, figuring out how to put it because, you know, you think, well, logically, they have a certain religious bent -- but I think the ultimate answer, and what Ms. Gillibrand is pointing out, is there's no way you can put "Islam" in there.
And has that -- is that a decision that our strategic communications folks have made -- let's call them, you know, al-Qaeda, call them "Qutbists," which is one, you know, a person that they followed -- find something else to call them that does not give them any piece of the Islam label. Is that a decision you've made?
MR. MACINNES: That is something we've looked for -- we try -- we basically call them terrorists, murderers, what they are. But when you want to talk about them as Muslims, you're better off using a positive Muslim voice saying that. Because if we talk about Islam, we're not credible in terms of "you're not a Muslim."
So what we actually have done -- and Dr. Doran talked about it earlier, is we're looking at getting, and collecting those positive statements made by leading Muslims against terrorism. And they can say, you know, they can use the word "Islam" and talk about Islam, and they are very convincing.
And we are finding that they actually -- that there is, there's a lot more of that going now than was previously. I mean, there are editorials; there are great cartoons that poke fun at terrorism. I think that Muslims are concerned very much about their religion being hijacked, but as Dr. Doran said, they're not a society that tends to have a lot of public debate on issues.
REP. GILLIBRAND: Dr. Pittman, what's your experience in the military? Are we beginning to change our terminology?
MR. PITTMAN: Well, I think a lexicon is always important, and we look at these kinds of things when we're working together to develop messaging. And we have some people who have studied these areas quite a bit. We're always focusing on trying to get more regional, cultural expertise, et cetera.
But part of the challenge is pushing it down to the very lowest levels, because when you have operational, you know, activities going on in a certain area, then you need to be able to have specific cultural expertise in that area.
REP. GILLIBRAND: And do you make these recommendations to the higher levels, too? Because this is something -- I mean, if you watched the presidential debates, you'll have presidential candidates using this terminology. You'll have the administration using this terminology. And have you made those recommendations to the higher- ups that if you're going to have a better communication strategy, that choice of identifying language is something that has to be a priority?
MR. PITTMAN: I think language is something that leadership focuses on. I think the issue of phrases like "violent extremists" -- you know, as opposed to -- you know, using Islam in a characterization or whatever -- I think that's something that we've evolved to over time. I don't think it's something that we naturally came about at the beginning of this.
REP. GILLIBRAND: Well, I would encourage you all to use your positions of expertise and advocacy to help improve how we address this issue.
The second question I just want to raise quickly is in your Digital Outreach Teams, you only have two individuals doing it now. What kind of recruiting are you doing on college campuses? This is an area where I would think for the military, there are enormous numbers of young individuals who would love to be part of winning the war on terror who we could develop to look to become foreign language experts, to work in a different capacity for the military, to do things like blogging and reviewing websites. What is your long-term plan of strategy to build that capability?
MR. PITTMAN: I'll address that from the Defense side and then Duncan can roll in as well.
There are actually -- I mean, the Digital Outreach Team at the Counterterrorism Communications Center is one cell. But there are also other discreet operations within Combatant Command Headquarters. For example, Central Command has a blogging engagement capability that use at that headquarters level. There are -- you know -- you know, new media-type engagement efforts at lower levels. The Joint Forces Command, for example, has a blogging engagement capability and they have written a pamphlet or a brochure on how to go about doing that. So it's an area that we're moving into. The Department of Defense has new media engagement as well.
Now does that mean that we have Arabic speakers or Farsi speakers? It doesn't necessarily mean that. Sometimes in the field, there may be contracted capabilities that are, you know, working in these areas to address these types of new media. But it certainly is an area that we're sharing with State and trying to, you know, better our knowledge on how to do it.
REP. GILLIBRAND: But are you actively recruiting on college campuses for these new kind of talents that could be brought into either our diplomatic side or our military side to really add value to our mission here?
MR. PITTMAN: I would tell you that I don't believe that it's drilled down to the extent that we're specifically seeking those skill sets. Rather, we're -- you know, for example, in recruiting military personnel, we would look for a background perhaps in media. And, I mean, almost all young people coming into the military today have some experience in using new media much more than people our age, for example. So --
REP. SMITH: The gentlelady's time has expired.
REP. GILLIBRAND: Mr. Chairman --
REP. SMITH: I'll give a little bit more, because I took some of it there.
But I just -- a couple of questions. One, in terms of how our audience in this war of ideas gets their information. You know, what's the best medium for reaching them? And there's a whole bunch of different mediums out there, depending on who your audience is and where they get their information. I just -- from my own campaign experience -- you know, when I was first running, you know, for Congress -- you know, there's a lot of different ways to reach the people in my district -- the ones who are going to vote. Radio, mail -- but just sort of walking around and having grown up there, I knew that sort of television, if you will, was the killer rap. That's -- you know, if I had a limited amount of money and I did, it should all go there because that's where they're going to get the bulk of their information. That was, you know, 12 years ago, so things may have changed.
But in the audience out there of sort of the disaffected Muslim world, the ones who are -- you know, we're trying to persuade, what -- have you discovered sort of what the best source of information -- where do they get their information? When they develop an opinion, where is it coming from? And then what have we done to try to get into that medium in the most effective way possible?
MR. PITTMAN: That's a very good question and one we grapple with all the time.
First of all, what -- what's happened in the modern -- the 21st century is audiences have segmented a lot. For instance --
REP. SMITH: It's a lot more difficult --
(Cross talk)
MR. PITTMAN: -- I watch television a lot -- news. My son, who's in high school, never watches television but he gets a lot of information off the Internet.
REP. SMITH: Right. And there's hundreds of channels now --
(Cross talk.)
MR. PITTMAN: So with -- for the general public in the Muslim world, television is the most powerful media, without question. For the youth audiences in much of the Muslim world that is well-connected to the Internet, it's the Internet, without -- okay. So we need to do both. But what happens is there's a relationship between the Internet and television. You know, if bin Laden puts a video on the Internet and if it gets picked up by TV, the TV runs something, the segment gets put into YouTube. So it's really the -- so we need to do both.
REP. SMITH: And if I may make the observation based on a pervious hearing we had on this subject, we need to do a lot more on the Internet. I -- and I think you guys get it. I think the people at the top leadership now understand that. We have not -- and this sort of follows up a little bit on Ms. Gillibrand's question -- we have not put the resources into it. I mean, once I discovered the television was the thing, I stopped doing everything and every nickel I could -- you know, I put into that. I don't sense that we've seen -- we've done the same with the Internet. We're vaguely aware of it. We don't have enough people involved and we need to do more, dramatically more. And we would like to be helpful here on this committee and in Congress in doing that.
Is that a fair assessment?
MR. PITTMAN: I think that's a fair assessment. I think we've -- that we identified that we are weak there and we need to move into it.
One of the things, to answer Mr. Levin's earlier question, was on recruitment -- one of the things we're looking at for Internet is do we need to actually have it done within the government? Is that the most effective way to be doing it? We need to do some of it, but we also have been working with, like, the University of Southern California School of Diplomacy on -- there are ways that we can get people outside the government to be doing it because they'll be more effective. They can be freer. They can say, "I don't like this policy." But -- you know -- which we can't -- we have to be -- we're in a -- somewhat of a straitjacket, okay? So we would like seek out ways that we can get nongovernmental organizations involved in using the Internet against extremist terrorism in ways that amplify because the Internet is best done often as a decentralized --
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