1/ I am a former senior civilian military analyst for the Dept of the Army. I look at political warfare thru the lens of warfare, esp John Boyd, Sun Tzu, and Bill Lind. Think of the Left or Progressive Movement as a combined arms combat unit. Maybe not so well organized and
2/ not uniform, without similar training across branches or segments. Some are professional regulars--Dems in Congress--some irregulars--women/POC protesters, some are heavy artillery, some are demolition engineers, some are special operators, some are intel, some reg infantry.
3/ We are all in the right-wing Order of Battle. We are all in their target deck for delegitimation or destruction. Lind, our strategist opponent, wants to "delegitimize the Left" and destroy the secular, multicultural, democracy in favor of white, evangelical, Xian white men.
4/ Much of what Lind learned about Fourth Generation Warfare he cribbed from John Boyd, America's greatest strategist, who thought Sun Tzu was without error. Boyd posited there were 3 levels of conflict: Physical, Mental, and Moral. Moral is the highest.
5/ Moral dominates. Guerrilla war is moral conflict. You can conceptualize guerrilla war also as non-kinetic. Thus, the principles of guerrilla warfare can be used in kinetic and non-kinetic warfare. For example, mass/disperse vs troll/bot swarm/disperse.
6/ The essence of moral conflict is in your head. Literally. It is epistemological warfare. It is a mindfuck. It is intended to be a mindfuck. Boyd: The aim of moral conflict is "to destroy moral bonds that permit an organic whole to exist." How?
7/ Boyd: You create, exploit, and magnify: menace, uncertainty, and mistrust. Menace is the sense of danger to your well being and survival. Uncertainty is the creation of events that "appear ambiguous, erratic, contradictory, unfamiliar, chaotic, etc." Mistrust is to create an
8/ "atmosphere of doubt and suspicion that loosens human bonds among members of an organic whole or between organic wholes." The aim is to "surface fear, anxiety, and alienation in order to generate many non-cooperative centers of gravity [turn on each other], as well as
9/ subvert those that adversary [you] depends upon, thereby magnify internal friction [turn on each other]. End Boyd. Now, this is the deep strategy being used against you as individuals, as a movement, as an organization, as a party, as lawyers. Now, I will go back to my
10/ analogy. When they pick on @MichaelAvenatti they are saying we don't like you using heavy artillery against our positions. When they say we don't like your "mobs" and "paid" protesters, they are saying we think it is very unfair to deploy special ops and heavy infantry.
11/ When they complain about Dems on Judiciary, they are saying we think it is very unfair to deploy professional combat forces. We are in a political war fought at the moral plane in which the legitimacy of everything you hold dear is at stake. There is more to Boyd, but his
12/ keys to moral victory: Moral Strength: the capacity to overcome menace, uncertainty, and mistrust. Develop Moral Values that "permit one to carry on in the face of menace, uncertainty, and mistrust." Moral Authority: a "person or body that can give one the courage,
13/ confidence, and esprit to overcome menace, uncertainty, and mistrust." Moral Defeat is the "triumph of fear, anxiety, and alienation over courage, confidence, and esprit when confronted by menace, uncertainty, and mistrust." Now, in the military we are very self-critical.
14/ We want to have "lessons learned" when we win, but especially and most importantly, when we lose. War is a constant struggle of adjustments. Tactics, weapons, organization changes as enemy changes. So, criticism is good and healthy. But, when the enemy criticizes you for
15/ being effective, stop and think. Why are they criticizing my regular army? My special ops? My heavy infantry? My heavy artillery? Why do they want us to not deploy this weapon system or use this tactic? Don't let them mindfuck you. Trust your comrades or fellows or resistors.
