A video that in many ways corresponds with what I argued in "America's Iranian Twitter Revolution," the video below in part shows how the use of social media to make falsified versions of Libyan reality can go viral--radioactive--producing an intellectually toxic swarm of passive repeaters. Critical questions are like static, they interrupt the clarity of the message: dictator vs. revolutionaries, support the people, implement a no-fly zone right now. But this is so patronizing, it denies "agency"--just like the agency of the consumer who must decide and then boldly act on which colour iPod™ to buy. Have a look at The Guardian's "Revealed: US spy operation that manipulates social media: Military's 'sock puppet' software creates fake online identities to spread pro-American propaganda."...Also check "‘Post-Qaddafi Libya’: on the Globalist Road," "Who are the Libyan Freedom Fighters and Their Patrons?" "US-trained [and U.S.-based] economist, Libyan rebels’ new finance minister," and "New Libyan rebel leader spent much of past 20 years in suburban Virginia."....
[Max Forte: The following article by John Allison, an anthropologist and former employee of the U.S. Army's Human Terrain System, offers us an inside look at the workings of HTS and its training program, adding to a growing body of insider accounts published as leaks to John Stanton's many articles, as comments on this blog […]
So General David Petraeus is back on the COIN campaign trail arguing that pacifying the Human Terrain (HT) is his number one priority. Petraeus’ model program for converting an indigenous human terrain that is opposed to US occupation to a pliant human terrain has been the troublesome US Army Human Terrain System run out of […]
For almost two years we have heard little more than passing statements and speculation about the U.S. Army’s Africa Command (AFRICOM) adopting the “human terrain” concept or deploying human terrain teams in Africa, even if individuals in the Human Terrain System seemed relatively confident this would happen (particularly, Montgomery McFate on the Charlie Rose show […]
A warm welcome back to John Stanton: this is his 18th article on the Human Terrain System, with his previous ones available here at: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, and 17. Once again, this article was sent in by John and is reproduced here with his permission. So far, this is one of the clearest indications of the roles performed […]
March 27, 2011 by Maximilian Forte
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