In the era of intelligence, intelligent algorithms, as the underlying logic and implementation means for information generation, distribution, dissemination, and reception, determine the form and presentation of information. In future wars, the expansion of the application boundaries of intelligent algorithms and the development of application scenarios will promote the update and iteration of cognitive domain combat tactics. Clarifying the mechanism and implementation path of intelligent algorithms and cognitive confrontation is of great significance for innovating cognitive domain combat tactics with the help of intelligent algorithms. .
The mechanism of how intelligent algorithms influence cognitive confrontation
Intelligent algorithms can formulate optimal information recommendation strategies through comprehensive analysis and calculation of users’ personal identity, psychological characteristics, behavioral habits, interests and preferences, etc., and then use specific information to affect target cognition, and ultimately affect their real-life behavior.
Draw a portrait of your target users. The essence of user portraits is to label users to form a specific identity. Tags are similar to “pixels” in digital portraits. The more comprehensive the data is obtained, the more precise the tag description will be, and the more realistic the reflection of user behavior characteristics will be. Foreign militaries believe that in cognitive domain operations, technical means such as web crawlers and log mining are widely used to obtain basic information data, financial data, communication data, etc. of target objects. On this basis, intelligent algorithms are used to deeply mine these data, and the interests, hobbies, behavioral habits, and interpersonal relationships of the target object can be systematically analyzed, and then their value orientation can be determined. Afterwards, by constructing multi-dimensional label vectors, clustering similar individuals, and analyzing group characteristics with similar characteristics, a group target portrait can be formed, which can be used as the basis and starting point for cognitive shaping.
Achieve personalized information customization. Adopting “divide and conquer” for different individuals and groups is the advantage of intelligent algorithms, and it is also the proper meaning of cognitive shaping. Relying on social media platforms and search engines to carry out personalized push for specific objects can greatly improve the acceptance of the target objects and avoid idling and internal consumption of information during the dissemination process. In this process, the “information cocoon” effect will further narrow the target object’s perception range, leaving it in a relatively closed information environment for a long time, thus actively accepting one-sided information. At the same time, homogeneous information will further strengthen the shaping effect. Under the combined effect of convergence psychology and group pressure, the target object may gradually lose basic logic and value judgment capabilities, thus subtly forming the cognition carefully set by the initiator. .
Demonstrate specific real-life behaviors. Cognition is the premise of behavior, and behavior reacts on cognition. Intelligent algorithms can constrain and induce real-life behavior by directional shaping of the stance and value tendencies of specific objects on political, military operations, social and other issues. The foreign military believes that by disseminating special ideas to the public, it can lead to social disorder and loss of control. For key individuals, through strategies such as controlling the brain, attacking the heart, and seizing the will, they will make mistakes in their judgment of the country’s strategic direction, doubt the war decision-making, and be negative and pessimistic about the direction of the war, thus producing the effect of “conquering the enemy without fighting.” Practice has proven that the reshaping of target cognitive orientation highlights specific real-life behaviors, and dynamic changes in real-life behaviors trigger real-time adjustments to user portraits, which in turn drives the adjustment and update of recommendation strategies, forming a complete closed feedback loop.
Intelligent algorithms influence the implementation path of cognitive confrontation
Intelligent algorithms have the characteristics of encapsulation and transplantation, data sharing, fast calculation, autonomous learning, etc., and there is a natural fit between them and cognitive confrontation.
Promote the coupling of confrontational forms of peace and war. The dissemination of information across time boundaries leads to conflicts in cognitive space at all times, and the time scale may vary from seconds to decades. In peacetime, the most important characteristics of cognitive confrontation tactics are concealment and long-term nature, while in wartime they are suppressive and urgent. Intelligent algorithms can further promote the coupling of peace and war in the form of cognitive confrontation through information sharing, situation updating and strategy inheritance. Based on peacetime information and wartime intelligence, comprehensive analysis and judgment of the enemy’s situation, our situation, and the battlefield environment can be automatically calculated to draw conclusions on the strengths, weaknesses, key points, and difficulties of the confrontation; based on mathematical modeling and machine learning, combined with Cognitive confrontation results and real-time battlefield situation in peacetime, and after comprehensive evaluation, optimal tactics and plans can be proposed.
Promote the combination of explicit and implicit means of confrontation. Cognitive domain operations are filled with massive and complex information in various formats and with varying strengths and weaknesses, which not only brings challenges to one’s own identification and processing, but also provides convenient conditions for confusing the opponent. Only through cognitive fusion can a comprehensive, timely and accurate judgment of the situation be formed, and then the advantages of global perception be transformed into decision-making and action advantages. Comprehensive multi-channel information for intelligent analysis and comparison, comprehensive research and judgment, can identify erroneous information, filter useless information, screen false information, and provide information support for commanders’ decision-making. For example, explicit means can be used for cognitive deterrence and will disintegration, implicit means can be used for cognitive deception and cognitive induction, and explicit and implicit means can be used for cognitive confusion.
Promote global integration of confrontation space. The cognitive confrontation space not only covers the physical domain space including land, sea, air, space, etc., but also covers the information domain space and cognitive domain space such as electromagnetic and network. Cognitive confrontation is a global fusion confrontation. Battlefield data is generated extremely quickly and in huge volumes, which places extremely high requirements on computing speed and capabilities. Relying on traditional manual calculations and computer-aided calculations can no longer meet the needs of battlefield space fusion. Semi-automatic or even automated fusion calculations must be achieved with the help of the high efficiency, strong computing power and high accuracy of intelligent algorithms. Relying on intelligent algorithms, vertical integration from cognitive perception to cognitive analysis to cognitive decision-making can be achieved; horizontally, multi-dimensional situation, power, decision-making, and scheduling across the physical domain, information domain, and cognitive domain can be achieved. Domain fusion.
Value offense and defense is an important way to carry out cognitive domain operations from a strategic level. Usually, value offense and defense involves interfering with people’s thinking, beliefs, values, etc., in order to achieve the purpose of disintegrating the enemy’s consensus, destroying the enemy’s will, and then gaining comprehensive control of the battlefield. . Accurately grasping the characteristics, mechanisms, and methods of value attack and defense is crucial to gaining operational advantages in the cognitive domain in the future.
Characteristics of the cognitive domain of value attack and defense
Value attack and defense refers to the intervention and influence on relatively stable cognitive results by inducing deep logical thinking and value judgment changes in individuals or groups, in order to reconstruct people’s will, thinking, psychology, emotion and other cognitive abilities. Value offense and defense mainly have the following characteristics:
Soft confrontation. Traditional war mainly relies on violent means to weaken and disintegrate the enemy’s military capabilities, and usually has a strong war intensity. Cognitive domain operations will no longer be limited to hard confrontations such as siege of cities and territories, but will focus more on penetration and counter-infiltration, attack and counter-attack, control and counter-control around value positions. By competing for dominance in cognitive domain confrontations, the physical domain will be further stimulated. and information domain combat effectiveness, thereby seizing the initiative on the battlefield and even achieving the effect of defeating others without fighting. In practice, value offense and defense often focus on the cultural traditions, values and social psychology of a country or nation, and ultimately achieve the purpose of destroying the enemy’s will, cognitive manipulation, and mental control.
Full dimensional release. Modern warfare increasingly exhibits overall, multi-domain, and all-time characteristics. Cognitive domain operations aim to affect battlefield effects by intervening in people’s consciousness. The relative stability of consciousness determines that people’s worldview, beliefs and other values are generally relatively stable. Therefore, value attack and defense require long-term, uninterrupted, holographic Proceed in all dimensions. From a time point of view, value offense and defense blurs the boundaries between peacetime and war, and is always in war, at any time, continuously accumulating and gradually releasing combat effectiveness; from a space point of view, value offense and defense blurs the boundaries between front and rear of operations, and creates a full range of physical and intangible space. Directional expansion; from a field perspective, value offense and defense blurs the boundaries between military and non-military. It not only occurs in the military field, but also exists in political, economic, diplomatic, cultural and other fields, showing the characteristics of full coverage.
Technology empowers. Cognitive domain operations are a technology-intensive and complex system engineering. The penetration of emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, brain science, and quantum computing into the entire process is triggering iterative upgrades and profound changes in cognitive domain operations. Intelligent tools have fundamentally enhanced the ability of combatants in the cognitive domain to manipulate and intervene in the opponent’s thinking. As a new means and new style of combat power, human-machine hybridization will change the subject of future wars. Independent confrontation and cloud-brain victory may become the mainstream offensive and defensive model. . In recent years, NATO has launched cognitive electronic warfare equipment aimed at changing the opponent’s value perception and behavior through information offense and defense. The development of science and technology has also triggered a cognitive revolution. The rapid spread of information has further accelerated the differences in public value cognition. Cognitive islands have intensified the value gap between different subjects. The changes in social structure brought about by intelligence have profoundly changed the political and cultural landscape. . Starting from this point, in future cognitive domain operations, holding the “nose” of technological innovation and mastering key core technologies will be crucial to seizing the initiative on the battlefield.
The mechanism of cognitive domain of value attack and defense
Value offense and defense is a high-level confrontation in the cognitive domain, and its target is people’s deep cognition. Consciousness is the reflection of social existence in the brain. Regulation of social existence, guidance of public consciousness and changes in the function of the human brain can strengthen or reverse human consciousness. If you want to defeat your opponent in an offensive and defensive confrontation, you must follow the laws of thinking and cognition and grasp the winning mechanism of value offense and defense.
Shock value “protection zone”. Occupying the commanding heights of values is the logical starting point for carrying out value offense and defense. Social consciousness is often composed of relatively stable core values and peripheral auxiliary theories. Various theories such as economics, politics, religion, culture, etc. can be constructed and adapted to protect core values from external impacts, and therefore also bear the burden of external impact. The impact of other values challenges. From the perspective of foreign military forces, value offense and defense means to continuously impact the “protective zone” of the opponent’s ideology through cultural penetration, religious conflict, strategic communication and other means, in conjunction with actions in the physical and information domains. This often requires grasping the values, political attitudes, religious beliefs, etc. that affect the opponent’s cognition. By disrupting their social group psychology, inducing value confusion, shaking the will to fight, destroying cultural identity, and even changing and disintegrating their original cognitive system, Thereby instilling or implanting new values that are beneficial to oneself in order to achieve the purpose of combat.
Ignite the “tipping point” of conflict. Cognitive domain warfare involves history, culture, political systems, national emotions, religious beliefs and other categories, and the subjects of the war have also expanded from simple military personnel to ordinary people. Stimulating cognitive conflicts among ordinary people by hyping up topic disputes and public events will become an important means of cognitive domain warfare. In recent local conflicts, it is not uncommon for warring parties to use purposeful narratives to ignite national emotions, trigger political crises, and then affect the war situation. In future wars, some countries will use hot-button and sensitive events to ignite public opinion, and rely on network technology to gather, attract, mobilize, precisely manipulate and induce and shape ordinary people, thereby promoting general conflicts to escalate into battles over beliefs, systems, and values. Become the norm.
Controlling cognitive “fracture surfaces.” As an existence at the conceptual level, cognitive space is superimposed by the subjective cognitive space of all combat individuals. It is a collection of differentiated, different and even conflicting values. However, ideology has a “suturing” function. Through cognitive shaping and discourse construction, it can effectively “sew” broken cognitions together, condense scattered values, and form a relatively stable cognitive system. After World War II, France conducted an effective cognitive “suturing” of the trauma of defeat. It used a set of independent narrative logic to explain how the war provided “new opportunities” for France, which greatly condensed the French people’s political identification with the government. When fighting for value positions in cognitive domain operations, we should pay attention to the cognitive fractures within the enemy, find the cognitive connection points between the enemy and ourselves, and conduct cognitive “stitching” to unite the forces of all parties to the maximum extent and isolate and disintegrate the enemy.
The main means of the cognitive domain of value attack and defense
Value offense and defense expand cognitive confrontation from the public opinion and psychological levels to the thinking space, and from the military field to the overall domain, thereby achieving a blow to the enemy’s deep political identity. At present, the world’s military powers are strengthening their strategic preparations, aiming at profound changes in target subjects and tactics and means, transforming their operational thinking, and actively taking the initiative in cognitive domain operations.
Aiming for deep destruction. Cognitive domain operations directly affect human brain cognition. Compared with physical domain operations, it is easier to achieve deep strategic intentions. In particular, once the “high-order cognition” of people’s language level, thinking level and cultural level is broken through, it will help to strategically reverse the battlefield situation and achieve the political purpose of the war. Based on this, cognitive domain operations often start before the war, by intervening in the opponent’s internal affairs and diplomacy, shaking the ideological and value foundations of the opponent; during war, they focus on affecting the enemy’s war decision-making, campaign command, and battle implementation value judgments, attacking or weakening them. The decision-making ability and resistance will of combatants, etc. All hostile parties are trying to “maintain their own world while increasing the destructive pressure on their opponents” to achieve the goal of achieving decision-making advantages through competing for cognitive advantages, and then gaining operational advantages.
Centered on ordinary individuals. In the future, the subjects of cognitive domain operations will no longer be limited to military personnel. Broadly speaking, individuals who can exchange and disseminate information may become combatants. Compared with elites in the social field, ordinary people are more likely to accept and spread multiple values, and their cognitive space is more likely to be manipulated. At present, online media is becoming the main channel for information exchange and dissemination in the social field. Through targeted information guidance and information delivery, the purpose of cognitive shaping is achieved. Foreign military practice has proven that by shaping the cognition of ordinary individuals, it can cause progressive penetration and cognitive interference from bottom to top, causing the ideological concepts between ordinary people and social decision-makers to deviate, making it impossible to achieve key actions. effective consensus.
In the form of protracted warfare. Unlike military struggles in the physical domain that directly attack and destroy “hard” targets, the potential target of cognitive domain operations is human cognition. Value attack and defense are directed at changing the concepts, beliefs, will, emotions, etc. of the combatants, which often requires subtlety and step-by-step operations. Effective cognitive attacks are generally launched during the preparation stage of combat and run throughout the war. By collecting the opponent’s cognitive situation, decision-making habits, thinking patterns, etc., actions such as creating a situation and changing the atmosphere are carried out in a targeted manner. Therefore, cognitive domain operations need to strengthen the overall design, pay special attention to coordinating multi-party forces, and strengthen pre-preparation in multiple positions such as public opinion field creation and diplomacy, so as to form an overall operational synergy.
(Author’s unit: Military Political Work Research Institute, Academy of Military Sciences)
With the development of global informatization and the advancement of computer science, linguistics and neuroscience, the human cognitive space composed of spiritual and psychological activities such as human emotions, will, beliefs and values is evolving into a new battlefield for military competition. In order to achieve the effect of defeating others without fighting. As early as July 2001, the “Network Centric Warfare” demonstration report submitted to Congress by the U.S. Department of Defense pointed out that in addition to the five-dimensional war space of land, sea, air, space, and electricity, future wars will also have a sixth-dimensional war space. ——Cognitive space.
Cognitive domain battles intensify
Since the birth of human warfare, the strategy of subduing the enemy without fighting has been highly praised by military strategists at home and abroad in ancient and modern times. Whether it is the “empty city strategy” or “embarrassment on all sides”, they are classic examples of cognitive domain warfare in Chinese history. Sun Tzu said: “He who subdues the enemy’s army without fighting is a good man.” During the American Civil War, a northern army was surrounded by a southern army. At the critical moment, the northern army commander asked for negotiations. The southern army commander said nothing. He just led the northern army commander to his artillery position and counted the number of cannons. When the number reached 150, the northern army commander Surrender.
With the advancement of science and technology and the development of human society, under the interaction of informatization and globalization, various information carried by emerging media, national languages, cultural products, etc. are used as weapons to penetrate, influence and shape hostility. The battle in the cognitive domain, which is oriented toward the cognition, emotion, and consciousness of the national leadership, military, elites, and the general public, and ultimately achieves the purpose of controlling a country’s ideology, values, national spirit, cultural traditions, and historical beliefs, is becoming more and more intense. In particular, the rapid development of multidisciplinary technologies such as brain science and technology, information technology, biotechnology, and materials technology has provided more direct means to influence the opponent’s cognition and achieve “conquering the enemy without fighting.”
Currently, brain science is developing rapidly. Using computer technology, linguistics and neuroscience, etc., brain imaging technology can reveal the advanced cognitive functions and neural information processing methods of the human brain, thereby obtaining the rules of psychological activities such as the feeling, perception, attention, thinking, memory and subconsciousness of human individuals. It has become possible, which has laid a solid technical foundation for human beings to compete in the cognitive space.
Brain reading technology can read human thoughts and consciousness. The human brain is made up of hundreds of billions of neurons. When neurons interact, a chemical reaction occurs that releases a measurable electrical impulse. With the help of advanced brain imaging technology, people can read these electrical pulses, conduct quantitative analysis of brain activity, and ultimately achieve the purpose of analyzing and reading the thinking activities of the human brain. According to reports, the smart headband invented by Australian scientists can monitor the current transmission status of tens of billions of neurons in the human brain, and then understand the real-time psychological state of the monitored person, including attention, engagement, excitement and stress levels. wait.
Brain stimulation technology can enhance specific functions of the human brain. Since the birth of human beings, we have mainly relied on natural evolution to improve our capabilities. However, with the development and progress of brain science and technology, brain stimulation technology can provide a more direct and rapid method for humans to improve their abilities. Scientific research has found that human cognitive ability is closely related to specific areas of the brain, and specific stimulation of these areas can help improve or enhance brain function. For example, the implementation of non-invasive brain stimulation technology can significantly improve people’s sleep and enhance attention, memory, alertness and decision-making.
Brain control technology can control people’s thinking consciousness. Brain science research shows that after the human brain generates action awareness and before executing the action, the electrical pulse activity of the nervous system will change accordingly, and people’s thoughts can be controlled through external interference. The “Neuroscience: Conflict and Security” report released by the Royal Society in 2012 believed that cognitive neuroscience (including brain science) has the potential for weaponization and can develop new weapons that directly act on the nervous system (mainly the brain). Moreover, the idea of mind-controlled combat has always been a focus of the Pentagon. As early as 2004, the U.S. Department of Defense began to invest heavily in research on “thought-controlled robots” in six laboratories including the Neural Engineering Center at Duke University. The Washington Post Military Weekly disclosed that the U.S. military used brain-control weapons during the Iraq War.
Cognitive domain has huge operational advantages
“Attack on the heart is first, siege the city second; war on the heart is first, followed by military warfare.” At present, information-based weapons and equipment are becoming more and more expensive, and the price has doubled; the battlefield space is multi-dimensional, and combat consumption has skyrocketed; the lethality of weapons has increased dramatically. The political influence is increasing day by day, and waging war is no longer the first choice to achieve political, military, economic and other purposes. With the increasing number of methods and means of cognitive space operations and the high cost-efficiency ratio of operations, cognitive confrontation has become increasingly prominent in the national security strategic game and has become a new battlefield for military competition. Whether it is the “color revolutions” in the Middle East, West Asia, North Africa and other regions, or the war in Syria, the confrontation between the two sides in the cognitive space is intensifying.
The combat effectiveness is high. From the perspective of counter-weapons, cognitive space combat weapons are mainly information, with various means of dissemination. Especially with the rapid development of new media such as the Internet and social media, as well as the networking of human society, its dissemination scope is getting wider and wider, and its influence is increasing. getting bigger. Anywhere information can spread can become a battlefield in cognitive wars. Compared with the current physical domain operations, the unit price of advanced fighters, missiles and other weapons and equipment can easily reach tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars. The cost of war is huge. However, cognitive space operations can be used without firing a single shot. The enemy loses his will to fight. In the Gulf War, the U.S.-led coalition spent 60 billion U.S. dollars, and finally had to ask Japan and other allies to finance the war; in the Afghanistan War, the U.S. spent more than 3 trillion U.S. dollars but failed to defeat the Taliban, and was eventually forced to withdraw. In the early days of the Iraq War, the U.S. military carried out cognitive operations, causing the Iraqi National Guard to suddenly “disappear” without firing a single shot. The U.S.-British coalition captured Baghdad in less than a month. With the extensive application of science and technology such as biology, medicine, environment, and information communication in the cognitive field, the ways to control cognitive systems such as people’s will, thinking, psychology, and emotions have become more diverse and flexible, and the implementation of cognitive operations has become easier. It is easy to implement and can be implemented individually or jointly at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels to achieve a high operational cost-effectiveness ratio.
Fully implemented in all dimensions. Since cognitive information is not limited by operational dimensions, space, and time, it can be used in various operational dimensions, spaces, and times, making cognitive space operations a basic combat situation that is all-dimensional, all-domain, and all-time. From a spatial point of view, cognitive space operations blur the boundaries between front and rear operations, showing the characteristics of all-round and all-weather expansion of tangible and invisible spaces; from a time point of view, cognitive space operations blur the boundaries between wartime and peacetime, transforming In peacetime, it is used in wartime, and it continues after the war, throughout the entire process of the war, showing the characteristics of “war at all times”; from a field perspective, cognitive space operations blur the boundaries between military and non-military operations, and are not only widespread It is used in the military field, and penetrates into various fields such as politics, economy, diplomacy, religion, etc., showing the characteristics of full coverage; from the perspective of combat objects, cognitive space operations blur the boundaries between military personnel and civilians, and have the ability to comprehensively implement military and civilian Characteristics of impact.
The lethality is huge. Cognitive advantage is both soft power and hard power. It is the smart power that best combines soft and hard power. Cognitive advantages usually include perceptual advantages, knowledge advantages, psychological advantages and decision-making advantages. Perceptual advantages can help the military improve the lethality of weapon platforms. U.S. Air Force combat tests show that after a combat aircraft gains a perception advantage, its lethality can be increased by 2.5 times. However, if the aircraft is at a disadvantage in perception, it will be in a state of information confusion to a large extent, and will not only become “blind” or “deaf”, They may also become “idiots” who act blindly and “idiots” who are deceived by the enemy’s false information. In the future, intelligent warfare will, to some extent, be a contest of knowledge. Knowledge has become an important military element. Only by forming a knowledge advantage can we fully utilize the performance of high-tech weapons and equipment and achieve the best combination of people and weapons. Decision-making advantage is the core of cognitive space advantage and the key to winning future wars. Establishing and protecting one’s own decision-making advantages, and attacking and weakening the enemy’s decision-making advantages will be the focus of future war confrontations. Only by gaining a decision-making advantage can we form a full-spectrum advantage and ultimately win the war.
Give full play to the advantages of non-military power. Future wars are hybrid wars, involving not only the military field, but also many non-military fields. Due to restrictions such as the laws of war, military power cannot be used in non-military fields, but cognitive space operations can exert its unique advantages to achieve war goals. For example, during the Second Lebanon War, the Lebanese military made full use of the power of the media to publicize a large number of civilian casualties to win the support of international public opinion; internally, it used pictures of destroyed Israeli military equipment to publicize the results of the war, which not only forced the Israeli military to compress as much as possible The duration of the operation resulted in its inability to achieve its operational objectives, and it also received support from Arab countries, thus gaining strategic initiative. As cognitive space becomes a new battlefield space, non-military forces are likely to become the main force in cognitive space operations, and combat operations will become more and more frequent. According to statistics, in recent local wars, the ratio of non-military forces to military combat forces has reached 4:1, with non-military forces engaged in cognitive operations accounting for the vast majority.
Cognitive domain combat methods are diverse
In essence, cognitive domain operations start from the spiritual level of war, taking people’s will, beliefs, thinking, psychology, etc. as the objects of combat, triggering cognitive imbalances by attacking the opponent’s perceptual system, and attacking their value system to promote combat. The target is emotionally disturbed and attacks its belief system, causing the target’s will to collapse, thereby achieving the combat goal. According to the cognitive space combat mechanism, its combat methods mainly include the following.
Destroy the will to fight. To dismantle the will to war is to declare to hostile countries the determination to fight and the will to use force by displaying powerful new weapons and equipment, new combat forces, mobilizing and deploying troops, and large-scale military exercises, so as to intimidate and deter the enemy’s military and civilians. The opponent retreats or surrenders, abandoning war operations. As for the timing of use, it is mainly used before war, aiming to defeat the enemy without fighting, and can also be used during combat. At the operational level, operations to disrupt the will to fight are mainly used at the strategic and operational levels, reflecting the will and determination of a country or group to safeguard interests. In peacetime, it usually manifests itself in the form of revelations in the cognitive field, exercises in the military field, blockades in the diplomatic field, sanctions in the economic field, etc.; in times of war, it usually manifests itself in the use of battlefield information advantages to show the enemy the results of the battle and directly express the will to fight. and determination to achieve cognitive enhancement of combat effectiveness. For example, pictures of the precise destruction of important targets in war are transmitted to enemy soldiers and civilians in the form of images or videos, which enhances the memory of the combat effects in the enemy’s cognitive field, creates a psychological shadow on the enemy, and makes them lose their will to fight.
Attack the idea of faith. Attacking beliefs and concepts refers to using various means to guide enemy soldiers and civilians to abandon or form certain beliefs and concepts, so as to disintegrate the spiritual pillars of enemy soldiers and civilians, change their attitude towards war, and then force the enemy to give up resistance. The main means of attacking beliefs and concepts include: vilifying the enemy’s political or spiritual leaders, destroying the values of the enemy’s military and civilians, and inducing young people to change their “three views.” For example, in the Iraq war and the Libyan war, the US military vilified Saddam Hussein and Gaddafi were typical examples. Another example is to use the Internet, social media and other channels to attack the beliefs of the enemy’s military and civilians, induce cognitive confusion among the enemy’s military and civilians, change their concepts, and thereby destroy the enemy’s public opinion foundation for war.
Public opinion attacks psychology. The psychology of public opinion attack refers to the use of various cognitive operations, such as creating a combat situation and atmosphere, to strongly stimulate the normal psychological state of enemy soldiers and civilians, thereby affecting combat judgment, decision-making, and actions. Public opinion attack psychological operations are not about eliminating the impact, but about controlling and minimizing the impact on one’s own military and civilians, and maximizing the impact on the enemy’s military and civilians. The U.S. military predicts through analysis of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that the proportion of attrition due to psychological problems will reach 10% to 25% in future operations. In recent local wars, the US military has always used psychological warfare as a “multiplier” of combat effectiveness and a “reducer” of combat costs. It must be used in every battle and every battle. Israel’s “Debka Files” website disclosed that in order to isolate Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, the US military called senior Syrian military officials and said bluntly: “General, we have used the global positioning system to determine your position, and then sent snipers Hand. What do you want to do now? If I were you, I would definitely think twice about who I should be loyal to.”
The battlefield conceals truth and reveals lies. Concealing truth and showing falsehood refers to concealing the true battlefield situation and combat intentions through various actions, creating and displaying illusions, inducing the enemy to make wrong decisions, and achieving the purpose of controlling the war situation. For example, in ancient times, “hanging sheep beats drums”, “thatched boats borrow arrows”, and “empty city strategy” all infiltrated the idea of concealing the truth and revealing the false. In future wars, both combatants will usually use false information in the information acquisition process to induce confusion in the enemy’s situation; use saturated information blocking in the information processing process to induce the enemy to make inaccurate analysis and judgment; use viruses in the information feedback process , Trojan horse attack means to make the enemy’s command decision-making errors.
●Cognitive domain operations focus on full-dimensional attacks, including both “peacetime” cognitive penetration and “wartime” cognitive coercion.
●Wartime cognitive domain operations revolve around the achievement of military objectives, and are implemented in conjunction with military operations to support each other.
●In cognitive domain operations, as the sound of gunfire dissipates, the horn of a new round of cognitive domain operations may sound again, and there must be no slacking off.
Cognitive domain warfare is a confrontation at the level of conscious thinking. Through selective processing and transmission of information, it affects judgment, changes concepts, and competes for people’s hearts, thereby guiding the real situation to develop in a direction that is beneficial to oneself. From the perspective of cognitive shaping, cognitive domain operations focus on full-dimensional attacks, including both “peacetime” cognitive penetration and “wartime” cognitive coercion. Therefore, cognitive domain operations have no clear boundaries between peace and war; at the same time, according to the needs of political or military purposes, its targets can be individuals, organizations or even countries. Therefore, cognitive domain operations should establish the concepts of peacetime and wartime integration, military-civilian integration, cross-domain integration, and joint victory, and sort out basic tasks accordingly.
Focus on ideological layout tasks
Ideology is “an ideological system that systematically and consciously reflects the socio-economic formation and political system.” Ideology determines the rational foundation of cognition and has distinct camp characteristics. Although ideology covers all aspects of social life, in confrontations between countries or political groups, the struggle around belief guidance, attitude struggle, and concept assimilation is particularly fierce, and has become a focus of cognitive domain operations.
Shape and guide political cognition and seize control of belief and establishment. Confrontation between countries or political groups is not only a confrontation of national strength, but also a confrontation of national aspirations. The confrontation of political beliefs bears the brunt. Shaping and guiding political cognition aims to condense or destroy political consensus, strengthen or shake political beliefs, and expand or dissolve political camps. In cognitive domain operations, through cognitive guidance on the legitimacy of the ruling party, the rationality of political ideas and systems, and the health of the political ecology, we cultivate recognition, denial, and support of political positions, beliefs, practices, etc. Or hatred and other emotions, laying out a political cognitive layout that is beneficial to oneself and detrimental to the enemy. Political cognition is related to the survival foundation of a country or organization and is the primary focus of cognitive domain operations.
Shape and guide war cognition and seize the right to lead war attitudes. A country can be without war, but it cannot be without a sense of war. War cognition is the basis for the formation and development of the will, concepts, psychology, and thinking of individuals, organizations, and countries in the war cycle. Through cognitive guidance on the essence, nature, legal concepts, etc. of war, we build a war cognitive thinking system, guide the evaluation direction of the rationality, justice, and legality of war, promote the formation of support or opposition attitudes towards possible wars, and regulate The rise and fall of willingness to assume war obligations is a key issue in cognitive guidance of war. War cognition affects war attitudes, and the struggle for its control is a task that must be paid attention to in cognitive domain operations.
Shape and guide value cognition and seize control of emotions and will. Values influence people’s judgment of beauty and ugliness, right and wrong, and social behavior orientation. In terms of identifying things and judging right and wrong, human emotions always tend to support claims with similar values. Value cognition permeates every corner of life. Through the dissemination of ethical concepts, standards of beauty, ugliness, good and evil, literary and artistic opinions, etc., competition for the right to guide values, the right to guide life patterns, and the right to judge traditional inheritance is frequent and fierce. . In real life, different values often interpenetrate and entangle with each other. The essence of shaping and guiding value cognition is to strive for social and emotional recognition, which is a regular task in cognitive domain operations.
Pay close attention to social psychology and the task of building momentum
Social psychology provides a perceptual and experiential basis for cognition. It is formed on the basis of daily life, social activities, practical insights and other experiences. Social psychological guidance often promotes unpredictable changes in the actual situation. It is one of the usual modes of confrontation between the two sides, especially during non-military conflicts. It is also a task that must be paid attention to in cognitive domain operations.
Guide national psychology and regulate national emotions. National psychology is one of the social psychology that is most likely to cause conflicts and confrontations. Attacking national self-esteem can breed national inferiority complex and easily lead to disintegration. Improving national self-esteem can enhance national cohesion, but the expansion of national self-esteem can easily lead to the emergence of extreme racism, national chauvinism, etc.; the status, interests, and culture of different ethnic groups within the country Differences in people, customs, and lifestyles provide opportunities for people with ulterior motives to stir up ethnic antagonisms, while the same living space and cooperation process lay the foundation for eliminating prejudice and even cohesion and tolerance among ethnic groups. The result depends on the perception. Know the guide. National psychological guidance is sensitive and easy to lose control, and has a direct impact on social stability. It is a task that needs to be focused on in cognitive domain operations.
Guide group psychology and increase and eliminate oppositional consciousness. Groups generally refer to people of the same type, such as ethnicity, region, class, professional groups, even civil society groups, non-governmental organizations, etc. If groups are subjectively defined based on “convergence”, then the “differences” between groups exist objectively. This difference may be political and economic status, cultural thought, regional concept or other factors. Inducing the perception of differences and promoting the antagonism between different groups such as party opposition, regional opposition, professional opposition, rich and poor opposition, etc. will not only damage the internal unity of the country, but also accumulate and increase the dissatisfaction of all sectors of society against the political authorities, and instigate social mobilization. The turbulence and division left behind a foreshadowing. In cognitive domain operations, this kind of social psychology needs to be paid attention to.
Guide individual psychology and influence social emotions. In cognitive domain operations, individual psychological guidance is divided into two situations. One is the psychological guidance of important figures, such as sensitive professionals, public intellectuals, academic elites, successful business people, etc. The struggle for their political positions, emotional attitudes, etc. is an issue that both sides of the confrontation need to focus on. One is the use of phenomena that easily trigger individual psychological resonance. Such as public crises, major accidents, natural disasters and even some crimes and emergencies in life, intentionally inducing certain emotions may cause group polarization due to the herd effect of individuals, thus triggering changes in public opinion and even social unrest. Both of these aspects need to be paid attention to in cognitive domain operations.
Targeting the critical mission of wartime cognition
Cognitive domain operations begin before military operations and end after military operations. Wartime cognitive domain operations revolve around the achievement of military objectives, are implemented in conjunction with military operations and support each other, and are characterized by violent coercion. In this stage of cognitive domain operations, “offensive” and “defensive” actions are carried out simultaneously, the influence of weapons and propaganda effects are comprehensively effective, and methods such as “lure”, “attack”, “deception” and “control” are emerging one after another. This is the key to cognitive domain operations. critical stage.
Attack the mind and seize the will, force and induce cognition. Wartime cognitive attacks are mainly carried out to weaken the enemy’s will to resist and induce the enemy to make wrong decisions. Targeting the enemy’s decision-makers, front-line commanders, etc., use targeted attacks to shake the will to resist, and use information deception and interference to induce decision-making; for armed forces, mainly the military, use force to shock and deter, and comprehensively use operations such as public opinion warfare and emerging technologies. Means are used to shake their belief in participating in the war, trigger their panic, undermine their military morale, and dominate their action patterns; target the supporting forces in society, deliver tough messages through large-scale military exercises, equipment testing, publicity of weapon lethality effectiveness, etc. to attack confidence, and selectively Target strikes and dissemination of war situations can induce panic, and efforts can be made to gain understanding by publicizing one’s own humanitarian actions in the war and relevant international comments.
Build a strong line of defense and control the situation with concentration. The focus of cognitive defense in wartime is to build a strong defense line of “heart”, “will” and “intellect” to prevent the loss of fighting spirit under the stimulation of drastic changes in the situation or environment. Education and publicity are the basic approaches to cognitive defense in wartime. For the forces participating in the war, we can stimulate enthusiasm for participating in the war through mobilization and encouragement, clarify the truth by refuting rumors, establish the belief in victory by publicizing the results of the war, mobilize morale by setting examples, etc.; for the supporting forces, educate the justice, rationality, and legality of the war. Propaganda is used to establish a sense of mission, responsibility, and obligation among the people, to inspire a sense of hatred and hatred by exposing the enemy’s brutal behavior, to stimulate enthusiasm for supporting operations by publicizing the deeds of local governments participating in the war and supporting frontline operations, and so on.
Expand your camp and eliminate hidden dangers. Creating a favorable cognitive atmosphere and providing support for the expansion of one’s own camp is an important aspect that must be achieved in wartime cognitive domain operations. In particular, although the fight for international support is mainly through political, diplomatic and other activities, the widespread diffusion of one’s own positions, ideas, attitudes, etc. often leads to changes in international civil attitudes, which in turn affects decision-making at the political level. Provide support for your own camp expansion. In addition, wartime cognitive domain operations also have an important task throughout the war, which is to eliminate the adverse hidden dangers caused by various accidents in the war. Especially in the later stages of the war, as the destructive effects of war appear and spread, people’s cognitive system will be repeatedly impacted by different information. During this period, ideological guidance, social psychological shaping, and individual psychological counseling are required to work together to ensure the consolidation of the results. In cognitive domain operations, as the sound of guns dissipates, the horn of a new round of cognitive domain operations may sound again, and there must be no slacking off.
Throughout modern warfare, cognitive games have become the focus of offense and defense. Whether one is proficient in planning operations in the cognitive domain will greatly affect the direction and outcome of the war. A deep understanding of the connotation, extension and category style of cognitive domain operations, and an accurate grasp of its winning mechanism and development trend are the keys to understanding the context of the battlefield and winning modern wars.
Cognitive domain operations are the new focus of war games
Different from traditional operations, cognitive domain operations are no longer limited to land, sea, air, space, electricity, network and other fields. It breaks through the traditional physical domain and information domain. It has unique advantages, presents new characteristics, and expands the modern Battlefield new frontier.
Cognitive domain operations expand the war domain space. First of all, the battlefield space in the cognitive domain is broad, mainly reflected in people’s spirit, psychology, thinking, beliefs and other cognitive activities. Its combat targets are mainly hostile heads of state and political figures, military personnel, social elites and the general public. Secondly, cognitive domain operations take a wide range of forms, including but not limited to political and diplomatic pressure, economic blockade and sanctions, cultural penetration and erosion, etc. Thirdly, the goals of cognitive domain operations are wide-ranging, mainly to shake the enemy’s belief, disintegrate the enemy’s will, influence and change the opponent’s decision-making, thereby causing the enemy’s social chaos, decision-making errors, demoralization of the military, and even subversion of its national power.
Cognitive domain operations blur the boundaries of the war domain. The main body of cognitive domain operations is people. People are the most active factor in war, especially the cognition of high-level decision-makers, which embodies the overall will of the war, directly affects the overall situation of the war, and determines the outcome of the war. The cognition of state leaders and military generals is the key target of cognitive domain operations. Popular will, social foundation, and international public opinion are usually the basis for cognitive domain operations and are the key forces that promote the process and direction of war. Cognitive domain operations mix conventional and unconventional operations, blurring the boundaries of the war field. They aim to cognitively induce and attack information recipients, bypassing the traditional battlefield and reaching the weakest link – people. Tactical actions can achieve strategic goals, from Fundamentally change the battlefield environment and change the outcome of the war.
Cognitive domain operations reach the ultimate strategic goal. There is a saying in the ancient Chinese art of war: “The way to use troops is to attack the heart first, and to attack the city below; to fight the heart first, and to fight soldiers lower.” Operations in the cognitive domain aim to occupy cognitive dominance and influence the enemy’s decision-making and behavior. Achieve maximum combat effectiveness at minimum cost. As Clausewitz mentioned in “On War”, “War is an act of violence that forces the enemy to obey our will.” Since cognitive domain operations are not hard kills against living forces, but soft kills against invisible targets, they can not only “force the enemy to obey our will”, but also objectively enable the enemy to destroy itself from within, making it unable to resist, disintegrate, and ultimately Achieve the strategic goal of “complete victory” without fighting.
Cognitive domain operations are a new product of military reform
At present, major changes in the world that have not been seen in a century are accelerating. The international situation is becoming increasingly complex, and local wars and regional conflicts continue. As a new combat method, cognitive domain operations are becoming more and more important driven by the new wave of military reforms.
The laws of war are the basic rules for combat in the cognitive domain. Cognitive domain operations still follow the basic laws of war. First, justice must prevail. Just wars promote historical development and ultimately defeat unjust wars, and cognitive domain operations that occupy the moral commanding heights have the conditions to win first. The second is the victory of the strong and the defeat of the weak. The advancement of science and technology has given rise to advanced military theories and promoted the development of high-tech equipment. Seizing control and control can achieve dimensionality reduction and attack and disintegrate enemy forces. Third, subjective guidance is consistent with objective reality. Cognitive domain operations must be based on a certain objective material basis. The battlefield environment must be comprehensively considered, the situations of both parties must be weighed, and favorable decisions must be made. Fourth, key operations affect the overall situation. In network-centered system operations, the cognitive domain often becomes the most critical link, and its success or failure can determine the battle situation.
Theoretical innovation is the basic support for cognitive domain operations. In recent years, the US military has successively proposed new combat theories such as “hybrid warfare”, “mosaic warfare” and “gray zone conflict”. It regards cognitive domain operations as the main combat method and has formed a relatively mature theory. The Russian army has also developed its own set of hybrid warfare methods in long-term military practice, especially in the Syrian battlefield, where it skillfully used “Gerasimov” tactics to deal with “hybrid warfare.” Japan has also vigorously developed its military power in recent years. In its new version of the “Defense White Paper”, it first mentioned the concept of “domain transversal” operations, aiming to break through traditional fields and regard new fields such as the cognitive domain as the key direction of its military power development, making it more proactive. and extraversion.
Military practice is an important basis for cognitive domain operations. Judging from the recent local wars, cognitive domain warfare has become the main combat method of modern warfare and has achieved high combat effectiveness. The confrontation between cognitive warfare and counter-cognitive warfare is quite fierce. In 2010, the United States and other Western countries launched a cognitive war, hyped up the Tunisian democratic movement and created the “Arab Spring”, which plunged the Middle East into chaos and allowed terrorist organizations to take advantage of the opportunity to wreak havoc. The United States attempted to consolidate its hegemony by overthrowing the Egyptian government, launching a war in Libya, and intervening in the Syrian war. In 2014, the Russian army took control of Crimea through a combination of strategies, multi-dimensional breakthroughs, and public opinion building. Its cognitive domain operations also have very distinctive characteristics.
Cognitive domain operations are a new direction for war planning
With the continuous development of high and new technologies and their widespread application in the military field, the shape of future wars will evolve at an accelerated pace, and the complexity and unknown nature of wars will increase dramatically. To this end, we should plan in advance, coordinate scientifically, strengthen the construction of combat capabilities in the cognitive domain, deeply integrate into the future battlefield, and effectively control the initiative in future wars.
Promote research on the winning mechanism of cognitive domain operations. As an important combat method in future wars, the status and role of cognitive domain operations will be more prominent, and the development prospects will be broader. Controlling cognitive power has become an important part of seizing war control. To win future wars, we must keep up with the trends in the development of war forms, vigorously study the winning mechanism of cognitive domain operations, use theoretical innovation to drive innovation in tactics, and seek advantages and opportunities.
Strengthen the construction of offensive and defensive capabilities in cognitive domain operations. From individuals to organizations to countries, the impact of cognitive domain operations spans all time and space and all elements, spans different combat fields, and affects the entire combat process. In future wars, commanders and combatants will face huge cognitive offensive and defensive challenges. Seizing control of cognitive power, and then seizing comprehensive battlefield control, will become the key point of control in future wars. We should adhere to demand-driven efforts, strengthen the construction of offensive and defensive forces in cognitive domain operations, build a cognitive domain combat system that integrates offense and defense, peacetime and war, and multi-dimensional integration, establish and improve drill and evaluation mechanisms, and continuously improve capabilities through long-term military practice.
Accelerate the research and development of high-tech cognitive domain operations. Currently, with the rapid development of high-tech technologies such as big data, artificial intelligence, and cloud computing, the acquisition of open source information has become more convenient and efficient. Cognitive domain operations are increasingly characterized by fast start-up, low cost, and high efficiency. In addition, with the quiet development of emerging technologies such as neuroscience and brain science, it can be inferred that cognitive warfare weapons will become increasingly abundant and widely used in future wars. We should keep up with the development of the times, plan and design in advance, vigorously develop cutting-edge technologies oriented to seizing cognitive advantages, and promote the update of cognitive domain combat concepts and methods, so as to seize the initiative in future wars.
Complexity science is one of the frontier fields of contemporary scientific development. It is a new tool for understanding, understanding, and exploring the phenomena, laws, and mechanisms of war. As the form of war evolves from information war to intelligent war, the complexity of war shows an exponential growth trend, and it becomes increasingly difficult to seize control of information. The key to combat is to put the enemy into a “decision-making dilemma” so that it can even Even with information superiority, it cannot make correct decisions, thus losing its combat advantage. The focus of operations will change from “information-centered” to “cognition-centered”, and the winning mechanism will change from “information winning” to “cognitive winning”.
“Three changes” reveal the driving forces behind the increasing complexity of war
War is a field full of possibilities, and change is the basic characteristic that runs through it. President Xi stressed that we must pay close attention to changes in technology, war, and opponents. Changes in science and technology are the foundation, changes in war are the subject, and changes in opponents are the key. Changes in science and technology lead to changes in war, and changes in war prompt changes in opponents. The “three changes” have promoted the evolution of war forms, the expansion of war fields, the transformation of war goals, and the expansion of war influence, revealing the driving forces behind the growth of war complexity.
Changes in technology have overturned the basis for winning wars. Science and technology are the core combat effectiveness and the most active and revolutionary factor in military development. Throughout the history of the world’s military development, every major scientific and technological innovation has started a new military revolution, and every military revolution has pushed military development into a new era. Scientific and technological innovation has become a huge engine to improve the military’s combat effectiveness. . At present, a new round of scientific and technological revolution and military revolution are accelerating. The degree of informatization of modern warfare is constantly increasing, and the characteristics of intelligence are becoming increasingly apparent. The role of driving the military revolution is becoming more and more prominent. The rapid development of some cutting-edge technologies may fundamentally change the face of war and war. According to the rules, the military game between great powers is more embodied in technological subversion and counter-subversion, raids and counter-raids, offsets and counter-offsets. The U.S. Navy’s “Nemesis” project includes reconnaissance, decoy, jamming and other systems. The decoy system covers air, surface and underwater. Under the scheduling and control of the distributed artificial intelligence engine, it can complement each other, coordinate deception, and truly create a A “ghost aircraft carrier formation” completely subverted traditional electronic deception methods and raised information deception to an unprecedented level. It can be said that science and technology has never had such a profound impact on the overall situation of national security and military strategy as it does today. It has profoundly intervened in, supported, and dominated the evolution of war forms and the innovation of combat styles, and has even subverted the mechanism of winning wars.
The U.S. Navy’s “Nemesis” project is based on networked collaborative electronic warfare
Concept, integrating different systems and utilizing unmanned distributed
Clusters of electronic warfare platforms enable large-scale collaborative electronic warfare
The changes in war highlight the complexity of war. Modern warfare is undergoing profound changes, showing unprecedented diversity and complexity. This super complexity stems from many reasons: first, various advanced technologies or weapons are constantly emerging, bringing many uncertainties; second, the battlefield covers land, sea, air, space, network, electricity and cognitive and other multiple third, multiple combat objects, combat styles, combat areas, and combat methods are cross-correlated and combined to form a complex “hybrid war”; fourth, artificial intelligence algorithms build a large number of combat elements into a complex logic, and use human Machine speed beyond the reach of thinking prompts the combination, deconstruction, and recombination of various elements. In the Ukraine crisis in 2022, on the surface it is a confrontation between Russia and Ukraine, but in essence it is a “hybrid war” between the United States and Western countries and Russia; the Russian and Ukrainian armies extensively use military and civilian drones to expand The “unmanned +” application model shows the prototype of future unmanned intelligent operations; with the support of U.S. NATO air and space situational intelligence, the Ukrainian army frequently uses low-cost unmanned equipment to carry out raids on important Russian weapons platforms, highlighting its new qualities Combat forces have asymmetric attack advantages against large weapons and equipment in traditional combat systems. Changes in technology will eventually lead to changes in war. The impact of a single element on war will become weaker and weaker. The joint combat system composed of multiple elements will have a complex impact on war. War is non-linear, uncertain, chaotic and open. Complex characteristics such as adaptability and confrontation will increase exponentially, which will make it more difficult for people to judge the progress and outcome of the war.
Changes in opponents accelerate the growth of war complexity. Changes in war prompt changes in opponents. Currently, we are experiencing major changes unseen in a century. Major military powers are actively making strategic adjustments and promoting a new round of military reforms, which exhibit the following characteristics: first, the trend of joint, miniaturized, and autonomous institutional establishments has become more obvious; second, The first is that weapons and equipment are showing a development trend of digitization, precision, stealth, unmanned, and intelligence; the third is that the combat form is moving towards the “four nons” (non-contact, non-linear, asymmetric and irregular) and the “three nos” (Invisible, silent, unmanned) combat; fourth, the military command form is developing in the direction of flattening, automation, networking, and seamlessness. The United States regards China as its main strategic opponent and strives to suppress and contain China. It has vigorously strengthened the innovation of operational concepts and has successively proposed new operational concepts such as “hybrid warfare”, “multi-domain warfare” and “mosaic warfare”, claiming that it will fight to defeat its opponents. A high-end war in which “technology cannot be understood, strikes are difficult to predict, and speed cannot keep up.” The core of the US military’s “mosaic warfare” is unmanned, low-cost, fast, lethal, flexible and reconfigurable. It is based on distributed situational awareness, with the help of intelligent auxiliary decision-making tools and the concept of building blocks and jigsaw puzzles to adaptively formulate mission planning. , dynamically reorganize combat forces, decompose the functions of the combat platform into a larger number of single-function nodes, and build a combat system with a large number of functional nodes. Replace the “kill chain” with a “kill network”. Several nodes will fail or be missing, and the combat system can be adaptively reorganized.
The increasing complexity of war drives the transformation of the winning mechanism of war
With the rapid development of national defense science and technology, the upgrading of weapons and equipment, and the rapid evolution of war forms, modern warfare has shown exponential and explosive complex changes. These changes may seem dazzling, but there are rules to follow behind them. The fundamental thing is that the winning mechanism of war has changed. Only by thoroughly understanding the winning mechanism of modern war can we accurately recognize changes, respond scientifically, be good at seeking change, and firmly grasp the initiative in future wars.
The form of war has changed from cold weapon warfare to intelligent warfare . The shape of war is a holistic understanding of war. So far, human war has generally gone through four historical stages: cold weapon war, hot weapon war, mechanized war, and information war, and is moving towards intelligent warfare. The history of cognitive warfare is almost as old as the history of human warfare. In the era of cold weapon war, hot weapon war, and mechanized war, cognitive warfare appears more in the form of public opinion warfare and psychological warfare. As mankind enters the information age, the development of cyberspace technology has greatly expanded the space for cognitive warfare, enriched the technical means of cognitive warfare, and greatly enhanced the permeability, timeliness, and deterrence of cognitive warfare. The status and role of Zhizhan have been unprecedentedly improved. In the future, the form of war will enter intelligent warfare, and a large number of intelligent weapon systems and platforms will be equipped with the military and put into combat. Cognitive warfare can not only interfere with and deceive the cognition of enemy personnel, but also attack the cognition of smart equipment through algorithm deception methods such as “adversarial input” and “data poisoning”. Its application scenarios and scope will be further expanded. , the status and role will be further improved.
Drones have gradually become the protagonist of war,
Combat complexity further increases
The purpose of war has changed from conquering by force to conquering by spirit. The winning mechanism of modern war has undergone great changes compared with the past. The violence of war has been curbed. The purpose of combat has changed from the original siege of cities and territories and annihilation of the enemy’s effective forces to making the opponent obey one’s own will. The means of combat have changed from conquering by force to conquering more areas. The emphasis on psychological and spiritual conquest and transformation has made cognitive warfare increasingly prominent in its status and role in modern warfare. In recent years, “hybrid warfare” has become a major means of great power competition. More and more countries have begun to focus on using new fields and new means to achieve political, military, and economic goals that are difficult to achieve with traditional warfare. “Hybrid war” is a mixture of war subjects such as states, non-state actors and individuals, a mixture of conventional warfare, unconventional warfare and other war styles, a mixture of military operations such as combat, stability maintenance and reconstruction, and a mixture of political, military and economic The mixture of multiple fields such as military and people’s livelihood is a mixture of multiple combat goals such as defeating the enemy and winning the hearts and minds of the people. This is highly consistent with cognitive warfare. The operational field of “hybrid warfare” has expanded from the military field to politics, economy, culture, people’s livelihood and other fields; the combat methods have expanded from firepower warfare and troop warfare to diplomatic warfare, economic warfare, cyber warfare, psychological warfare, public opinion warfare and other directions. This is highly consistent with cognitive warfare. Its core essence is to “make profit out of chaos”, its main purpose is to win people’s hearts, and its combat guidance is to win by cleverness.
The winning domain of war changes from the physical domain and information domain to the cognitive domain. Modern war occurs in three fields: physics, information and cognition at the same time. The physical domain and information domain are separated from the material domain, and the cognitive domain is separated from the spiritual domain. The physical domain is a traditional war domain, consisting of combat platforms and military facilities, which provides the material basis for information warfare. The information domain is a newly emerging war field, that is, the space for information generation, transmission and sharing, and is the focus of information warfare competition. Cognitive domain is the scope and field involved in human cognitive activities. It is not only the space for human feeling, perception, memory and thinking activities, but also the space for knowledge generation, exchange, association, storage and application. It is also the space for perception, judgment and decision-making in combat activities. and spaces of command and control. The cognitive domain exists in the field of consciousness of combatants and affects their judgment and decision-making. It is a rising field of warfare. With the development of technologies such as network information and artificial intelligence, the scope of the cognitive domain has greatly expanded, and is expanding from the field of human consciousness to the field of modern cognitive tools and artificial intelligence. The development of military technology has expanded the scope of the cognitive domain, providing more advanced, faster, and more effective material and technical means for cognitive warfare, greatly enhancing the permeability, timeliness, and deterrence of cognitive warfare, and fundamentally It has changed cognitive warfare, making the cognitive domain a new winning field that transcends the physical domain and information domain, and has become the ultimate domain for great power games and military confrontations.
The mechanism for winning wars changes from information victory to cognitive victory. In the final analysis, war confrontation is a game and confrontation of cognition. Mastering the right to control cognition will largely control the initiative in war. Losing the right to control cognition will put you in a passive position of being beaten in the war. Obtaining higher and stronger control rights is the key to defeating powerful enemies. Finding ways to control cognitive power and then seize comprehensive battlefield control, so as to achieve maximum victory at the minimum cost, is an important mechanism and inherent law of modern warfare, especially cognitive warfare. In recent years, the U.S. military has successively proposed new concepts of future warfare represented by “decision-centered warfare” and “mosaic warfare”, intending to use complexity as a weapon to create multiple dilemmas for opponents, requiring it to ensure its own tactical “selective advantage”. At the same time, by creating highly complex decision-making influences on the enemy and interfering with its decision-making capabilities, it can achieve a subversive advantage over the enemy in the cognitive domain. In the primary and intermediate stages of information warfare, the key to combat is to seize network control and information control, which runs through the progressive model of “network advantage → information advantage → decision-making advantage → combat advantage”. After information warfare enters an advanced stage, it becomes more and more difficult to seize control of information. The key to combat is to make the enemy fall into a “decision-making dilemma” so that even if it has information superiority, it cannot make correct decisions, thereby losing its combat advantage and having recognition. Only by knowing the advantages can you have the combat advantage. In future wars, cognitive advantage will be the most important strategic advantage, and cognitive confrontation will be the most important form of confrontation. It can be said that “without cognition, there is no war.”
Coping with complex wars has given rise to the concept of cognitive-centered warfare
In order to cope with the exponential growth trend of the complexity characteristics of modern warfare, we must use the theories and methods of complexity science to change the concept of platform-centered warfare where firepower is supreme and killing is king, and establish a cognitive-centered combat thinking. Cognition-centered warfare refers to taking the cognitive domain as the winning area, taking the cognitive advantage as the operational goal, and focusing on interfering with cognitive means, suppressing cognitive channels, affecting cognitive production, and conducting cognitive operations on enemy personnel and intelligent equipment. Interference, suppression, deception and inducement are a new operational concept that obtains combat advantages by seizing and maintaining cognitive advantages. Its main winning mechanisms are as follows.
Sun Tzu mentioned in “The Art of War” that “there is no constant force in an army;
Water has no permanent shape; those who can win due to the changes of the enemy are called gods.
Use cyber deterrence to destroy the enemy’s will to fight. Targeting the enemy’s political, economic, military, diplomatic, and cultural contradictions and weaknesses, disseminate deterrent information through cyberspace, or publish military parades, large-scale military exercises, new weapons and equipment research and development and other information through the Internet, so as to cause extreme cognitive and psychological changes in the opponent. Great fear and shock, deterring the enemy is not conducive to the implementation of my actions. Comprehensive use of network and electricity attack methods to carry out point strikes and warning attacks against the enemy’s important network and electricity targets and key core nodes, destroying the enemy’s system combat capabilities, affecting the normal performance of the enemy’s weapons and equipment, and providing psychological deterrence to the enemy. The US military’s “gray zone operations” theory relies on its own technological advantages and mainly takes actions such as cyber and electronic countermeasures to respond to the opponent’s “gray zone provocation” and deter the opponent from giving up “confrontation” or escalating the conflict, putting it in a dilemma.
Use information deception to induce the enemy to make misjudgments. Aiming at the enemy’s reconnaissance equipment, intelligence agencies and command systems, use cyber attacks, electronic deception and other means to conceal one’s military intentions, military operations and military objectives, and transmit to the enemy erroneous and false combat plans, troop configurations and operations. capabilities, combat plans, battlefield situation, etc., or use the enemy’s command information system to send false orders and information to induce the enemy to make wrong judgments and disrupt the enemy’s combat command. Implement new attacks such as “adversarial input” and “data poisoning” against artificial intelligence algorithms, allowing them to obtain preset conclusions through deep learning training, or causing them to fall into local optimal solutions and ignore the global optimal. Use technologies such as computer imaging, video synthesis, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence to synthesize sounds, videos, images, text information, etc., or use “deep fake” technology to generate false information that is difficult to distinguish between true and false, and transmit it through the Internet Spread in large quantities to confuse and deceive opponents and influence their decisions and actions.
Use information suppression to block the enemy’s cognitive means. Target the enemy’s important network targets, as well as core routers, switches, gateways, key servers, etc., and use “soft” and “hard” attack methods to destroy their network nodes. Based on the networking characteristics of wireless links such as the enemy’s command and control network, communication transmission network, weapon hinge network, and early warning detection network, comprehensively use technologies and means such as electronic jamming, GPS spoofing attacks, command link takeover, and data hijacking control to suppress them. Data communication, blocking its communication links and interfering with its combat command. Implement cyber-paralysis attacks on enemy command and control, military communications, early warning detection, aerospace information and other military networks, destroying core networks that affect their operations and weakening their combat capabilities.
Use public opinion propaganda to create a favorable public opinion environment . Cooperate with the country’s political, military, and diplomatic struggles, vigorously promote one’s own justice in the war, and stimulate the enthusiasm of all people to fully support the war. With the help of new media platforms such as instant messaging tools, online forums, podcasts, Twitter, and WeChat, we can systematically disseminate information that targets the enemy’s weaknesses. After gaining widespread attention and consensus, we can then promptly report information, create new hot spots, and repeatedly build momentum. Enhance the influence and form a resonance effect to expand the effect. Propaganda “sets the tone” by cleverly setting agendas, building public opinion through powerful media, setting off a “spiral of silence”, controlling and guiding public opinion, and changing people’s opinions and behaviors.
Use psychological attacks to undermine the morale of enemy soldiers and civilians. Through the Internet, processed and processed information is widely disseminated to promote one’s justice, demonstrate one’s strength, will and determination, vilify the enemy politically and morally, gather the thoughts and will of the military and civilians internally, and strive to win externally. The commanding heights of law and morality can “soften” and “weaken” the enemy spiritually. Use a variety of network communication methods and technical means to send various deceptive, disruptive, inductive, and deterrent messages to the enemy’s military and civilians in a targeted manner to attack the enemy’s psychological defense line, promote an ineffective confrontation mentality, and then lose combat capabilities. . Through the Internet, we can create, guide, plan, build, and expand momentum to create a “momentum” that is beneficial to ourselves but not beneficial to the enemy, causing a psychological impact on the other party’s people, thereby affecting or changing their psychological state, and implementing effective psychological attacks.
Use legal struggle to obtain legal and moral support. Use legal weapons to curb the enemy’s possible or future illegal acts, declare the legality of our actions, affirm our power of military counterattack, declare our determination to pursue war responsibilities, and deter the enemy. By exposing the illegality of the enemy’s provocative behavior, criticizing the legal basis for the enemy’s combat operations, and condemning the enemy’s illegal behavior, it causes the enemy’s strategic defeat and our own strategic gain. Use legal means to restrict the enemy’s possible actions, limit the possible interference of third parties, and block other parties from interfering with our own actions. Formulate the laws and regulations necessary for our operations to provide legal protection for our operations, or take legal remedial measures to reduce the possible negative impacts of our operations and ensure that combat operations are carried out in accordance with the law.
With the rapid development of intelligent technology and its widespread application in military affairs, intelligent warfare is becoming a new form of warfare after information warfare, and dissipative warfare has become a typical method of intelligent warfare. The so-called dissipative warfare refers to a combat method in which the intelligent warfare system achieves comprehensive combat power integrating material consumption, energy release and information diffusion through internal integration and integration and external mutation. Strengthening research on dissipative warfare will help us deeply reveal the winning mechanism of intelligent warfare and win the initiative in future war games.
Dissipative war is the inevitable result of the development of the times
Dissipative warfare is manifested in the comprehensive confrontation of the physical domain, information domain and cognitive domain in the intelligent era. It is reflected in the high degree of unity in the form of political contest, economic competition, military offense and defense, cultural conflict and diplomatic checks and balances, reflecting the intelligent war system. openness, complexity and emergence.
Adapt to the security situation requirements of the intelligent era. Entering the era of intelligence, technologies such as wide networks, big data, big models, cloud computing, and deep learning are developing rapidly, and the connections between political groups, countries, and ethnic groups have become more extensive. Under the influence of multiple factors such as political pluralism, economic integration, social openness, and technological revolution, non-traditional security has emerged and is intertwined with traditional threats. The subjects and categories of intelligent warfare have continued to expand. The time and space of war have continued to expand. War and peace are like shadows. As they become more integrated, the war system will further transcend local geographical restrictions, move from a relatively closed world to a more open one, and form a higher-level and wider-scale confrontation. Dissipative warfare emphasizes the comprehensive development of intelligent warfare systems in the physical, information and cognitive domains. It highly unifies political contests, economic competitions, military offense and defense, cultural conflicts and diplomatic checks and balances into the scope of confrontation between ourselves and the enemy, adapting to the The requirements of the times as the world security situation develops.
It is in line with the objective laws of the evolution of war forms. The dissipation phenomenon of the war system has always existed since the birth of war. However, before the emergence of intelligent warfare, due to technological constraints, it has always been in a relatively low-level and simple state. War confrontation can only be manifested in material consumption and energy release. A form of dispersion and information diffusion. In the agricultural era, the main form of war was cold weapon warfare dominated by material elements and centered on the human body. In the era of industrialization, the main forms of warfare are thermonuclear weapons and mechanized warfare dominated by energy elements and centered on platforms. In the information age, the form of war is mainly information-based war dominated by information elements and centered on the network information system. Entering the era of intelligence, intelligent technology highly unifies the cognitive advantages, decision-making advantages and action advantages in the confrontation between ourselves and the enemy. In essence, it highly unifies matter, energy and information. Through intelligent empowerment, intelligent energy gathering, Interpreting energy through intelligence has formed an intelligent war form dominated by intelligent elements and centered on intelligent algorithms. The main form of expression is dissipative warfare that reflects the confrontation of the complex systems of intelligent warfare.
It is supported by a solid philosophical theoretical foundation. Social form is the matrix of war forms. To explore and understand intelligent warfare, we must be based on the basic principles of historical materialism and dialectical materialism, comprehensively examine the evolution of war forms and the social form in which intelligent warfare occurs, and construct a new war concept and context system. From a philosophical perspective, matter, energy and information are the three major elements that make up the world. Material embodies the existence of the source, energy embodies the existence of movement, and information embodies the existence of connections. The three progressively and alternately dominate the formation of social forms and war forms. Evolve and run. According to the principle of negation of dialectical materialism, in the intelligent age after the information age, the dominant element of society will be material again after matter, energy, and information. However, this material is formed after a spiral of high informatization. The main characteristic of new materials is that they have intelligent technical properties. Therefore, in essence, dissipative warfare is the intelligent element that highly unifies the characteristic advantages of matter, energy and information in previous low-level warfare forms, and highly integrates the common forms of material consumption, energy release and information diffusion in war. Unified, it reflects the typical characteristics of intelligent warfare.
Deeply grasp the inner essence of dissipative warfare
Dissipative warfare is based on the real world and covers the virtual world. It adapts to the rapid development of intelligent technology, the rise of non-traditional security threats, and the continuous expansion of war subjects and categories, and presents many new characteristics.
Against comprehensive games. As the form of intelligent warfare accelerates to develop to a higher depth and breadth, the political, economic, cultural, diplomatic and other fields are more interconnected and have more extensive influence. The focus of war begins to shift from the military system to the social system, and the war stakeholders The confrontation will be reflected in various forms of comprehensive games such as political competition, economic competition, military offense and defense, cultural conflicts, and diplomatic checks and balances. The pursuit of war advantages is no longer limited to the field of military confrontation. The winner of the war must adapt to the openness, complexity and emergence requirements of the war system, transform from the extensive consumption and use of single materials, energy and information to the dissipation of the war system dominated by intelligent advantages, and strive to compete in comprehensive games in multiple fields Gain the initiative and advantage.
Subjects are diverse across domains. The subjects of intelligent warfare are becoming increasingly generalized, and the potential war forces that need to be mobilized for traditional warfare will be in a state of normalized confrontation. Political forces, various institutions and personnel, together with the troops and soldiers fighting on the battlefield in the traditional sense, constitute the main body of the war. Diversified war subjects will span the real domain and the virtual domain, appearing in land, sea, air, space, electricity, psychology and other spatial domains, covering the physical domain, information domain, cognitive domain, etc., covering politics, economy, culture, Diplomacy and other social fields. For example, civilians can use smartphones to collect information on military battlefields and pass it on to war stakeholders, causing the spread of key war information, which in turn affects war decisions or the victory or defeat of a campaign or battle.
Strength is gathered into one body. Virtual and real power are integrated. Focusing on the purpose of war, all possible real and virtual forces that may be used will be integrated with the support of intelligent technology, and they will perform their duties and act according to regulations on parallel battlefields; they will be integrated with and without forces. Unmanned combat forces will achieve a high degree of autonomy after going through the stages of manual operation, manual authorization, and human supervision. They can be deployed and combined with various manned forces on demand, and can effectively coordinate and operate in parallel under the constraints of common war rules. Symbiosis; multiple forces integrated into one. Based on the extensive connections in various fields and the common purpose of the war system, the party, government, military, police and civilians and other forces closely coordinate and act in a unified manner with political, economic, diplomatic, public opinion, and legal struggles to form a comprehensive combat capability. In short, under the unified planning of the country or political group, although the diverse participating forces in intelligent warfare are physically dispersed, they can achieve logical concentration, instant enrichment, complementary advantages, and integration of excellence around the common war purpose.
Effectiveness emerges cumulatively. While high-level warfare forms have new technological features, they still include the characteristic advantages of lower-level warfare forms. Dissipative warfare emphasizes continuous comprehensive confrontation in multiple domains. This includes not only the consumption of ammunition, materials, equipment and even combat personnel at the material level, but also the continuous collection and release of energy at the energy level. It also includes the use of data, knowledge, and algorithms at the information level. The diffusion and integration of information, etc. will have an unlimited impact on people’s thinking and cognition, value pursuit, moral concepts, emotions, will, behavior patterns, etc. Under the constant deterrence of nuclear weapons, intelligent warfare will become less bloody, but political isolation, economic blockade, cultural conflict, diplomatic stranglehold, etc. will become more serious and intense. When the military, political, economic, cultural, diplomatic and other systems continue to play their roles and the cumulative effectiveness reaches a certain level, the war system will increase negative entropy, thereby achieving a sudden change in combat power and the emergence of system effectiveness, thereby gaining a war advantage.
Choose the right focus to fight the dissipation war well
The intelligent warfare system maximizes the combat effectiveness of the system through internal aggregation and integration, external mutation emergence, cross-domain efficiency enhancement, and intelligent dissipation. This is the winning mechanism contained in dissipative warfare. To win in intelligent warfare, it is necessary to clarify the focus of dissipative warfare, target the shortcomings and weaknesses of the opponent’s system, and identify the focus of war preparations.
Focus on the openness of the system and close and isolate the opponent’s war system. Cut off the material, energy and information exchange between the opponent’s war system and the external battlefield environment, causing it to lack material, energy and information source channels, and gradually move towards a state of isolation, closure and weakness. For example, at the strategic level, political isolation is adopted to isolate the opponent’s war system, causing an increase in system entropy. At the operational level, methods such as cutting off data sources, destroying data backups, falsifying data, and tampering with information can be used to force the opponent’s war system to transform into a closed state, thereby reducing the effectiveness of the opponent’s system.
Focus on the complexity of the system and attack the opponent’s war system by domain. The more connections and the closer the connections between the elements of an intelligent warfare system, the lower the reliability of the system structure. Using the principle that each layer in a complex system is relatively independent, we can formulate overall strategic, local campaign and tactical action strategies to achieve layered and domain-based attacks on the enemy’s war system. For example, at the strategic level, the use of economic blockade can greatly weaken the opponent’s war strength and development potential. At the operational level, the vulnerability of the communication network of the combat system is exploited, and network and electricity composite attacks are used as the basic path and means, and methods such as “destroying terminals, attacking elements, lone groups, disconnecting networks, and breaking clouds” are used to destroy the opponent’s combat system structure. , prompting the opponent’s war system to “collapse”.
Focus on the emergent nature of the system and dismantle and disperse the opponent’s combat system. Only when mutation and emergence effects occur in an intelligent warfare system can it quickly form and exert its effectiveness and gain advantages in dissipative warfare. If only a single component or element plays a role, it is impossible to form an advantage. It is foreseeable that the currently emerging technologies such as ChatGPT and more advanced intelligent technologies in the future will provide a new way of thinking for understanding and discovering the operating behaviors, states and laws of complex systems of war, as well as new means of exploring objective laws and transforming nature and society. The dominant side in war confrontation will reduce the coupling degree of the opponent’s war system through a combination of virtual and real, parallel and integrated confrontation methods, and achieve the purpose of dismantling and dispersing the enemy’s war system.