PRINCIPLES OF PROPAGANDA

1. Propagandist must have access to intelligence concerning events and public opinion.

2. Propaganda must be planned and executed by only one authority.
a. It must issue all the propaganda directives.

b. It must explain propaganda directives to important officials and maintain their morale.

c. It must oversee other agencies' activities which have propaganda consequences

3. The propaganda consequences of an action must be considered in planning that action.

4. Propaganda must affect the enemy's policy and action.
a. By suppressing propagandistically desirable material which can provide the enemy with useful intelligence

b. By openly disseminating propaganda whose content or tone causes the enemy to draw the desired conclusions

c. By goading the enemy into revealing vital information about himself

d. By making no reference to a desired enemy activity when any reference would discredit that activity

5. Declassified, operational information must be available to implement a propaganda campaign

6. To be perceived, propaganda must evoke the interest of an audience and must be transmitted through an attention-getting communications medium.

7. Credibility alone must determine whether propaganda output should be true or false.

8. The purpose, content and effectiveness of enemy propaganda; the strength and effects of an expose; and the nature of current propaganda campaigns determine whether enemy propaganda should be ignored or refuted.

9. Credibility, intelligence, and the possible effects of communicating determine whether propaganda materials should be censored.

10. Material from enemy propaganda may be utilized in operations when it helps diminish that enemy's prestige or lends support to the propagandist's own objective.

11. Black rather than white propaganda may be employed when the latter is less credible or produces undesirable effects.

12. Propaganda may be facilitated by leaders with prestige.

13. Propaganda must be carefully timed.
a. The communication must reach the audience ahead of competing propaganda.

b. A propaganda campaign must begin at the optimum moment

c. A propaganda theme must be repeated, but not beyond some point of diminishing effectiveness

14. Propaganda must label events and people with distinctive phrases or slogans.
a. They must evoke desired responses which the audience previously possesses

b. They must be capable of being easily learned

c. They must be utilized again and again, but only in appropriate situations

d. They must be boomerang-proof

15. Propaganda to the home front must prevent the raising of false hopes which can be blasted by future events.

16. Propaganda to the home front must create an optimum anxiety level.
a. Propaganda must reinforce anxiety concerning the consequences of defeat

b. Propaganda must diminish anxiety (other than concerning the consequences of defeat) which is too high and which cannot be reduced by people themselves

17. Propaganda to the home front must diminish the impact of frustration.
a. Inevitable frustrations must be anticipated

b. Inevitable frustrations must be placed in perspective

18. Propaganda must facilitate the displacement of aggression by specifying the targets for hatred.

19. Propaganda cannot immediately affect strong counter-tendencies; instead it must offer some form of action or diversion, or both.
from:
GOEBBELS' PRINCIPLES OF PROPAGANDA
Based upon Goebbels' Principles of Propaganda by Leonard W. Doob, published in Public Opinion and Propaganda; A Book of Readings edited for The Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues.


The Information Operations Roadmap is a document commissioned by the Pentagon in 2003 and personally approved by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

Read below adn then click on this link: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB177/index.htm
The document was declassified in January 2006 and describes the United States Military's approach to information warfare, with an emphasis on the Internet
Although "information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP, increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa," the document observes that "the distinction between foreign and domestic audiences becomes more a question of USG [U.S. government] intent rather than information dissemination practices."[1]
Kristin Adair reported:
The Roadmap presents as one of its key assumptions the importance of Psychological Operations (PSYOP), particularly in wartime: "Effectively communicating U.S. Government (USG) capabilities and intentions is an important means of combating the plans of our adversaries.[1]
and:
The document calls on DoD to enhance its capabilities in five key Information Operations (IO) areas: electronic warfare (EW), PSYOP, Operations Security (OPSEC), military deception and computer network operations (CNO).[1]
An article by the BBC states:
The operations described in the document include a surprising range of military activities: public affairs officers who brief journalists, psychological operations troops who try to manipulate the thoughts and beliefs of an enemy, computer network attack specialists who seek to destroy enemy networks.[3]
The document acknowledges the Smith-Mundt Act, adopted in 1948, which explicitly forbids information and psychological operations aimed at the US public, but fails to offer any way of limiting the effect this program has on domestic audiences.[1][3]
The document states the internet can be used as weapon system by opposing forces, with its rapid growth it is becoming harder to defend:
"Strategy should be based on the premise that the Department [of Defense] will 'fight the net' as it would an enemy weapons system ... Networks are growing faster than we can defend them... Attack sophistication is increasing... Number of events is increasing."[3]
One of the stated goals of improving network and electro-magnetic attack capabilities is:
To prevail in an information-centric fight, its increasingly important that our forces dominate the electromagnetic spectrum with attack capabilities"