by Andrew Arnett

Events surrounding ISIS in Iraq and Syria have been ratcheted to a fever pitch since the U.S. launched airstrikes on the region last month.

There are reports, on October 10, that ISIS is within shelling range of Baghdad International Airport. In addition, the Iraqi Defense Ministry confirmed ISIS is armed with shoulder fired anti-aircraft missiles, called MANPADs.

Islamic State forces to the north, surrounding the Syria-Turkey border town of Kobane, may be on the verge of taking that location, putting at risk the lives of its Kurdish inhabitants.

Meanwhile, the U.S. has begun using Apache AH-64 attack helicopters in their air-strike campaign against ISIS, effectively putting boots in the air, if not yet on the ground.

Nonetheless, U.S. troops are still at risk, with the first U.S. military casualty of the ISIS campaign being Marine Cpl. Jordan Spears, who’s MV-22 Osprey crashed into the Persian Gulf on October 5.

In the midst of all this, ISIS has dropped yet another gruesome beheading video into the social media network, showing the graphic murder of British hostage Alan Henning.

Surely, the ISIS propaganda war is as virulent as their military strategy, prompting the Daily Beast to comment “ISIS is winning the online Jihad against the west.”

But what effect, if any, does this have on the battlefield?

To understand the reasons why ISIS invests so much stock in their propaganda machine, we need to know how it works. But propaganda is an elusive concept to apprehend.

The name most associated with modern day propaganda is non other than the Minister of Propaganda himself: Joseph Goebbels. In Goebbels’ hands, propaganda was taken to a high, albeit dark, art form. A look at his modus operandi can give us a glimpse into its true potentials.

Joseph Goebbels, Germany (1934)

Goebbels considered propaganda to be an arm of warfare itself, no less important than any other branch of the armed or intelligence services.

Leonard Doob, in Goebbels’ Principals of Propaganda, states that propaganda must affect the enemy’s policy and action.

What policy is ISIS attempting to affect with the distribution of their horrific beheading videos? If anything, it would seem that ISIS is merely garnering the world’s ire with such a display of savagery.

According to Richard Engel of NBC News, ISIS is “trying to provoke a response. ISIS wants to get the U.S. more deeply involved in this conflict, which ISIS firmly believes will be a quagmire for the U.S. and any other country.”

In addition, contrary to repulsing viewers, ISIS propaganda has become a potent tool for recruiting Westerners to their cause.

According to NYPD Commissioner Bratton, ISIS has the “ability to inspire people here in the United States who can’t travel to Syria to fight, or inspire people to travel to Syria and while they’re there, train them and inspire them to come home and commit terrorist acts.”

And it is doing just that. On October 6, a U.S. teen was apprehended at Chicago’s International Airport, en route to joining ISIS in the Middle East. In addition, CBS reported that young girls from as far away as France, Britain, and even Australia were part of a growing number of women answering the call to join ISIS for excitement, marriage, and “producing jihadist children.”

Goebbels believed that propaganda must label events and people with distinctive phrases or slogans. These labels must in turn provoke emotional responses which are inherent in their audience. In addition, they must be repeated over and over again.

With an über significance placed on names, there were certain words Goebbels put in reserve for Nazi use only. For instance, it was forbidden to use the term Führer in any context other than the referencing of Hitler himself, even though it was originally a generic term meaning “leader”. Similarly, the term Reich was co-opted to signify the Nazi regime exclusively.

The Islamic State is practicing the same methodology, carefully choosing words and labels loaded with meta-data which carry an emotional and political impact. Words such as Islamic, state, and caliphate all trigger a response, often below the threshold of conscious awareness.

In a recent display of counter propaganda, the French government has taken the initiative to rename the Islamic State with the derogatory moniker Daesh, which sounds like the Arabic word Dahes, meaning “one who sows discord.”

“This is a terrorist group and not a state,” said French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius. “I do not recommend using the term Islamic State because it blurs the lines between Islam, Muslims, and Islamists

This war over words recently spilled over into the western liberal media set when Ben Affleck debated Bill Maher over the term Islam.

“It’s the only religion,” commented Maher, “that acts like the mafia, that will fucking kill you if you say the wrong thing, draw the wrong picture, or write the wrong book.”

Ben Affleck describes Mahar’s comments as gross, racist, and disgusting. “It’s like saying,” said Affleck, “‘Oh, you shifty Jew!’”

“The Flames of War”, a 55 minute propaganda video by ISIS

According to Doob, Goebbels felt that propaganda must evoke the interest of an audience and must be transmitted through an attention-getting communications medium.

Towards this end, Goebbels exerted tremendous control over newspapers, radio stations, publishing houses, and the German motion picture industry. Indeed, Goebbels’ far reaching vision encompassed an Orwellian-style cable TV system to broadcast Nazi propaganda around Germany.

Goebbels believed that film was especially effective because the visual medium provided “proof” for his propaganda contentions. As a result, the Nazi elite cultivated close relations with the film industry.

An associate of Hitler was the acclaimed filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl, who directed the breakthrough Nazi propaganda film Triumph of the Will.

The recently released ISIS propaganda film The Flames of War has been compared to Riefenstahl’s work.

According to Doob, Goebbels believed that “all media must be employed simultaneously, since one never knew what type of bait would catch the variety of fish who were Nazi targets.”

ISIS has taken this view, and is running with it. Embracing all the means of modern communication at their disposal, ISIS is very active on Youtube, Twitter, and the social media networks.

Recognizing the power and influence this lends ISIS, Twitter moved to “suspend more than 1,000 suspect accounts linked to the group during September, including at least 100 foreign fighters.”

ISIS is not taking this move lightly and are responding in the manner they are accustomed, with threats of excessive force and violence.

On October 9, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo revealed that he and his staff were subjects of death threats by ISIS. “After we started suspending their accounts,” Costolo said, “some folks affiliated with the organization used Twitter to declare that employees of Twitter and their management should be assassinated. Obviously that’s a jarring thing for anyone to deal with.”

Trajan Column depicting Roman soldier beheading Dacian soldier (88 AD)

Even though the term “propaganda” came into usage during World War One, the science of propaganda is much older, dating back even, to ancient Greece.

The Athenians developed the art of propaganda, utilizing theater, festivals, assembly, books, and oratory as powerful engines for political and social persuasion.

The Romans however, brought propaganda to its full maturity, in the form of the Roman Spectacle.

These spectacles were ritualized games and blood sports housed in large arenas such as the Colosseum and the Circus Maximus, built specifically for the purpose. They hosted chariot races, gladiator fights, naval battles and executions. Death was the central theme as crucifixions, wild animal attacks, and beheadings were par for the course.

According to Donald Kyle, “The death of humans usually constitutes a spectacle, a disturbing sight which is awful in both senses of the word, an eerie yet intriguing phenomenon demanding acknowledgement and attention.”

Even though the Roman citizenry swarmed to these events on the pretext of entertainment, the Roman Empire staged these events, according to Alison Futrell, for the purpose of “providing a venue for the establishment of power relations, a sanctuary where ritualized combat resolved cosmic tensions, and a stage for blood-drenched demonstrations of Roman moral strength.”

Today, the Roman arena has been replaced by television, and the even more accessible Youtube. The Islamic State, with their cruel beheading videos, may be demonstrating that they too have a grasp of the underlying dynamics of power. This sophistication would make them an even greater threat then they already have demonstrated to be on the battlefield.