Does the U.S. Suffer From a Narrative Gap?

Is the problem the messaging or the message?

Photo by David Beale on Unsplash

Until recently, Mike Studeman served as a U.S. Rear Admiral in naval information warfare. Before that he was the Commander of the Office of Naval Intelligence. And before that he was the Director of Intelligence (J2) at U.S. Indo-Pacific Command. If anyone has a bead on information warfare in the world, it’s him.

Late last month the newly-retired Studeman took to the pages of the Financial Times to argue that the United States is losing the battle of strategic narratives to China:

Over the past 30 years, America’s information instrument has been neglected. If Washington is truly committed to competing against China and Russia, then we must marshal greater information powers to compete effectively in the battle of strategic narratives and expose disinformation and malign actions of authoritarian governments

The inconvenient truth is that Beijing has been running circles around us, flooding the global media with prompt, polished narratives. It promises connectivity, progress and prosperity through its Belt and Road Initiative and casts itself as a champion for globalisation. It aims to achieve global primacy through “discourse power”, gradually redefining the world order with concepts such as global security, development and civilisation initiatives, which are gaining traction in the UN and other international bodies. 

Beijing also incessantly throws shade on the US and the wider west. It assails western alliances such as Nato as anachronistic and accuses America of being the “black hand” behind the colour revolutions that leave countries in chaos, while alleged US attempts to exert hegemony are blamed for suffering in the Middle East. American military operations in the Pacific are portrayed as provocative and disruptive efforts to encircle and contain China. Beijing adeptly engages in psychological warfare with slogans such “the east is rising, the west is declining” — propaganda that resonates in much of the global south, earning China tremendous influence.

By comparison, US information operations are subdued. We have placed less emphasis on training information professionals to engage in information warfare at the speed and scale required to deal with our adversaries….

The net result is that US strategic messaging is often weak, late or absent. The supreme irony is that Beijing has more empowered people in its police state to engage in lies and propaganda than America in an open democracy allows its people to deploy the truth. If we don’t figure out how to do a better job of rapidly sharing facts and describing reality to domestic and international audiences, then Chinese fiction, fabrications and falsehoods will continue to fill the information vacuum.

Studeman’s specific laments are grounded in the nature of the national security and foreign policy bureaucracy. Much like actual U.S. fighting forces, he wants lower-level theater-level information officers to have more autonomy and alacrity in responding to the information warfare of others — or even initiating information campaigns.

And fair enough! The hard-working staff here at Drezner’s World has taken an interest in strategic narratives in recent years. It is certainly in U.S. interests to put forward a compelling narrative and improve its communications strategy.

But reading Studeman’s op-ed, three things kept gnawing at me. First, I am old enough to remember past efforts to improve U.S. public diplomacy. Contra Studeman’s claims, the first Bush administration invested a lot of effort into this venture. It didn’t work very well, but not because it was neglected! Similarly, during the Cold War there was a lot of hair-pulling about whether the United States was doing a good job at information campaigns. It was only in retrospect that commentators felt good about the U.S. performance. In other words, Studeman’s lament is nothing new.

The second thing is Studeman’s claim that slogans like “the east is rising, the west is declining” are examples of “adept psychological warfare.” It sounds like a transparently empty slogan to me! I am skeptical that such a line persuades many of the validity of China’s narrative. Last year’s Pew Global Attitudes survey of trust in the two countries backs this up: “On balance, views of the U.S. are much more positive than views of China, and increasingly so.”

The final thing that gnawed at me, however, is whether the U.S. has a problem with its messaging… or with its message. This is true in the Pacific Rim, where efforts to produce U.S. led economic initiatives have foundered badly. It is also true in the Middle East, where U.S. hypocrisy over Gaza and Ukraine has been on manifest display as of late. It is very true inside Washington, where the United States Congress cannot pass a foreign aid bill.

Of course, hypocrisy is not the same thing as cynicism, and Russia and China possess copious amounts of the latter. Maybe Studeman is correct that a more pro-active U.S. information strategy would lead to better narratives.

The deeper problem, however, is not about the U.S. ability to communicate its message. It’s about the eroding appeal of the message itself. And that requires a much longer conversation and debate than an FT op-ed can provide.