US Devises 'Influence Games' For Working with Syria, Levant
The US Army's Asymmetric Warfare Group wants a better grasp of its vulnerabilities, those of its adversaries and the consequences of US actions. Barbara Slavin reports on the body''s "competitive influence" game that will focus on the crisis in Syria. “You can tie every threat group around the world to the Levant,” said one participant.
When is a war game not a war game? When it is a “competitive influence” game.
For three days earlier this month (May 15-17), more than 100 people met in Annapolis, Md. to brainstorm about devising such an exercise. The actual game is to be played this summer at an air base in Florida.
If current trends hold, the focus will be on the crisis unfolding around the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria. Experts will represent the players, who will include Syria’s neighbors, the United States, NATO and other interested parties such as Russia and Iran that might impact Syrian events and be affected by them in return.
Surprised all too often by nominally less well-equipped adversaries in Afghanistan and Iraq, the US military wants to know more about what it is getting into before it has to fight another war. It especially wants to know if there are non-military ways of dealing with crises.
