REVISION ONE

1

Department of Defense

DIRECTIVE

October #, 2001

Number 3600.1

ASD(C3I)

SUBJECT: Information Operations (IO)

References: (a). DoD Directive S-3600.1, "Information Operations (U)," December 9, 1996 (hereby canceled)

(b). DoD Instruction S-3600.2, "Information Operations Security Classification Guidance (U)," August 6, 1998

A. REISSUANCE AND PURPOSE

This Directive reissues reference (a) to update Information Operations policy, definition, and responsibilities within the Department of Defense (DoD).

B. APPLICABILITY

This Directive applies to the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Military Departments, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Combatant Commands, the Inspector General of the DoD, the Defense Agencies, and the DoD Field Activities (hereafter referred to collectively as "the DoD Components").

C. DEFINITIONS

1. Information Operations (IO). Actions taken to affect adversary information, information systems and decision making, while defending one's own information, information systems and decision making.

2. All other terms used in this Directive are defined in the enclosure.

D. POLICY

1. The DoD supports the national security strategy and national objectives through the accomplishment of a variety of missions that range the spectrum of military operations, from peace to war. In peacetime the DoD conducts activities to accomplish these missions and shape the international environment. In conflict, as in peacetime, information superiority enables the DoD to direct the full power of Information Age concepts and technologies; transforming capabilities for maneuver, strike, logistics, protection and situation awareness into full spectrum dominance.

a. A primary focus of IO (defensively and offensively) is ultimately on decision-makers; the information they acquire and use to make decisions, the information they generate in making decisions and the full range of systems and organizations involved in handling, processing and

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implementing this information. IO may also be used to effect the automated component of a weapon system.

b. IO, conducted as an integral element of land, sea, air, space, special and joint operations, contributes to information superiority by protecting military decision-making from adversary attacks and as necessary degrades an adversary's decision-making, thereby producing a relative information advantage.

(1) One set of IO activities employed by the DoD Components focuses on the perceptions and attitudes of decision-makers or groups.

(2) A second set of IO activities also employed by the DoD Components focuses on attacking or defending the electromagnetic spectrum, information systems, and information which supports decision makers, command and control and automated responses.

c. The DoD's activities to conduct IO include psychological operations (PSYOP), electronic warfare (EW) (including directed energy), computer network operations (CNO), information assurance (IA), military deception, security, and counterintelligence.

2. IO exploits the opportunities and vulnerabilities inherent in dependence on information supporting military activities. Therefore, IO will be considered by DoD components when developing policy, doctrine, and capabilities (to include the full range of responsibilities to train and equip forces from acquisition through maintenance and sustainment) as well as the planning and execution of operations.

3. Public affairs (PA) and civil affairs (CA) represent related activities which, like IO, can contribute to achieving a commander's overall objectives in shaping the information environment.

a. The intent of PA is to truthfully inform the public and thus shall not focus on directing or manipulating public actions or opinion. As such, PA can be useful as a counter to adversary propaganda and disinformation. DoD components must ensure PA offices are aware of the military objective and ensure mutually supporting efforts.

b. CA activities support DoD informational objectives by influencing, developing, or controlling indigenous infrastructures in foreign operational areas, and can be an alternate means to communicate with the host nation and foreign public.

4. DoD shall integrate IO into theater engagement strategies and campaign plans to support national policy and strategy.

5. DoD shall coordinate with other USG agencies, as appropriate, DoD engagement strategies and the employment of IO.

6. DoD shall ensure intelligence supports an array of DoD IO requirements, to include indications and warning, research, development and acquisition and operational support. Detailed intelligence on the information systems, decision-making processes, and human factors is required.

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7. To facilitate efficient development of IO capabilities, the DoD Components shall share tactics, techniques, procedures and technologies to the maximum extent practicable.

8. DoD shall develop and conduct education, training and exercise programs to ensure the successful planning and execution of IO.

E. RESPONSIBILITIES

1. The Assistant Secretary of Defense for Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence (ASD(C3I)) shall:

a. Serve as the principal staff assistant to the Secretary of Defense for IO.

b. Provide overarching strategy, policy and guidance for the development and integration of capabilities to conduct IO.

c. Conduct oversight of the DoD Component's efforts to plan, program, and develop capabilities in support of validated IO capability requirements.

d. Serve as the DoD proponent for the Information Operations Technology Center.

e. In coordination with Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics (USD(AT&L)), support and guide science and technology efforts to develop IO capabilities.

f. Lead interagency coordination and allied cooperation concerning intelligence support, information assurance, counterintelligence, security and the development of IO related capabilities.

g. Support Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (USD(P)), in reviewing IO aspects of CINC OPLANS and Theater Engagement Plans.

h. Coordinate with USD(P) on IO matters that pertain to PSYOP, military deception or International Public Information.

i. Coordinate with USD(AT&L) when IO matters pertain to acquisition issues, EW or special programs.

j. Require the Director, Defense Security Information Agency to:

(1) Serve as the DoD focal point to oversee the application of information assurance (IA) for the Global Information Grid.

(2) Plan, develop, coordinate, and support IA activity to protect and maintain automated information systems (including the command, control, communications, and computer systems) which serve the needs of the National Command Authority.

k. Require the Director, Defense Intelligence Agency to:

(1) Manage DoD intelligence community's all-source production to support the full range of DoD IO intelligence requirements.

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(2) Oversee IO intelligence requirements, and serve as the DoD intelligence community focal point, for development, management, and maintenance of information systems and databases which facilitate timely collection, processing, and dissemination of all-source, finished intelligence for DoD IO.

(3) Coordinate with the DoD Components to support the development of IO capabilities.

(4) Provide political-military assessments to support the full range of IO, including the validation of IO threats.

(5) Provide human factors intelligence support, and integrate human factors analysis with U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) to support and leverage the capabilities of the PSYOP components.

2. The USD(AT&L) shall:

a. Coordinate with ASD(C3I) when developing policy and conducting oversight that pertains to EW or other IO related activities.

b. Consider IO threats in the review and approval of acquisition programs.

c. Ensure that adequate science and technology programs exist to support the development of IO capabilities.

d. As the proponent for EW, develop and maintain a technology investment strategy to support the development and integration of EW capabilities.

3. The USD(P) shall:

a. As the principal staff assistant to the Secretary of Defense for policy, strategy and review of operational plans, provide policy guidance and oversight of the DoD Component's employment of offensive IO capabilities, PSYOP and International Public Information.

b. Lead interagency discussions and coordination as well as international cooperation and dialog concerning the employment of IO.

4. The DoD General Counsel shall provide legal advice and assistance to the Secretary of Defense and other DoD officials on IO plans and capabilities employed.

5. The Secretaries of the Military Departments and the Commander in Chief, USSOCOM (within their respective U.S. Title X and Major Force Program 11 responsibilities respectively) shall develop IO doctrine and tactics; and organize, train and equip to ensure that IO become effective elements of, and integral to, U.S. military capabilities.

6. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff shall:

a. Serve as the principal military advisor to the Secretary of Defense on IO.

b. Validate IO requirements through the Joint Requirements Oversight Council.

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c. Establish doctrine to facilitate the integration of IO concepts into joint operations. Ensure all U.S. military plans and operations include and are consistent with IO policy, strategy, and doctrine.

7. Commander in Chief, U.S. Joint Forces Command shall ensure that joint concept development, experimentation, and exercises routinely test and refine IO capabilities, including the application of realistic wartime stress to information systems.

8. Commander in Chief, U.S. Space Command shall:

a. Coordinate and conduct DoD CND to protect the Defense Information Infrastructure from adversary CNO.

b. Provide planning and coordination support to the CNA missions of supported combatant commands.

c. On behalf of other CINCs and in coordination with the Joint Staff, USCINCSPACE will advocate CNA requirements and assist in Joint Requirements Oversight Council (JROC) validation as appropriate.

9. The Director, National Security Agency (NSA), shall:

a. Provide a conduit for deconfliction of DoD CNO activities with the intelligence community (IC) and IC intelligence gain/loss assessments and targeting strategies to support proposed IO courses of actions.

b. Assess and provide information systems security threat and vulnerability information, in conjunction with appropriate agencies, to support IO requirements.

c. Coordinate IO support activities with Secretaries of the Military Departments, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the heads of the DoD Components.

10. The Heads of the DoD Components shall assign responsibilities and establish procedures within their organizations to implement the policies in section D., above. The Component heads shall apprise the ASD(C3I), of developmental efforts consistent with subsection E.1., above.

F. EFFECTIVE DATE

This Directive is effective immediately.

\\SIGNED\\

Paul Wolfowitz
Deputy Secretary of Defense

Enclosure

Definitions

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DEFINITIONS

1. Computer network attack (CNA). Operations to [manipulate] disrupt, deny, degrade, or destroy information resident in computers and computer networks, or the computers and networks themselves.

-OR-

1. Computer network attack (CNA): Operations using computer hardware or software, or conducted through computers or computer networks, with the intended objective or likely effect of disrupting, denying, degrading, or destroying information resident in computers and computer networks, or the computers and networks themselves.

2. Computer network defense (CND). Efforts to defend against the CNO of others, especially that directed against U.S. and allied computer networks.

-OR-

2. Computer network defense (CND): Those measures, internal to the protected entity, taken to protect and defend information, computers, and networks from intrusion, exploitation, disruption, denial, degradation, or destruction.

3. Computer network exploitation (CNE). Intelligence collection and enabling operations to gather data from target adversary automated information systems (AIS) or networks.

-OR-

3. Computer network exploitation (CNE): Intelligence collection and enabling operations to gather data from target or adversary automated information systems or networks. CNE is composed of two types of activities:

(1) enabling activities designed to obtain or facilitate access to the target computer system where the purpose includes foreign intelligence collection; and,

(2) collection activities designed to acquire foreign intelligence information from the target computer system.

4. Computer network operations (CNO) Comprises CNA, CND and CNE collectively.

5. Computer network response (CNR) ["Active Computer Network Defense"]: Those measures, that do not constitute CNA, taken to protect and defend information, computers, and networks from disruption, denial, degradation, destruction, or exploitation that involve activity external to the protected entity. Computer Network Response, when authorized, may include measures to determine the source of hostile CNA or CNE.

6. Deception. Those measures designed to mislead an adversary by manipulation, distortion, or falsification of evidence to induce him to react in a manner prejudicial to his interests.

7. Electronic warfare. Electromagnetic and directed energy used to control the electromagnetic spectrum or to attack an adversary.

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8. Global Information Grid (GIG). The globally interconnected, end-to-end set of information capabilities, associated processes, and personnel for collecting, processing and storing, disseminating and managing information on demand to warfighters, policy makers, and support personnel. The GIG includes all [USG] owned and leased communications and computing systems and services, software (including applications), data, security services, and other associated services necessary to achieve Information Superiority.

9. Human Factors. The psychological, cultural, behavioral, and other human attributes that influence decision making, the flow of information, and the interpretation of information by individuals or groups at any level in a state or organization.

10. Information. Facts, data, or instruction in any medium or form.

11. Information assurance (IA). IO that protect and defend information and information systems by ensuring their availability, integrity, authentication, confidentiality, and non-repudiation. This includes providing for restoration of information systems by incorporating protection, detection, and reaction capabilities.

12. Information superiority. The capabilities to collect, process, and disseminate an uninterrupted flow of information while exploiting or denying an adversary's ability to do the same.

13. Information system. The entire infrastructure, organization, personnel and components that collect, process, store, transmit, display, disseminate, and act on information.

14. Operations security (OPSEC). A process of identifying critical information and subsequently analyzing friendly actions attendant to military operations and other activities to:

a. Identify those actions that can be observed by adversary intelligence systems;

b. Determine indicators hostile intelligence systems might obtain that could be interpreted or pieced together to derive critical information in time to be useful to adversaries; c. Select and execute measures that eliminate or reduce to an acceptable level the vulnerabilities of friendly actions to adversary exploitation.

15. Psychological operations (PSYOP). Planned operations to convey selected information and indicators to foreign audiences to influence their emotions, motives, objective reasoning, and ultimately the behavior of foreign governments, organizations, groups, and individuals. The purpose of Psychological Operations is to induce or reinforce foreign attitudes and behavior favorable to the originator's objectives.

[End directive.]

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http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/16/international/16MILI.html

Pentagon Debates Propaganda Push in Allied Nations

By THOM SHANKER and ERIC SCHMITT

WASHINGTON, Dec. 15 — The Defense Department is considering issuing a secret directive to the American military to conduct covert operations aimed at influencing public opinion and policy makers in friendly and neutral countries, senior Pentagon and administration officials say.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has not yet decided on the proposal, which has ignited a fierce battle throughout the Bush administration over whether the military should carry out secret propaganda missions in friendly nations like Germany, where many of the Sept. 11 hijackers congregated, or Pakistan, still considered a haven for Al Qaeda's militants.

Such a program, for example, could include efforts to discredit and undermine the influence of mosques and religious schools that have become breeding grounds for Islamic militancy and anti-Americanism across the Middle East, Asia and Europe. It might even include setting up schools with secret American financing to teach a moderate Islamic position laced with sympathetic depictions of how the religion is practiced in America, officials said.

Many administration officials agree that the government's broad strategy to counter terrorism must include vigorous and creative propaganda to change the negative view of America held in many countries.

The fight, one Pentagon official said, is over "the strategic communications for our nation, the message we want to send for long-term influence, and how we do it."

As a military officer put it: "We have the assets and the capabilities and the training to go into friendly and neutral nations to influence public opinion. We could do it and get away with it. That doesn't mean we should."

It is not the first time that the debate over how the United States should marshal its forces to win the hearts and minds of the world has raised difficult and potentially embarrassing questions at the Pentagon. A nonclandestine parallel effort at the State Department, which refers to its role as public diplomacy, has not met with so much resistance.

In February, Mr. Rumsfeld had to disband the Pentagon's Office of Strategic Influence, ending a short-lived plan to provide news items, and possibly false ones, to foreign journalists to influence public sentiment abroad. Senior Pentagon officials say Mr. Rumsfeld is deeply frustrated that the United States government has no coherent plan for molding public opinion worldwide in favor of America in its global campaign against terrorism and militancy.

Many administration officials agree that there is a role for the military in carrying out what it calls information operations against adversaries, especially before and during war, as well as routine public relations work in friendly nations like Colombia, the Philippines or Bosnia, whose governments have welcomed American troops.

In hostile countries like Iraq, such missions are permitted under policy and typically would include broadcasting from airborne radio stations or dropping leaflets like those the military has printed to undermine morale among Iraqi soldiers. In future wars, they might include technical attacks to disable computer networks, both military and civilian.

But the idea of ordering the military to take psychological aim at allies has divided the Pentagon — with civilians and uniformed officers on both sides of the debate.

Some are troubled by suggestions that the military might pay journalists to write stories favorable to American policies or hire outside contractors without obvious ties to the Pentagon to organize rallies in support of American policies.

The current battlefield for these issues involves amendments to a classified Department of Defense directive, titled "3600.1: Information Operations," which would enshrine an overarching Pentagon policy for years to come.

Current policy holds that aggressive information tactics are "to affect adversary decision makers" — not those of friendly or even neutral nations. But proposed revisions to the directive, as quoted by senior officials, would not make adversaries the only targets for carrying out military information operations — abbreviated as "I.O." in the document, which is written in the dense jargon typical of military doctrine.

"In peacetime, I.O. supports national objectives primarily by influencing foreign perceptions and decision-making," the proposal states. "In crises short of hostilities, I.O. can be used as a flexible deterrent option to communicate national interest and demonstrate resolve. In conflict, I.O. can be applied to achieve physical and psychological results in support of military objectives."

Although the defense secretary is among those pushing to come up with a bolder strategy for getting out the American message, he has not yet decided whether the military should take on those responsibilities, the officials said.

There is little dispute over such battlefield tactics as destroying an enemy's radio and television stations. All is considered fair in that kind of war.

But several senior military officers, some of whom have recently left service, expressed dismay at the concept of assigning the military to wage covert propaganda campaigns in friendly or neutral countries. "Running ops against your allies doesn't work very well," Adm. Dennis C. Blair, a retired commander of American forces in the Pacific, advised Pentagon officials as they began re-examining the classified directive over the summer. "I've seen it tried a few times, and it generally is not very effective."

Those in favor of assigning the military an expanded role argue that no other department is stepping up to the task of countering propaganda from terrorists, who hold no taboo against deception.

They also contend that the Pentagon has the best technological tools for the job, especially in the areas of satellite communications and computer warfare, and that the American military has important interests to protect in some countries, including those where ties with the government are stronger than the affections of the population.

For example, as anti-American sentiment has risen this year in South Korea, intensified recently by the deaths of two schoolgirls who were crushed by an American armored vehicle, some Pentagon officials were prompted to consider ways of influencing Korean public opinion outside of traditional public affairs or community outreach programs, one military official said. No detailed plan has yet emerged.

Those who oppose the military's taking on the job of managing perceptions of America in allied states say it more naturally falls to diplomats and civilians, or even uniformed public affairs specialists. They say that secret operations, if deemed warranted by the president, should be carried out by American intelligence agencies.

In addition, they say, the Pentagon's job of explaining itself through public affairs officers could be tainted by any link to covert information missions. "These allied nations would absolutely object to having the American military attempt to secretly affect communications to their populations," said one State Department official with a long career in overseas public affairs.

Even so, this official conceded: "The State Department can't do it. We're not arranged to do it, and we don't have the money. And U.S.I.A. is broken." He was referring to the United States Information Agency, which was absorbed into the State Department.

One effort to reshape the nation's ability to get its message out was a proposal by Representative Henry J. Hyde, an Illinois Republican who is chairman of the House International Relations Committee. Mr. Hyde is pushing for $255 million to bolster the State Department's public diplomacy effort and reorganize international broadcasting activities.

"If we are to be successful in our broader foreign policy goals," Mr. Hyde said in a statement, "America's effort to engage the peoples of the world must assume a more prominent place in the planning and execution of our foreign policy."

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