Ethics, Counterinsurgency, and Perceptions, in the Information Era

The thesis of this study is that when actions that are not consistent with stated values are introduced into the information environment, they can create a strategic effect. In the present Information Era, it is very difficult for a government to win a counterinsurgent war when the actions of its military do not consistently support stated values. What is the importance of the relationship between ethics and counterinsurgency? Perception. From antiquity to the present there has been cultural tension over different views of what is perceived to be right and wrong, and every culture desires to apply their values universally to the rest of the world. When a nation chooses to go to war, exercising its sovereign right to use military force, it must act in a way that is ethically justifiable. The central issue of this paper is analyzing the effects caused by actions that do not support stated values when they are reported in the information environment. No country in the world today can act autonomously; each must justify its actions or inevitably face failure. Especially challenged is the country that justifies its choice to go to war based upon universally stated values and then consistently act in ways that do not support those values.