A Military Deception Primer

Therefore when capable, feign incapacity; when active, in-activity. When near, make it appear that you are far away; when far away, that you are near.

                                                                              ----- Sun Tzu, The Art of War.

Introduction

Deception is an accepted and integral part of any rational conduct of war. When all other elements of power are roughly equal, deception will magnify the strength of an army or enable it to use its strength more economically. It can help in achieving a quicker victory at a lower cost with lesser casualties. Strong armies need not waste their strength or increase their own costs because they are stronger. A wise commander should therefore make a conscious effort to systematically incorporate military deception into all plans.

The Philosophy Of Deception

The ultimate goal of deception measures should be to make the enemy quite certain, very decisive and very wrong. In case the stress is only upon making the enemy ‘very wrong’ the deception will not be convincing and he may see through it. Hence, there is a requirement to feed the enemy ‘truths’ and ‘half-truths’ which lead him onto a course which is wrong.

The perfect deception plan should be like a jigsaw puzzle. Pieces of information should reach the enemy in such a way as to convince him that he has discovered them by accident. If he puts them together himself he is far more likely to believe that the intended picture is a true one.

The Aim Of Deception

• To Misdirect The Enemy’s Attention/War Effort.  The aim is to make the enemy concentrate his forces in the wrong place. In case the enemy is made to violate the principle of ‘Concentration of Forces in Space’, he will move his forces to the wrong place enabling us to achieve superiority at the point where we want to achieve success.

• To Make Him Waste His Resources. To make the enemy violate the principle of ‘Economy of Force’. The aim is to cause the enemy to waste his resources such as time, ammunition, weapons, manpower, fuel etc. either in unimportant directions or on non-existent targets.

• To Surprise The Enemy. The aim is to create a situation which will catch the enemy off guard and unprepared for action when it comes. A variety of deceptive ploys dullthe senses of the enemy and create an impression that no offensive plans are entertained by the deceiver.

Basic Types Of Deception

• To Deceive The Enemy Regarding Intentions.  This is done to try to conceal the actual plans and goals of the deceiver. This can be achieved through secrecy or a more elaborate deception plot that diverts the enemy’s attention from the real set of intentions to another.   It is also important to ascertain that the enemy has indeed swallowed the bait, especially in complex deception operations;this is because the enemy can pretend that he has been deceived when he may have not been deceived and thus carry out counter-deception.

• To Deceive The Enemy Regarding Our Capabilities. This deception is employed to mislead the enemy about our military, primarily material capabilities. This type of deception can be divided into two types. The first attempts to create an exaggerated evaluation of capabilities both in terms of quality and quantity, and the second attempts to conceal existing capabilities.

Levels of Deception

Deception can be classified to five levels based upon where it is planned and coordinated. These are :

• Strategic. Planned at National level.
• Military Strategic. Planned at Joint Services level.
• Operational. Planned at Theatre (Command) and Corps level.
• Tactical. Planned at Corps and lower level.
• Battlefield. This is tactical deception at the lowest level.

Classification of Deception

• Passive Deception. This is primarily based on secrecy and camouflage, on hiding and concealing our intentions and/or capabilities. Passive deception as a concept is relatively easier to devise and implement as it forms a part of basic military training. Passive deception may not have the aura of intellectual excitement as active deception; however, many active deception measures depend on the success of Passive deception.

• Active Deception. This involves a policy of disclosing half-truths supported by appropriate ‘proof’ signals or other material evidence. The aim is to create decoy intentions. In active deception, the deceived must ‘discover’ the evidence himself. He must work hard for it to be more convinced of its authenticity and importance. For successful active deception one must learn to think like the enemy. What may make sense for us may not make sense to the enemy.

Structure Of Deception

Deception can be built up based on two activities, Simulation and Dissimulation. These can be defined as under:

• Simulation. This consists of giving ‘positive’ evidence to pretend, portray and suggest a lie. In other words to show false activity or identity in an area other than the area of intended operations.

• Dissimulation.  This is a ‘negative’ action for hiding the reality or obscuring the truth for creating ambiguity. Here the aim is to hide or cover our presence in the intended area of operations.

Planning of Deception Operations

Deception aims at achieving certain negative objectives. These can be described as those objectives which help in keeping the enemy in the dark about our intentions or capabilities. Each negative objective can be made more achievable by enlightening the enemy by presenting him information. This information will however be contrary to the truth. In other words we prevent the enemy from deducing some information by persuading him to deduce a falsehood. The six main negative objectives with their corresponding positive objectives are given below:

Steps To Deception.

The following steps are required to carry out deception ops:

• Formulate the Enemy’s Viewpoint.  Unless we are aware of the likely courses open to the enemy we cannot start the process of deception. We need to see the things from the enemy’s vantage point. In such an exercise we will have the biases of our own functioning, the enemy’s perceived inaptitude, and our own world view affecting our appreciation.

• Formulate the Deception Measures. The next step is an organisation to formulate and deception actions. The person heading this cell should be imaginative and aware of the overall picture. Experts in the field maintain that the ideal personality for devising deception should besides being imaginative, be a practical joker who has a flair for playing pranks, a person who has dexterity of hand such as one who plays card tricks, or is an amateur magician.

Conclusion

Deception that is too sophisticated and elegant may be intellectually satisfying to those who create it, but it may not be picked up by the intended victim, especially during short wars. Hence, there has to be a balance between degree of difficulty of the “jigsaw puzzle” and size of the pieces of the jigsaw. In case the war is likely to be short the size of the pieces has to be bigger so that the enemy forms the picture within the time frame in which deception will give dividends.

Modern deception requires much greater skill in technical areas as well as detailed and systematic preparations. The availability of high-powered monitoring and analysis systems, UAVs, satellite-imagery etc. makes deception very difficult. The likely short duration of wars adds to the problem of successful deception. The false signals and spoof generated requires some time for the enemy to form a picture. In incident-based short wars there may be insufficient time for deception to be effective. This may be not only because the enemy may not be able to put the jigsaw pieces of deception together, but also because the deceiver may be so busy in the conduct of operations that he forgets about the deception plans that he has made. Hence, greater efforts for the preparation of deception plans in peacetime will have to be made so that they are available if war breaks out and they can be implemented right from the day the nation mobilizes for war.

Views expressed here by the author are personal.