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example, General Hal Hornburg, USAF, Chief of Air Combat Command, noted
that IO should be separated into three areas: manipulation of public perception,
computer network attack, and electronic warfare. Only the latter should be
assigned to the warfighter. 166
In a 2000 article in China Military Science, Dai stated that the means of
integrated application of information fighting will initially be the integrated
application of networks and electronics and that the key to gaining the initiative
in IO lies in the establishment of an “active offensive.” Dai also noted that an
IO is a series of operations with an information environment as the basic
battlefield condition, with military information and an information system as
the direct operational targets, and with EW and a computer network war as the
principal forms. 167 His emphasis on INEW was thus clear over three years ago.
Dai further noted that IOs are both confrontations focusing on forces
and arms and, more importantly, trials of strength focusing on knowledge and
strategies, meaning the emphasis should be on strategies. As technology has
reinforced human initiative, it has also highlighted the role played by a
confrontation of strategies. Now traditional strategic theories are being
rethought, new strategies mapped out, and new confrontation strategies
advanced. Dai speaks of:
Informationalized arms and equipment, which will, together with
information systems, sound, light, electronics, magnetism, heat, and so
on, turn into a carrier of strategies, thereby extending the field of
strategic thinking and application of strategies; enabling us to map out a
strategy from the angle of technology, technological equipment, and
techniques; and helping us study and develop some new methods for
applying a strategy by technological means. Thus, we’re able to map
out strategies aimed at applying technology to a battlefield; organically
integrate technology with a strategy; add strategic wings to technology
or scientific and technological genes to strategies; match technology
with strategies; make strategies complement technology; or apply
strategies in light of technology. 168
166 David Fulghum, “USAF Redefining Boundaries of Computer Attack,” Aviation
Week and Space Technology, Vol. 158, No. 9 (3 March 2003), p. 33.
167 Dai Qingmin, “Innovating and Developing Views on Information Operations,”
Zhongguo Junshi Kexue, [China Military Science] Vol. 13, No. 8 (20 August 2000),
pp. 72-77, from the FBIS website.
168 Ibid.
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