Since Russia invaded Ukraine, Kyiv has controlled the narrative with a hybrid approach of news, public opinion, psychological and cognitive elements, and disinformation. Information warfare has displaced traditional political warfare and gained new strategic importance.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has been broadcasting live daily, as well as at significant times during the conflict, to show his country and the world his resolve to fight to the end and to castigate Russia for launching an unjust, unprovoked war.
During particularly tense episodes, he has given impassioned speeches, telling Ukrainians to stay alive so that they can once again sit down to eat together.
Reports have referenced the “Ghost of Kyiv,” a suspected flying ace who the Ukrainian Security Service claims has shot down 10 Russian fighter jets; the civilian army — comprised of men and women, young and old — willing to die for their country; and the weapons — Javelin anti-tank missiles, Stinger surface-to-air missiles and shoulder-fired next generation light anti-tank weapons — which have been crucial in repelling the Russians.
There have been images of destroyed or abandoned Russian military vehicles, and stories of poorly trained Russian soldiers.
These accounts have all found their way onto social media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube — all while people refuse to report on Ukrainian troop movements.
Public opinion around the world — with the exception of Belarus and China — sides with Ukraine, which is pressuring EU countries to provide military equipment and humanitarian aid.
Even SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has donated his company’s Starlink terminals to Ukraine to sidestep Russian efforts to block its Internet access.
Such support has enabled the EU to assist Ukraine, and paint Russia forces and Russian President Vladimir Putin as inhumane invaders.
The lack of a legitimate cause for the war and Russia’s inadequate preparation, amplified by Ukraine’s effective media use, has led to low morale among Russian troops and reportedly caused some invaders cast aside their equipment and abandon their vehicles.
Stories of derelict equipment and soldiers going AWOL are regularly replayed online. One video on YouTube shows a Russian mother saying that her son told her that he was deployed on a military exercise, only to later discover he was a prisoner of war in Ukraine.
People from around the world, as well as Ukrainians living abroad, are traveling to Ukraine to enlist in a volunteer army.
What Ukrainians have achieved is straight from the pages of the political warfare handbook: consolidate at home, bring others together and disrupt the enemy.
Taiwan’s armed forces can learn from this approach. The military should consolidate its operations, bringing together instructors and political warfare operatives to form a psychological operations and warfare unit responsible for utilizing social media to control the narrative during a potential war.
The military should reinforce training related to online campaigns — including the use of keywords, broadcasts, statistical analysis, visualization, and methods to increase online traffic and facilitate the setting of agendas — to shift away from relying on conventional “psy-op” techniques.
It should procure the equipment needed to avoid Internet disruptions and the blocking of online accounts.
The time is right for the military to learn from how Ukraine’s armed forces organized and consolidated its operations so that Taiwan can be ready to control the narrative.
Chu-Ke Feng-yun is director of a medical management department at a hospital.
Translated by Paul Cooper
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