WHAT IS 5GW? PART 2: MODERN CONTEXT

Welcome to Part 2. If you missed Part 1, we recommend you go back and read it because it will explain helpful concepts and terminology as we unpack modern characteristics of 5GW. We don’t like to waste time, so let’s get into it.

 

MASS CYBER ATTACKS

First up is mass cyberattacks, not attributable to an actor or nation-state. This one is kind of easy. As many people have stated over the years, the impact of cyber warfare on everything will be extremely significant. Very little has been done over the years to combat the rising threat of technologies on our critical infrastructure. 

 

 

We have already found the vulnerability of somewhat invulnerable SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) systems – basically, the computer systems that allow industrial plants to function. When it comes to POL (Petroleum, Oil, and Lubricants) production, the massive waves of cyber attacks at the commercial and at the consumer levels have proven the vulnerabilities in these areas as well. Very, very little can be done about cyber attacks at the consumer level, especially considering the interconnected nature of everything these days. But we will address this when we talk solutions… So, this characteristic is pretty short. Just think matrix-level cyber stuff and we have no idea where it’s coming from. A major part of 5GW, but still pretty easy to think about. 

 

MASS SOCIAL ENGINEERING

Something a little more complex is mass social engineering which, if conducted by a nation-state, the social engineering might be conducted on their own citizenry. Again, this is not a surprising tactic. As societal norms and skills change, social engineering becomes a much more significant threat than in years past. Some could make the argument that people today are simply more stupid than in years past, so social engineering works quite well; whereas, people in the past would never fall for the social engineering tricks of today.

 

 

While we fight the urge to agree with the cognitive decline of modern societies and cultures, we begrudgingly admit that it’s not as simple as people being stupid in our modern world. What’s more accurate is that people in today’s world are vulnerable to social engineering that is different from people in the past. Our modern world has made many comparisons to the past akin to comparing apples and oranges which is something that militaries, nation-states, and especially non-state actors have taken note of. And that’s why social engineering is a critical tool for waging a fifth-generation war. 

 

LACK OF US-VERSUS-THEM NATURE

Another attribute of fifth-generation war is that conflict will exhibit a lack of an “Us-versus Them” nature. Rather, the conflict itself is often observed to be spontaneous. Much like with cyber attacks, kinetic actions, when they do occur in a fifth-generation war, are often seemingly random since we cannot observe the lead-up to the conflict. Conflagrations might pop over a social event and might even be egged on by silent actors who seek to capitalize on the destabilization. Never let a good crisis go to waste … right?

 

But the conflicts that do occur will not look like your normal conflicts of the past. You might have some actors strike back against an adversary by targeting a third-party group. To the bystanders, this will make no logical sense, but to the belligerents, this makes perfect sense in the context of a fifth-generation war that does not play by the “Us-versus-Them” mentality. That’s a lot of funny words, so, what does this mean in plain English?

 

Well, due to how globalization has severely warped our logistical networks, it means to get ready for some weird stuff.

 

…Russia invades Ukraine? Well, we’re gonna fight back by pouring out government alcohol that taxpayers already paid for.

 

…Medical tyranny no longer working? Congratulations, physically exercising at home is now “white supremacy.”

 

…Our economy is failing? Oh, I know what will  fix it… putting US soldiers in elementary schools. 

 

 

Of course, a lot of these examples are more accurately explained by the state seeking to increase their influence and control over the American people rather than the strange nature of fifth-generation warfare. But you get the point.

 

At the end of the day, this illustrates the complexity and the self-fulfilling nature of a fifth-generation war. School teachers start teaching extreme political ideology and other perversion in schools, which makes parents upset, which make the DOJ upset, and they start labelling parents as terrorists, which makes the parents even more livid, and brings people who don’t even have kids into the fray, along with social movements which impacts the economic sector and brings in career politicians with their own egotistical and tyrannical goals. So now you’ve got a multi-front war going on which just keep churning on its own, because everyone is fighting everyone else, and all originating from a single point of origin. Points of origin which are sometimes likes to the next point, which is that non-state actors are becoming primary belligerents. 

 

 

NON-STATE ACTORS BECOMING PRIMARY BELLIGERENTS

Another main characteristic of fifth-generation war that separates it from even fourth-generation war is the nature and power of non-state actors. And no, we’re not talking about a terror group or cell; that’s covered in fourth-generation warfare. Remember, 4GW is about insurgencies.

 

Fifth-generation warfare takes it to another degree by including private companies. Just look around the world today and we can make some pretty interesting observations with regards to so-called private companies and their relationship with other non-state actors or even the state itself. Take the Biden regime. It’s a very fascinating example of the unique relationship between private companies and a nation-state in a 5G war. For instance, a lot of people have noticed the extremely overwhelming support from private companies to protect the Biden regime, even when the Biden regime didn’t really explicitly ask for it. A great example of this is the media, and again, it’s utterly fascinating. Right now, it’s pretty obvious that the Biden regime is directing all mainstream media sources, just as Justin Trudeau is doing with establishment media in Canada. At some point, they’ve openly admitted to such in the past, but it’s not total control. It’s influence the regime wants … remember? 

 

There is not a White House representative sitting in MSNBC directing the show. No, we now live in a world of fact checkers who have been delegated the power to broadcast propaganda and push content that supports the regime. Sometimes they guess right, and sometimes they accidentally go against the regime. Thus, the thousands of news articles that have been changed – this is a major part of fifth-generation warfare. Not necessarily the propaganda itself, but how private companies will seek to prop up nation-states and political regimes with fervor that even the regime themselves thinks is surprising. 

 

In a traditional political structure, or even a traditional dictatorship, you would think that propaganda is directed from the top down. That the nation-state is totally controlling and directing their media organizations. But there’s the difference in a 5G war. It might be the other way around. Governments themselves might be the ones with the training wheels, and private companies the ones with their hands in the seat saying good job. Obviously, this is not the case everywhere, but the bottom line is that in a fifth-generation war, the nation-state is no longer the big dog in town. And due to all of the information warfare that is also present in a fifth generation war, governments might not even know that they aren’t top dog in certain circumstances. That’s why people are now talking a lot about the “New World Order” and other similar stuff in the open now. Because it’s quite plain to see that there are non-state organizations, entities, and lines of effort that appear to be transnational. 

 

Is the World Economic Forum more powerful than a nation-state? We don’t know… we suppose it would depend on the nation-state. We think that that specific organization is not some kind of James Bond “Spectre” group (despite the fact that they desperately want to be). They’re just another interest group on the board of globalization. 

 

 

They might want to be the puppet masters of the world, but they’re still fighting to achieve that goal, just like everyone else; the “Great Reset” being their front line in this global, fifth-generation war. Of course, this is all debatable, but what is certain is that these guys and other non-state actors like them, wield A LOT of influence. And though their success is not explicitly guaranteed, their mere existence is exactly the type of thing that you would expect to see in a fifth-generation war. 

 

NATION-STATES HAVE THE WRONG TOOLS FOR THE JOB

Another unfortunate characteristic of a fifth-generation war is nation-states, or powerful actors, possessing the wrong tools for the job. In other words, nation-states will fight the fight that fits one’s weapons. The United States has built a military centred around fighting insurgencies, and though the pivot back to a more traditional near-peer fight has become more pressing following the pacific pivot to counter China, and even the current Ukrainian war, the fact of the matter is that the US is best equipped to fight insurgencies. So it is an insurgency they will fight. Even if that is not the right tool for the job. This is kind of linked to what we were talking about when it comes to the lack of an Us-versus-Them nature, right? 

 

You’re going to have nation-states or powerful actors, or non-state actors, fighting against each other. It’s not really like a proxy war situation – it’s more like an innocent bystander, or a non-affiliated group, or society gets impacted by this conflict, seemingly out of nowhere. But due to the fifth-generation warfare model, it kind of makes sense. Like… China is getting handsy in the south Pacific, or… the insurgencies are kicking up in North Africa again, or… Russia has invaded Ukraine … well, the solution is to launch a counterinsurgency mission at home in the US.  That’s a scene that’s kind of like the way we’re going to see this being manifested. Remember, ever since the military occupation of Washington DC in the days leading up to and the months after the 2020 inauguration, the United States government has increasingly leaned on skills, technology, and doctrine that was learned and developed during the global war on terror. 

 

It might not be as simple as, say, “Russia invading Ukraine and the US can’t do anything about that, so we’re going to target our own people because that’s what we know how to do.” It’s not really that simple, but it sure seems like it. Tactics like crowd control, checkpoints, aerial surveillance, and urban warfare have already been weaponized against the American people, and arguably also in Canada during the 2022 Convoy. 

 

In short, the US military is already a mile down the dangerous path of treating the national mall like Baghdad, and treating American citizens like Iraqis. Of course, this is not happening everywhere just yet, but the fact that it happened in the first place breaks the illusion that it can’t happen. And the undisputed fact – the undeniable reality that we have already seen – is certain states using armed soldiers to set up checkpoints on highways and checking the identity papers of citizens. Well, it seems Americans are a lot closer to being treated like Iraqi citizens than previously thought. And since these comments will invariably result in a lot of discussion, let’s briefly follow that rabbit hole a bit further. 

 

 

If all you have is a hammer, every problem is a nail. And right now, the US military, law enforcement, and federal agencies are the hammer. And the nail is the citizenry just trying to live their lives with as much freedom as possible, which is the antithesis of most political regimes, regardless of the political party. We know a lot of military folks out there might not want to hear this, because people don’t want to think that they might be the bad guy. After all, most military service members sign up to do good things and serve their country, and for the men and women that are still dedicated to that, despite fighting a losing battle, those service members should be an inspiration to us all. And for those who are fighting back and actually living up to their oath, we have nothing but the highest respect. But from the civilian side of things, we have to acknowledge that some of their compatriots, and most of their commanders and leadership, do not have the same dedication to the oath they swore. 

 

Right now, there is a sort of reckoning within both the US and Canadian Armed Forces. There is an increasing number of people in the military, especially senior leadership, that care nothing about service, and only care about the paycheck or their stock options. There is also a disturbing number of military leaders that have more sadistic motives. As a former military officer, this author can only speak about his own experiences here, and reference the experiences of fellow veterans. Drawing from my own career working in a variety of higher headquarters, and hearing from my friends still in the service who are now majors and colonels, I can confidently say that the majority of commanders we have worked with, I would want nowhere near a domestic mission of any kind. In years past, it would have been out of the question to suggest that most military service members would do the wrong thing and commit immoral and illegal actions against US or Canadian citizens on home soil. That used to be unthinkable, but these days, clinging to that mentality is not the best move. 

 

I’m not trying to throw shade at the US and Canadian Armed Forces and I don’t hold animosity toward service members, especially considering the hardships they have had to go through with regards to the medical mandates; but for many, those medical mandates are very illuminating. Most service members are jabbed, and because of that, what am I, a Canadian citizen, supposed to think about service members’ prospects of refusing even more serious orders? If they won’t fight back against the one that just requires paperwork, I’m sorry, but the soldier that takes up arms to prevent me from traveling between provinces, or leaving my country, or prevents me from attending Christmas celebrations with my family, that soldier is not my friend, no matter how they might feel about the mission. 

 

They might complain, they might know that what they are doing is wrong in every conceivable way, or they might only realize that what they are doing is wrong after the fact. Then I empathize with soldiers in that tough situation, I really do. But at the end of the day, they made not just one choice, but a series of choices, and those choices result in shifting the nature of the relationship between the citizenry and the military. We can no longer let our extremely high respect for service members cloud our judgment when it comes to holding people accountable for their actions. And I understand why people don’t like to talk about this stuff.

 

It’s perfectly fine, it’s perfectly socially acceptable, we suppose, to lay criticism at senior defence department officials. We can rag on Lloyd Austin and Anita Anand all day long, and you know, of course, some people will be upset at that, but for the most part, those are “safe” targets. Those are safe things to talk about where people won’t get upset. But don’t you dare talk about cousin Timmy in the National Guard! He’s a sweet boy… he’s a good person and he would never do anything wrong. He was just following orders…

 

Actions like this make us realize that there needs to be a healthy distance between the power of the institutions and the monopoly those institutions have on violence, and the citizenry. And despite the DoD clearly wanting there to be an adversarial relationship there, there doesn’t necessarily need to be. There just needs to be a healthy respect between the military and the citizenry, and the fact that the institutions are changing the way that we have to think about things. The US and Canadian governments have segregated themselves from the citizenry in every conceivable way, but especially judicially, so we would do well to recognize that. 

 

Sorry for the digression. I know we’re supposed to be talking about 5GW, but that’s the interesting part. We have been talking about it this entire time. I know it may not seem like it, but examining the relationship between the citizenry, and the institutions that are causing problems is a critical part of fighting back in a fifth-generation war. It was the Department of Defence, not us, that started this. The DoD and the current political regime brought warfare into our living rooms and onto our streets, and though the price for this has yet to be paid, a side effect of these actions is that people like us now have to look at this, which leads us to attributing these actions as a characteristic of a fifth-generation war being waged on citizens of North America. It’s uncomfortable, it really is, but at this point, our own armed forces and police have restricted our freedoms more than any foreign nation ever has. And ignoring this fact because it makes military leadership uncomfortable, or trying to provide  excuses for service members’ choices out of respect for their service is negligent on our part. 

 

Remember, there are a lot of other non-fifth-generation wars going on right now, and there are a lot of threats we have to face in the world today, and we need a strong military, but we are not going to win those conflicts if we are stuck fighting a fifth-generation war here at home. Which is why these uncomfortable conversations must happen. 

 

DIFFICULT DEFINITIONS

So, we can see how this is an insanely difficult problem to define, especially with the other conflicts occurring that are muddying the waters. A lot of people in the field of warfare academia have struggled to define this. Every few years, someone comes up with a new way to try to categorize it. Remember the whole “Small Wars” theory from a few years back?

 

This was the theory that, in a post-nuclear, post-mutually assured destruction age, we will not have large, devastating global wars, but rather, smaller, more frequent proxy wars in far-flung regions of the earth. Well, the Ukrainian war is kind of disproving that theory right now, but if you boil it down, it seems like the Small Wars theory is really just a recategorization of the nature of insurgencies and how technology has aided them, sprinkled with a few fifth-generation warfare tactics that nation states have been using. We’ve got a lot of arguments here on how to define and categorize the tactics and characteristics that we observe, but there’s a huge problem. What if we do not observe the tactics?

 

If you go to a vending machine and it takes your dollar without giving you your bag of chips, you wouldn’t think anything of it. Yeah, you’d be annoyed, but you wouldn’t look at it like it’s a hostile action against you. You wouldn’t treat that as a hostile action against yourself by a nation-state or other malign actor. It’s just something that happens. 

 

Now, what if it was a voting machine? Ahh… now we might start attributing a bit of malign action to something like that, due to the context. That’s a bit more clear to define, and academics can argue over what box to put election tampering into. But you see our perspective on things, and our historical ability to recognize what is a hostile action is heavily affected by this new age of warfare. Something bad happens to us, and we want to attribute it to an adversary, but if we can’t, we just suck it up and go without our bag of chips, or even worse, we shove another dollar into the same machine again, hoping the result will change. 

 

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Something else to consider is that a lot of people or, really just the handful people who care about these kinds of topics, tried to apply the debates we’ve seen in the world of artificial intelligence, which we think is interesting. For instance, a lot of people have been thinking about artificial intelligence and have had a lot of thoughts on it. For example, Elon Musk is well known for his really serious thoughts on AI that do not reflect a bright future for humans. Stephen Hawking was also well known for his views of AI, stating that,

Whereas the short-term impact of AI depends on who controls it, the long-term impact depends on whether it can be controlled at all.

The same line of thinking, the same philosophy and reasoning can and, in our opinion, should be applied to this new style of warfare. That’s what makes fifth-generation warfare something unique, and not just a technological progression following fourth-generation warfare. Here’s what we think. If fifth-generation war will be over, or if it will have transitioned to something else, before most people even realize it has even begun, we think we’re currently fighting a fifth-generation war right now. We’re not really so concerned about what box it goes into. Call it “sixth” or “seventh-generation” warfare – who cares. And the symptoms of this war will make no sense when compared to the previous lines of thinking. Like, how many of you out there have gone through your day and just suddenly felt anxious for no apparent reason? Or you psyche yourself out with just your own thoughts about something… Or experience symptoms of depression, or apathy, again, for no reason whatsoever. Or even just the feeling that something isn’t quite right, but you can’t figure out what it is. 

 

I’m certainly no psychologist, but I can tell you that all of the above is exactly what I would expect a fifth-generation war to look like, and we are not alone in these observations. I think this is why so many ideas are coming out right now. Ideas that used to be labeled as ridiculous conspiracy theories. Now, the general theory is becoming that the only difference between an outlandish conspiracy theory and undisputed fact is about six months.

 

Can you have a war without conflict? A war where there are no enemies, and no allies, but casualties everywhere. A war in which actual combat isn’t really the main attack, but you standing at a vending or voting machine is.

 

You see how philosophical and weird this stuff gets? It goes way over my head and it drives me crazy, it really does. 

 

OUR BEST DEFINITION OF 5GW

This stuff is really freaky to think about and put into words on paper. And thinking along these lines illustrates where most academics who have discussed fifth-generation warfare have gone astray. Every single person who has discussed fifth-generation warfare has done so from the perspective of a military strategist, or a military historian, which is not inherently bad. That actually makes the most sense. You would expect the same guy who spent years writing about third- or fourth-generation warfare to naturally talk about the fifth generation of warfare, and how technology has affected the history of war. However, we think that a milestone has been reached.

 

We think that fifth-generation warfare is just as much a concern to civilian academics as military strategists. After all, we are not fighting this fifth generation war in a lecture hall at West Point or in a conference room full of majors and colonels. We are living this war in our grocery stores, in our schools, and in our homes. This is not some issue that can be philosophized over mahogany conference tables. This is our life now. So, at last, after taking all of these ideas and putting them together, we can piece together our definition for what fifth-generation warfare really is:

Fifth-generation warfare is defined as a global war of ideas and narratives. This style of war is primarily fought in the information space. However, the actions undertaken in the information space are not intended to be the final goal, but rather a way to affect the physical, kinetic battlespaces. Cyberwarfare is a critical part of fifth-generation warfare, but these tactics do not supersede the overall function of fifth-generation warfare. Rather, actions in the cyber battlespace are a tool to both supplement traditional forms of military warfare, while simultaneously serving as a tool that certain actors can utilize to further their war of ideas. The ambiguous nature of this cyber realm most clearly illustrates the uncertainty present throughout this style of warfare, and the struggle that is present throughout societies as citizens try to make sense of their world around them. This ambiguity is key … the “perfect crime” is the one that no one ever knows has been committed, and as such a “perfect 5GW” is one that the target never even knew occurred.

 

And voila. Simple enough, right? Yeah, we think so, too! Pffft. 

 

…OK. Now that we’ve reviewed the essentials of 5GW, we’re going to present you with some possible solutions. But not here! We think that’s plenty for now.

 

Go stretch it out, rest, and once you’ve recovered, please advance to the third and final part of this series.