A MESSAGE NOT YET SENT 

Using Strategic Communications to Combat 

Weapons of Mass Destruction Threats 

by 

Richard H. Estes 

The Counterproliferation Papers 

Future Warfare Series No. 35 

USAF Counterproliferation Center

Air University 

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama 

A MESSAGE NOT YET SENT 

Using Strategic Communications to Combat 

Weapons of Mass Destruction Threats 

Richard H. Estes 

July 2006 

The Counterproliferation Papers Series was established by the USAF 

Counterproliferation Center to provide information and analysis to assist 

the understanding of the U.S. national security policy-makers and USAF 

officers to help them better prepare to counter the threat from weapons of 

mass destruction. Copies of No. 35 and previous papers in this series are 

available from the USAF Counterproliferation Center, 325 Chennault 

Circle, Maxwell AFB AL 36112-6427. The fax number is (334) 953-

7530; phone (334) 953-7538. 

Counterproliferation Paper No. 35 

USAF Counterproliferation Center

Air University 

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama 36112-6427

The Internet address for the USAF Counterproliferation Center is: 

http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/awc-cps.htm

Contents 

Page 

Disclaimer................................................................................................... ii 

Acknowledgements.................................................................................... iii

About the Author .........................................................................................v

I. Introduction.........................................................................................1 

II. The USAF Counterproliferation Center Project.................................3 

III. Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction .........................................7 

IV. Strategic Communications................................................................15 

V. Why the Bottom Fell Out .................................................................21 

VI. Linking Strategic Communications to Combating WMD................27 

VII. Where to Start at the National Level ................................................39 

VIII. Off and Running: 

The New Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy.................43 

IX. Progress at the Pentagon? .................................................................53 

X. Final Recommendations ...................................................................57 

XI. Conclusion ........................................................................................59 

Notes..........................................................................................................61 
ii 

Disclaimer 

The views expressed in this publication are those of the author and do 

not reflect the official policy or position of the U.S. Government, 

Department of Defense, or the USAF Counterproliferation Center. 
iii 

Acknowledgements 

This project was sponsored and funded by the Directorate of 

Technology Development, Defense Threat Reduction Agency. We at the 

USAF Counterproliferation Center appreciate the continuing support from 

this directorate, one of our original and most generous sponsors. Second, I 

would like to thank the staff at the U.S. Strategic Command, particularly 

Colonel Scott Land, Colonel Sandy Wade, and Major Don Drechsler, who 

provided support for this project, arranged many meetings, and 

participated in workshops. USSTRATCOM, in addition to being a mentor 

for this project, will eventually be a customer of the results. I also would 

like to thank personally the countless number of people that I interviewed 

for this project in 2004 and 2005. Those individuals were more than 

patient as I mined their experience in the field, and most provided 

additional contacts and arranged other meetings for me. 

Many experts participated in three workshops and symposia, offering 

their expertise, and in many cases making presentations. They have my 

thanks and those of the Center. 

Finally, I wish to thank the entire staff of the USAF 

Counterproliferation Center for its support. Dr. Barry Schneider, the 

Director of the Center, has been involved at every stage of this project, has 

made presentations, and has offered countless valuable inputs. Ms. Jo 

Ann Eddy has been instrumental in arranging the finances for the project, 

and participated directly in all of the workshops, journeying to 

Washington for the final symposium to manage all of the administrative 

details. Lt Col (S) Tasha Pravacek also came to Washington to support 

the symposium, providing both expert and administrative support. Dr. 

Jerry Post, an associate member of the Center, attended all of the 

workshops, made multiple presentations, provided valuable contacts, and 

offered substantial encouragement on the subject. The remainder of the 

staff provided support throughout for local symposia and workshops, 

editing and publishing. Thanks to all. 

v 

The Author 

Mr. Richard H. Estes is the Associate Director of the USAF 

Counterproliferation Center and President of Estes Consulting. For more 

than four years, Mr. Estes has focused his efforts for the Center in the 

Washington, DC, and Tidewater areas of Virginia from his office in 

Williamsburg. A command pilot, he retired from the Air Force as a 

colonel in 2000 with over thirty years of wide-ranging service including 

operational, command, and staff assignments at various levels, and in his 

final assignment was the Defense and Air Attaché to the Kingdom of 

Morocco. He also served on the faculty of the Air War College as 

Director of Regional Studies, and Deputy Department Chairman, Joint 

Force Employment. He is a graduate in residence of the Industrial College 

of the Armed Forces and Air Command and Staff College, has a BA from 

NC Methodist College, and holds a Master of Arts in Government and 

Public Administration from the University of South Carolina. 

A Message Not Yet Sent 

Using Strategic Communications to Combat 

Weapons of Mass Destruction Threats 

Richard H. Estes 

I. Introduction 

The invasion and occupation of Iraq was a strong message sent by the 

United States to the world. The message was this: “We can take down 

your country for just about any reason we want to. And if you purport to 

have weapons of mass destruction, that’s a pretty good reason.” How 

effective this message was, we may never know precisely. A big hammer 

always receives some attention, and Libya, a little way down the 

Mediterranean, may have coughed up its WMD programs partially as a 

result of our invasion– although other factors certainly were involved. But 

we may never know which states or organizations decided to drop (or do 

not start) a clandestine program as a result of our actions. 

These actions, by themselves, no doubt, had a good effect in places 

like Libya, but an optimal strategic communications campaign would have 

used both words and actions effectively. A strategic communications 

campaign, while it benefits from a demonstration of the will to back up 

words with force, should be better articulated and needs to be more 

nuanced and repeated over a long-term. Furthermore, many have made 

the case that our invasion of Iraq, along with the virtual collapse of 

international support for the United States prior to the invasion, and some 

questionable actions by U.S. occupiers, have badly tarnished the image of 

the United States abroad – especially in the Arab world. The United 

States turned heads with its message of willingness to use force, but failed 

utterly in communicating the righteousness of the cause. The critical 

element missing was a coherent message – using precise and planned 

words, together with other instruments of influence, to explain to the 
2 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

world why the United States was worthy of being followed – and if not 

followed, at least understood. What was missing was a coherent strategic 

communications campaign for the United States – a campaign that needed 

to be in place long before any invasion. 

There is some evidence that the Bush administration has come to the 

same conclusion. With the appointment of Karen Hughes, a close 

confidant and advisor to the President, to the post of Under Secretary of 

State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs in July of 2005, Mr. Bush 

has tacitly acknowledged that there is some repair work to be done. She 

has assumed her post, made her first trips abroad, and established some 

goals and guidelines for achieving them, but the long-range effect of her 

appointment is yet to be written. However, a serious name filling a 

heretofore vacuum is seen by many as a good first step. 

At the same time, the move to combat weapons of mass destruction is on 

the ascendancy within the administration – to the point that combating WMD 

is arguably the top mission for this government beyond the on-going conflict 

in Iraq. The Department of Homeland Security is at full speed trying to avoid 

a WMD calamity within our borders, and recently established an operating 

Domestic Nuclear Detection Office to team with other agencies within the 

government to look for nuclear weapons. Secretary of Defense Donald 

Rumsfeld designated the United States Strategic Command in Omaha, 

Nebraska, in January 2005 as the combatant command within DoD directly 

responsible for the combating WMD mission. STRATCOM’s commander, 

General James Cartwright, and his staff have been scrambling since early 

2005 to devise a plan of action that would be at once effective, and at the 

same time, palatable to the regional combatant commanders on whose turf 

such a plan would be executed. 

Here, then, are two major sea changes within the administration, 

occurring at approximately the same time – but on parallel rather than 

converging paths. The strategic communications effort is lagging the fight 

to combat WMD, both in developed plans and intensity, but many expect 

the pace to quicken in the communications arena in coming months. As it 

does, any new strategic communications campaign for the United States 

should include thoughtful consideration of employing this little-used tool 

to combat WMD as well. To be effective, such an effort may require 

years, not days or months – and the United States should have started long 

ago. But like investing, the second best time to begin is now. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 3 

II. The USAF Counterproliferation Center Project 

With these changes becoming imperatives for the United States 

government, the USAF Counterproliferation Center has worked under the 

sponsorship of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and the mentorship 

of the United States Strategic Command to develop advocacy for a 

strategic communications campaign to combat weapons of mass 

destruction. 

The project began with a request from the United States European 

Command for assistance in developing a psychological warfare campaign 

to combat weapons of mass destruction in its Area of Responsibility – 

particularly those regions where the United States has little military 

presence. Over a period of several months, members of the Center, on 

USEUCOM’s behalf, engaged in comprehensive research on the tactical, 

operational, and strategic programs in place at all levels. In-person 

interviews were conducted with experts at USEUCOM, U.S. Special 

Operations Command, U.S. Strategic Command, the Joint Staff, Office of 

the Secretary of Defense, the Air Staff, Air University, National Defense 

University, the Joint Special Operations School at Hurlburt AFB, the State 

Department, the National Security Council, the Department of Homeland 

Security, the FBI, the 4th Psychological Warfare Group at Ft. Bragg, 

several think tanks, independent experts, former ambassadors, and 

members of the defense industry. Three symposia were held. The first 

was comprised of members of the Center staff, subject matter experts 

associated with the Center, and other associate members of the Center. 

The second was held at Air University with essentially the same cast as 

the first, but with the addition of faculty and Air War College students 

who had expertise in the field. The last was an assemblage of experts 

from across the entire field, and was held in the Washington, DC, area. 

Over the course of this research, the team from the Center 

encountered a shifting landscape that caused the focus of the project to 

change accordingly. First, USEUCOM, in conjunction with USSOCOM, 

was found to be performing quite adequately at the tactical and operational 

level, but seemed to lack a national or strategic level plan into which their 

efforts could fit. Programs were in place to influence targets at the point 

of contact, but were not backed by a more comprehensive national 
4 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

message. Worse, the United States – to put it simply – had and continues 

to have an image problem in the international community. Magnified 

significantly by the rancor surrounding the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the 

aftermath, attitudes had hardened and U.S. messages at any level were 

finding few persons willing to be persuaded. 

At about the time that the team came to the conclusion that its efforts 

were focused at the wrong level, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld 

assigned the mission of combating weapons of mass destruction to 

USSTRATCOM, and to a certain degree that command picked up the 

mission of strategic communications as well. After consultations with 

USEUCOM – the original customer for the project – and with DTRA, the 

USAF Counterproliferation Center team created a briefing for 

USSTRATCOM and presented it to members of the J5 and J3 staffs in 

March of 2005. This briefing advocated that the focus of the study be 

shifted from regional to global – and from the tactical/operational to the 

strategic level. Furthermore, the team recommended that the mentorship 

of the project be shifted from USEUCOM to USSTRATCOM. Both 

commands and DTRA agreed. 

The United States Air Force Counterproliferation Center believes that 

the strategic communications community both in and out of the 

Department of Defense is in substantial agreement in two areas: (1) until 

now, there has been little national direction or coordination for overall 

U.S. strategic communications to the rest of the world explaining our 

policies and attempting to influence important foreign attitudes, and (2) as 

we correct this glaring shortfall, which the United States seems to be 

gearing up to do, we should include a very carefully considered strategic 

communications campaign for countering the threat of weapons of mass 

destruction. 

The Center has developed findings that were vetted at the final 

symposium in Washington, DC. Specifically we believe: 

1. USSTRATCOM should include in its efforts to combat WMD a 

strong element of strategic communications. 

2. USSTRATCOM should encourage the appointment of a single 

point of contact for strategic communications within the DoD, and 

that person should keep the WMD issue front and center as he 

represents the Department at the national level. Further, the DoD 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 5 

should speak with that one voice at the national level – and if 

necessary encourage the interagency process, particularly 

representatives from the NSC and State Department, to develop 

and maintain a single, coordinated plan into which all facets of 

strategic communications fit. 

3. While this project is being sponsored and run from within DoD, to 

be successful, agencies outside of DoD must be engaged – 

particularly the State Department. Just as those working at the 

tactical and operational level need strategic-level guidance to be 

successful, the DoD cannot develop a strategic communications 

campaign in a vacuum. The entire government from the President 

down must be involved – and must want that campaign to succeed. 

4. No strategic communications campaign will be successful until 

steps are taken first to repair the image of the United States abroad. 

This could be a process requiring many years – perhaps decades – 

and the primary tool for this process must be a greatly enhanced 

public diplomacy effort. This process must have the support of the 

President, must have a working infrastructure, and must be tailored 

by regional experts to fit its intended targets. Karen Hughes 

cannot do this alone; she must establish a process that will outlive 

her tenure at the State Department, and one that reaches beyond 

that department. 

5. As others have noted, policies matter.1

 A bad policy cannot be 

fixed with a good strategic communications plan, nor is putting the 

best spin on an already executed policy good strategic 

communications. Rather, strategic communications should be 

considered as part and parcel of policy formulation at the outset. 

How a policy fits into the message that already exists – or the 

United States wishes to send – should be carefully considered by 

policy makers. 

6. While a strategic communications campaign for combating WMD 

could serve as a template for other facets of a national 

communications plan, a stand-alone campaign for WMD seems 

destined for failure without the support and infrastructure of that 

overarching national campaign. 
6 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

This project is one of problem identification, gap analysis, and 

advocacy. That advocacy already has led indirectly to the inclusion of 

strategic communications as a “strategic enabler” in the National Military 

Strategy for Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction.2

 The 

Counterproliferation Center expects that a follow-on project will be 

approved and funded, and that project will give rise to an actual template 

of a strategic communications plan for combating WMD that can be used 

by policy makers and regional experts. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 7 

III. Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction 

The United States has had a well-developed strategy for combating 

weapons of mass destruction since December of 2002. The National 

Strategy to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction3

 opens with an oftused, but nevertheless on target, quote by President Bush in September of 

that year: 

The gravest danger our Nation faces lies at the crossroads 

of radicalism and technology. Our enemies have openly 

declared that they are seeking weapons of mass destruction, 

and evidence indicates that they are doing so with 

determination. The United States will not allow these 

efforts to succeed....History will judge harshly those who 

saw this coming danger but failed to act. In the new world 

we have entered, the only path to peace and security is the 

path of action.”4

This quote has proven to be a policy driver. Venn diagrams started to 

appear on many PowerPoint slides showing the nexus of terrorism and 

WMD. There. Right there where the two circles intersect is what this 

country needs to worry about. Furthermore, said the briefers and policy 

makers, that hatched area where two calamitous forces intersect could occur 

right here in the United States. There are those out there who are building 

bombs and creating biological weapons and they intend to visit them on the 

United States, its deployed troops, and allies at the earliest opportunity. 

And these people probably could not be dissuaded from doing so. Thus the 

strategy to combat WMD became a clarion call to action. 

This new strategy had, and still has, three pillars: 

Counterproliferation, Nonproliferation, and Consequence Management.5

 

On the day this new strategy hit the street just before Christmas 2002, 

newscasters heralded a major shift in national strategy. Here was a 

strategy with counterproliferation as its centerpiece. Granted, we would 

prefer that states and terrorist organizations not seek WMD in the first 

place, and we would certainly pursue diplomatic and economic measures 

to try to prevent proliferation of WMD as we have in the past; this was the 

nonproliferation aspect of our strategy. But, and this was a big “but,” if 

any rogue player, acting outside of international law and norms, chose to 
8 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

pursue WMD – let alone use such weapons – despite our best 

nonproliferation efforts to the contrary, we as a last resort were prepared 

to bring force to bear to take out any illegal weapons. This 

counterproliferation element of the new strategy was for the first time 

nonproliferation with teeth in it. Four months later the United States bared 

those teeth and invaded Iraq. 

The third pillar, consequence management, was separated from the 

other two as a method of emphasizing that a WMD event on U.S. soil or 

elsewhere would have unimaginable consequences – and that every 

preparation should be made to be prepared to deal with such an attack and 

its aftermath. This, in effect, gave recovery almost equal priority to 

stopping the attack in the first place. 

Unfortunately, nowhere in this strategy does the administration 

mention that a good strategic communications campaign could be useful in 

this endeavor. 

Several methods of describing this continuum date back to Secretary 

of Defense Perry’s Eight D’s in 19956 and all are in some ways similar. In 

fact, although numerous organizations, including our own, have outlined 

various ways to view combating WMD, the commonality among these has 

been remarkable. Each has included a nonproliferation set of mission 

areas and a counterproliferation group. 

Nonproliferation is the use of the full range of political, economic, 

and negotiating tools to prevent WMD proliferation to additional states or 

groups of concern, or to reverse it diplomatically once it occurs 

(rollback).7 The idea here is to keep countries and non-state actors from 

obtaining WMD in the first place. A strategic communications campaign 

would fit nicely within our nonproliferation efforts. 

Counterproliferation, on the other hand, refers to the activities of the 

Department of Defense where it has the lead such as deterrence, offensive 

operations, active defense and consequence management.8

 While having a 

good counterproliferation capability is quite useful in deterring an 

adversary, this same capability is tailored to take out the WMD of an 

adversary if called upon to do so – and to defend against it if necessary. 

Again, this is the centerpiece of the current national strategy to combat 

WMD: to have not only the capability to enforce compliance, but to 

actually use military measures to protect U.S. forces and allies if 

necessary. But this capability, without strategic communications, is 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 9 

essentially “carrying a big stick” without the “speaking softly” element. 

Some would modify “speaking softly” to “speaking clearly and 

persuasively.” 

A look at the continuum that the USAF Counterproliferation Center 

used previously takes us smoothly through the process as it existed until 

recently: 

Figure 1. Countering the NBC Threats 

Although there is some overlap, the first three mission areas in Figure 

1, arms control through diplomacy, are generally considered to comprise 

nonproliferation, while the last five, deterrence through consequence 
10 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

management, make up the counterproliferation elements of the 

continuum. This sequence manifests the principle that the more weapons 

prevented from being in adversary hands through nonproliferation efforts, 

the fewer that will need to be dealt with using counterproliferation 

capabilities. 

Eight New Mission Areas from the Joint Staff 

Countering WMD always has appeared to have some urgency 

attached to its pursuit. Previous quadrennial defense reviews have 

acknowledged the threat from WMD, but have failed to describe 

combating WMD as a primary mission area. Similarly, former Air Force 

Chief of Staff, John Jumper, produced the “USAF Transformation Flight 

Plan” in response to QDR 2001 in which the Air Force revolves around 

six core competencies (air and space superiority, information security, 

global attack, precision engagement, rapid global mobility, and agile 

combat support) during his tenure.9

 But again, there was no separate 

combating WMD core competency, yet combating WMD affects all six, 

and in turn is affected by these six capabilities. When this sort of 

ownerless, broad-brush treatment occurs, the lack of focused advocacy 

results in spotty funding. 

OSD and the Joint Staff are now correcting this shortfall. In 2005, the 

Unified Command Plan was modified to designate the Commander of U.S. 

Strategic Command as the combatant commander for integrating and 

synchronizing efforts to combat WMD – the first ever single focal point 

for that mission. In assigning the combating WMD as a primary mission 

to the United States Strategic Command, the Secretary of Defense tasked 

the command to pursue results in eight mission areas:10

• Security Cooperation and Partner Activities 

• Threat Reduction Cooperation 

• Offensive Operations (Preemptive & Reactive) 

• WMD Elimination 

• WMD Interdiction 

• Active Defense 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 11 

• Passive Defense 

• Consequence Management 

These mission areas are further reflected in the accompanying chart, 

Figure 2.11

Figure 2. U.S. Strategy to Combat WMD Proliferation 

As the military bounds these eight mission areas into the National 

Military Strategy to Combat WMD as a vehicle to implement the National 

Strategy to Combat WMD, initial emphasis will be on interdiction and 

elimination – in large part because the United States sees two significant 

threats to its security with regards to WMD. 

First, WMD in the hands of terrorists are likely to be used. Many 

experts believe that they are not deterable since many terrorist 

U.S. Strategy to Combat WMD Proliferation

Enemy capable of WMD use / subsequent use Enemy uses WMD

Defeat, Deter Defend, Respond, Recover

Prevent, Dissuade, Deny Reduce, Destroy, Reverse

Potential adversaries or others attempt to 

possess or proliferate

Others agree to destroy or secure 

current WMD

•Partner Capacity

•Intelligence

•Strategic Communication

3⁄4Passive Defense

3⁄4Active Defense

3⁄4WMD Consequence Management

3⁄4Offensive Operations

3⁄4WMD Elimination

3⁄4Active Defense

3⁄4Passive Defense

3⁄4WMD Interdiction

3⁄4Offensive Operations

3⁄4WMD Interdiction

3⁄4Security Cooperation & Partner Activities

3⁄4Threat Reduction Cooperation

Mission: Dissuade, deter, defend against & defeat those who seek to harm the U.S., its allies and partners 

through WMD use or threat of use, and, if attacked, mitigate the effects and restore deterrence.
12 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

organizations such as Al Qaeda have no known return addresses against 

which to retaliate. Therefore the primary means to avert such a disaster is 

to interdict any weapons that are being moved by or to terrorists and to 

keep these weapons out of their hands, and prudence would dictate that 

posture regardless of one’s beliefs on the likelihood of employment. 

However, organizations could, if acting rationally, have one or more 

reasons not to employ WMD even if such weapons were in their 

possession. First a chemical attack might not be spectacular – normally a 

goal of organizations such as Al Qaeda. For similar reasons, some 

biological attacks might seem more like a flu epidemic than a terrorist 

attack. Finally the detonation of a nuclear weapon could be perceived so 

horrible as to be damaging to the terrorist’s cause – or the weapon could 

be deemed too valuable as a tool of blackmail to be expended. Still, one 

would not want to bet on such rational behavior, and interdiction is 

therefore critical.12

Second, non-conforming states such as North Korea and Iran 

apparently possess or are developing WMD. And while these states and 

others have not been proven conclusively to be undeterable, we must 

proceed on the assumption that at some point we and our allies may need 

to deal with existing weapons – either in combat, or in a difficult 

environment. Finding and eliminating these adversary weapons should 

therefore be a top priority. We are rightly preparing now for this 

possibility. 

QDR 2006 

Indicating even more emphasis on the combating WMD mission, in the 

Quadrennial Defense Review Report for 2006, senior leaders identified 

preventing hostile states and non-state actors from acquiring or using WMD 

as one of four priority areas for examination during the review process.13 

Further, combating WMD is now a major mission area – unlike in previous 

reviews. The vision for this mission area: 

The future force will be organized, trained, equipped, and 

resourced to deal with all aspects of the threat posed by 

weapons of mass destruction... The Department will be 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 13 

prepared to respond to and help other agencies to mitigate 

the consequences of WMD attacks.14

The 2006 QDR identified the need for the following capabilities: 

• Special operations forces to locate, characterize, and secure WMD. 

• Capabilities to locate, tag, and track WMD, their delivery systems 

and related materials, including the means to move such items. 

• Capabilities to detect fissile materials such as nuclear devices at 

stand-off ranges. 

• Interdiction capabilities to stop air, maritime, and ground 

shipments of WMD, their delivery systems and related materials. 

• Persistent surveillance over wide areas to locate WMD capabilities 

or hostile forces.

• Human intelligence, language skills, and cultural awareness to 

understand better the intentions and motivations of potential 

adversaries and to speed recovery efforts.

• Capabilities and specialized teams to render safe and secure WMD.

• Non-lethal weapons to secure WMD sites so that materials cannot 

be removed. 

• Joint command and control tailored for the WMD elimination 

mission. 

• The capability to deploy, sustain, protect, support, and re-deploy 

special operations forces in hostile environments. 

• The capability to shield critical and vulnerable systems and 

technologies from the catastrophic effects of EMP.15

DoD’s initial look at this redefined mission area has great merit, and 

to the extent the new emphasis moves the United States beyond the purely 

force protection mode and into the business of stopping these weapons in 

the first place, is exactly on target. But beyond the clearly undeterables, 

there are others that can be influenced. Allies can be encouraged not to 

use WMD, others can be encouraged to roll their programs back, still 

others can be encouraged and assisted to provide better security for the 
14 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

weapons and material they already possess, and all can be encouraged not 

to harbor, or otherwise aid terrorists as they seek WMD. What then is 

called for? 

What is needed is something beyond the eight proposed missions 

areas and the recommendations of the QDR, because – like the National 

Strategy to Combat WMD – strategic communications is not included in 

the primary line-up. However, in a recent development, the Joint Staff has 

included “Strategic Communication Support” as a strategic enabler16 to 

the eight primary mission areas, indicating an increase in the commitment 

to providing such support. The following words in the current draft are 

precisely on point: 

Strategic communications shape perceptions at the global, 

regional, and national levels. U.S. words and actions 

reassure allies and partners and underscore, to potential 

adversaries, the costs and risks associated with WMD 

acquisition and use.17

With these words, the Joint Staff is stepping out in front in a 

campaign to use strategic communications to combat WMD. The 2006 

QDR also gives a slight nod to strategic communications, but not in the 

context of combating WMD. Significant work remains to be done. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 15 

IV. Strategic Communications 

Obviously adversaries, allies, and neutrals look at both actions and 

words to try to understand how the United States may act and what its 

intentions are. When words and deeds are congruent, U.S. policy has its 

most influential impact. But it should be understood that military action is 

not what is called strategic communications. What are the components of 

such a program? There are three generally accepted subsets of strategic 

communications: information operations, public affairs, and public 

diplomacy. A strategic communications campaign should weave these 

three elements together in a coordinated effort to advance U.S. interests 

and policies in concert with other political, economic, information, and 

military actions.18 Each of the three subsets can be divided further as 

shown in the accompanying table. 

Information Operations Public Affairs Public Diplomacy 

Operational Security Counsel to leadership Information 

Military Deception Public trust and support Engagement19

Psychological Operations Morale and readiness Influence 

Electronic Warfare Global influence and deterrence 

Figure 3. Subsets of Strategic Communications 

A fourth subset, International Broadcasting Services, is sometimes 

listed separately, but it fits quite conveniently under public diplomacy as 

well. International broadcasting services in this context are funded by 

governments to transmit news, information, public affairs programming, 

and entertainment to a global audience using satellite television, 

AM/FM/shortwave radio, and web-based systems. Radio Free Europe and 

Radio Liberty, Radio/TV Marti, Radio Sawi, and Radio Al Hurra are 

examples of these services.20

The United States actually is fairly accomplished in Information 

Operations and Public Affairs at the tactical and operational level; 

established programs in both areas are in place to support military 

commanders and civilian leaders. But these programs suffer from a lack 

of solid underpinnings that a coherent national-level message would 
16 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

provide. The third element, Public Diplomacy, could provide that 

foundation, at least partially, if properly coordinated. It is in the public 

diplomacy area where the United States has expended very little effort or 

money, and it is in this arena where much more can be accomplished with 

a properly focused and supported campaign. This holds true whether one 

wishes to repair the image of the United States abroad to the point that 

positive messages can again be sent out, or if the objective is a targeted 

campaign to combat WMD. 

Public Diplomacy 

Two significant studies have been published recently among many 

others that confirm what many have suspected for quite some time: The 

image of the United States abroad is in such disrepair that it is almost 

impossible to project positive messages to listening ears until that image is 

mended. That is not to say that U.S. foreign policy absolutely must be 

changed to effect perceptions of the United States and its policies. But 

any policy that we do choose to pursue must be plausible, easily defended 

and explained – and consideration must be applied to its effect on world 

opinion and support. A strategic communications campaign must be built 

along with the policy or policies, and if the administration finds such 

construction difficult, perhaps the policy itself requires reexamination. A 

quick look at the two defining reports follows. Both point to a strong dose 

of public diplomacy as one of the fixes. 

The Defense Science Board Report on Strategic Communications. 

“Strategic communications is a vital component of U.S. national security. 

It is in crisis, and it must be transformed with a strength of purpose that 

matches our commitment to diplomacy, defense, intelligence, law 

enforcement, and homeland security. Presidential leadership and the 

bipartisan political will of Congress are essential. Collaboration between 

government and the private sector on an unprecedented scale is 

imperative. To succeed, we must understand the United States is engaged 

in a generational and global struggle about ideas, not a war between the 

West and Islam.”21

This study, completed in September of 2004, was led by Dr. Vincent 

Vitto, Chairman and CEO of the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory and 

member of the Defense Science Board, and received wide distribution, 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 17

carrying considerable weight (if not action) in and outside of the 

department. 

Aside from concluding that our strategic communications apparatus is 

broken, the DSB study was significant for pointing out that we need an 

entirely different way of communicating, and that in the Arab and Muslim 

world, such a communication channel for the most part does not exist. 

Furthermore, at least in the Arab and Muslim world, there are precious 

few people even susceptible to listening to our approaches – if we 

possessed that communications channel in the first place. But additional 

analysis shows that the man on the street at the time of the report was 

opposed to many of our policies toward their world, not so much to our 

values. We have room to work here, particularly if we leverage the 

private sector. And, in some cases, we may want to recast some of our 

existing policies that rub so many the wrong way. 

Changing Minds Winning Peace – the Djerejian Report. “Today, 

the public diplomacy challenge is less about being the source of reliable 

news and information and more about engaging listeners awash in 

misinformation, culture-clashing, and growing anti-Americanism.”22 This 

alarming statement is from an excellent study, Changing Minds Winning 

Peace: A New Strategic Direction for U.S. Public Diplomacy in the Arab 

and Muslim World, commissioned by the House Appropriations 

Committee in 2003 – members of which were concerned that the 

apparatus of U.S. public diplomacy was inadequate, especially in the Arab 

and Muslim world. The committee directed the State Department to form 

an advisory group which would recommend new approaches, initiatives, 

and program models to improve public diplomacy. 

Former ambassador to Syria and Assistant Secretary of State for Near 

East Affairs, Edward P. Djerejian, was appointed to chair this advisory 

group. As Director of the Institute for Public Policy at Rice University, 

Ambassador Djerejian was able to assemble a quite distinguished group of 

diplomats, journalists, academics, economists, and John Zogby, the 

pollster, who together visited Egypt, Syria, Senegal, Morocco, the United 

Kingdom, Turkey, and France. In addition, the group consulted sources in 

Indonesia and Pakistan via video conference. 

This group focused exclusively on the Arab and Muslim world, and 

did not consider weapons of mass destruction as a subject for public 
18 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent 

diplomacy, but the results are nevertheless instructive on the larger 

problem of a national message. Among the findings: 

• “The United States today lacks the capabilities in public diplomacy 

to meet the national security threat emanating from political 

instability, economic deprivation, and extremism, especially in the 

Arab and Muslim world.” 

• “If you do not define yourself in this part of the world, the 

extremists will define you.” (from a Moroccan official) 

• “By a greater than 2-1 margin, Muslims surveyed in Saudi Arabia, 

Qatar, and Jordan said that the United States was a more serious 

threat than Iraq.” 

• “The bottom has indeed fallen out of support for the United 

States.”23

Later, we’ll examine a few of the suggested fixes from both of these 

studies. 

A Significant Third Report. While not aimed specifically at public 

diplomacy, a third report has implications from a galaxy of experts that 

cannot be ignored when assembling a strategic communications campaign. 

Focused on the Arab world, From Conflict to Cooperation: Writing a 

New Chapter in U.S.-Arab Relations,

24 was developed by the Center for 

Strategic and International Studies, and headed by William Cohen, former 

Secretary of Defense, and now head of the Cohen Group. The project 

chair was Edward Gabriel, former Ambassador to the Kingdom of 

Morocco. Among the findings: 

• Getting Iraq right is a necessary but not sufficient step in 

rebuilding credibility in the Arab world. The committee saw very 

little hope that Iraq could ever become an inspiration to the Arab 

world. 

• U.S. policies must be backed by consistent principles. Again, 

policies matter, and linking them with a message reflecting our 

principles is critical. 

• Anti-Americanism has sky-rocketed since 2002, and these attitudes 

are related more to U.S. policies than values. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 19 

• Arab majorities want help with improving quality of life – not 

necessarily political reforms. 

• Arabs receive most information from the Arab media, but also are 

eager to visit the United States. Most Arabs with this direct 

exposure have more favorable impressions of America and its 

values. 

• Any approach to the Arab world must focus on its people as well 

as the governments, and there is little future in investing time and 

effort in countries and people that are not at least somewhat 

receptive to U.S. overtures.25

• The committee was impressed with the avenues of communication 

open to improve U.S.-Arab relations. Because of technology and 

travel, Arab citizens are able to think and interact beyond their 

borders. 

A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 21 

V. Why the Bottom Fell Out 

Not Just a Recent Problem. Using dozens of interviews with 

communications professionals over the past year, and drawing on some 

personal diplomatic experience abroad within the past few years, one can 

easily discern how the United States finds itself in this predicament. And 

the difficulties do not begin with the present Bush administration, the 

September 11, 2001, attacks or the United States’ invasion of Iraq. 

Rather, they can be traced to the end of the Cold War and the supposed 

“end of history” that would lead to liberal democracy everywhere.26 This 

collective and premature sigh of relief led to increasingly isolationist 

sentiment throughout the 1990s. The election of the quite conservative 

Congressional Class of 1994 led by Newt Gingrich exacerbated this mood, 

and that group and subsequent Congresses threw every impediment 

possible in the way of increased diplomatic involvement abroad. The 

Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 1995 to 2001, 

Jesse Helms, Republican from North Carolina, contributed mightily to 

isolationist policies, using his committee to only minimally fund State 

Department operations and foreign aid – to the point that any “nice to do” 

programs fell by the wayside. Then Secretary of State Madeleine Albright 

was heard to voice her frustrations in a small gathering saying, “I can 

make only so many trips to North Carolina” (to engage the Chairman on 

these issues). 

A further casualty of the era was the United States Information 

Agency (USIA), which was incorporated into the State Department proper 

in 1999. For nearly fifty years, USIA explained policies in ways crafted to 

promote better and more widespread appreciation of why we do what we 

do. This program was a priority of every president through George H.W. 

Bush. The agency trained foreign service nationals who would represent 

the United States’ policies in the host country’s language, and along the 

way opened libraries and study centers at which local citizens could find 

newspapers, books, and magazines representing American culture and 

politics.27 When USIA was absorbed into the State Department, USIA 

officers lost a good bit of their autonomy and separate funding. And when 

the underfunded larger department was flying on fumes rather than a full 

tank of fuel, those libraries, reading corners, formal speaking programs, 
22 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

cultural programs, and other outreach endeavors were the first things 

jettisoned. 

My experience at the United States Embassy in Rabat, Morocco, in 

the late 1990s is a case in point. Although admittedly not a post 

absolutely crucial to U.S. foreign policy on its face, Morocco was 

emblematic of diplomacy that suffered from lack of funding and direction. 

Here was a country that had been an ally during the Cold War, and was 

indeed a proxy for us in North Africa against a Soviet-supplied Algeria. 

Further, it was a country that was a full-fledged player in the Arab and 

Muslim arena that could have been encouraged to come along with the 

United States, if not on all policies, at least on many of them. Morocco 

was an Islamic country whose government was adamantly against militant 

Islam – but was a bit more heavy-handed about keeping the movement 

under control than the United States would have been under similar 

circumstances. Morocco was a moderate Islamic country that, while it did 

not allow proselytizing for other religions, had a thriving Jewish 

community, and allowed churches of other denominations to function. 

The Moroccans had a spotty record on human rights, but were four-square 

against weapons of mass destruction. In fact, when it was rumored that 

Algeria may be storing WMD for Saddam Hussein in the late nineties, the 

Moroccan government became much more interested (or at least less 

adverse) to U.S. opposition to the Baathist regime in Iraq. And since 

1999, Morocco has had a king, who, while still a monarch in every sense, 

has allowed more and more vestiges of democracy, and has eased 

repression as his reign progresses. 

This was an Arab Islamist state that was susceptible to a carefully 

crafted influence program aimed at its government and people – a country 

on which a strategic communications campaign almost certainly would 

have had some effect. 

Instead, the United States supplied virtually no military aid and there 

was no formal speakers program. No American cultural programs were 

brought into the country, and the U.S. Information Service, now part of the 

State Department, closed its very popular Dar America (American Home) 

library and research center. This vacuum was happily filled by the French, 

Spanish, Chinese, and others who targeted Morocco with many of the 

tools of diplomacy that the United States had failed to fund. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 23 

This is not to say that the United States did nothing. At the time, the 

very activist U.S. ambassador almost single-handedly created a speaking 

and influence program of his own – but with little support or central 

guidance from Washington. And there certainly was no coordinated 

communications message that was supplied to him to help him show how 

Morocco fit into the plans for United States foreign policy writ large. The 

U.S. Navy occasionally sent warships into Casablanca, and forums were 

held for journalists. The ambassador firmly resisted building a new 

“crusader castle” embassy at the edge of town, opting for the accessibility 

of the down-town embassy with beefed-up security over the absolute 

security of a new embassy. But there were still relatively few programs 

available to get the American story out. The Moroccans watched the 

United States bomb and later invade Iraq and Afghanistan with the benefit 

of few, if any, formal attempts to present a favorable side of those actions, 

or a favorable side of the United States itself. 

Today, while the Moroccan government still looks for ways to 

cooperate with the United States, acting against terrorism where it can and 

attempting to hold the line against militant Islam, 88% of Moroccans view 

the United States and its policies with disfavor,28 and a disproportionate 

number of arrested or suspected terrorists had their origins in Morocco. 

While it is difficult to find a direct cause and effect relationship between 

an outreach vacuum by the United States and the attitudes of Moroccans 

on the street, one can’t help but think a coordinated effort on the part of 

the United States would have paid dividends. And it is clear that militant 

Islamists do have a coordinated effort, actively recruiting nascent terrorists 

from bidonvilles, the shanty towns in the large cities such as Casablanca. 

The message to these disaffected was, “Come with us, fight the infidels. 

We’ll provide for you and your families both spiritually and physically.” 

They did and they did, and smoking ruins in Casablanca and Spain are the 

legacy. 

The War on Terrorism, September 11, 2001, and the Bush 

Administration. The world has changed extremely fast, faster than most 

of us anticipated. And we made some of those changes ourselves. As we 

coasted through the post Cold War world of the 1990s, stock market on 

the rise, crime on the decline, an easy war fought with Iraq in 1991 with 

international support, and no Soviet Union to worry about after 1991, we 

became a bit complacent. What we did not see as we won that war with 
24 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

Saddam Hussein and were victorious in the Cold War, a new conflict was 

beginning that we did not anticipate, what James Woolsey had termed the 

“Long War of the 21st Century” – the war between Islamic extremists and 

the West. We didn’t quite see the warning signs accumulating: the 

debacle in Mogadishu, the first attempt on the World Trade Center in 

1993, the embassy bombings in 1998, and other lesser events. 

While we used our extraordinary capabilities to intervene 

internationally without too much trouble on an ad hoc basis (Bosnia for 

example), we saw little reason for overseas involvement – or for the 

creation of a strategic communications strategy that would serve us in this 

new world. Some saw our view as saying, “We have all the marbles; let 

the other guys figure out how to coexist with us.” A bit of hyperbole to be 

sure – the United States has always accomplished numerous good deeds 

around the world – but the basic point is valid. We did not see anything or 

anybody on the horizon that we couldn’t handle, nor did we fully sense the 

building resentment of our monolithic wealth and power. 

Then came September 11, 2001. The surprise attacks brought with 

them the sympathy of the world – including that of a significant portion of 

Arabs and Muslims. We rightly chose a path of strength and resolve, our 

message being “Either you are with us, or you are against us.” We 

garnered widespread support for our take-down of Afghanistan and the 

pursuit of Osama bin Laden. But then the international relations 

nightmare began – a nightmare that continues into 2006, and one that 

requires this new strategic communications campaign to help shift world 

opinion in our favor once again. More than world opinion, we need those 

outside our borders to believe in us. 

As far as much of the world was concerned, the United States took a 

wrong turn in 2002 as we shifted our attention from Afghanistan to Iraq. 

There was a prevailing belief among our allies and others that Saddam had 

weapons of mass destruction at some time in the past and probably still 

had at least chemical and biological weapons – if not a fully functioning 

nuclear weapons program. There was, however, significantly less 

agreement on Iraq’s ties to Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. Furthermore, 

as the United States marched toward the invasion of March 2003, the 

international community, including the United Nations, saw the U.S. 

process as inexorable – with proof of WMD and involvement with the 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 25 

terrorists’ network being fitted to the planned action rather than the other 

way round. This started the nightmare. 

The quick large unit force-on-force victory over the Saddam’s armed 

forces militated in our favor, but the protracted aftermath, both the 

“untidiness” as Secretary Rumsfeld called the chaos following the 

invasion, and the continuing resistance from hardliners, has given 

opponents of the U.S. action reason to say “I told you so.” The treatment 

of prisoners at the Abu Graihb prison and the facility at Guantanemo only 

has added public protest – both domestic and international. Arab and 

Muslim adversaries have taken full advantage of these developments and 

have staged a relentless strategic communications campaign of their own. 

Between 2002 and 2004, a clear decline in favorable impressions of the 

United States (of policies certainly – but values as well) has taken place 

throughout the Muslim world. And this decline is not just among radicals 

who already were predisposed to dislike us. This decline includes 

moderates – the ones that we should be reaching.29 The nightmare has 

continued to deepen. 

Even with this deepening state of international dissatisfaction with the 

United States, it remains the world’s greatest democracy and it 

accomplishes some wonderful things around the world. Not only that, our 

actions in the war against terrorism are undoubtedly making the world a 

safer place. But the perception is that the United States has abandoned the 

U.S. Constitution, the Geneva Convention accords, and the United Nations 

as it relentlessly pursues its enemies as it sees them. And like it or not, 

this perception exists and will remain until we develop a better way to 

explain why we do what we do. 

There is no question that a well-conceived strategic communications 

campaign would help in this regard, but we should not be so naïve as to 

believe that even a perfect campaign would accomplish our goals abroad. 

As the Defense Science Board pointed out, policies matter and cannot be 

separated from communications. At the same time though, we should not 

be surprised at reactions to our policies. A policy should be 

communicated in a way that allows intelligent people to make up their 

own minds as to the efficacy of the policy.30 Finally, the best U.S. 

strategic communications program will be divorced from claiming too 

much, from sounding like the U.S. leadership has a corner on intelligence 

or virtue. U.S. policy and the explanations given for it must evidence, as 
26 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent 

Thomas Jefferson once advocated, “a decent respect for the opinions of 

mankind.” Claiming too much rectitude, too much moral superiority, and 

too much certainty about the absolute correctness of the American cause 

does not persuade the part of the world that is already suspicious of U.S. 

motives and fearful of U.S. power. Such an arrogant attitude just confirms 

their previous negative biases. Senator J. William Fulbright, then the 

Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said it best in 1966, 

words still fresh almost forty years later: 

The attitude above all others which I feel sure is no longer 

valid is the arrogance of power, the tendency of great 

nations to equate power with virtue and major 

responsibilities with a universal mission. The dilemmas 

involved are preeminently American dilemmas, not because 

America has weaknesses that others do not have but 

because America is powerful as no nation has ever been 

before and the discrepancy between its power and the 

power of others appears to be increasing....If America has 

a service to perform in the world, and I believe it has, it is 

in large part the service of its own example. In our 

excessive involvement in the affairs of other countries, we 

are not only living off our assets and denying our own 

people the proper enjoyment of their resources; we are also 

denying the world the example of a free society enjoying its 

freedom to the fullest. This is regrettable indeed for a 

nation that aspires to teach democracy to other nations...31

Intelligent people can differ over the degree to which the United 

States should be involved overseas. But it is difficult to find fault with a 

strategic communications campaign and accompanying policies that 

correct misperceptions and lessen the perception of American arrogance as 

we do involve ourselves in the affairs of the world. We don’t require that 

the world loves us or our policies – which necessarily may be hard-hitting. 

What we require is that the world understands our policies and that we 

mean well. Such an understanding would translate to an amelioration of 

world views of American values – a basis of confidence on which a 

further positive message campaign can be built. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 27

VI. Linking Strategic Communications to 

Combating WMD 

Clearly the United States suffers from an image problem in the 

international community. Correcting that image should be top priority – in 

order that other, more specific, messages can be heard. One of these more 

specific messages, and one that should not be far from the top of the list, is 

a concentrated effort to convince the world that weapons of mass 

destruction pose the greatest threat to mankind, and keeping those 

weapons out of irresponsible hands should be uppermost in the minds of 

leaders worldwide, and should be central to security policy everywhere. 

How one would put such a campaign together varies according to who is 

doing the planning. But the experts brought together by the USAF 

Counterproliferation Center all agree on one thing: There should be such 

a campaign. The following are thoughts on the process. 

Assure, Dissuade, Deter, Defeat. These four defense policy goals 

were articulated in the Quadrennial Defense Review in 2001, and much of 

DoD planning has been based on those words – including the 2005 

National Defense Strategy. This continuum is part of any logical security 

policy planning process, not just military – and indeed is used in the 

language of the National Strategy to Combat WMD. All of the elements 

of strategic communications should be used vigorously to some degree as 

U.S. policy makers navigate the peacetime actions of assuring, dissuading, 

and deterring. But communications take on a distinctly operational and 

tactical bent as changing circumstances cause us to go into combat to 

defeat the enemy with our military forces. Therefore, any strategic

communications campaign to combat WMD would necessarily tend to 

concentrate on the three peacetime activities. 

ASSURE DISSUADE DETER DEFEAT

Strategic Tactical

PEACE WAR

Figure 4. Defense Policy Goals 
28 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

Of the three elements, the term that seems most useful is “dissuade” – 

particularly when using strategic communications to prevent the acquisition, 

development, trade in, supplying of WMD, or assistance to adversaries who 

seek or possess such weapons: What words do we use to persuade potential 

enemies to stay out of the WMD business entirely? Dissuasion, of course, 

is more all-encompassing than just a communications strategy or words. 

For example, a program of developing preemptive capabilities or building 

defenses, being poised to physically remove a WMD capability, and being 

prepared to respond to an attack (“resiliency” as Dr. Paul Bernstein of SAIC 

phrases it), also are methods of dissuading a potential adversary from taking 

an action – as is an acquisition program so technologically superior as to 

persuade the adversary that any WMD acquisition program of its own 

would be futile and perhaps dangerous. An effective strategic 

communications campaign could be a tool to aid in these efforts – but it 

could be a stand-alone endeavor as well. 

Colonel Chuck Lutes of the National Defense University interprets 

the National Security Strategy to imply that dissuasion would be most 

effective in preventing acquisition of WMD programs and that deterrence, 

through the threat of retaliation or denial of results if used, would be most 

effective in preventing use of weapons already acquired.32 Strategic 

communications would seem to have a role in both. And we should not 

fail to mention the efficacy of using strategic communications to assure

allies and others that our intentions are pure and our actions will not be 

harmful to their interests as we pursue our security policy. Lutes also 

makes the point that dissuasion becomes increasingly more difficult as 

targeted audiences become less friendly and more irrational, a useful 

formulation when considering a strategic communications campaign.33

Intention Active Acquisition Possession Use

Assure Dissuade Deter Defeat

Figure 5. 

Narrowing the Scope. A working hypothesis then, would be that a 

strategic communications campaign to combat weapons of mass destruction 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 29 

should be focused initially where it has the best opportunity for success. 

While, attempting to win the hearts and minds of those who would do us 

harm is a tempting objective, we may be better off rebuilding bridges to our 

allies and to neutrals, bringing along other rational international audiences 

that could be allies in the future, and using them to help make inroads 

against rogue states. A persuasive campaign that directly targets those in 

the shadowy underworld of arms merchants, criminals, and terrorists, seems 

doomed to failure until these people and organizations are more isolated in 

the world. Far better to use strategic communications to help isolate them 

than to target them for conversion directly. So first, let’s get the help of our 

friends – and make more of them while we are at it. 

The second part of the hypothesis is that dissuading rational states from 

acquiring WMD programs in the first place is easier than causing programs 

to be rolled back or dismantled. Much more difficult still is dissuading a 

terrorist organization or rogue state from pursuing a WMD capability. A 

well-structured campaign would explain why our policies (and those of our 

trusted allies) would make us good risks to possess some weapons, and why 

it would not be to the advantage of other states to acquire their own WMD 

instead. As Dr. Brad Roberts of the Institute for Defense Analyses points 

out, the 2001 Quadrennial Defense Review laid this out quite nicely: 

Assure Allies and Friends Deter Aggressors 

• Credible non-nuclear and nuclear 

response options support U.S. 

commitments 

• Defenses protect security partners 

and power projection forces 

• Second-to-none nuclear capability 

assures allies and public 

• Nuclear and non-nuclear options 

provide a tailored deterrent 

• Defenses discourage attack by 

frustrating adversary’s attack plans 

• Infrastructure improves U.S. 

capabilities to counter emerging 

threats 

Dissuade Competitors Defeat Enemies 

• Diverse portfolio of capabilities 

denies payoff from competition 

• Non-nuclear strike favors U.S. 

• Infrastructure promises U.S. 

competitive edge 

• Strike systems can neutralize a 

range of enemy targets 

• Defenses will provide protection if 

deterrence fails 

Figure 6. QDR: Defense Policy Goals 
30 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

Dr. Roberts advocates a tough strategic communications policy with 

potential adversaries, emphasizing the consequences of possession and 

bad behavior. This would take place against the backdrop of the 

reassurance of our allies and friends that the United States is there for 

them in this war against weapons of mass destruction – while 

demonstrating responsible stewardship of the stockpile the United States 

possesses. This last requires the maintenance of absolute credibility by 

America, and the avoidance of “mirror imaging” – projecting our own 

strategic culture onto those we wish to influence – requiring regional 

experts to assist in crafting any strategic communications campaign. All 

of this encompasses the full range of assurance, dissuasion, and deterrence 

objectives, and is more than just a complement to policy; strategic 

communications is an essential means to desired ends. 

Dr. Barry Schneider, Director of the USAF Counterproliferation 

Center, applies assure, dissuade, deter, and defeat to the more specific task 

of combating WMD, particularly as it applies to Jihadists. (See Figure 7.) 

But, what about our allies, and near allies, that possess nuclear 

weapons who might be tempted to use them in a regional conflict not 

involving us? How does our strategic communications campaign work the 

next time India and Pakistan decide to lock and load their nuclear weapons 

and aim them at one another? How do we keep Israel’s finger off of the 

nuclear trigger if its existence is threatened by a neighboring Arab state? In 

both of these cases, we would seem to be in the dissuasion business rather 

than that of deterrence. These countries would not likely deem it credible 

that the United States or an ally would attack India, Pakistan, or Israel to 

prevent a nuclear war on the subcontinent or in the Middle East. Neither 

would retaliation by us make sense in the case of a nuclear weapon use by 

one of them. Instead the United States is left with other tools like economic 

and political carrots and sticks to try to persuade these states to do the right 

thing. One tool that currently is missing is a strategic communications 

program to educate the elites and populations on the advantages of WMD 

nonproliferation and non-use, and the acute disadvantages of an opposite 

policy. The United States has, of course, leaned on these countries in the 

heat of crises past – and has been successful. But also to do the work ahead 

of time through strategic communications is eminently sensible. Still, this 

part of the campaign breaks the mold somewhat – using dissuasion to 

prevent use by potential actors, be they adversaries, allies, or neutrals. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 31 

 

 

Figure 7. Preventing the Spread of WMD to Jihadists 

Preventing the Spread of 

WMD to Jihadists

• Promoting virtues of democracy, globalization, 

and civil liberties. 

• Showing U.S. identification with the values of 

our friends. 

• Strengthening allied states – but not 

dictatorships. 

• Promoting virtues of nonproliferation and 

counterproliferation to allied governments with 

emphasis on cooperation on specific activities 

such as the Cooperative Defense Initiative in 

the Middle East, and the worldwide 

Proliferation Security Initiative. 

• Trumpeting the advantages of roll-back of 

WMD arsenals, using the following countries as 

examples: 

o Libya 

o South Africa 

o Ukraine 

o Kazakhstan 

o Belarus 

• Separating Jihadists from the rest of Islam. 

• Promoting the denial of safe havens to 

Jihadists. 

• Using strategic communications to undercut 

Jihadist capabilities: 

o Recruitment of new members 

o Retention of present members 

o Cohesion of groups 

o Financial support to groups 

o Appeal and reputation of terrorists 

o Community support for groups 

• Promoting the denial of terrorist: 

o Sponsorship 

o Training 

o Weapons 

o Transit 

o Funding 

o Technology 

o Materials 

• Interdict and destroy terrorist groups

ASSURE 

DISSUADE 

DETER 

DEFEAT 
32 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

An additional, but perhaps less likely regional scenario would be that 

of South Korea reengaging in a nuclear weapons program in response to 

the threat from the North. The United States has headed off that scenario 

in the past through dissuasion based on a threat to withdraw U.S. forces if 

the ROK proceeded with a WMD program, but strategic communications 

could be quite helpful in this regard. Of course, the United States must be 

willing to defend those states like the Republic of Korea if they were to 

pledge not to acquire a nuclear force of their own. However, if we are 

willing to provide an extended deterrence shield, the strategic 

communications tool can facilitate such restraint on the part of our allies. 

Finally, putting all of this together, as Colonel Lutes suggests, 

increasing the number of instruments of policy enhances the dissuasive 

effect, but also increases the complexity of the task: 

Aims of a U.S. Strategic Communications Effort

Increase Costs to acquire WMD Reduce benefits from 

possessing/using WMD

• Delegitimize WMD possession 

–Public diplomacy 

–Strategic Information Operations 

• Impose political/economic costs 

–Robust multilateral nonproliferation 

regimes backed by inspections 

–Sanctions for violators 

• Restrict/deny access 

–Export/technology controls 

–Information security enhancements 

–Cooperative Threat Reduction Program 

–Interdiction (Proliferation Security 

Initiative) 

–Law enforcement action 

• Raise the bar 

–Maintain U.S. nuclear force levels 

above those of adversaries

• Information operations 

–Persuade 

–Confuse 

–Neutralize 

• Detection/monitoring/ 

attribution capability 

–Enhanced ISR 

–Predictive Intelligence 

• Preempt/Strike 

–Global Strike offensive capability 

–Special Operations Forces 

–Agent Defeat Weapons 

• Defend and Recover 

–Active Defense 

–Passive Defense and mitigation 

–Consequence management

Figure 8. Aims of a U.S. Strategic Communications Effort 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 33 

Adding Elements of Information Operations. Up to this point the 

discussion has revolved around those activities that can be accomplished 

through public or private diplomacy – including international 

broadcasting. The United States and its allies have other capabilities at 

their disposal, and should include them in any strategic communications 

campaign. 

Psychological operations and some forms of electronic warfare can be 

and are used quite effectively to target population segments with messages 

based on specific themes. For example, the United States European 

Command has created a web site, The Southeast European Times, aimed 

at the people of the Balkans, designed to present news, information and 

comment. This is a straightforward news site, but the fact that the United 

States and the European Command are behind the on-line publication, 

which has been updated daily, provides opportunities for both to present 

U.S. policies and values in a favorable light. Is this propaganda? Maybe. 

Is it good strategic communications? Definitely, if properly focused. This 

is an example of a program that works well, but might be ever so much 

more effective if it was were carried out as part of a larger national 

strategic communications campaign. 

A recent story was published by the Los Angeles Times concerning an 

information operations scheme to pay legitimate Iraqi newspapers to 

publish articles written by Americans.34 This operation has caused 

somewhat of a furor, with discussions about the legitimacy of such an 

operation, as well as its efficacy. The United States has doctrine for 

information operations to assist commanders, particularly those engaged 

in combat, and this operation could fit into that category – although 

several high-ranking officials say this one has drifted into a “gray” area 

since the sources of the articles were not clearly delineated.35

On the other hand, clumsy attempts at information management such 

as this one could be counterproductive. A disingenuous plan made public 

could very well have the opposite effect intended – particularly in such a 

high-visibility region as Iraq. If winning the hearts and minds of allies and 

would-be allies is the goal, and confidence building and assurance is one 

of the means, surely a thinly-veiled clandestine effort such as the one 

uncovered in recent days is to no one’s advantage. The discovery of such 

an effort makes listeners or readers question all further information from 

that source. Furthermore, the free press in the United States and elsewhere 
34 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

will make it into such a negative event that the United States government 

image will be further tarnished once under-cover propaganda operations 

are revealed. 

Finding the Right Buttons to Push. Judging which individuals or 

groups in a particular country or organization should be targeted should 

fall to regional experts capable of best determining the policy and 

influence purveyors there. These targets could include members of the 

general population, government members, moderate religious leaders, 

military elites, and economic elites. Influencing states or organizations 

through others in a particular region can be a particularly effective course 

of action if experts are aware of regional sensitivities – by using existing 

lines of communications and creating new ones, by isolating a country or 

group in a region, playing on a regional conflict there, or by creating good 

will in the region. 

The process of locating and concentrating on pressure points – in this 

case using strategic communications – is the process of effects-based 

operations. In the world of putting real bombs on targets, effects-based 

operations lead the targeteers to seek targets, the destruction of which 

would produce a desired effect, rather than just obliterating everything on 

the target list. For example, hitting the bank belonging to the minister that 

finances arms sales to terrorists could stop the financing – and get the 

attention of that policy maker at the same time. 

The same process should apply to strategic communications. The 

United States should use regional experts to find the right buttons to push. 

They could provide answers to some key questions such as: Whom can 

we influence to write that key editorial in a paper that will actually publish 

the piece? [Note, this is actually influencing someone to spread our 

message, not paying a paper to take a story as has happened recently in 

Iraq.] Where can we provide talking points through friendly sources to 

clerics who in turn are reaching over a billion Muslims? Which country is 

ready to move beyond confidence and trust-building themes to allow a 

more proactive policy? 

But as Dr. Paul Bernstein of SAIC points out, there has been a 

dramatic decline in regional studies in the United States. Americans have 

traditionally been poor at foreign languages, having little incentive to learn 

languages that are used several thousand miles away. This propensity to 

speak only English decreases the ability to study a region in its native 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 35 

language. Thus even where programs exist, studies are only accomplished 

through the filters of translation and interpretation. Unfortunately, in most 

U.S. colleges and universities there has been a trend away from the 

intensive study of countries, regions, and cultures. Indeed, many colleges 

and universities don’t have regional programs at all. Similar difficulties 

are encountered in the Intelligence Community, but for different reasons. 

Global priorities have caused under-staffed agencies to focus on regions 

and countries of primary interest. In-depth studies of countries of lesser 

significance to the United States would need to be accomplished almost 

from scratch when the need became apparent. 

Dr. Barry Schneider believes that regional experts should include the 

following when constructing a strategic communications plan based on 

national policy priorities. He would follow these steps: 

1. Use and build on in-depth knowledge of the region and culture. 

2. Formulate specific objectives based on national policy priorities. 

3. Map regional perceptions of the United States, its policies, and its 

values. 

4. Map influence networks. 

5. Focus on doable tasks. 

6. Cultivate and use credible messengers. 

7. Employ relevant channels of communications. 

8. Monitor success and failure. Develop metrics if possible. 

9. Sustain the campaign over time. 

10. Corollary: Don’t expect immediate results. 

One process should be added to this formula or planning process, and that 

step should be fit into the early going, perhaps between steps one and two: 

1-a. Listen to the priorities of legitimate voices in the region and take 

those into account in crafting a strategic communications campaign – and 

most importantly, when developing the policy objectives for the region. 

A key element of this strategic communications effect-based 

operations is the method used to deliver messages. The range of delivery 

methods is broad and can extend from an international speech by the 
36 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

President of the United States – to a cell phone call targeting a specific 

individual because of that person’s ability to affect policy. This area of 

delivery means is perhaps the one most open to innovation as technology 

and imaginative ideas spread around the world. 

Targets, Themes, Messages. Once the general concepts of a strategic 

communications campaign are in place, it is back to the basics of targets, 

themes, and methods of delivery to execute the campaign. The basics 

require regional experts, and in the case of the plan to combat WMD – 

experts in that field as well. 

Actual counter-WMD themes and messages are for later stages of this 

project, should the United States choose to embark on it in earnest. 

However, any strategic campaign to combat weapons of mass destruction 

has some international agreements already in place that form a quite 

effective normative basis for international behavior. For example: 

• The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons 

• The Chemical Weapons Convention 

• The Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, 

Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and 

Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction 

Matching U.S. policies and values to these multi-national treaties in a 

way that makes sense to the world will be somewhat more difficult. 

Convincing others, particularly organizations that are not signatories to the 

treaties, that possession of weapons contrary to the treaties creates 

insecurity for them rather than security, has proven problematic in the past. 

On the brighter side, certainly not every state or group that was 

capable of developing, deploying, and using nuclear, biological, chemical, 

or radiological weapons has done so. Indeed, out of the 190+ states in the 

world, at least 40 or so are considered advanced enough to have already 

developed nuclear weapons, but it appears that only eight to ten have 

carried through. The others had good reasons for not going ahead. A 

strategic communications program should study these motives and use 

such arguments for WMD restraint in its messages. 

A Bit of Realpolitik. Finally, the question of consistency arises. Must 

the United States treat all actual or potential owners of WMD the same? 

Clearly the answer is no; as discussed earlier, each state or region should be 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 37

addressed with tailored plans. But what about compliance with 

international norms such as the Non-Proliferation Treaty? The United 

States has in effect winked at India and Israel, neither of which has signed 

the NPT, and both of which possess nuclear weapons. Now the United 

States has agreed to help India with its nuclear energy program – a reward 

reserved specifically for signatories of the treaty. And of course, Israel is 

near the top of the list for foreign aid from the United States. We seem to 

be saying that who you are and how you conduct yourself in the 

international arena matters more than the weapons you possess.36 Such an 

approach could be considered reasonable. [In fact, Mohamed El Baradei, 

the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, recently 

stated that the United States’ policy toward India could make sense, in that 

India is a democracy with one sixth of the world’s population, clearly has 

nuclear weapons – treaty or no treaty – and is a significant force in Asia and 

the world. Nuclear energy is important to the Indians, and it seems logical 

to bring them into the tent of respectability and first world technology – 

rather than letting them remain unmonitored nuclear outcasts.]37

But a policy that adhered strictly to the tenets of the NPT could make 

sense as well. We expect neither Israel nor India to attack the United 

States with nuclear weapons, but that reasoning is less certain with 

Pakistan or North Korea, the other non-signatories. Further, what if an 

ally chose to take the North Korean approach of dropping out of the NPT 

and developing nuclear weapons? Would we stand idly by? The chances 

are more likely in that case that we would than if the developer were 

someone inimical to U.S. interests. Thus, the basic dilemma is one of 

assisting friends that are outside the NPT or other international norms 

(possibly giving the signal to others that wish to develop WMD that treaty 

participation has little value) versus consistent application of those norms. 

The Bush administration’s gamble on India seems to be dividing critics, 

and how that plays out is certainly important. The larger question, 

however, is that the United States’ approach to the NPT is precisely the 

sort of issue that should be part of any formulation of a strategic 

communications campaign. 

A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 39 

VII. Where to Start at the National Level 

Having laid out the need for a national strategic communications 

policy for the United States, and one that contains a strategy for using that 

policy to combat weapons of mass destruction proliferation and 

employment, where do we start? As outlined previously, actual targets, 

themes, and messages will be tailored by regional and functional experts 

to fit a national campaign. What remains then, is creating a coherent 

structure that will put that national campaign in place, creating the national 

message – on which more specific and targeted second and third tier plans 

will be based. This coordinated national-level effort has been a missing 

element in policy in recent years. Many ideas exist for fixing strategic 

communications for the United States; at last count there were some 

thirty-two studies.38 Earlier we highlighted two of the more significant 

ones and briefly summarized some of their more alarming findings. Here 

are some of the ideas from the two studies for repairing the system and 

getting that national-level campaign in place. 

Recommendations from the Defense Science Board (DSB). The 

preponderance of the DSB recommendations revolve around establishing a 

national structure; those ideas are receiving varying degrees of attention as 

this is being written:39

1. The President should issue a directive to strengthen the 

government at the national level to better understand global 

opinion and its effects on policy. Second, the directive should 

insist on coordination of all components of strategic 

communication at the national level, and provide a legislative 

foundation for the planning, coordination, conduct, and funding of 

strategic communications. 

2. The President should establish a permanent strategic 

communications structure within the National Security Council 

that includes: 

• A Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic 

Communications. 

• A Strategic Communication Committee within the NSC. 
40 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

• An independent, non-profit, non-partisan Center for Strategic 

Communications. This center would be a 501(c)(3) corporation 

that would: 

o Provide information and analysis to civilian and military 

decision-makers on vital security issues; 

o Develop plans, themes, products, and programs for U.S. 

communications strategies; and 

o Support national strategic communication by mobilizing 

non-governmental initiatives, fostering cross-cultural 

exchanges, and recruiting private sector experts for short 

term assignments. 

3. The Secretary of State should redefine and make the Under 

Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs (the 

Karen Hughes position) more robust with staffing, budget, and 

decision-making authority. 

4. Public diplomacy should become an integral part of the State 

Department and the careers of Foreign Service officers. Chiefs of 

Mission should have served at least one prior tour in a public 

diplomacy assignment. 

5. The Under Secretary of Defense for Policy should act as the DoD 

focal point for strategic communication and serve on the NSC’s 

Strategic Communications Committee. The Assistant Secretary of 

Defense for International Security Affairs should act as the focal 

point for military support for public diplomacy and create a deputy 

assistant secretary to coordinate this new business. 

6. OSD and the Joint Chiefs should ensure that all military plans and 

operations have appropriate strategic communications components 

coordinated at the national level, and are adequately funded. 

Recommendations from the Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy 

(the Djerejian Report). This study is aimed strictly at public diplomacy to 

the Arab and Muslim world, but the recommendations,40 although more 

State department centric, suggest a beefing up of our national strategic 

communications structure similar to those of the DSB. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 41 

1. Establish a Cabinet-level Special Counselor to the President for 

Public Diplomacy. 

2. Strengthen the role of the Undersecretary of State for Public 

Diplomacy and Public Affairs. 

3. Tie the U.S. Agency for International Development and the 

Defense Department more closely into national-level strategic 

communications plans. 

4. Provide additional funding and staff to fix the “absurdly and 

dangerously inadequate” levels dedicated to public diplomacy with 

the Arab and Muslim world. 

5. Devote a greater portion of the budget to tap the resources of the 

Internet and other communication technologies more effectively. 

6. Expand English language training along with the scope of the 

American Corners program in other countries. American Corners 

are usually located at universities, libraries, or host-country 

facilities and tell America’s story, especially to the young, through 

books, periodicals, the Internet, music, film, and other means. 

7. Create the American Knowledge Library by translating thousands 

of the best American books and place them in libraries, study 

centers, universities, and American Corners around the world. 

And From One Who Just Left the Interagency Process. Jeff Jones 

recently left the National Security Council after working strategic 

communications there for four years. He agrees that the process is nonfunctional, characterized by the following shortcomings: 

• There is an absence of national-level leadership, guidance, and 

strategy. 

• There exists an organizational void, as well as bureaucratic 

inefficiencies. 

• It is an undisciplined process, hindered by the fact that multiple 

sources of information and technology are not fully fused. 

• There are far too few resources devoted to strategic 

communications at the national level: people, money, technology, 
42 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

training, and time devoted to making it work all are well below the 

level of effort needed to succeed. 

Jones suggests the following: 

1. Empower the recently appointed Deputy National Security Advisor 

for Strategic Communications to work with the new 

Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs to 

invigorate the interagency process. 

2. Ensure the Principals Committee discusses strategic 

communications at least every quarter, and the Deputies 

Committee does the same each month. 

3. Reactivate the following presently non-functional Policy 

Coordinating Committees (PCCs): 

a. Strategic Communications PCC 

b. Counter-Terrorism Information Strategy PCC 

c. Muslim World Outreach PCC 

4. Create an OMB-led Interagency Working Group to help develop a 

long-range plan as well as a Capitol Hill strategy. 

5. Create or activate a National Security Council web site and DoD 

Information Management Portal devoted to strategic 

communications. 

6. Create a 21st century version of the United States Information 

Service. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 43 

VIII. Off and Running: The New Undersecretary 

of State for Public Diplomacy 

Karen Hughes is not really a cabinet-level official – as many of the 

reports and studies recommended be installed to further public diplomacy. 

But consider this: The President spoke at her swearing in, she has lunch 

with the President frequently, and she has been the President’s personal 

counselor for ten years or more – including during her hiatus in Texas while 

she attended to her self-described “mom duties.” She is a close associate of 

Condoleezza Rice, the Secretary of State, one of the people closest to the 

President. All of which is to say Karen Hughes arguably has more access to 

the President and his inner circle than do most of the people that are cabinet 

officials. She is a first string member of the administration. So what does 

she plan to do with this access and with this position? 

Her background is one of a communicator, having come from TV 

broadcast journalism. Therefore, she has taken on the role as the face of 

public diplomacy, traveling abroad several times now on extended trips 

covered extensively by the press, meeting with leaders, students, religious 

groups, and frequently women representatives of all of those. On a brief 

trip in November, she traveled to Pakistan to survey earthquake damage 

and to meet with officials. Her meetings and speeches are certainly 

emblematic of public diplomacy, and apparently she does a wonderful job 

on the diplomatic trail by dint of her belief in the United States and its 

values – and her enthusiasm. However she is but one person. The open 

question is whether or not she can make public diplomacy systemic. Can 

she be in charge of public diplomacy for the government in addition to 

dispensing it? 

Initial Steps Within the State Department. Ambassador Hughes (her 

new position carries the title of ambassador as well as under secretary) has 

instituted several programs, primarily within the State Department. First, at 

the President’s direction, she is leading an interagency process that brings 

together senior policy and communications officials from different agencies 

to develop a government-wide communications strategy “to promote 

freedom and democracy, to win the war of ideas, and to set in place the 

communications strategic plans for the administration.”41 If she causes this 

process to be successful, she will be the first to have done so in recent years. 
44 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

The strategic communications interagency process has been broken 

for some time now, primarily for lack of interest and support from both the 

White House and the State Department. And there remains but one person 

at the White House that has any responsibility for strategic 

communications, the recently appointed Deputy National Security Advisor 

for Strategic Communications – and she is too new on the job to have a 

track record. The recently departed occupant of the same position stated 

that there is in fact an interagency organization on paper as shown in the 

accompanying diagram, but that organization does not actually exist. 

While the DNSA for Strategic Communications can help bring about a 

reinvigoration of the process and the organization, it will take the 

leadership of Karen Hughes to make both productive. 

Figure 9. Putative White House Organization 

18

Putative White House Organization

White House

Office of Global 

Communications

NSC-led

CT Information Strategy PCC

Military-Related, Classified and

Special Activities Issues

Counterpropaganda

DOS/NSC Co-Chaired

Strategic Communications PCC

• Develops a Strategic Comms Plan

• Coordinates interagency support for foreign 

information programs and PD

• Promotes training

DOS/NSC Muslim World Outreach PCC

Working with Muslim Partners to Counter Extremism

National Security 

Council

• Principals Committee

• Deputies Committee

Deputy National Security

Advisor for Communications

Coordination

Policy Guidance

Assistant to the 

President for 

Communications

Coordination

NOTE: All three committees are presently inoperative (as of February 2006)
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 45 

If she can energize these committees and bring people to the table on 

a regular basis – the right people, and the same people each time – then the 

interagency process has a chance. But if Hughes is being asked to run a 

major section of the State Department, and take up the slack for a nonexistent White House structure as well, the enterprise seems headed for 

disappointment. A stalwart shouting into the wind while every other 

agency, NSC included, goes on about its business will have limited 

impact. This goes double if the President himself is not fervently 

supportive of crafting an effective strategic communications campaign. 

And as Ambassador Hughes said in her opening days, a strategic 

communications plan – particularly public diplomacy – is a two-way 

conversation. “It takes two hands to clap.”42 If the President sees her 

assignment as one of putting spin on intractable policy – and not listening 

to potential audiences – then the venture is going nowhere. 

Second, the new under secretary, with Secretary Rice’s support, has 

instituted a plan that will install a Deputy Assistant Secretary (DAS) for 

Public Diplomacy in each of the regional bureaus within the State 

Department. That person would report to the Assistant Secretary for the 

region, but would report also to Under Secretary Hughes. This new position 

would ensure that public diplomacy is integrated with policy when it is 

being made, and by reporting to Hughes, would ensure as well that the 

strategic communications message for the region fits into the larger message 

for the United States. This fits nicely into the concept that calls for strategic 

communications and public diplomacy messages to be crafted by the 

experts that know the region and country – experts that know what buttons 

to push. The first such DAS, Colleen Graffy, a twenty-year resident of 

London, has been installed in the European Bureau. 

Third, the State Department is expanding its exchange programs, and 

has increased the budget significantly in that area for 2006 under the 

direction of Hughes and her Deputy Under Secretary, Dina Powell. In 

virtually all appearances since her confirmation, Ambassador Hughes has 

repeatedly said that exchange programs are the single most important 

public diplomacy tool. She is particularly interested in English language 

programs and educational exchanges, but there are many others – 

including military exchanges. In her appearances and speeches, Karen 

Hughes frequently quotes Edward R. Murrow on saying that “the most 

important part of public diplomacy is that last three feet. It’s that person-
46 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

to-person contact.”43 Exchanges certainly qualify as person-to-person 

contact, and any increase in those programs that Hughes’ office can affect 

is certainly a good start. But it is precisely that sort of approach that must 

find its way into the interagency process and into other organizations. 

Ambassador Hughes and her deputy can have an impact here if the policy 

is carried across the government. 

Fourth, Hughes and the State Department are insisting that 

ambassadors and other foreign service officers become more involved in 

public diplomacy. To provide emphasis, the under secretary is speaking to 

all seminars for new ambassadors, and is addressing regional conclaves 

for ambassadors in the field – to which she insists the ambassadors bring 

their top public affairs officer for the embassy. She is publishing “alerts” 

for embassies, current policy and information from high-level meetings in 

Washington, that can be immediately used in the field by diplomats and 

other officials without further clearance. Such information should be quite 

useful for press conferences and speeches, and has the added benefit of 

being a consistent message across regions. Of course, Emerson said, “a 

foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little 

statesmen...,” the corollary in this being that messages almost certainly 

should be customized for different audiences. But having a reserve of 

cleared policy statements will help keep our diplomats out of trouble as 

they craft those targeted messages. 

Finally, to help the cause further, Ambassador Hughes would like to 

develop public diplomacy as a viable career path within the State 

Department. As mentioned earlier, the United States Information Service, 

USIS, essentially filled that role – and it was dismantled in the 1990s. 

While she insists that she will be the advocate for that career field, several 

people interviewed for this project said until a USIS-like organization is 

reestablished, foreign service officers laboring in the field of public 

diplomacy, public affairs, and cultural affairs will always have a lower 

status than political and economic officers when it comes to affairs of state. 

The Substance of Karen Hughes’ Approach Thus Far. “We’re 

engaged in a fight about our most fundamental and founding values, the 

freedom to speak our minds, the freedom to worship freely, and as we 

choose, the freedom to participate in the political process. President Bush 

has charged me with developing a long-term strategy to ensure that our 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 47

ideas prevail.”44 With those words as a basis, Ambassador Hughes has 

created a strategic framework that has three key components or pillars.45

1. The United States must offer a positive vision of hope that is rooted 

in the President’s freedom agenda. Within the foreign policy ranks and 

elsewhere, there has always existed a gut-wrenching discussion of 

democracy versus stability as we view potential allies and foes. Is the 

United States willing to endure the disorder that a nascent freedom 

movement brings in a target country – and the possible accompanying loss 

of regional security? Or would the United States prefer to deal with a 

dictator, benevolent or otherwise, who will keep a lid on his country’s 

people and security – thus allowing the United States and its allies to 

operate or trade freely in the region? As Secretary Rice has said though, 

in the Middle East, we have had neither stability nor security. Instead 

conditions became so cancerous that people were willing to kill 

themselves by flying airplanes into buildings full of innocent people. “So 

our policy is to stand for freedom, freedom for people to express 

themselves, to have an opportunity to make an impact, to know their voice 

can make a difference in the future of their country. Freedom took a long 

time in this country, so we know that the pace of change will be different 

in different places. But freedom must be fostered, nurtured, and 

encouraged.” And to quote Secretary Rice again, “It is not liberty and 

democracy that must be imposed, it is tyranny and silence that are 

imposed upon people at gunpoint.” 

2. We must work to isolate and marginalize the extremists and 

undermine their appropriation of religion. This part of the program, 

which requires little explanation, is difficult to oppose, but even harder to 

implement. Ambassador Hughes draws on her many trips with the 

President to Afghanistan and elsewhere and hastens to point out the severe 

discrimination, particularly for women, that exists in some Muslim 

societies. She has illustrated the point using a quote from President Bush: 

“They wish to make everyone powerless except themselves. They banned 

books and desecrated historical monuments and brutalized women. They 

seek to end dissent in every form and to control every aspect of life and 

rule the soul itself.” Most thinking people in the United States agree with 

the President and Ambassador Hughes – and many among the downtrodden elsewhere do as well. But shouting U.S. opposition from the 
48 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

rooftops does not constitute a strategic communications or public 

diplomacy campaign, and in the early going, Hughes has not had time to 

offer more. 

This pillar, more than any other perhaps, will take the longest to 

effect change, since modifying behavior means modifying a belief 

structure and culture – even among the more moderates of the Muslim 

world. Many moderates in the Muslim world and elsewhere do not wish 

us harm, but neither do they buy into our culture completely. For 

example, some who clearly are not extremists still do not support equal 

rights and privileges for women. A potential ally against extremism, then, 

may not see the conflict between Muslim extremism and the West as a 

black and white issue. They must gradually be convinced over time why it 

is to their advantage to help us isolate the extremists, and the 

representatives of the United States simply stating that imperative will not 

make it so. It may be necessary to find key influential individuals and 

organizations within the targeted region that can help us understand their 

culture – and then in turn help to influence others within that culture over 

time. Such a process is central to the success of a strategic 

communications campaign. 

3. We must work to foster a sense of common interests and common 

values between Americans and people from different countries. 

“America is...confident of our ideals. We believe, given a fair hearing 

and a free choice, that people the world over will choose freedom over 

tyranny, tolerance over extremism, diversity over rigid conformity and 

justice over injustice...And so our mission is to create the climate and 

conditions that allow people to give us that fair hearing.”46 Ms. Hughes’ 

thoughts are undoubtedly correct again. But the same thoughts, translated 

to another region and another culture, give rise to the delicateness of 

developing the components of that fair hearing. Even conceding the 

purest of motives, suggesting that others wish to be just like us is pure 

hubris. Many will risk life, limb, and freedom to come to the United 

States to be sure, and, when here, will more or less accept our values. 

Many more, however, perhaps better established in their own countries, 

certainly would like to experience freedom, tolerance, diversity, and 

justice – but on terms that make better sense to them for their own 

government and society. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 49 

Returning to Morocco for a moment as an example, many citizens 

there would embrace all of that openness. But for them, democracy may 

not mean an elected president. The king is revered there, but even more so 

is the throne – the position of king. Moroccans would very much like to 

have a more representative government – but with a king at the head. 

Rather than a pure constitutional monarchy, they want something perhaps 

in between an absolute monarchy and a representative democracy. They 

see several diverse nations within the territory of Morocco and other areas 

claimed by the country – the Berbers in the north, the Moroccan Arabs in 

the south, and the Sarharawi Arabs in the Western Sahara. In their minds, 

an elected leader could not be nearly as effective as would a king in 

governing these diverse elements – while maintaining the integrity of the 

country. Furthermore, many are willing to relinquish a certain amount of 

due process and freedom to ensure that the country is safe. And while 

religious tolerance exists in Morocco more than elsewhere in the Arab 

world, 99% of the country is Muslim. There is no driving force to 

promote minority religions – and proselytizing for those religions is 

illegal. Women certainly have privileges in Morocco that don’t exist in 

many Arab and Muslim countries, but being the best in this category is 

still well below the norm for the United States and much of the rest of the 

world. All of which is to say, when constructing a strategic 

communications campaign for a country or region, it pays to know that 

area intimately – which in turn involves listening before talking. Tailored 

campaigns are called for – crafted by regional experts – as part of a 

national campaign. 

Hughes’ Four E’s 

Ambassador Hughes has a plan to communicate the three pillars of 

her strategic vision. And while her plan, at least in the early going, 

consists effectively of slogans, she has made an effort to lay out a 

blueprint on which to build. This blueprint is made up of her 4-E’s: 

engage, exchange, educate, and empower. 

1. Engage. “We cannot expect people to give a fair hearing to our ideas if 

we don’t advocate for them. And research shows, when people know that 

America is partnering with their governments to improve their lives, it makes 

a difference in how they think of us. America must improve our rapid 
50 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

response, and as Secretary Rice has said, we must do much more to confront 

hateful propaganda, dispel dangerous myths, and get out the truth.”47 

Ambassador Hughes really has two distinct thoughts in that paragraph. The 

first is the case for pure diplomacy – bringing other countries along with us. 

Working with other governments, however, is more than delivering 

demarches stating our policies and what we expect. It involves listening to 

those governments, finding out what is important to them as well, where 

possible developing policies that benefit both sides – and, engaging in public 

diplomacy as well, so that the citizens see how we operate. 

The second idea is more aggressive: a counter-propaganda campaign. 

This involves not letting harmful statements by others just fester without a 

response. Such a reactive posture is difficult. Much better to be proactive

and get our story out first. Even better is a longer term campaign of 

confidence-building that eventually causes people elsewhere to believe us 

over others. We are a long way from that goal. 

2. Exchanges. As mentioned earlier, Ambassador Hughes sees exchanges 

as the single most effective way to reach people with the American 

message. Rarely does an intelligent person come to the United States as 

part of an exchange program, in effect assuming the role of an American, 

and not come away profoundly changed. Many want to stay in the United 

States as a result, but many return to their countries with new ideas and 

values – and a fresh view of the United States. Frequently they in turn 

become the principal advocates for sending others back to the United States 

on exchanges. As part of the experience, people who have been to the 

United States on an exchange almost always become fluent in English, 

allowing them to read and hear first hand what Americans hear, rather than 

having it filtered through a foreign news or broadcast agency. Military 

exchanges frequently can be quite effective, since legitimate militaries share 

certain values at the outset. Foreign militaries universally respect their 

counterparts in the United States, and therefore the transition to U.S. values 

has a leg up. Medical exchanges are similar. But since 9/11, exchanges 

have become more difficult, not less so, simply because of the added 

scrutiny and suspicion attached to international visitors to the United States. 

3. Education. Ambassador Hughes believes that educating Americans 

about other cultures will pay great dividends in the long run, particularly if 

such studies involve learning a foreign language. Making our citizens 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 51 

“better citizens of the world” will lessen the perception that Americans are 

arrogant, and the learning of other languages will go a long way toward 

understanding other cultures while softening our image abroad. Hughes 

includes under this rubric an increased effort to provide English language 

training to people from other countries. This last is more difficult, because 

her own State Department makes it quite difficult for would-be 

immigrants to obtain a U.S. visa purely for language training. The 

department requires a more compelling reason for entering the country to 

obviate frivolous visa seekers – and English can almost always be learned 

in their own country. 

4. Empowerment. “The most powerful and incredible voices may not 

always be our own government officials.”48 Ambassador Hughes has 

taken representative citizens with her on her trips and has found them 

quite good at reaching foreign nationals. Moreover, she would like to 

empower individuals to speak for the United States as citizen ambassadors 

whether traveling with U.S. officials or in their own capacity. 

The Place of Declarative Policy in Strategic Communications. The 

United States has a de facto strategic communications campaign in place, 

one with which Ambassador Hughes and U.S. officials around the world 

must contend. The government of the United States declares its policies 

every day, and people listen. Every time we sign a treaty (or don’t sign 

one), release a strategy or policy document, enter into a trade agreement, 

or produce any number of other official policy statements, we are sending 

a message or messages. Those messages are always out there for the 

press, foreign governments, and international organizations to mine – and 

will remain available even if a detailed strategic communications plan is 

developed. Therefore, any strategic communications campaign must take 

into account the declarative policy of the United States in formulating a 

message. Other people certainly are.49

A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 53 

IX. Progress at the Pentagon? 

DoD May Not Be On the Same Track. The Pentagon has no Karen 

Hughes position. The Joint Staff has taken some initiative – particularly in 

the National Military Strategy to Combat WMD. But OSD has taken little if 

any action to organize itself around a strategic communications mission, and 

certainly has not taken the recommendations of the Defense Science Board. 

The DSB recommended that the Under Secretary of Defense was to have 

been the single point of contact within DoD for strategic communications – 

with various lower-ranking officials to be devoted almost entirely to the 

task. Nor has OSD implemented the recommendation that all military plans 

and operations have an adequately funded strategic communications 

component coordinated at the national level. 

Furthermore, says former defense official Dr. Christopher Lamb, the 

ponderous Department of Defense simply isn’t properly organized to have 

a single point of view on anything – particularly on combating WMD. 

While that mission is arguably the most important for the United States 

over the next ten years, there are at least 26 offices in OSD and the Joint 

Staff alone that have some responsibility for it, and all are competing for 

scarce funds. Fragmented support for combating WMD is the result, and 

applying a consistent strategic communications message across those 

competing interests verges on the unmanageable.50

Still, words are in place that seemingly say the correct thing. Aside 

from inserting strategic communications as a strategic enabler into the 

NMS to Combat WMD, the Joint Strategic Capabilities Plan (JSCP), 

which translates national security strategy into planning guidance for the 

military, mandates the following: 

• Incorporate a proactive and continuous strategic communications 

process into every phase of planning. 

• Develop and continuously update strategic communications 

themes, messages and actions (programs, products, and plans) for 

all Areas of Responsibility (AORs). 

• Closely coordinate strategic themes, messages, and actions, along 

with their proposed metrics with the Joint Staff, Office of the 
54 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

Secretary of Defense, and when designated, the lead federal 

agency. 

As mentioned previously, the 2006 QDR has a small section on 

strategic communications as well, calling for “an emphasis on consistency, 

veracity and transparency both in words and deeds... To this end, the 

Department will work to integrate communications efforts horizontally 

across the enterprise to link information and communications issues with 

broader policies, plans, and actions.”51

In addition, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has a Director of 

Communications, a member of the Senior Executive Service, who has 

assembled a senior Strategic Communications Working Group that meets 

periodically, with a working-level group meeting frequently. The senior 

group, according to the director, is useful in ensuring that members of the 

Joint Staff are in agreement on messages, but he, too, believes the national 

interagency process is not functional, providing little guidance to DoD. 

U.S. Strategic Command Moves Out. The United States Strategic 

Command, a mentor for this project, has taken some positive steps with 

regards to strategic communications, having stood up a strategic 

communications division within the headquarters at Omaha, Nebraska, 

headed for the moment by a colonel. Furthermore, the command’s 

Foreign Policy Advisor (formerly the position of Political Advisor or 

POLAD) is a public diplomacy expert from the State Department, and was 

a leading advocate for strategic communications, particularly public 

diplomacy, while at his parent organization. He carries that expertise and 

advocacy to USSTRATCOM. 

The Strategic Communications Division is programmed to be 

subsumed into a new organization in 2006, headed by a member of the 

SES, sporting the grand designation of Global Integration Strategy Center 

(GISC). The new director will be dual-hatted as the GISC head and 

Director of Strategic Communications. This new organization will be in 

downtown Omaha, away from the USSTRATCOM headquarters at Offut 

Air Force Base. The Center will have a Washington liaison, and will 

provide independent thinking to the commander. Among its strategic 

communications functions are:52

• Conduct deliberate strategic communications planning for 

USSTRATCOM missions. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 55 

• Synchronize strategic communications for USSTRATCOM 

missions. 

• Conduct cultural and situational analysis. 

• Conduct strategic communications crisis action planning for transregional issues. 

• Contribute to the development of strategic communications 

doctrine and training. 

• Advocate for strategic communications as a capability. 

• Conduct, collate, and make available strategic communications 

measures of effectiveness. 

The immediate task of the current division is to partner with another 

combatant command to develop and execute a strategic communications 

campaign. This endeavor will involve developing a concept of operations, 

examining requirements and authorities, compile lessons learned, and to 

be as forward-leaning as possible in accomplishing these tasks. This 

brings us to the very real concern that USSTRATCOM is one step 

removed from the interagency process, and while attempting to develop a 

strategic communications campaign, it may not be in step with any truly 

national and strategic communications designs that may eventually be 

developed. Combatant commands are currently being tasked to include 

strategic communications in all of their planning, but those that are 

proceeding are doing so with quite limited guidance – either at the national 

level, or from within the Department of Defense.53 The appointment of a 

single point of contact for DoD, the invigoration of the interagency 

process – with that person deeply involved, and the passing of first-hand 

information to the combatant commands, seems essential to make the 

plans of USSTRATCOM and other well-meaning commands effective. 

If all goes according to plan at USSTRATCOM, the Global 

Integration Strategy Center will create a collaborative environment that 

will allow the combatant commands to gain access to information that 

they need to develop Theater Security Cooperation Plans, Operations 

Plans, and Intelligence Campaign Plans. Above all, the Center will ensure 

that strategic communications is inseparable from all missions performed 

or supported by USSTRATCOM.54

A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 57

X. Final Recommendations 

The project team believes that this project should be continued, and 

that an actual strategic communications campaign for combating weapons 

of mass destruction should be written, building on this first phase – which 

we saw as one of problem identification, gap analysis, and advocacy. The 

emphasis in coming months should be on the latter – advocacy, because 

the timing is propitious and there is near unanimity on the problem and 

steps that could lead to its resolution. Advocacy should focus on the six 

findings in Section II. 

Strategic communications is an underused tool at the national level, 

and an unused tool with regards to weapons of mass destruction. The 

objective of this project is to keep the attention of senior leaders focused 

on the need to ensure that as strategic communications takes root, a crucial 

element must be a campaign to combat weapons of mass destruction. 

To do that we recommend: 

1. This report receive the widest dissemination possible. Original 

drafts will be forwarded to the Defense Threat Reduction Agency 

and to the United States Strategic Command. In addition, we 

suggest that the report be published as one of the USAF 

Counterproliferation Center’s Counterproliferation Papers series, 

and that a condensed version be published in a journal apt to be 

read by senior leaders. 

2. An advocacy briefing be produced and presented (if the audiences 

are receptive) in Calendar Year 2006 to: 

• The Defense Threat Reduction Agency 

• The United States Strategic Command 

• The Counterproliferation Program Review Committee 

• The office of the Under Secretary of State for Public 

Diplomacy and Public Affairs 

3. A second phase of this project be funded and supported, in which 

an actual strategic communications campaign for combating 

weapons of mass destruction template would be developed. This 
58 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

plan would serve to assist regional experts and commands in 

developing tailored plans based on in-depth knowledge of the 

region and culture. The template could serve also as a guide to 

other modules within a national strategic communications 

campaign writ large. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 59 

XI. Conclusion 

The United States has not lost its way in the world, or anything close 

to it. As a force for good, it is still unequalled. While our stock in the 

Arab and overall Muslim world is in wholesale decline, some of that is a 

natural antipathy between our two cultures as outlined in Huntington’s 

Clash of Civilizations.

55 While we have many common interests with 

those in the Muslim world, we also are hindered by our alliances with 

regimes unpopular within that world. No doubt some of these difficulties 

are indeed linked to our other alliances and policies as well as cultural 

differences, but nevertheless, many of these problems with our friends and 

foes can be linked directly to our failure to explain ourselves well to the 

world. As two significant studies have shown, the United States has a 

significant amount of work to do to just bring our image back to neutral. 

And not until we reach that modest level will we be able to positively 

influence other world actors. We require a strategic communications 

campaign to do so, and there are signs that the Bush Administration has 

come to that same conclusion. 

A key area ripe for influence around the world is the fight to counter 

weapons of mass destruction. We are engaged on many levels in 

preventing acquisition of WMD by international actors that should not 

have them. So, too, are we feverishly working to have in our arsenal the 

proper capabilities to counter these weapons if we are unable to prevent 

acquisition. But we are not developing a sufficient strategic 

communications component to combat WMD threats. As the United 

States belatedly pursues a strategic communications campaign to match its 

other security policies, a critical element of that campaign must be 

combating WMD threats, preventing the worst people from acquiring the 

worst weapons. 

However, this strategic communications campaign for combating 

WMD is best aimed only indirectly at the worst people. We should 

influence our allies first, and then other rational international actors, to 

help us isolate rogue states, dry up supplier networks, and defeat terrorists. 

Preventing states from acquiring a WMD program is probably easier than 

convincing someone to roll back an already developed chemical, 

biological, nuclear, or radiological capability. Furthermore, any campaign 
60 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

must focus also on preventing regional actors from using WMD in 

conflicts with their neighbors. 

To do all of this will require to decision-makers to devote much more 

time and attention to strategic communications in combating WMD 

threats. It will also require resolve, reorganization, additional staff and 

money at the national level – starting with the White House. The 

appointment of Karen Hughes to a key post at the State Department is an 

excellent start, and shows at least a bit of that resolve. The community is 

newly energized by her appointment, and there is plenty of advice on how 

she should go about this new task. The Department of Defense should 

participate fully and be completely integrated into any strategic 

communications national campaign as that campaign develops. 

Why does the United States do what it does? In the eyes of some the 

answer may appear to be, “Because no one can stop us.” This may be an 

answer that satisfies a few in a world where might makes right, but it is 

insufficient if we wish to lead in the world community and remain secure 

with a combination of strength and friends. To be a force for good that is 

supported by others and admired around the world requires much more. 

We need a campaign – a coherent message – that explains the actions of 

the greatest democracy the world has ever known. To date, this is a 

message not yet sent. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 61 

Notes 

1. Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on Strategic Communications, 

Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics, 

Washington, DC, September 2004. 

2. National Military Strategy to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction, Final Draft, 

Fall 2005. 

3. National Security Council, the White House, December 2002. 

4. The National Security Strategy of the United States of America, 17 September 

2002. 

5. National Strategy to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction, December 2002. 

6. Dissuasion, Denial, Disarmament and arms control, Diplomatic pressure, 

Defusing, Deterring, Disabling or destroying, Defending. As quoted in Future War and 

Counterproliferation, Barry R. Schneider, Praeger, 1999. 

7. Ibid. 

8. Ibid. 

9. The U.S. Air Force Transformation Flight Plan 2004, HQUSAF/XPX, January 

2005. 

10. Draft National Military Strategy to Combat WMD, JCS/J5 2005. 

11. Ibid. 

12. Lewis A. Dunn, Can Al Qaeda Be Deterred From Using Nuclear Weapons? 

Center for the Study of Weapons of Mass Destruction, Occasional Paper 3, National 

Defense University Press, Washington, DC, July 2005. 

13. Quadrennial Defense Review Report, Department of Defense, Washington, DC, 

6 February 2006, 19. The other three are defeating terrorist networks, defending the 

homeland in depth, and shaping the choices of countries at strategic crossroads. 

14. Ibid., 51. 

15. Ibid., 35. 

16. The two other strategic enablers are ‘Detection/Intelligence” and ‘Partnership 

Capacity’. 
62 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

17. Ibid. 

18. JCS J5 IO briefing, 18 October 2004. 

19. Engagement can take on several forms. Examples are cultural, military, and 

educational exchange programs, speeches, personal meetings, and many others. 

20. Report of the DSB on Strategic Communications. 

21. Ibid. 

22. Changing Minds Winning Peace: A New Strategic Direction for U.S. Public 

Diplomacy in the Arab and Muslim World, The Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy for 

the Arab and Muslim World, Washington, October 2003. 

23. Ibid. 

24. From Conflict to Cooperation: Writing a New Chapter in Arab-U.S. Relation, 

Center for Strategic and International Studies, March 2005. 

25. Interview with Ambassador Edward Gabriel, Project Chair for From Conflict to 

Cooperation, 2 August 2005. 

26. Leonard Marks, Charles Wick, Bruce Gelb, and Henry Catto, “America Needs a 

Voice Abroad,” The Washington Post, Saturday, 26 February 2005, A19. 

27. Ibid. 

28. Report of DSB Task Force on Strategic Communication, 44. 

29. Ibid. 

30. Ibid. 

31. Fulbright, Senator J. William, Essay “On the Arrogance of Power,” 1966. 

32. Chuck Lutes, The Role of Dissuasion in Combating Weapons of Mass 

Destruction, Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University, 

October 2004. 

33. Ibid. 

34. Mark Mazzetti and Borzou Daragahi, “U.S. Military Covertly Pays to Run 

Stories in Iraqi Press,” The Los Angeles Times, 30 November 2005. 
A Message Not Yet Sent . . . 63 

35. Josh White and Bradley Graham, “Military Says it Paid Papers for News,” The 

Washington Post, 3 December 2005. 

36. Jim Hoagland, “Bush’s Bold Bet on India,” The Washington Post, 24 July 2005. 

37. Remarks by IAEA Director, Mohamed El Baradei, Carnegie Endowment 

Nonproliferation Conference, 7 November 2005. 

38. Interview with Jeremy Curtin, Department of State, Office of the Under 

Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, June 30, 2005. 

39. Report of DSB Task Force on Strategic Communication. 

40. Changing Minds Winning Peace...Report of the Advisory Group on Public 

Diplomacy. 

41. Remarks by Karen Hughes to the 2005 Forum on the Future of Public 

Diplomacy and Public Affairs, Washington, DC, 14 October 2005. 

42. From an Afghan proverb, quoted by Karen Hughes during her confirmation 

hearing on 22 July 2005. 

43. Hughes remarks, 14 October 2005. 

44. Ibid. 

45. Ibid. 

46. Ibid. 

47. Karen Hughes, Testimony at confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign 

Relations Committee, Washington, DC, 22 July 2005. 

48. Hughes remarks, 14 October 2005. 

49. Informal comments of Dr. Paul Bernstein, Senior Vice President, SAIC, to the 

author, 26 September 2005. 

50. Remarks by Dr. Christopher Lamb, Senior Research Fellow at NDU’s Institute 

for National Strategic Studies, at USAF Counterproliferation Center Symposium, an 

Underused Tool. Using Strategic Communications to Combat Weapons of Mass 

Destruction, September 23, 2005. 

51. 2006 QDR, 92. 
64 . . . A Message Not Yet Sent

52. Briefing by Col Scott Lamb, USSTRATCOM, at USAF Counterproliferation 

Center Symposium, an Underused Tool. Using Strategic Communications to Combat 

Weapons of Mass Destruction, 23 September 2005. 

53. Briefing by Mr. Dennis Scofield, USNORTHCOM, at USAF 

Counterproliferation Center Symposium, an Underused Tool. Using Strategic 

Communications to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction, 23 September 2005. 

54. Ibid. 

55. Samuel P. Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations?” The Council on Foreign 

Relations, 1993.