About the Forum||Journals||FPP Online||Contributor Information||Board Members||Order Forms||Contact||

|| Back to Forum on Public Policy Online||Fall 2006 || Winter 2007 || Spring 2007 || Summer 2007 ||

Summer 2009: Table of Contents

|Digital Age||Fighting Terrorism||Issues in Education||Literature||Science and Religion||Social Justice||Three Cultures||Women and Leadership||

Fighting TerrorismBack to top

Countering the Radical Islamist Message: Image Management as a Counter-terror Strategy
Brent J. Talbot, Professor, Department of Military Strategic Studies,US Air Force Academy

Abstract
The ancient Chinese strategist Sun Tzu declared that it was best “to subdue the enemy without fighting” and goes on to explain that understanding and defeating the enemy strategy—aided by superior information/intelligence—rather than attacking the enemy force, is the best means of doing so. Strategists must consider public opinion as a strategic center of gravity. Radical Islamist enemies understand and use propaganda to distort the truth to their advantage. Thus, the US needs to conduct “Image management,” a new term which avoids the old connotations of propaganda, even the more recently tainted “strategic communication/influence,” and offers a fresh start at telling the truth, getting the word out, in order to counter the misleading use of information by America’s enemies. Image management is countering the false perceptions engineered via enemy propaganda. The ‘war of ideas’ struggles with identifying and engaging several “critical cultural-cognitive dimensions,” has often failed to successfully employ a policy-making system that engages cultural awareness and understanding. Image management must necessarily observe patterns on a strategic scale, import cultural contexts, and export cultural understanding to win hearts and minds away from supporting radical terrorist actors. A previous institutional lack of focus on image management has resulted in US standing plummeting around the world, and has undermined domestic political support for the war on terror. This essay explores three applications of image management: interests and ideals, executive authority, and religion/culture, in order to define and apply the concept and as an initial effort to demonstrate its policy application.

©Copyright by the Forum on Public Policy
All rights Reserved. Electronic edition published 2006