When it comes to big powers like the US fighting groups such as Islamic State (ISIS), it should be no contest – but it hasn’t turned out that way because of the mini-actors’ mastery of information operations.
Professor Mervyn Frost from the Department of War Studies at King’s College, London, said the information war element of asymmetrical conflict provided the only plausible explanation for the power wielded by such mini-powers in contest with great powers.
He said this would appear to be completely one-sided but that had proved not to be the case.
“We have seen how a mini-power like Al Qaeda has managed to exert sufficient power to get the US and its allies to modify their policies,” he told the UNSW Canberra Defence Leaders’ Breakfast.
“In Israel, the mini-power Hamas (and also Hezbollah in Lebanon) continues to engage with a vastly superior military power in Israel – yet it has sufficient power to stay in the struggle. How is this possible?”
It’s possible because the rise of modern communication technology and social media allows anyone to communicate with like-minded others globally, quickly and cheaply. This involves a couple of techniques.
One is ethical trapping, where the group commits an act so outrageous that the target state responds with a large scale counter-attack, violating the fundamental ethical norms it espouses.
“This then enables the small actor to point to the hypocrisy of the giant which purported to be the defender of fundamental ethical standards,” he said.
Read the article in Australian Defence Magazine.