Abstract
This study surveys the academic literature, mass media and political actors’ understanding of warfare in the 21st century by tracing the trajectory of conflict and its relationship to information. The book is by Iulian Chifu and Greg Simons, who co-authored the introduction and conclusion, but individually wrote the ten chapters (four by Chifu and six by Simons). Despite the different authorship of the chapters, the chapters together explain how ‘global transformation is creating an environment of increasing instability and tensions’ (p. 8). In particular, the book explains how war and information have evolved and are now closely connected with the rise of social media in the 21st century. The authors synthesize a large body of existing research and provide a new interpretation that stresses the role of information, technology, and politics in war.
Chifu and Simons’ co-authored introduction lays out the study’s purpose in understanding the transformation and trajectory of war and information. It provides a survey of the book’s key concepts with attention to the differences of warfare by looking at the shift away from the Cold War to the Global War on Terrorism and the roles of information and politics in warfare during the new millennium. They also highlight mainstream media mistrust and social media in conflicts. First, Chifu examines information warfare with a theoretical discussion about the evolution of approaches that foster distrust and societal tensions. He describes the ways truth has been politicized by showing how misleading and false claims influence the cognition of the audience and create an ‘alternative reality’. Next, Simons probes the tangible and intangible elements in wars, describing the significance of intangible factors and non-state actors. He argues, ‘The intangible elements of legitimacy, reputation, public will and opinion are all critical factors when shaping the information environment to support launching or continuing a military conflict’ (p. 76).
Turning to information war, Chifu probes generational changes and argues it currently involves hybrid operations that seek to press decision-makers into changing their actions. He shows a ‘fourth’ generation of information war targets different personalities and currently a fifth will emerge in about two years involving real images/video with fake or manipulated audio of leaders. Building from this, Simons explains culture and language’s importance for uniting and dividing society that are exploited for political operational advantages. He writes that increasingly ‘warfare is being waged in the name of political vanity against various challengers, and that lacks a clear sense of beginning or end, ostensibly to defend an eroding privileged global position’ (p. 139). Likewise, Simons categorizes different levels of ‘truth’ in armed conflict by focusing on information’s selective use at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels. He explains that information and communication are connected aspects ‘in the operationalisation of the informational domain aspects of parallel kinetic warfare’ because information and communication ‘influence and shape the cognitive domain of the various actual and potential stakeholders’ (p. 177).
The next four chapters explore specific new threats related to technology. Chifu probes the effects of technological changes and social media on people, society, and politics. He describes how social media amplifies extremism, requires simplified answers, and made opinions equal, which creates new challenges and vulnerabilities that cause ruptures in fields like defence and security. Then Simons looks at Western hybrid warfare used for subversion and regime change in terms of information and cognition. Reminiscent of Noam Chomsky but not citing him, Simons explores manufacturing crises with the Arab Spring’s Libyan uprising and shows efforts to shape public perception ‘with an emotional logic that is designed to prime and mobilise them politically into accepting foreign policy’ (p. 241). Delving into another specific case, Simons looks at the battle for influence on social media surrounding events of Euromaidan in Ukraine around 2013 and before Russia’s large-scale 2022 invasion. He looks at Euromaidan support and opposition, examining how competing narratives framed the protests and how emotional appeals portrayed Euromaidan supporters as being like Westerners, and opponents framed the events with notions of fear as well as Nazism.
Taking a comparative approach involving recent conflicts, Simons reviews how the mainstream media describes conflicts using Ukraine and Syria as examples of multi-layered conflicts with local, regional and global dimensions. In the case of Ukraine, the sum of the narrative is that the United States instigated a successful regime change operation and is now defending and attempting to stabilise their client government by increasing its capability and capacity to effectively govern its national territory against Russian attempts to destabilise. (p. 301)
Moving away from war, Chifu explores the COVID-19 pandemic impact on politics, daily life and international relations as well as broader freedoms in the context of information. He argues the pandemic amplified the complexity of the information landscape, provoking an ‘infodemic’ and exacerbating practices and crises at the national and global level. Lastly, their conclusion highlights how war has increasingly been used in foreign policy in the 21st century, how politics and information have changed war, and how there is ‘an environment of decreased predictability at a time of increased risk and change’ (p. 351).
This book makes a solid contribution to understanding the connections between politics, information and media surrounding conflict. With chapters written by different authors and taking different approaches, there is sometimes a lack of cohesion with the authors highlighting separate themes and issues. Moreover, the chapters devote significant space to summarizing media reports or scholarly findings with less empirical innovation than expected. Additionally, the book largely does not describe the methodology, aside from the polling process in the Ukraine chapter, so it is unclear why some literature was included or excluded from the book. Nonetheless, the book is a strategic view of information warfare and how technology has shaped and is shaping conflict, providing an insightful look at warfare in the 21st century. Scholars interested in information operations, international security and technology will find this a welcome addition to the literature.
