# Cognitive Warfare **Domain:** Security studies / Cognition **Doc Type:** Developed Emerging-Doctrine Node **Maturity:** Developed **Collection:** [[collections/Gamification|Gamification Collection]] ## Definition **Cognitive warfare** is an emerging and contested security concept describing efforts to influence, disrupt, or exploit human cognition and collective sense-making as an operational objective. It can encompass information operations, behavioral influence, social-media manipulation, psychological techniques, and cyber-enabled effects. ## Significance The concept shifts attention from control of messages to control of decision environments. In a gamified enclosure, the relevant targets may be trust, attention, identity, perceived affordances, and confidence in the possibility of adjudication. There is no single settled NATO doctrine that makes every use of the term equivalent. Policy papers, innovation studies, alliance discussions, and national concepts must be distinguished. The phrase should not medicalize disagreement or turn ordinary persuasion into an act of war. ## Sources - NATO Innovation Hub, [Cognitive Warfare](https://www.innovationhub-act.org/sites/default/files/2021-01/20210122_CW%20Final.pdf) - François du Cluzel, [*Cognitive Warfare*, Innovation Hub hosted PDF, November 2020](https://innovationhub-act.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/20210122_CW-Final.pdf). The study states that it was sponsored by Allied Command Transformation but that its views are not official statements of ACT or its member nations. At p. 16 it attributes the “brain battlefield” phrase to [[wiki/James Giordano|James Giordano]], with a missing “be” in the printed quotation; do not silently present that faulty text as Giordano's verbatim wording. - NATO Review, [Countering cognitive warfare](https://www.nato.int/docu/review/articles/2021/05/20/countering-cognitive-warfare-awareness-and-resilience/index.html) ## Relationships - **Source and sponsorship:** François du Cluzel wrote the Innovation Hub *Cognitive Warfare* study; Allied Command Transformation sponsored it. The study's disclaimer denies official ACT or member-nation attribution. - **Documented contributor:** [[wiki/James Giordano|James Giordano]] supplied a commissioned October 2020 essay listed in the study's bibliography and is named at p. 16. He also co-authored [[wiki/Cyborg Soldier 2050|Cyborg Soldier 2050]] (2019). This is a shared-personnel connection, not proof of one joint program. - **Technical and article routes:** [[collections/Neurotech|Neurotech]] and [[articles/Technologies for Consciousness Mapping and Transfer|Technologies for Consciousness Mapping and Transfer]] distinguish actual neural capabilities from forecasts. [[articles/Cognitive-Cyber Warfare Measures and Countermeasures|Cognitive-Cyber Warfare Measures and Countermeasures]] develops the security-studies context. ## Simple Reminders, Quotations, and Thoughts The following are passages from du Cluzel's ACT-sponsored but explicitly non-official study. The first describes a possible convergence of healing and enhancement; the second defines the study's societal security concern. Neither is a statement of Bryant McGill's personal stance toward enhancement. > “Scientists around the world are asking the question of how to free humanity from the limitations of the body. The line between healing and augmentation becomes blurred. In addition, the logical progression of research is to achieve a perfect human being through new technological standards.” > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, NATO Innovation Hub study, p. 18* [[reminders/Cybernetics/Healing and Augmentation May Converge in Body Technologies by François du Cluzel|Healing and Augmentation May Converge in Body Technologies by François du Cluzel]] > “While the objective of Cognitive Warfare is to harm societies and not only the military, this type of warfare resembles to ‘shadow wars’ and requires a whole-of-government approach to warfare.” > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, NATO Innovation Hub study, p. 32* [[reminders/Capture/Cognitive Warfare Can Target Whole Societies by François du Cluzel|Cognitive Warfare Can Target Whole Societies by François du Cluzel]] The author defines cognitive warfare as acting through the human domain, not merely affecting it indirectly. > "While actions taken in the five domains are executed in order to have an effect on the human domain, cognitive warfare's objective is to make everyone a weapon." > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, Innovation Hub study, p. 25* [[reminders/Capture/Cognitive Warfare Could Make Everyone a Weapon by François du Cluzel|Cognitive Warfare Could Make Everyone a Weapon by François du Cluzel]] The passage is the author’s forecast of future military competition, not NATO doctrine. > "The future battlefield will depend not only upon achieving 'biological dominance', but achieving 'mental/cognitive dominance' and 'intelligence dominance' as well." > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, Innovation Hub study, p. 23* [[reminders/Capture/Battlefield Dominance Could Become Cognitive by François du Cluzel|Battlefield Dominance Could Become Cognitive by François du Cluzel]] The study describes potential mechanisms affecting cognition, emotion, and movement; it does not establish that every projected device exists. > "The objectives for neuroweapons in warfare may be achieved by augmenting or degrading functions of the nervous system, so as to affect cognitive, emotional and/or motor activity and capability." > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, Innovation Hub study, p. 20* [[reminders/Neural Interfaces/Neuroweapons Could Augment or Degrade Nervous Function by François du Cluzel|Neuroweapons Could Augment or Degrade Nervous Function by François du Cluzel]] The claim is an analytic characterization of this form of conflict rather than a report of a specific endless operation. > "Cognitive warfare is potentially endless since there can be no peace treaty or surrender for this type of conflict." > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, Innovation Hub study, p. 7* [[reminders/Capture/Cognitive Warfare May Have No Peace Treaty by François du Cluzel|Cognitive Warfare May Have No Peace Treaty by François du Cluzel]] The conclusion makes the author’s strategic warning, not an official NATO forecast. > "Failing to thwart the cognitive efforts of NATO's opponents would condemn Western liberal societies to lose the next war without a fight." > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, Innovation Hub study, p. 36* [[reminders/Capture/A Cognitive Defeat Might Come Without a Fight by François du Cluzel|A Cognitive Defeat Might Come Without a Fight by François du Cluzel]] Du Cluzel quotes a translated statement attributed to He Fuchu; the report is an intermediary source. > "The sphere of operations will be expanded from the physical domain and the information domain to the domain of consciousness, the human brain will become a new combat space." > **— He Fuchu**, *quoted in François du Cluzel, Cognitive Warfare, 2020, p. 27; translated wording* [[reminders/Capture/The Human Brain Could Become a Combat Space by He Fuchu|The Human Brain Could Become a Combat Space by He Fuchu]] This is Cole and Le Guyader’s passage quoted inside du Cluzel’s report; “Today’s progresses” is retained as printed. > "Today's progresses in nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology and cognitive science (NBIC), boosted by the seemingly unstoppable march of a triumphant troika made of Artificial Intelligence, Big Data and civilisational 'digital addiction' have created a much more ominous prospect: an embedded fifth column, where everyone, unbeknownst to him or her, is behaving according to the plans of one of our competitors." > **— August Cole and Hervé Le Guyader**, *“NATO’s 6th Domain,” quoted in du Cluzel, Cognitive Warfare, 2020, p. 36* [[reminders/Capture/A Digital Fifth Column Could Hide in Everyday Behavior by August Cole and Hervé Le Guyader|A Digital Fifth Column Could Hide in Everyday Behavior by August Cole and Hervé Le Guyader]] The ACT-sponsored author makes a forward-looking judgment about use of neuroscience and technology; sponsorship does not make it NATO policy. > "It is not a question of whether neuroS/T will be utilised in military, intelligence, and political operations, but rather when, how, to what extent." > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, Innovation Hub study, p. 23* [[reminders/Neural Interfaces/Neuroscience Will Enter Military and Political Operations by François du Cluzel|Neuroscience Will Enter Military and Political Operations by François du Cluzel]] The report’s formulation concerns cognitive process, not merely the content of individual beliefs; its endnote credits an underlying point to Zac Rogers. > "The goal is not to attack what individuals think but rather the way they think." > **— François du Cluzel**, *2020, Cognitive Warfare, Innovation Hub study, p. 8* [[reminders/Capture/Cognitive Warfare Targets How People Think by François du Cluzel|Cognitive Warfare Targets How People Think by François du Cluzel]] ## Routes [[articles/Cognitive-Cyber Warfare Measures and Countermeasures|Cognitive-Cyber Warfare Measures and Countermeasures]] · [[wiki/Epistemic Injury|Epistemic Injury]] · [[wiki/Truth Decay|Truth Decay]] · [[wiki/Hybrid Warfare|Hybrid Warfare]]