The year is 2010 AD. You are a strategic information operations analyst in the division of Adversary Knowledge Warfare at the U.S. Army War College. Among other operations, your division develops ongoing simulations of leadership groups of nations and organizations which might become adversaries of the U.S. Based on your simulation studies, strategic operations are put in place.

The political leader of a small country with nuclear capability is being interviewed in a live press conference over the World Communication Network (WCN). Nuclear devices, he states, have been planted in critical areas in Washington, DC, New York City, and San Francisco. Detonation of these nuclear bombs will result in significant loss of life among high-level decision-making and civilian groups and--even more significant to this renegade nation--will destroy the national icons: the U.S. Capitol Building and the White House, the Empire State Building and the Statue of Liberty, and the Golden Gate Bridge. The political leader, Leader X, announces that ten billion dollars must be credited to a Swiss bank account within forty-eight hours or the nuclear devices will be detonated. Any attempt to arrest any member of his national leadership group will result in immediate destruction of one or more of the targets.

Amidst the panic and disarray following this world-wide terrorist threat, your phone rings and an advisor communicates to you a presidential order for your group to work non-stop on a strategic personality simulation on the enemy leaders and provide analysis and recommendations as soon as possible. Your group develops a fine-grain profile of Leader X: who influences him, what persons and groups he controls, what internal personality factors drive him, his leadership skills, and how he thinks--the ideas and patterns he uses in planning and acting. The profile goes into minute detail, down to how certain persons in Leader X's family and peer group influence him, how he reacts to stress, and what rules of thought tend to dominate his decision-making. Similar simulation models of the other enemy leaders are developed in detail.

Fourteen hours later your group provides detailed recommendations as to how to control Leader X's behavior and realize American strategic goals. An entire scenario is outlined, each specific action and its effect on Leader X is delineated, so that the outcome is virtually certain. The President and the National Security Council agree to follow your recommendations. The plan is put into operation and within twelve hours, Leader X has communicated to the NSC that he is willing to identify where the nuclear devices are located and abandon his threat.

Unknown to the world at large, without firing a single shot, the United States has just won the First Knowledge War.



Reference: Norman D. Livergood. (1995). Strategic Personality Simulation: A New Strategic Concept, United States Army War College