SMA Publications

Authors: Lt. Gen (Ret) Robert Elder (George Mason University); and Dr. Alexander Lewis (George Mason University)

This publication was released as part of the SMA project, “CENTCOM Regional and Population Dynamics in the Central Region.”  For more information regarding this project, please click here.

Report Abstract

With support from GTRI, GMU worked with Strategic Multilayer Assessment (SMA) Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to assess strategic risk to U.S. and partner interests in the Middle East caused by great power competition in the region. Strategic risk was decomposed into key risk influence factors which were then aligned with potential causal activities of China, Russia, Middle East countries, and the United States and its partners. These were used to construct a Timed Influence Net (TIN) model which provided a means to identify opportunities for the U.S. military and its inter-organizational partners to integrate military efforts and align military and non-military activities to avoid unacceptable strategic outcomes in the Middle East while pursuing U.S. national interests. Analysis using the TIN model suggests that economic (and to a lesser extent, political) shaping activities would appear to provide the greatest benefit to reduce U.S. strategic risk from great power competition, particularly actions that demonstrate long-term U.S. commitment to the region. From a military perspective, multinational, multi-agency response preparation exercises offer opportunities to improve regional security, promote western values and institutions, counter China and Russia influence, and demonstrate U.S. and western commitment to Middle East security. Potential Middle East cooperation opportunities (which could include China and Russia) include maritime security, counter-terrorism, counter-radicalism, anti-piracy, and counterproliferation.

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Authors: Lawrence Kuznar (NSI, Inc.); Ali Jafri (NSI, Inc.); and Eric Kuznar (NSI, Inc.)

This publication was released as part of the SMA project, “CENTCOM Regional and Population Dynamics in the Central Region.”  For more information regarding this project, please click here.

NSI Reachback Report Preview

The Middle Eastern region of the USCENTCOM area of responsibility (AOR) currently has approximately 20 million displaced persons, many of whom live in camps (see NSI Reachback question B3 response). These people have been uprooted, lost their livelihoods, and in many cases experienced severe trauma. These stresses place them at risk of radicalization as their frustrations and grievances increase with time. Research was conducted on counter-radicalization and deradicalization programs appropriate for use in refugee camps, returning a broad range of counter-radicalization measures, and screening and segregation protocols. Their validity, respective pros and cons, and implementation considerations are reported here. Determining the appropriate measures for protecting refugees, building community resilience, and triaging individuals who would most benefit from deradicalization programs can inform how USCENTCOM can take action, or support organizations that are engaged with deradicalization in refugee camps.

We used the following definitions of key terms throughout the report.

• Radicalization refers to a process whereby individuals (and even groups) develop a mindset that can, under the right circumstances and opportunities, increase the risk that he or she will engage in violent extremism or terrorism (Clutterbuck, 2015).

• Deradicalization implies that an individual change his or her thought and values toward more mainstream views. Actually changing one’s views and assessing one’s values is extremely difficult and presents ethical issues in light of US principles of freedom of conscience. A more achievable and less problematic goal is disengagement, which is a shift away from supporting violence as a means for achieving political or ideological goals; a person may retain radical views, but violent behavior, which is observable, can be mitigated. As a further consideration, much of what is addressed in this report is more properly defined as counter-radicalization, efforts to counter and prevent radicalization efforts by militants. Unfortunately, the term deradicalization is often used in research and policy variously to mean deradicalization, disengagement, and counter-radicalization. These distinctions will be made when possible in this report (Horgan, 2009; Clutterbuck, 2015).

The summarized, overall findings of this report are as follows:

1. An integrated system of interventions addressing individual through community needs is necessary for effective counter-radicalization and deradicalization efforts, bearing in mind that the primary goal is disengagement from violence (see Figure 1). Such an integrated system addresses deradicalization and disengagement at multiple social scales, enabling protection of individual refugees from radicalization up through building community resilience against radicalization.
2. Limiting the time spent in a camp setting is key to preventing the long-term radicalization of refugees. The average time refugees spend in camp is seventeen years, enough time for a generation to grow up with deep resentment and grievance that militants can use for radicalizing a population.
3. Screening instruments exist for triaging an individual’s degree of radicalization and propensity for violence. However, they are useful only in the hands of trained professionals.
4. One consideration concerning triage is the extent to which radicalized individuals and groups should be segregated from, versus dispersed into, the general population. There are pros and cons to each approach, and each has its associated ethical dilemmas. The competing benefits and risks need to be weighed when deciding what degree of separation or dispersal is appropriate for a particular camp; this report provides guidelines for weighing the pros and cons.

Drivers of radicalization occur in layers from the individual level up to the wider community that are mutually influencing. As a result, deradicalization and disengagement interventions designed to protect refugees from and build community resilience to radicalization must address these levels in mutually supportive ways. Consequently, this report will be structured as follows: The first two parts of the question of focus are answered in Section I, which addresses deradicalization and disengagement efforts. The third part of the question is answered in Section II, which describes practical matters of screening refugees and managing camps through segregation and dispersal mechanisms.

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The COVID Crisis: Implications for United States—and Global—Biosecurity

Authors | Editors: Giordano, J. (Georgetown University Medical Center/US Naval War College); Venkatram, V. (Georgetown University)

Special Topics Paper Preview

The United States’ (US) engagement of public health resources to meet the current SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) crisis has revealed vulnerabilities in testing and treatment components of biosecurity. Facing a severe shortage of available testing kits, the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) attempted to develop its own test for COVID-19, rather than following World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations for testing methods. The lack of tests has made it difficult to track exactly how many people within each state, as well as the US at-large have been affected, which has implications both for the extent of public health response, and considerations for approaches to stabilize and sustain the national economy.

Currently, COVID-19 testing utilizes a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method to analyze genetic material found within bodily fluids, to identify the presence of SARS-CoV-2 viral genetic material . However, PCR testing has incurred a number of problems: There have been considerable delays in making test results available to healthcare professionals and patients; the test may provide false negative results if administered soon after initial infection3; and PCR methods only assess the presence of a current viral infection, but do not afford information about whether the test recipient has recovered from prior COVID-19 infection.

This latter issue is important. Following infection, the immune system produces antibodies that are specific to the virus, and which remain functional after recovery. This antibody response also occurs in individuals who have been infected, but do not develop signs or symptoms of disease. Serological testing can assess the presence of viral-specific antibodies in a person’s blood, and in this way detect presence of an immune response (rather than the virus itself), thus identifying those individuals who will likely possess subsequent immunity – at least in the short-term. This makes serological testing extremely useful to enable more precise evaluation of viral spread, how many individuals are likely to be immune, and how many people remain vulnerable to infection. Such assessments would facilitate more accurate predictions about the trajectory of COVID-19, and could also be used to identify those individuals who are immune and could provide the human resources necessary to stabilize and sustain the economy.

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Author | Editor: Ali Jafri (NSI, Inc.)

This publication was released as part of the SMA project, “CENTCOM Regional and Population Dynamics in the Central Region.”  For more information regarding this project, please click here.

Download Publication

Please contact Sarah Canna (scanna@nsiteam.com) if you are interested in requesting access to this report.

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Authors: Dr. Asya Cooley (Oklahoma State University); Dr. Skye Cooley (Oklahoma State University); Dr. Robert Hinck (Monmouth College); Dr. Sara Kitsch (Monmouth College)

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Summary

This report supported SMA’s Integrating Information in Joint Operations (IIJO) project. For additional speaker sessions and project publications, please visit the IIJO project page.

• Effective communication is a complex and fragile human process that requires strategic design, careful monitoring, and responsive adaptation (Kreps & Neuhauser, 2010). This report reviews scholarship on public communication campaigns and provides insights into six characteristics of effective communication campaigns.
• SUPPORTED: Communication alone is not enough to change human behavior. Other social change mechanisms (discussed in Takeaway 1) are needed to complement communication efforts.
• TARGETED: Communication that targets specific behavior change is more effective than communication that targets categories of behavior.
• COMMITTED: Effective communication campaigns are committed.
• TAILORED: Effective communication efforts are highly tailored. They aim at first impacting intermediate variables (such as cognitive and affective variables) before attaining behavioral objectives.
• MULTI-DIMENSIONAL: There is no one way of measuring communication effectiveness. Multiple dimensions of effectiveness should be considered (such as contextual, political, ideological, and definitional effectiveness).
• MULTI-STEP: Changing individual behavior is not always the most effective strategy. Sometimes, effective communication campaigns are multi-step: They focus on changing social norms first, and then, through social norm change, influencing individual behavior.

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Author | Editor: Sabrina Polansky (Pagano) (NSI, Inc.); Sarah Canna (NSI, Inc.); and George Popp (NSI, Inc.)

This publication was released as part of the SMA project, “CENTCOM Regional and Population Dynamics in the Central Region.”  For more information regarding this project, please click here.

Report Preview

At the request of United States Central Command (USCENTCOM), SMA initiated a study to understand the strategic implications of destabilizing population dynamics within the Central Region. The effort examined drivers of instability in the region emerging from radicalization, great power competition, state-level instability, and black swan scenarios. This report integrates the research conducted by the teams listed on the front cover in response to USCENTCOM’s questions about great power competition. This report is intended to be a succinct, easily navigable representation of the exceptional work by the collective SMA team. Please click on the links embedded in the report to go directly to the research studies.

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• This series of USCENTCOM questions is largely oriented around processes of radicalization and deradicalization, which focus on deeply held beliefs. However, several studies suggested that a similar or greater emphasis on behavior (e.g., disengagement) may be a more practical goal in the short term.
• The questions also assume a reliable base of generalizable findings exists for deradicalization and reintegration programs, from which lessons learned can be derived and applied across a variety of contexts. This in turn presupposes effective assessments are in place using reliable metrics to determine each program’s degree of success. Yet the research base is both narrow and largely based on Western populations, which limits generalizability.
• Moreover, while there are some common components to programs generally thought to be successful, there is no one size fits all solution for deradicalization, reintegration, and reconciliation program design. Instead, programs should be tailored to the specifics of the context and target populations in question.
• Additionally, approaches should be both multi-level (e.g., addressing the needs of both individuals and communities) and harness the inputs of multiple organizations (e.g., taking a whole of government approach, working with US partners and local entities).
• Solutions also require both short and long time horizons. As an example of the latter, overcoming years of trauma and shifting people’s outlook on life in order to effect behavioral and especially attitudinal change are long-term processes and require sustained follow-up, including after-care.
• The research conducted for this effort suggests that addressing the root causes of trauma and recruitment to violent extremism, rather than taking a reactive approach, is the best long-term solution for breaking the cycle of radicalization. Nonetheless, several effective and impactful measures can be taken in the short term by, for example, drawing on insights from other fields to inform development of relatively low cost interventions that can be scaled to the resource environment (e.g., low or medium).

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Authors: Lawrence Kuznar (NSI, Inc.); and Eric Kuznar (NSI, Inc.)

This publication was released as part of the SMA project, “CENTCOM Regional and Population Dynamics in the Central Region.”  For more information regarding this project, please click here.

Executive Summary

NSI, Inc. interviewed seven subject matter experts and conducted additional background research in support of its analyses on Black Swans, Gray Rhinos, and current thinking about key factors and variables not typically included in political stability models (e.g., climate variables, the influence of illicit networks). The main topics of focus included water and food availability, sectarianism (ethnic and religious), refugee flows, illicit drug networks, illicit antiquities trade, and human trafficking. Summarized findings relating to each of these topics are presented in detail below.

Water and Food Availability

• The USCENTCOM area of responsibility (AOR) is largely dependent on groundwater resources, which are finite and dwindling. This is a looming threat because, as the region, especially the Middle East, runs out of water, the population will come under stress and may be forced to emigrate.
• Surface water is also in jeopardy due to decreasing rainfall. Furthermore, it is controlled by relatively few states in the Middle East and Central Asia, creating the potential for interstate conflict over this life-essential resource.
• The Middle East is dependent on foods and goods produced in other regions (particularly Eurasia and China). Many of these resources require continued access to water for sustained production. Therefore, droughts in these regions that impact food production levels will also have a profound impact on food insecurity and instability in the Middle East.
• A Black Swan-like danger is that when food and water availability cross critical thresholds, weak governance in the region may not be able to compensate, which could lead to rapid regime collapse and instability.
• The greatest potential for sudden, Black Swan-like effects is in the interactions between water availability, climate change, economic growth, urbanization, and population growth. Unit changes in these variables are multiplied, producing amplified effects on instability.

Sectarianism

• Religious and ethnic sectarianism is important in the region. However, these identities are not immutable and written in stone.
• Sectarianism rose after the Iranian Islamic Revolution in 1979, which alarmed Sunni Arab states in the region and intensified the Sunni/Shia Muslim division. Within Iraq, the US invasion in 2003, increased Sunni/Shia sectarianism within the country as those factions vied for power. However, the ethnic orders established in Middle Eastern and Central Asian countries may be weakening as their governments have failed to serve their own ethnic constituencies.
• A new generational division appears to be emerging between a disaffected younger population and the ethnically-based establishment.
• Sectarian divides exist but are not necessarily always salient and should not be assumed as such. They become active when elites use them to mobilize support in bids for power. Extremists will also try to mobilize support along sectarian lines.
• However, power typically flows upward from local strongmen and elites who serve as patrons for local followings. Those local leaders similarly gain benefits and serve provincial leaders, and so forth to national leaders. These power relations do not necessarily follow sectarian lines.
• The dynamics of these power relations can be different from country to country.
• Outside powers exert powerful influences as well; however, they do not always do so to their own benefit. Russian and Chinese ethnocentrism is manifest in different ways. Central Asians are dependent on remittances from labor in Russia but resent the discrimination they experience when working there. The Russian government appears to regard Central Asia as a region it could take back if it wanted to, which is probably a delusion. China tends to look down on non-Han, and while its investments are welcome in cash-strapped Central Asian states, China’s condescension, predatory loaning practices, and unfair labor practices may eventually create a serious backlash.
• The dependency of Central Asians on remittances from Russia means that political or economic instability in Russia is likely to have a ripple effect on Central Asia.

Refugee Flows

• Refugees are a destabilizing factor in the Middle East. Iran also houses millions of Afghan refugees.
• Countries that house large refugee populations are burdened and potentially destabilized, but they can also use them as political pawns by threatening to send them home or unleash them on other regions of the world.
• The water availability crisis in the region may ultimately cause mass migrations from the region if food availability and quality of life become no longer tenable. This is especially the case if regional governments are unable to cope with the effects of water and food vulnerability.

Drugs

• Illicit drug manufacturers and traffickers benefit from insecurity, and places like Syria and Afghanistan have attracted drug trafficking as a result. However, there is a reciprocal effect in that drug trafficking increases corruption and instability in these very states, creating a spiraling positive feedback loop of increasing drug trafficking and instability.
• Terrorist organizations, including Hezbollah (with Captagon), the Taliban (with opium), and ISIS (with Tramadol and nicotine) have benefitted from the instability they have sown and have been able to partially fund their operations through the illicit trade.
• The proliferation of the drug trade in the Middle East and Central Asia has led to extremely high drug abuse rates, taxing health care systems and damaging societies throughout the region.

Illicit Antiquities

• Political insecurity increases the looting of antiquities. Locals may opportunistically loot as law enforcement and antiquity site protection becomes diminished or insufficient, and terrorist groups may strategically loot to fund their operations and denigrate their enemies by destroying sacred sites.
• Because re-establishing security in unstable regions is difficult, the most effective way of preventing illegal antiquities trade and denying terrorists this income may be to target wealthy buyers in the West who make online purchases with near impunity.

Human Trafficking

• Human trafficking in the Middle East is often used to coerce labor and force women into prostitution and sexual slavery. This adds to the burden of grievances that fuel unrest in the region.
• Trafficking networks also fuel illegal migration outside of the region and destabilize regions like Europe.

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Authors: Michael Logan (University of Nebraska, Omaha); Lauren Zimmerman (University of Nebraska, Omaha); Gina Ligon (University of Nebraska, Omaha)

This publication was released as part of the SMA project, “CENTCOM Regional and Population Dynamics in the Central Region.”  For more information regarding this project, please click here.

Executive Summary

In this study, our research team examines the organizational sophistication, leadership, and tactical patterns of five high-priority Violent Extremist Organizations (VEOs) operating in the United States Central Command Area of Responsibility (USCENTCOM). The five VEOs include Hay’at Tahrir al- Sham (HTS), Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL), the Islamic State – Sinai Province (IS-SP), Jaish al-Adl, and Lebanese Hezbollah. We draw from both the leadership for the Extreme and Dangerous for Innovative Results project and the Global Terrorism Database to examine the organizational sophistication, leadership, and tactical patterns of each of the five VEOs. Our findings indicate that ISIL continues to pose the greatest threat to US interests in the CENTCOM AOR. In the near future, however, HTS and Lebanese Hezbollah may pose greater threats depending on dynamic actions.

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“Terrorism in the Philippines and Its Influence on Great Powers“

Authors | Editors: Logan, M. K. (University of Nebraska Omaha), Zimmerman, L. (University of Nebraska Omaha), Parker B. (University of Nebraska Omaha), & Ligon, G. S. (University of Nebraska Omaha)

Executive Summary

The UNO research team examined four active Violent Non-State Actors (VNSAs) and their capacity to disrupt Chinese influence in the Philippines. The four VNSAs include the Abu Sayyaf Group, the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters, the Moro National Liberation Front, and the New People’s Army. Drawing from both the Leadership for the Extreme and Dangerous for Innovative Results project and the Global Terrorism Database, they focused on each VNSA’s organizational and leadership capabilities as well as their tactical patterns between 2012 and 2017. Their findings suggest that, of the four VNSAs, the New People’s Army has both the motivation and resources to spoil Chinese influence in the Philippines.

LEADIR Dataset

In this study, they utilized the LEADIR project to assess differences in organizational sophistication and leadership decision-making between four VNSAs. Broadly speaking, the LEADIR project houses data on 280 active VNSAs and 299 of their corresponding leaders. For this effort, they examined degrees of organizational sophistication, which consists of three interlinked concepts: centralization, formalization, and specialization (Logan & Ligon, 2019). Centralization refers to the degree to which decision-making is concentrated. Formalization refers to the extent to which rules and procedures are used to govern the behaviors of members of the organization. Specialization refers to the degree to which the organization is composed of many interrelated parts. In general, VNSAs with high degrees of organizational sophistication are better equipped to engage in complex tactics and operations and coordinate with other VNSAs. At the leader-level, we assess the degree to which each leader has strategic compared to operational influence. Strategic influence refers to the degree to which a leader has influence over the goals or mission of the organization, whereas operational influence refers to the degree to which a leader has influence over the operational, day-to-day aspects of the organization (e.g., fundraising, weapons procurement). They argue that leaders with strategic influence have a unique capacity to motivate followers to sacrifice personally for the strategic goals of the organization.

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Author | Editor: Schon, J. (University of Florida); Yager, M. (NSI, Inc.)

Invited Perspective Preview

There are estimates that by 2050, roughly 150 million people will be internally displaced. This displacement is also expected to turn into international migration and refugee flows, as displaced populations search for areas where they have a chance to survive and prosper. In this piece, I will show that this is likely to increase the share of the world’s population living near country borders. With greater internal strains on countries, the resulting rapid urbanization rates pose important security threats. In addition, clustering populations around border areas may increase the threat of cross-border political violence. If governments continue responding to high levels of international migration with harsh border enforcement, including border closures, walls, and high-tech monitoring equipment, then they are likely to aggravate these risks. This piece argues that governments need to prepare for adverse effects of climate change by supporting the diverse arrays of adaptation and survival strategies that civilians may use according to their local contexts. This includes allowing people to be as mobile as they feel is necessary and providing options for seasonal migration.