George Packer, Know The Enemy

George Packer, in his December 18 article in The New Yorker, wonders whether social scientists can redefine the "war on terror."

He asks this question because a social scientist, an Australian by the name of David Kilcullen is being asked to do just that by the State Department's coordinator for counterterrorism, Henry Crumpton.

According to Kilcullen, the war on terror would be better defined as a global counterinsurgency. As Packer writes, to Kilcullen, "a war on terror suggests an undifferentiated enemy." He argues that the U.S. needs to avoid mapping the various conflicts around the world onto a global jihad because it will be far easier in the long run to address local grievances. As Packer reports Kilcullen saying: "Let's not talk about bin Laden's objectives - let's talk about your objectives. How do we solve that problem? You don't play to the enemy's global information strategy of making it all one fight."

As Packer writes, in Kilcullen's view, this fight is less about religion or ideology and more about social networks. It is one's friends, family and associates who will ultimately determine which side somebody ends up on. To combat this war then, Kilcullen believes that the U.S. has to establish competing networks - of friendly mosques, community leaders, professional associations - in order to provide a social context that enables people to choose a way other than jihad.

In his view, social scientists are the ideal persons to identify these individuals and alternative networks but there's one problem. Most social scientists are unwilling to assist the U.S. government, a legacy of the Vietnam War era.

Packard interviews one of the few who is willing to do so, an anthropologist who works for the Pentagon, Montgomery McFate. She describes herself as a rebellious daughter of "hippie parents" who says she grew up believing that the Cold War was just a "bunch of lies the government fed us to keep us paranoid." Her rebellion began, she says, when she finally realized that "there was a thing called the Cold War, and we nearly lost. And there was no guarantee that we were going to win."

Since 9/11, as she told Packer, she has been on an "evangelical mission" to get the Department of Defense to understand the importance of "cultural knowledge" because in her view, the government has no choice but to understand its adversaries.

The Pentagon seems to be convinced enough of the need for this type of knowledge that it has formed a Cultural Operations Research Terrain that is planning to send out teams of social scientists to act as cultural advisors in Iraq and Afghanistan. Steve Fondacara, the head of this effort, says it's difficult to recruit people for this mission. Aside from the not insignificant risks involved, many scientists still shun the idea of working for the U.S. government.

For McFate, the good she can do outweighs the risk, both personal and academic, "I see there could be misuse," she told Packer, "But I just can't stand to sit back and watch these mistakes happen over and over as people get killed, and do nothing."

While it does seem that social scientists could indeed help redefine the "war on terror" and in a positive way, perhaps the real question Packard was asking was will they?