Feral Jundi

Friday, October 3, 2008

Building Snowmobiles: Text Messaging and Counterinsurgency

Filed under: Building Snowmobiles,Technology — Tags: , , — Matt @ 2:27 PM

      A couple of posts back I mentioned that Feral Jundi signed on with Twitter, a mini-blogging site.  I made a mention about connecting your phone to your Twitter account to receive updates via Short Message Service(SMS) or text messaging.  The reason why you would want to do something like this, is to be instantly updated with news that is important to you, and to communicate back instantly.  It is a simple concept, but extremely powerful.  So I wanted to expand on this topic of text messaging, and try and tie this into how this could apply to counterinsurgency. So in the tradition of FJ, let’s build a snowmobile. 

     The stories I have posted below are a collection of text messaging usage throughout the world and in the various war zones out there.  From recruiting and propaganda, to putting out an alert to protect the citizenry from attack, text messaging is becoming widely used tool of the populations of the world.  And in my view, if text messaging is used correctly, we can certainly enhance our counterinsurgency efforts in this war. 

     Surprisingly, cellphones and the companies that sell the devices and plans are in wide use in such places like Iraq or Afghanistan.  These local populations with phones are making calls and they are text messaging one another, and this is what makes the cell phone an excellent tool to use in order to connect with these populations.  And believe me, I have seen Iraqis text message one another with the same excitement and enthusiasm as anyone here in the US or world.  SMS is easy to use, and the technology is built into most phones that are used out there–and people like using it.  I think it’s that ‘passing notes’ in class feeling, when you text someone, and it can be fun.  It is also a universal feeling, and if you can read and push buttons on a phone, then you get to play.  But how do you get people involved and interested in text messages?  

     My answer to that is entertainment.  You take the most popular past time of that country, and you find ways to take advantage of this interest with text messaging.  Much like American Idol here in the US, where viewers could text message votes and get involved with the process, you could apply something similar to Iraq or Afghanistan.  It doesn’t have to be some American Idol thing–maybe soccer or something that the local population is excited about.  The point is to get the population to use that phone as a tool to connect, and then start expanding on this connection with other means that could be valuable to a SMS Counterinsurgency(COIN) plan.

     I say SMS COIN plan, because anyone serious enough about connecting with a population and wanting to protect it, should exploit all and any methods to connect with that population.   The technologies are there, the populations know how to use it(or could easily learn), and war planners and commanders on the front lines should not be afraid to take advantage of this.  But it must be done right, and there has to be a plan.

     Now how could a planner use text messaging to their advantage.  Well, the first step is to ‘learn’ from others throughout the world, and see what works. Build that snowmobile, and find the experts to make it happen.  I like the warning system that the Israelis are using for oncoming missiles–protecting the local population.  I like the Crime Stoppers use of text messaging as a tip line for criminals–population turning in the enemy.  I like the use of text messaging to send recruitment notices–reaching out to the population for manpower.  The only limit is your imagination as to the ways you could connect with the local population and find ways to protect them as well as entertain them.  The goal should be to empower that population, and make them feel a part of the process.  Use the local radio stations, and get people to vote in polls via text message about important issues.  Or they could vote for their favorite soccer team, or send a text about the Taliban who are currently ravaging their village.  

     The other angle with text messaging/cellphones is when people fall in love with that technology, they tend to protect it.  So once folks really enjoy the power of connecting, and someone threatens to take it away or destroys it, then the people will rise up.  And in the opening story below, Dennis O’Brien of cellphone company Digicel discusses the power of the people in Haiti. He describes how the people were rioting against the government, and spared all the Digicel cellphone stores and towers.  The reason why, was because the cellphone was a major part of their life.  From business deals, to affairs of the heart, to discussing politics with others, and so on–the cellphone was a prized and extremely useful tool for daily life in Haiti.  That is why they protected it, because they feared losing that vital tool of life and freedom.  I can only imagine how I would react if someone destroyed my cellphone service, or even my internet service–I would not be happy.

     These are just a few ideas below, but you get the basic idea.  And just last night, I was using text messaging to send in a vote in a poll about the US Vice Presidential debates.  I did it because I wanted to show a reaction to events, and voice an opinion. I wanted to connect and feel a part of the process. Like I said, if you are a war planner on the ground, and you do not have a SMS COIN plan, you are missing out on a huge opportunity to connect with the local populations.  –Head Jundi 

SMS in Kenya

A message to Kenyans from their government via cellphone and text messaging(SMS).

Short Message Service Wikipedia

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August 23rd, 2008 at 11:59 pm

Bringing Cell Phones To the Third World (an excerpt from this article about Digicel and it’s owner Denis O’Brien)

He sums up his strategy thusly: “Get big fast. [Damn] the cost. Be brave. Go over the cliff. [The competition] doesn’t have the balls.” O’Brien doesn’t let government obstructionism or corruption deter him. He dots countries with cell towers, sometimes before rulers even grant a licence, then slashes the price of mobiles on opening day to get the masses using them fast.

It’s a bet that poor people who have never had phone service before won’t let the politicians take their phones away without a fight. Thus does O’Brien avoid the fate of many Western investors in corrupt, violent countries – being forced to sell out on the cheap.

That’s what happened to Royal Dutch Shell’s oil well on Russia’s Sakhalin Island. In an April riot in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, the mob not only spared Digicel stores from its burning and looting but even gathered in front of a few of them and cheered. Says a jubilant O’Brien, as he reads an e-mail on the news, “They’re calling us the Company of the People.”

Story Here

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Telephone Communications in Afghanistan

As of 2007, eight out of 100 people have access to a telephone. Mobile communications are improving because of the introduction of two wireless carriers into this developing country. There are over 1.4 Million cellular lines in the country. In 2007, Communication Minister, Amirzai Sangin, announced that 150,000 new fixed-telephone-lines would be installed in the 4 major cities of Afghanistan in one year. The project would be completed at the cost of 40 million US dollars, which will be provided from the development budget of the Afghan Ministry of Communications. There are also five or more VSAT’s installed in Kabul, Kandahar, Herat, Mazari Sharif, and Jalalabad, providing international and domestic voice/data connectivity. The international calling code for Afghanistan is +93. The following is a list of cellular phone companies in the country:

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Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Building Snowmobiles: Incident Command System for Military Companies and Enhancing COIN

Filed under: Building Snowmobiles,Industry Talk — Tags: , , , , , — Matt @ 3:16 PM

   This is a subject close to my heart, and I think it deserves some attention.  I respect Peter Singer’s work and I have read Corporate Warriors, and it was an interesting book about the history of security contracting. I have also read his article about the harm military contractors are doing to the current counterinsurgency(COIN) operations and it has troubled me to some degree.  The article makes the case as if there is no place in today’s wars for the private industry and that we are not worth the effort.  I guess my argument is that we do have a place in today’s wars, and we are performing crucial services for the US Government.   But I do agree that we could be doing some harm to the overall COIN strategy and that we need to find some solutions on how to work together more efficiently.  

 

     Now my focus will be more about the operational relationship out in the field between the military companies and the military.  I cannot even begin to talk about contracts or money or all of that other stuff.  But what I can talk about is the operational relationship of the two, and some possible solutions to get us all on the same sheet of music so we can only enhance the war effort, and not hinder it. 

 

     As for my background, I have worked for the US Government in one capacity or another for most of my adult life. But the most relevant job to this discussion I held was as a smokejumper and forest fighter in the US wild land fire services.  I fought forest fires with the Bureau of Land Management and with the Forest Service, and I witnessed the use of thousands of private industry service providers doing an amazing job providing support to these incidents.  From cooking food, to cleaning clothes, to providing shelter, all the way up to fighting fires from the land and air–the private fire fighting industry does it all.  I also think today’s military companies and military can learn a lot from this relationship. 

 

     What was most unique with this relationship is the fact that the services of these fire contractors could be called up at a moments notice through a dispatch center, and released at a moments notice through what is called a ‘call when needed contract’.  And this call up was all based on the Incident Commander’s decision(the manager of the fire).  If this commander of the fire did not need those services anymore, he would just tell them that they were no longer needed and inform the Dispatch Center that they have been released from incident.  There is something remarkably simplistic about this system of command that the military companies and military can learn a lot from.  

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Friday, August 22, 2008

Building Snowmobiles: Self-sufficiency in a Box

Filed under: Afghanistan,Building Snowmobiles,Iraq — Tags: , , , , , — Matt @ 10:31 AM

     I have written about this before on Feral Jundi, and I always like going back to it.  This concept is definitely ‘building snowmobiles’ material, because it brings together so many interesting concepts and makes sense at so many levels.  I also think we will see these ‘Self-sufficiency in a Box’ concepts continue to expand as technologies and efficiencies of solar, wind and storage devices increase.  

 

     What gets me about Iraq and Afghanistan, is that they are solar and wind heavens. So systems that take advantage of that are great. And if a Skybuilt unit can generate 5 KW a day, that is pretty cool. (compared to 10 kw a day for a typical generator-just buy two Skybuilt units)

 

     But the most important concept out of all of this, is the loss of lives because of attacks on convoys. I have had several of my comrades killed in Iraq, in convoy operations. Every military veteran of the conflict there, can say the same thing. IED and EFPs have done their damage, and the targets were usually massive supply convoys that supplied the insurgent’s diet of targets. It just killed me to know that the camp I worked out of, had supply convoys feeding it once and sometimes twice a week. That guys were risking their lives to get fuel and water and food to our camps. We all thanked them for the service, but I often times thought “isn’t there another way?”

 

     Not to mention the fact that oil is one of the main reasons why we care so much about the middle east in the first place.

 

     So at these sites, I would have loved to have seen water processing plants and solar/wind farms. And to think, one key mortar impact could easily take out a generator and screw over the entire camp. A power farm with various sources of energy spread out throughout the camp makes way more tactical sense. And why not drill for water at a camp?

 

     The water issue really gets me, because water was responsible for more convoys than fuel for remote camps. We should be drilling for water, or processing water from local sources. And I even think recycled water should be looked at. And with the hot sun, solar distillers is totally possible in Iraq and Afghanistan. And during the winter, there is the snow in Afghanistan. The point being, convoys for fuel and water should be reduced to a once a month thing, and not a once or twice a week thing. It would save lives and it would make operational sense, both for contractors and for the military.

 

   The last thing I wanted to mention is that Afghanistan will be the war zone to watch in the coming months and years.  The enemy has switched gears and is focusing on that battlefield. Our relations with Iran and Russia are increasingly strained, and we are pouring more troops into the region that will need more logistical support.  Not to mention the NATO presence, which Russia will no-doubt take an interest in messing with by proxy.  So to sum it up, I am predicting a surge of attacks on supply trains coming in and out of Afghanistan, which could also mean a surge of private security to protect those convoys.  And with that said, we must increase our self-sufficiency out there in order to minimize the logistics tail.  –Head Jundi

 

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SkyBuilt Power MPS solar/battery system.

 

Link to Story

 

Commanders in Iraq Urgently Request Renewable Power Options

 

27-Jun-2007 06:19 EDT

 

On July 25, 2006 Al-Anbar commander and U.S. Marine Corps Maj. Gen. Richard Zilmer submitted an MNF-W priority 1 request pointing to the hazards inherent in American supply lines, and noted that the up to many of the supply convoys on Iraq’s roads (up to 70%, by some studies) are carrying fuel. Much of that fuel isn’t even for vehicles – it’s for diesel generators used to generate power at US bases et. al. In response, the document requests alternative energy solutions to power US forward operating bases… and the US military looks like it will act on the request.

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Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Building Snowmobiles: Chess Boxing?

Filed under: Building Snowmobiles — Tags: , , — Matt @ 12:17 PM

  Ok, I am sure I will get a lot of crap over this one, but I thought it was intriguing.  As ridiculous as it sounds and looks, I imagine that it is incredibly difficult to think between rounds of boxing to play the chess game.  And imagine replacing boxing with mixed martial arts, and now you will bring in the American market?  Or they will laugh it out of the ring. But back to the concept and it’s potential value.

   Anytime you can add stress to your decision making process during your training is a good thing.  It sounds like with this sport, the biggest hurdle for the athletes is to be able to control their adrenaline to play the chess game after the boxing part.  That has great application to the security and military industry.  To be able to think out a strategy while completely pumped up on the ‘go juice’ is a very tough thing to do.  For some, it increases their ability to think quickly and for others it clouds it because of a total adrenal overload(fog of war, tunnel vision, slowed time).  And with our industry, that kind of situation can happen in the form of an ambush.  Your adrenaline is pumping and you have to think quick to save your life and the lives of others.  Sure you fall back on your training, but you still have to work out the problem when your brain is in overdrive.  

     But yes, I kind of agree that this would be ridiculous to watch.  But to participate in such a sport would really add a new level to the concept of refining or working out your tactical thought processes.  Sure you can do pushups in between firing your weapon at the range to add stress.  But imagine trying to play a game of chess between sets of all out boxing or mixed martial arts? Now that is building snowmobiles.(with the music of Wu Tang Clan playing in the background)LOL  –Head Jundi

 

Chess Boxing

A chess boxing match in Berlin, 2007

Chess boxing

From Wikipedia

Chess boxing is a hybrid sport which combines the sport of boxing with games of chess in alternating rounds. Chess boxing fights have been organized since early 2003. The sport was started when Dutch artist Iepe Rubingh, inspired by fictional descriptions of the sport in the writing of Enki Bilal, organized actual matches. To succeed players must be both skilled chess players and skilled boxers.

 Structure and rules

A match between two opponents consists of up to eleven alternating rounds of boxing and chess sessions, starting with a four-minute chess round followed by two minutes of boxing and so on. Between rounds there is a one minute pause, during which competitors change their gear. The form of chess played is speed chess in which each competitor has a total of twelve minutes for the whole game. Competitors may win by knockout, checkmate, a judge’s decision or if their opponent’s twelve minutes of chess time elapses. If a contestant does not make a move in the chessround, he will be issued a warning by the referee. At the second warning the contestant will be disqualified.

 History

The concept was envisioned in 1992 by cartoonist Enki Bilal, and a match of chess boxing was a major plot point of his graphic novel Froid Équateur. Iepe Rubingh, a Dutch artist, was inspired by Bilal’s book and brought the concept to life in the spring of 2001, fighting under the name, ‘Iepe the Joker’.

Chess boxing was featured in the 1991 Finnish movie Uuno Turhapuro – herra Helsingin herra, where Uuno plays blindfold chess against one person using a hands-free telephone headset while boxing another person. It is not known whether Bilal was aware of the movie.

In addition, there is a 1979 movie by director Joseph Kuo called “Ninja Checkmate” whose USA dubbed version was known as “Mystery of Chess Boxing”. It does not feature chessboxing as understood in this article. This movie is likely an inspiration for the Wu-Tang Clan song “Da Mystery of Chessboxin'” from their first album Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) (1993).

The sport is governed by the World Chess Boxing Organisation (WCBO), whose motto is “Fighting is done in the ring and wars are waged on the board.” The first world championship was held in Amsterdam in 2003 and was won by Iepe Rubingh himself. The First European Chess Boxing Championship took place in Berlin on 1 October 2005 when Tihomir Atanassov Dovramadjiev of Bulgaria defeated Andreas ‘D’Schneider of Germany after the latter conceded defeat in the seventh round.

On April 21, 2006, about 400 people gathered in the Gloria Theatre, Cologne, to see two chessboxing matches. Zoran ‘the Priest’ Mijatovic played the Queen’s Gambit. Zoran’s opponent, 37-year old former UN Peacekeeper Frank ‘Anti Terror’ Stoldt, was well prepared and controlled both the chess board and the boxing rounds. In the seventh round (a chess round) Mijatovic was three moves away from being checkmated, so he resigned. 

In April 2008, the World Chess Federation FIDE posted a video on its website in which its president Kirsan Ilyumzhinov played a friendly chess boxing match in Elista.

Also in April 2008 the UK’s first Chess Boxing club was launched in London by Great Britain Chess Boxing Organisation founder Tim Woolgar.

A 19-year old Russian Mathematics student Nikolai Sahzin won the title of “World Champion” in chess boxing by defeating Frank Stoldt in Berlin in July of 2008. Stoldt resigned in the 5th round after losing his queen.

Required chess skill

World-class chess-boxers are not just good boxers but are skilled chess players as well. For example, Sahzin has an Elo rating of around 1900 while European chess boxing champion Tihomir Atanassov Dovramadjiev has won multiple major chess tournaments.

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Building Snowmobiles: OODA and You by Robert Greene

Filed under: Building Snowmobiles,Tactical Thought Process — Tags: , , , — Matt @ 12:14 PM

   snowmobile

     This is a new category that I am really excited about here at FJ.  Colonel John Boyd is highly inspirational not only to me, but to thousands out there that are into radical thought processes and winning the fight.  He also was able to change the Pentagon from the inside out with his ideas, which says a lot about his ideas.  So in celebration of his ‘building snowmobiles’ concept, I will try to find the various idea people out there that are putting the pieces together to win.

     Also, if you want to get a good sense of what Boyd was about, there are several videos and audio recordings of him and his briefings.  Just click here to check them out.

      This article below, is a prime example of an idea guy ‘building snowmobiles’ out of Boyd’s OODA Loop.  In the future, I will seek out individuals who are creating new ideas out of the various pieces out there.  How this applies to the security industry, is that we are always trying to assemble the pieces in our area of operations and put them together to find solutions to defeat the enemy.  To us, winning is protecting our client.

    In a larger sense, security companies are also building snowmobiles by winning bids on contracts.  They do this by constantly constructing plans and strategies within their own organizations to be more efficient and cost effective than the next guy.  And companies are constantly reworking their capabilities(building snowmobiles) and doing their best to deliver excellent services so they can keep those contracts.

     On a personal level, we as security professionals are constantly evolving.  We must never say we are an expert, because that would imply that we know everything there is to know about a subject.  Instead you should always have the mind frame of having a firm foundation with the concepts, but always willing to look outward and inward and learn.  To continue to learn about yourself and to learn about your enemy.  And we are always taking all of this information and assembling it into what we are and how we do business or basically building snowmobiles. –Head Jundi

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(This is the break down of the building snowmobiles thought experiment by one of Boyd’s associates.)

 On to the experiment. Imagine four scenarios: someone skiing, someone power-boating, someone bicycling, and a boy playing with a toy tank. Break down each domain into its component parts: For skiing, there would be snow, chairlifts, skis, hot chocolate, and so on. Within their domain, the parts have directly identifiable relationships with one another. But scramble together the parts from the four domains, and suddenly it’s hard to determine any relationships at all. We are thrown into chaos.

Now, Spinney instructs, take one part from each scene: From skiing, select the skis; from power boating, the motor; from bicycling, the handlebars; and from the boy with his toy tank, the treads. What do these elements have to do with one another? At first, seemingly nothing — because we still think of them in terms of their original domains. But bring the parts together, and you’ve used your creative pattern-recognition skills to build … a snowmobile! “A winner,” Boyd concluded, “is someone who can build snowmobiles … when facing uncertainty and unpredictable change.”

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 OODA Loop and You

February 24, 2007

by Robert Greene

A few weeks ago I gave a talk at a company convention in southern California. This company has offices worldwide, is very successful in its line of work, but on the horizon are some dangers. They brought me in to address those dangers. The specifics here do not matter much, only to say that, like a lot of companies that were successful in the 80s and on up to the present, they have come to rely upon a particular business model that is part circumstance and part design.

Loosely put, their upper-tier employees operate more like entrepreneurs, each one out for him or herself. Each office tends to think of itself as an island, competing with the other branches across the globe. This works to some extent, as these entrepreneurs are very motivated to expand the business. On the other hand, it makes it very difficult to create an overall esprit de corps.

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