US Government Social Engineering Exposed: OSD Human Social Behavior Modeling Program

Prologue

The empires of the future are the empires of the mind.

Winston Churchill

"If you can control a man's thinking, you do not have to worry about his actions. When you determine what a man shall think you do not have to concern yourself about what he will do. If you make a man feel that he is inferior, you do not have to compel him to accept an inferior status, for he will seek it himself . If you make a man think that he is justly an outcast, you do not have to order him to the back door. He will go without being told; and if there is no back door, his very nature will demand one."

George G. Woodson

Lyndon Johnson is famous for using the term "hearts and minds" quite often in speeches regarding the Vietnam War. It is said:

Johnson’s use of the phrase is most likely based on a quote of John Adams, the American Revolutionary War patriot and second president of the United States, who wrote in a letter dated 13 February 1818: "The Revolution was effected before the War commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people; a change in their religious sentiments of their duties and obligations…. This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people, was the real American Revolution".

Source

Please, read those words from President Adams once again. They are compelling and as true today as they have ever been. The use of the word "hearts" is a bit archaic - as we now know that emotional is also part of the mind - but we still, even today, use the word "heart" to define emotion. So, in paraphrasing it to a more accurate mold - what matters is the emotions and thoughts of the people. Their perceptions. Their beliefs. These are the things that lead men to be greater than themselves... Emotions, perceptions, and beliefs... And this is why it is a very real concern that others would try to dictate these attributes on a national or even global scale.

In a series of threads, over the past four or five months, I have endeavored to address not just the issue of manipulation, thought control, and social engineering - but also the players, mechanisms, techniques, and agencies engaged in this ancient form of warfare - now much more dangerous due to media... The war for our minds. Some think me hyperbolic in my zeal for this subject. But I persist in digging up every fact I can regarding it because I feel that it is the most important issue that we face as a species today. Technology and science have brought us to a point where manipulating others is no longer an art - it is a science - and that science is now very much militarized and agenda driven.

Tonight I was perusing the Department of Defense Research, Development, Test & Evaluation Programs (R-1) budget PDF file - otherwise known as the "Black Budget". In Googling some of the line items I came across the following and brought it to you, ATS, to share. So, without further ado...


OSD Human Social Behavior Modeling Program

This program is attached to the Research And Engineering Enterprise and the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Their capabilities, as listed on their website are so astounding in implication that I feel compelled to simply provide a screen shot, rather than type them out myself. This will, hopefully, preclude any assertions that I am overstating things or missing the actual context of the words:



Understand, detect, forecast, mitigate.






Their "Overview" page says the following:

OVERVIEW

The vision of the HSCB program is to remain DoD’s flagship socio-cultural modeling program dedicated to working with our partners to develop, transition, and apply technologies, tools, and methods to allow US forces to more effectively understand and interact with the socio-cultural environment so that they have the requisite technologies, tools, and methods for understanding, interacting with, and shaping the human socio-cultural behavioral environment. Working with academia, industry, and government partners, HSCB will cultivate an applied science base in socio-cultural modeling and cross-cultural training; develop computational social science models and training platforms; instantiate models and training systems into software applications; and transition validated, sustainable technologies to programs of record.

SPECIFIC ACTIVITIES INCLUDE

Working with government partners to issue BAAs and resulting awards to conduct applied research, mature and demonstrate that research, and then transition the results of select research to select programs of record.

Working with the warfighter and combat developers to facilitate the development of documented requirements in the socio-cultural modeling domain.

Working with transition partners to transition select HSCB technology that meets the needs of the warfighter and are sustained within programs of record.

And their "Other Programs" page?



Thier Newsletters page has links to several PDF files that are worth reading and contain a vast wealth of indirect information, including many, many acronyms and DoD program names worth Googling. The most recent newsletter contains a page that I think most here will appreciate. So, please excuse the size of the following picture - but I wanted to present it in its raw form:



Yes, this does specifically discuss Afghanistan. But don't think for a second that these technologies are limited in scope to the battlefields across the seas and far away. Military tech is always domestically implimented as well. These policies of Understand, detext, forecast, and mitigate are being used on us all we well - no matter where we live. We all know that the fox is in the henhouse. This simply is a window into the fox's mind.

~Continued...

In past threads I have detailed a myriad of agencies, programs, and protocols involved in this subject matter. Tonight I will add one additional bread crumb for your consideration. The Minerva Initiative - as it is a partner venture to the OSD HSBMP.



Whereas I normally tend to be overly verbose when discussing these issues. Tonight I feel as though there is no need for it. The evidence, just in the pictures, is enough to indict. And those who choose to follow all of the appropriate links and do a bit of Googling will, I believe, share my outrage and concern.

The battle for your minds is a large part of that secret "Black Budget" I linked at the top of this entry. This might seem trite or trivial to some of you because you feel that you are smart enough that no attempt to control your opinions or perceptions would be successful. To you I say:

Why do you think what you think?
Where did you learn it?
Where does your input come from?
Who controls that information?
What are their motives and agendas?
Can you really trust that "what you know" is not implanted, indoctrinated thought?
Do you have the strength to question everything - even that which you truly believe is correct?

Whether or not the motives are base or altruistic, I cannot say. But what I do know is that there are those who wish to control what we think, how we feel, and what we believe. They've been at it for the entirety of recorded history, in one form or another. But never before have they had the science and money to back it that they have today.

In closing

The things I have presented here are not entries from blogs claiming to be written by whistle blowers or psychics. These are not leaked documents that one can summarily dismiss as spurious and then walk away. Every single link and image I have provided in this OP is from a legitimate US Government website - with the sole exception of a passage from Wikipedia that I doubt anyone with argue the veracity of. Given this fact, I offer the following thought... if this level of admission to social engineering is available publicly... Imagine that which is NOT in the public domain regarding this issue. Also consider that what I have presented here is only a fraction of what I have been able to uncover through my own research.

Welcome to the front lines of the greatest War in human history - the battle for your mind.

~Heff

This would be one of the most important discovery to me, a psychology major, I have seen on this website. I know that Skinner was involved with this kind of research in the 60's and 70's - I will have to check out more of your work.

I think the problem arises when the government tries to control how we think -

reply to post by Hefficide

reply to post by Hefficide


This is a heavy duty and very complex topic, which all your info will take me a while to read.

But I have always been intrigued by the "power of suggestion" or manipulation through words, which ever is the correct term. The government is always studying different ways to control man. The use of words are just one of the many tools used.

Great research and looks like a good read....
Keep it coming, I love these kind of subjects.

S&F

Much respect ~~
snarky

Nice thread. Oh, OK, great thread

I think it true to say that the Government already has this in the bag. They managed to convince the Western world that Communism was evil and had to be fought. They convinced several entire generations that Truth, Justice and The American way were worth fighting for.

There are even people, right now, who are convinced that they have a say in their government and they live in a democracy. There are no democracies anywhere in the world.

The moment that one single politician gets away with a lie, democracy dies. Democracy is about making informed decisions and you can not make an informed decision if the bastards are constantly lying to you.

Communism is a failed experiment. The American way is an experiment that is about to fail. A system based on greed will always fail.

The real problem is simple, people don't care! Even here on ATS everyone massages their conscious and pretends to be active in the fight against tyranny and in reality they are just blowin it out their backside.

P

reply to post by pheonix358


The US was founded on the ideal of the 'Republic' not democracy by the few.
Large difference.
Freedom is what made America great, not democracy for the control by the few.
There are those of all religious denominations here in the US that do as they Do.
They are neither discriminatied against or 'terrorized' for their beliefs.
Let them believe what they like as long as it does not interfere with their innate right to believe what they 'understand' to be the truth. Who is another 'human' to judge the merit of another's beliefs?

I see no 'terrorists' here in the US with respect to one's religion.
Do you?
No, we don't.
Pure fiction.

Yep Hef,

It's based on Colonel John Boyd's OODA Loop.

It is considered to be a primary tool for being a successful combatant in 5th gradient warfare. and that is why they want to have a system in place so that soldiers can apply it to the cultures that they are meant to engage with...

The OODA loop (for observe, orient, decide, and act) is a concept originally applied to the combat operations process, often at the strategic level in military operations. It is now also often applied to understand commercial operations and learning processes. The concept was developed by military strategist and USAF Colonel John Boyd.


en.wikipedia.org...

See there? We are back to two of our favorite subjects: cybernetics and AI and all that.

But yeah, it's just a fancy name for modelling the cultures that soldiers must engage with so they might do so successfully.

We have touched on how this has been weaponized and turned upon us in other threads, I think.



P.S. Understand, Detect, Forecast, Mitigate, see what happens when you mix the military and the liberal sciences?



P.S.S. One upshot of this all is that lots of sociologists and anthropologists are going to be finding work. So we got that going for us.

Fourth Generation Warfare

I would recommend Peter Levenda's Sinister Forces series for some interesting background to this whole issue.

It is frightening how Dr José Delgado's stimoceiver has, sixty years on, simply been replaced by social media and a better understanding of the human psyche.

reply to post by Bluemoonsine


Just start a thread on Islam and watch the US responses. What you believe and what is reality may be very different. I don't see tolerance, I see hate from the bible belt, greed from the TV ministries and a crowd of christians interrupting funerals. You call this tolerance and free speech. I call this hate.

P

ETA. Based on the rule of divide and conquer, the Government applauds all sides.

reply to post by pheonix358


I just don't 'see' what you speak of nor have I experienced it though the mass media have done their best to stir that pot. I just don't see it as one may claim. Americans, in general, are very accepting and tolerant of others as long as they don't attempt to impose their will, whether by force or by $ on their innate freedoms. I am only being honest here. I've been around and lived here most of my life. Long line. I have travelled half the world and still find the American populace the most peaceful and tolerant of all peoples because, I would imagine they are of a melting pot of peoples. An experiment in motion though the international bankster cabal wish to change this for their assumed benefit.

They have lived in their towers for too long and unfortunately have not learned what they need to have learned the most; Brotherhood, respect for their neighbors and most importantly, who they 'are' or could be amongst their brethren. Most act as subjects which is 'choice' and they are treated as such and are not respected.....naturally. Who wins? No one; one hides, one seeks sustenance. Both suffer in their own ways though most would not understand the lives of others not lived; I suppose. The Creator punishes the rich and poor in mysterious ways.. Most understand this instinctively though it often goes unspoken. *God Bless*.

I was just thinking about what bothers me about this - if the government is involved in social engineering and gets in over its head, it could really screw up a whole society. For example, let's look at Strauss-Howe Generation Theory.

This shows how a new generation will develop in order to compensate for deficiencies in its parents. The cycle happens over 4 generations, and seems to be completely natural. If this was unknowingly interfered with in order to prevent change, who knows what could happen.

reply to post by LiveForever8


Just wanted to make a post to say that this...

It is frightening how Dr José Delgado's stimoceiver has, sixty years on, simply been replaced by social media and a better understanding of the human psyche.

...is a really cogent and well-informed post.

That's the thing about 5th gradient warfare, because of the fact that we all need to be networked in for what this post suggests...

...We are all automatically conscripted as soldiers. That's the current thought on this anyhow. I tend to agree.

Be a drone and remain neutralized till summoned to express this or that, in other words react...

or act.

P.S. 5th gradient warfare, generational warfare, all of it is just a lexical tool to help describe what is happening in the world right now, new words and ways of using old words have to be developed as the world changes, and it is doing so very rapidly. We will toss out what does not work and replace it with better ideas as they come along.

reply to post by Hefficide


Thank you for the info and links, as I am also interested in this topic. Once I have a bit more time I will further delve into what you've presented. I suggest that you would enjoy the book entitled, The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge by Berger and Luckmann 1967.

The greatest danger the Government social engineering programs face is the power of the internet.

Mass knowledge and access to mass knowledge is the most dangerous element a Government faces.

The more educated a society becomes and with the ability to freely and effectively communicate, many intellectuals can start to affect society in general.

In the past few decades there has been a systemic push to marginalize intelligent people by labeling them as eccentric, geeks and nerds. Now, if you oppose the Government program you are a conspiracy nut job and recently you are viewed as a terrorist.

The reason the Government wants to control the internet is because the internet is the greatest threat any Government has ever faced. Be ware they will take control of it, they have to. What will be telling is what we do about it.

P

The Minerva Initiative was started in 2008. Never heard of this little gem until now, thank you very much.

The Minerva Initiative is a Department of Defense (DoD)-sponsored, university-based social science research initiative launched by the Secretary of Defense in 2008 focusing on areas of strategic importance to U.S. national security policy.

The goal of the Minerva Initiative is to improve DoD's basic understanding of the social, cultural, behavioral, and political forces that shape regions of the world of strategic importance to the U.S.

What I notice was this little tid bit of information that made me go hmmm....

--------
"The Minerva Initiative brings together universities, research institutions, and individual scholars and supports interdisciplinary and cross-institutional projects addressing specific topic areas determined by the Secretary of Defense."
-------


So, they're going to infiltrate the universities [top schools] and do what, start manipulating what is being taught in school and control people through their "teachings"? All for national security?
Or will they have their own "special" classes for students/professors to volunteer for?

Just curious......

reply to post by pheonix358

reply to post by snarky412

So, they're going to infiltrate the universities [top schools] and do what, start manipulating what is being taught in school and control people through their "teachings"? All for national security? Or will they have their own "special" classes for students/professors to volunteer for?

Hi, no, they want to enlist the best people that they can so that they can form think tank style collectives for multidisciplinary study.

To understand what they are trying to understand they can't specialize or rely on specialists, they need people from all walks of thinking and doing.

This way of doing things became a sort of science of its own and you will find the methodology in universities everywhere even though they may not call it Cybernetics.

They are trying to staff a knowledge base, with lots of nodes. Frankly, I want to play too.

reply to post by snarky412


To control the population you need a multidisciplinary approach.

Marginalize or imprison those whose intellect and / or training allows them to see straight through your efforts.

Take control of any University courses that may bring awareness of your actions to the upcoming generation. This knowledge must be suppressed by any means necessary. Make course structures such that everyone passes with little difficulty diluting the entire field of study.

Make the average people fear your agents. Train LEOs such that everyone passes with little effort diluting the entire field. Ensure that anyone with moderate to high intelligence can never get a foothold in Law enforcement.

Divide and conquer by ensuring the media concentrates and expands on differences and provide for perceived differences to be dangerous and needing the attention of LEOs.

Maintain the population at extreme levels of fear, the higher the better.

P

Originally posted by pheonix358
reply to post by snarky412

 

To control the population you need a multidisciplinary approach.

Marginalize or imprison those whose intellect and / or training allows them to see straight through your efforts.

Take control of any University courses that may bring awareness of your actions to the upcoming generation. This knowledge must be suppressed by any means necessary. Make course structures such that everyone passes with little difficulty diluting the entire field of study.

Make the average people fear your agents. Train LEOs such that everyone passes with little effort diluting the entire field. Ensure that anyone with moderate to high intelligence can never get a foothold in Law enforcement.

Divide and conquer by ensuring the media concentrates and expands on differences and provide for perceived differences to be dangerous and needing the attention of LEOs.

Maintain the population at extreme levels of fear, the higher the better.

P

Oh, is that all ?! [sarcasm]

According to their website, it sounds like they want to "research" EVERY aspect of life.