Writing Mad: Our Failed Public Diplomacy Campaigns

I try to affect a mild analytic tone in my writing here (which probably doesn't get me many readers.) But today I can't, I am really mad. On Christmas, The Washington Post ran this story on how the U.S. bureaucracy could not pull together an effective response to Russian information operations.

Here is are two critical clips, but by all means, read the entire article.

Above, the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy had a creative idea for leveraging the fantastic content generated by the American entertainment industry as a public diplomacy tool to counter the Kremlin. But, the material is already under contract and it just couldn't happen.

Here again, a clever official at State has a plan to use cutting edge social media analytics to build networks to counter Kremlin propaganda networks. Great, but State cannot carry out public diplomacy on the American people, so it couldn't happen.

What made me so angry?

Am I mad at the State Department lawyers who wouldn't permit the project to go ahead? No, they are there for a reason. Our bureaucracies operate under constraints that reflect our values and priorities. 

Let me step back.

Since 9/11 I have gone to hundreds of think tank events, public forums, and other events where the great and good explain the world. I've even spoken at a few of them. All of them talked about the need to fight "The War or Ideas" or "Counter the Narrative." 

At one, discussing ISIS, about two years ago I said: "I've gone to so many of these events over the past fifteen years ago and everyone says we need to win the war of ideas. But we still haven't really committed to doing anything about it."

The speaker observed that ISIS propaganda works differently from al-Qaeda propaganda, so past efforts aren't effective.

My rejoinder was, "Fair enough, but that's like talking about needing snow tires when we still haven't bought a car!"

The speaker acknowledged my point. It isn't that State was blindsided by Russian propaganda. They were, but that is going to happen. It isn't that we probably shouldn't have dismantled our public diplomacy infrastructure after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Again, we shouldn't have, but we were feeling good about ourselves.

It is that - and I've written about this before - despite talking about it, we still have not established the bureaucratic infrastructure for effective public diplomacy. Given time, work arounds can be developed to bureaucratic constraints. If the U.S. government had really been working these issues (not the individuals - who are trying - but the institutions) then there would have been a range of ideas and capabilities available. They might need to be repurposed from countering radical Islam to countering the Kremlin, but at least there would have been frameworks already established. 

Failure of Leadership

Ultimately, to get results investments need to be made. It is that simple. Yes there is political turnover, but plenty of agencies have sufficient resources to build and maintain capabilities regardless of political leadership. DOD maintains a vast range of capabilities regardless of who is in power. If we want effective public diplomacy we need the personnel and the funding to create ongoing, continuing capabilities - sort of like the infrastructure we have for financial sanctions.

We often hear that U.S. public diplomacy has difficulty adapting to new media. Fair enough, but if the resources are there, then they can have people looking over the horizon at what is coming next. If they are completely overwhelmed by their inboxes there is no time. Further, with resources they can break the bureaucratic log-jams. Doing this requires people, to do research, attend meetings, and brainstorm work-arounds.

Maybe we need to re-establish the old U.S. Information Agency, which was so effective in the Cold War, but folded into State when it was over.

A corollary to this is that public diplomacy is a strategic afterthought, off in a corner. That reduces synergies. If public diplomacy is understood as a central, critical element (DIMEC? the C is for communications) other components of the U.S. government can contribute. 

I am still pissed that almost a decade ago we deported the brother of Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafez Saeed. The brother, a Muslim cleric in Sharon, Massachusetts, desperately wanted to stay in the U.S. and was much loved in his town (the rabbis went to bat for him.) Talk about a potential public diplomacy asset!!! But instead we deported him and he signed on with his brother.

But unless there is real bureaucratic heft behind public diplomacy, other agency prerogatives - such as Justice's desire to convict people - will prevail.

None of this stuff is easy. There are a lot of other priorities. But really, we've had a decade of complaining about this issue and no action.

I'll write about this later, but State has its own basket of fundamental structural problems.

And no real public diplomacy effort is likely in this administration where the entire State Department is being defenestrated, the very concept of diplomacy is not understood, and our president's toxicity is spoiling our world-beating brand.

Still, I'm mad about this ongoing failure.

Odds of Catastrophe Under the Current Administration

As 2017 comes to an end, much to the surprise of many, the world has not. Well, not yet, there's still a week. One of the things I worry about given our incompetent and neuroses driven president is the potential for stumbling into a really big catastrophe.

Not the tax bill. Yes, it's lousy, but it will not destroy the country or create huge mass suffering and it is reversible. I'm thinking more along the lines of what has happened in Puerto Rico (which is atrocious) happening nationwide. Just something big and abominable - something that makes 9/11 look tiny, like say, a war with North Korea.

We are probably not going to have a war with North Korea
Some knowledgeable people are very, very worried about this possibility. Others might argue that there is a sort of strategy of compellence evolving. Lots of threats and sanctions to force the North Koreans to the negotiating table on our terms (see below). One can see the logic of this strategy, but also recognize that, when deal with a paranoid (rational, but paranoid) regime, there is a tremendous potential for accidents. In international affairs, signaling can be a dicey business. A threat and a move interpreted by Pyongyang as hostile or a move toward pre-emption, and we could end up in a shooting war. And once that kind of thing starts, it will get very bloody very fast.

Tweetstorm explaining why war with DPRK isn't likely

I don't think that is going to happen. But here's the thing, if the probability very low, it is now low. In the world of intelligence analysis
, words are considered very poor tools for probabilities. It is important to assign number, because what is low probability - 5%, 25%? It matters.

So let's say that overall the probability of war with North Korea was 1%. Could happen, don't worry too much about it. But, with ill-considered rhetoric flying around, perhaps it is up to 10%. That is still very unlikely, but higher than it should be. Stuff that is 10% likely happens and when it is as catastrophic as a nuclear war with North Korea, you really want to keep it as low as possible.

It's the economy stupid
North Korea is not the only - or even the first - nightmare scenario I worry about it. I also worry about the debt ceiling. They keep making temporary deals to raise it. But, if they should fail to make this deal and the U.S. starts defaulting on its debt, that would send unbelievable shockwaves to the global economy. We could plunge the world into an economic meltdown. Now, to be clear, this is also not likely. First, Congress will keep coming to agreements and if they miss a little, there are contingency plans that would buy a little extra time. But, given the administration's incompetence, not just the White House - also the Secretary of Treasury - one can see this happening through miscalculation.

That isn't the only scenario. What about the President, in a fit of pique, ending NAFTA. Besides possibly triggering a huge recession, it could also push Mexico into a serious political instability. Again, not likely - but likelier.

There are probably other scenarios I haven't thought of. Under Bush 43 they had the 1% doctrine, that is if a terrorist threat seemed 1% likely they had to treat it as highly probable. In retrospect, it was a pretty problematic doctrine.

I have my 10% doctrine, outlier scenarios that would normally be very highly unlikely (say 1%) are now just highly unlikely (say 10%). Things that are only 10% likely probably won't happen. But if you roll the dice often enough...

Thankful for the United States

Right now, my country, the United States is in a pretty bad way. It isn't just about our politics (I can only write so much about that topic.) But wage stagnation and inequality has placed the American dream (or basic security) out of reach of so many. The ongoing legacy of slavery has re-emerged in stark ways. There are so many unnecessary petty cruelties visited on so many Americans (including those who are among us but don't have citizenship). I cannot list them all. (There is also the terrible treatment women must endure - but while I am completely sympathetic to this problem - it is not a problem unique to the United States. Sadly, for so much of human history women have been treated unjustly.)

Today we gather for one of our great - perhaps our greatest - national holiday, Thanksgiving. Of course the day itself is now complicated. The Pilgrims survived thanks to gifts from the native Americans. Those gifts have been repaid - an infinity fold - in murder and theft.

But I still love this country. First, every nation is built on a pile of bones. History is complicated. But the United States was founded on ideals. We do not live up to these ideals, and while it is easy to castigate us for this - no one could live up to our ideals. But we do try, and when we have we have done great things. At home, while so much of our wealth was built on slavery, we also fought a long and terrible war to end it.

Abroad we have done many awful things. This comes with being a great power. But (and you have to grade on a curve here) we are the least bad great power ever. We rebuilt Europe and Japan after WWII. We have promoted freedom and prosperity with at least some success. We have - at our best - been a shining example.

And for me, my life has been very comfortable. But my people, the Jewish people, have been persecuted terribly across the globe. While things have not always been easy for Jews in the United States, it is hard to think of another well place where Jews have been as successful and safe.

So I am thankful and remain thankful and will use my remaining time to help make sure we live up to our better angels and not become just another country.

I'm also thankful for the podcast The Hilarious World of Depression. Seriously grateful.

Domestic Security Implications of Las Vegas: Cold Takes

I've waited a few days to write. Nothing sensational here or grand theories. No hot takes.

First, the terrible events in Las Vegas cannot, at this point, be described as terrorism. They may be terrible and terrifying, but the Federal definition of terrorism includes a social or political objective. So far, there is no evidence that this event had a political motive - that could change if new evidence comes to light. While everyone seeks some kind of explanation, it will bring at least a tiny amount of coherence to the horror and in a time like this we take what comfort we can.

While the event was not terrorism, it was a security crisis and raises new issues for consideration. I will leave tactical response issues to others with the appropriate expertise. It did appear that the new procedures for integrating police and fire units during the incident were effective and allowed the extrication of victims during the incident. This allowed the wounded to receive more timely medical treatment, saving lives.

Geron-Terror

The classic terrorist is a male between late teens and early thirties. Dylan Roof and Omar Mateen are classic cases, there are of course outliers. Years ago, working on a very different project, I was examining the files of violent incidents kept by the Southern Poverty Law Center. While many of the perpetrators were the classic disaffected young men, I also noted a lot of much older men involved in incidents as well. This was not the purpose of the project, but the information stayed with me.

I do not have hard data, but it is worth noting that - particularly among right-wing extremists - there are a fair number of much older perpetrators. The 2009 attack on the Holocaust Museum in which a security guard was killed was carried out by 88 year old James W. von Brunn. Glenn Frazier Cross, who killed three at a Jewish Community Center in Kansas in 2014, was 73. On the left, James T. Hodgkinson, who attacked the GOP Congressional baseball team practice, was 66.

The Vegas gunman was also in his sixties.

More study is needed. These incidents might simply be outliers. The vast majority of terrorists and violent criminals will continue to be between their late teens and early thirties. But those are also the populations most likely to be monitored. Even a small uptick in violence from a population generally assumed to be non-violent could have a significant impact on public safety.

Guns

It is not my intention to wade into the question of gun control. People who are passionate about gun ownership know the law back and forth. I don't. I cannot accept either mass tragedies such as Las Vegas and Orlando or the steady and endless stream of deaths and injuries by firearms. I don't know what policies would necessarily be effective in achieving this. But I will make two tentative observations.

First, plenty of people make good livings spinning out dramatic terrorist attacks scenarios. It is kind of fun, and if you can sell it, you can become a consultant and/or peddle technological solutions. Drones are the nightmare du jour. Let's be clear, drones are being used by state and non-state U.S. adversaries on battlefields. But terrorists using drones to strike within the U.S., such as described in this article, is actually not that easy. The scenario is a drone dropping a thermite grenade on a gas tank. This might be very bad. But the focus in these and other scenarios is on how terrorists would use drones to deliver explosives or toxins. Putting aside that - as I've written elsewhere - this may not be that easy, the assumption is that the terrorists have explosives or toxins. But in fact explosives and toxins are not that easy to obtain. The chokepoint in preventing these attacks is not the drones, it is the weapon.

So while experts are obsessing about hard to pull off drone attacks, tools with proven death dealing capabilities are easily and readily available.

Second, there is a question of broader politics. Lobbyists for firearm ownership have been extraordinarily successful. Politics changes. Public opinion is shifting against them and eventually politics will follow. When they start losing, they will start losing big - sliding down the slippery slope they worry so much about.

The vast majority of gun owners, who are law-abiding and safety conscious will accept these new inconveniences. For a small number, gun ownership is about much more than a hobby, it is about identity in a very profound way that sometimes aligns with radical causes (do I really need to say more about this?) Overall smart policies (not necessarily laws) could reduce gun violence substantially. At the same time, it may spark a violent counter-reaction.

Afghanistan Agonistes 1: No Good Choices

Quick note, I have two blogs - this one, which started out on terrorism and has expanded to international affairs, technology, and ideas in general. Then I have Veepcritique, which started out as sort of the commentary track to my dissertation on the vice president, but now is more broadly on presidents, politics, and White House process. This particular rant is unique because part 1 is at here at TerrorWonk because it is about the policy aspects of Afghanistan. Part 2 is about the struggles in actually making policy on Afghanistan and the Vice President's increasingly significant role.

Also, I was originally going to entitle this Sympathy for the Donald, but my sympathy for the President has evaporated.

Readers will have no doubts about my thoughts on that man in the White House. But the intractable problem of Afghanistan is not his doing and based on most of the reporting he is truly wrestling with the problem. And that is the ugly secret of the presidency (and of really most foreign policy issues) there are no good choices. You have to decide what costs you can live with.

In a nutshell, the president is wondering why we have been there for over 16 years and aren't winning? If we aren't winning with the current troop levels of 8400, and we just had 100,000 troops there, why will adding a few thousand now be anything more than a stop-gap?

These are very good questions. The president is right to ask them. And coming to the conclusion that we should remove our forces and leave Afghanistan to its fate is a perfectly valid conclusion. It is proving increasingly expensive in blood and treasure. It is proving a bad investment, time to cut our losses.

But, this comes at a pretty high cost. If the U.S. allied government falls, it will be a strategic defeat for the U.S. (although not truly fatal to U.S. power.) It will also be very, very bad for the people of Afghanistan - who have suffered terribly over the past several decades. An Afghanistan under Taliban control could again become a center for cultivating and exporting radical Islam.

The alternatives are to throw a huge number of troops to Afghanistan and really try nation-building. The problem is that it is hideously expensive and will involve significant casualties. Also, we just did that and it didn't work.

Instead of going big in space with huge numbers of troops, we could go big in time - that is make a long-term commitment to a more modest force in Afghanistan. There the argument is that if the Taliban know we are not leaving so that they cannot ultimately win, they will be forced to come to the table. It is a good argument, and while expensive it is not inconceivable. Politically the American people want wars to end and a presence in Afghanistan keeps us wrapped up with neighboring Pakistan.

It appears the president will choose to send about 3800 more troops. This will buy some time for the government in Kabul. Will it be enough for that government to develop the capacity to defeat the Taliban or at least force them to the negotiating table? Perhaps, it's a gamble. It has the political advantage that it removes any really hard decisions to a few years in the future. Presidents often like that.

It is this lousy set of options that led the president to seriously consider hiring mercenaries to do the job in Afghanistan. Most presidential aspirants campaign arguing that there are simple, easy solutions that only they know about. But, most politicians know quite well, that magic is not real.

Our first amateur president is learning this in real time, the hard way. Most hard problems are about deciding what kind of pain you can live with - defeat, endless commitment, or huge expense. The default is usually incrementalism and that appears to be the path chosen. It is understandable, but it too has costs. Incrementalism can lead to greater costs down the line as commitments slowly increase without a clear decision. A hard expensive decision at the beginning often leads to better policy. But here I do have some sympathy for anyone faced with such a decision.

The Data Story-Teller

Data scientist is now officially the hip cool job. I remember laughing at the scene a couple seasons ago in House of Cards where thegenius data scientist stood shirtless in a soundproof room, blared music andscreamed as he came up with deep insights to help the Underwoods use data to win the election.

The reality is a bit more prosaic. Surveys show most data scientists spend most of their time cleaning and preparing data. They aren’t data scientists. They are data janitors. Of course a lot of science is like that (talk to anyone who has worked in a lab.)

Anyway, I’ve been hanging around people doing big data for over a decade now. I don’t write code and can’t do much math. So what am I?

There was a terrific article from Deloitte about the light quant. That is someone who knew enough data science and was a skilled communicator who could translate between the data science time and the C-suite decision-makers.

But I play a much broader role in the process than communicating results (not that that isn’t really important!) I help conceptualize the project. What are the problems people are trying to solve? This is sometimes not obvious. People don’t know what they don’t know. In discussing the surface problem, bigger problems can emerge.

I think a lot about the format and nature of the data. In many, many cases the really interesting information is unstructured or qualitative. What does it really mean and how do we best incorporate it? In some projects I have played a key role in collecting the data, but in the case of terrorism research much of the information is narrative – how do we meaningfully describe this numerically.

Then of course, when we do have results, we have to describe them and balance them against what is already known or believed.

We understand the world through stories. In addressing abstract problems, I often find myself asking for examples. At the core of the process I have described are stories. There is the story of the client. What are they saying about their workflow and challenges?

On so many interesting problems, the challenge is turning a story with fascinating details into a number or group of numbers. In my decade at UMIACS, I worked on projects modeling terrorist groups. Some things, like terrorist attacks were relatively easy to turn into numerical data (how many killed, codes for targets etc.) Other things, like information on the terrorist group’s public statements or their internal dynamics, were a bit more challenging to quantify. It is worth noting that computer scientists (and data scientists) tend to be interested in type. The analysts and SMEs tend to be interested in instance. The instance is a story, how to categorize the instance to a type without losing too much critical information is a hard challenge. The decisions about how this is done will shape the results – that too is part of the story.

When there are results, they must be considered in light of what is already known. What stories do we tell ourselves about this issue? How does the analysis inform these stories? Does it upend them, modify them, or confirm them. How confident can we be in the new findings? What are the broader organizational impacts of these findings for the client?

Making policies incorporate a combination of facts and values. Values are expressed through stories. Relying only on cold hard facts will not result in acceptable policies – values have to be part of the equation.

Answering any and all of these questions requires listening to and telling stories.

I guess I am a Data Storyteller.

Will you need a Chief Roboticist or a Chief Robotics Officer

As I've mentioned elsewhere, your humble blogger is thinking a bit about technology policy issues and, in particular, robotics. So here's a little musing about the different role of the chief robotics officer (CRO) and chief roboticist.

Definitions
First, a critical definition. A robot is system using the sense/think/act paradigm. That is it takes in information about the world, can process that information (and learn from it), and then act on it. In processing the information it is using nondeterministic algorithms which is a complicated way of saying we cannot predict exactly what it will do in a given situation. It will learn from data it has collected and determine the best course of action. This is what makes robots particularly interesting - it is the difference between automated (which is predictable) and autonomous. The classic example is if a self-driving car causes an accident, who is at fault? The vehicle itself had autonomy, it may not have been the programmer's error.


While self-driving cars and Rosie from the Jetson's are examples of robots in the public consciousness, potential items falling under the definition described above are vast. Lots of IoT. A smart home systems that took in data about people's comings and goings and the weather might learn to adjust temperature, likes etc. That would be a robot.

The CRO would be inward facing, overseeing the organization's robots, while the Chief Roboticist would be outward facing, making policy decisions facing the broader world. There would be significant overlapping expertise and in some agencies the two hats might be worn by the same person. But in most large agencies, the jobs would be very different. Consider two examples.

FDA as a Case Study
The FDA regulates drugs, medical devices, and (in conjunction with the Department of Agriculture) oversees the safety of the nation's food supply. The FDA will, as robots become more ubiquitous, almost certainly employ them in various tasks ranging from building maintenance and security, to laboratory work, and in conducting inspections. The Chief Robotics Officer will need to think deeply about establishing frameworks for purchasing robots that can best serve the agency's mission. Some of these systems will be highly specialized, say for food inspection. Others, such as custodial systems, will probably be commercial (with certain modifications.) One critical issue will be the proprietary nature of the data these systems might handle (robots are inherently big data systems). Regulating the pharmaceuticals and other industries, the FDA has access to very valuable corporate data that must be handled securely and with discretion. In short it will be a hard, complicated job.

The FDA's real role with robotics however, will be in regulating medical devices - many of which will be robots. Imagine a smart insulin pump or surgical system? The FDA's Chief Roboticist will be advising the agency on how to determine if these systems are safe and effective. As mentioned above, these are non-deterministic systems - it cannot be known exactly how the system will react in a given situation. The challenge of validating this type of system, devising a testing regime that ensures it is safe and effective. This will also entail considering cyber-security and privacy issues (among a whole host of other challenges.) In doing so, she will also be considering how this shapes the medical robotics industry as a whole.

One person might be able to do this job. But it seems unlikely. There is overlap between the skills needed (a deep knowledge of robotics) but also a lot of variation. There may be smaller agencies where one individual handles both roles. In the FDA there may not need to be a CRO - although some organizational expertise in managing the robot pool seems appropriate. But, the Chief Roboticist would play a pretty significant role as robotics played an increasing role in health-care.

Other Examples
An even more extreme case might be the Federal Trade Commission. In its mission to protect American consumers, the FTC may need to develop significant expertise in robotics and require a seasoned Chief Roboticist. (They have recruited deeply experienced Chief Technologists.) Their need for a Chief Robotics officer will be far more limited (although not negligible - robots may be useful in their investigations, for example.)

For a counter example, consider the EPA. In monitoring and protecting the environment, the EPA may run a pretty extensive fleet of robots. The Chief Robotics Officer will have a critical role in understanding the agency's mission (current events aside) and working with manufacturers to build systems to fulfill this mission. The EPA may not need a Chief Roboticist. There could be environmental concerns about the manufacture and disposal of robots (which will have all kinds of complicated parts involving rare and toxic materials). But the Chief Roboticist role will probably not be central to the agency.

Large police departments and agencies (like the FBI or a big-city or state police department) may be an example where the CRO and Chief Roboticist are equally important. Police departments may deploy robots for a vast range of issues to ensure public safety (as well as internal uses in logistics and forensics.) Because of the sensitivity of the police role, ensuring these systems operate lawfully and safely will be a critical issue. To take one example, robotic law enforcement systems may not be able to exercise the discretion that human police officers can (consider speed cameras - or don't, I hate them.) Presumably police robots will not be given access to lethal force, but establishing policies around use of non-lethal force (tear gas or restraints) will be a multi-faceted challenge. The Police CRO will have a tough job.

The Police Chief Roboticist will also have a tough gig. Robots will be damaged in crimes, gather evidence of crimes, and be used to commit crimes. Robo-forensics will be a field and it will require extensive technical knowledge but also a grasp of the legal issues. Further, police will need to make policy around robots in public spaces that could endanger or otherwise impact public safety. Can one person do both of these jobs? In a large organization that seems difficult.

Private Sector Needs
Your humble blogger does not know much about the private sector. But this framework may be apt. Consider an automobile manufacturer: the CRO would have the challenging technical role of obtaining autonomous manufacturing robots, while the Chief Roboticist would wrestle with the vast complexities around self-driving vehicles. These are two very different jobs.

Just as with government agencies, many companies may not need both positions. A hospital will need a CRO, but outward facing policies on robotics may not be an issue. Alternately, an advisory firm may not have much need for robots internally, but may develop expertise to better inform their clients.

Concluding Thoughts

First, I have to observe that there is another possible position: Chief Robot. This will be the senior robot in the organization, elected to represent robotic needs. This is... a long way off.

But seriously who cares? In my paper on robotics governance I observed:

Bureaucracies are bundles of programs and routines, carrying out systematic operations. Bureaucracies, given broad goals, have the ability to act autonomously and develop programs and responses.

This raises an interesting question: are bureaucracies robots? Bureaucracies take in information about the world. They process that information. They can then act on that information, sometimes in surprising and unexpected (and occasionally counter-productive) ways.

If organizations are sort of giant robots, thinking through their configuration is important. What kinds of capabilities will they need? Robotics has the potential to be a profoundly transformative technology. Many organizations (public and private) will approach it in a haphazard manner. Government IT has often suffered from this approach (I imagine plenty in the private sector have as well). Thinking through these issues and developing the appropriate capabilities beforehand would only be prudent.

Finally, in response to my observation about bureaucracies being giant robots my boss wrote in the margin: "The world's slowest robot."

-->