Rumsfeld's Roadmap to Propaganda
Secret Pentagon "roadmap" calls for "boundaries" between "information operations" abroad
and at home but provides no actual limits as long as US doesn't "target" Americans
National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 177 - January 26, 2006 -
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB177/index.htmWashington, D.C., January 26, 2006 - A secret Pentagon "roadmap" on war propaganda, personally approved by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in October 2003, calls for "boundaries" between information operations abroad and the news media at home, but provides for no such limits and claims that as long as the American public is not "targeted," any leakage of PSYOP to the American public does not matter.
Obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by the National Security Archive at George Washington University and posted on the Web today, the 74-page "Information Operations Roadmap" admits that "information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP, increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa," but argues that "the distinction between foreign and domestic audiences becomes more a question of USG
intent rather than information dissemination practices."
The Smith-Mundt Act of 1948, amended in 1972 and 1998, prohibits the U.S. government from propagandizing the American public with information and psychological operations directed at foreign audiences; and several presidential directives, including Reagan's NSD-77 in 1983, Clinton's PDD-68 in 1999, and Bush's NSPD-16 in July 2002 (the latter two still classified), have set up specific structures to carry out public diplomacy and information operations. These and other documents relating to U.S. PSYOP programs were posted today as part of a new Archive Electronic Breifing Book. ..........
Rumsfeld's Roadmap to Propaganda
The Information Operations Roadmap, a 30 October 2003 document approved personally by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, "provides the Department with a plan to advance the goal of information operations as a core military competency" and "stands as an another example of the Department's commitment to transform our military capabilities to keep pace with emerging threats and to exploit new opportunities afforded by innovation and rapidly developing information technologies." ..... http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB177/info_ops_roadmap.pdf .....
Documents.... in PDF format .... (various).....