Psychotronic Terrorism

Psychotronic weapons leverage psychology and the subconscious to attack a person’s will, and otherwise suppress and/or temporarily disable or zombify that person. Acoustics, microwaves, and lasers can also surreptitiously enter the brain, affecting psycho-physical condition of man and his decision-making abilities.

• Psychological Warfare
• Cognitive warfare
• Smear campaign
• Fifth-generation warfare
• New generation warfare
• Information Weapons
• Yuri Bezmenov
• Stage 1: Demoralisation (15–20 yrs)
• Stage 2: Destabilisation (2–5 years)
• Stage 3–4: Crisis & Normalisation (6 weeks)
• Reference / Documents

Psychological Warfare

Psychological warfare (PSYWAR), or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations (PsyOp), have been known by many other names or terms, including Military Information Support Operations (MISO), Psy Ops, political warfare, "Hearts and Minds", and propaganda. Various techniques are used, and are aimed at influencing a target audience's value system, belief system, emotions, motives, reasoning, or behavior. Target audiences can be governments, organisations, groups, and individuals, and is not just limited to soldiers. Civilians of foreign territories can also be targeted by technology and media so as to cause an effect on the government of their country.

In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule..

The British were one of the first major military powers to use psychological warfare in the First and Second World Wars. In the current British Armed Forces, PsyOps are handled by the tri-service 15 Psychological Operations Group. The Group was established immediately after the 1991 Gulf War, has since grown significantly in size to meet operational requirements, and since 2015 has been one of the sub-units of the 77th Brigade, formerly called the Security Assistance Group. In June 2015, NSA files published by Glenn Greenwald revealed details of the JTRIG group at British intelligence agency GCHQ covertly manipulating online communities.

The Brigade uses social media such as Twitter and Facebook as well as psyop techniques to influence populations and behaviour. David Miller, a professor of political sociology at the University of Bristol who studies British government propaganda and public relations, said that it is "involved in manipulation of the media including using fake online profiles". In September 2019, Middle East Eye reported that Gordon MacMillan, a Twitter executive with editorial control over the Middle East and North Africa, is also a reservist officer in the 77th Brigade.

On 22 April 2020, during the UK government's daily coronavirus briefing, General Nick Carter confirmed that 77th Brigade are working with the Home Office Rapid Response Unit "helping to quash rumours from misinformation, but also to counter disinformation". On 7 May 2020, The Economist interviewed Carter on the role of 77th Brigade in fighting COVID-19 pandemic disinformation.

The Defence Cultural Specialist Unit was used to monitor the internet for content on COVID-19 and to look for evidence of disinformation related to COVID-19 vaccines. An army source later told the Mail on Sunday that this involved monitoring of the UK population.

Psychological warfare operations are known to be divided into three categories:

1. White propaganda (Omissions and Emphasis): Truthful and not strongly biased, where the source of information is acknowledged.
2. Grey propaganda (Omissions, Emphasis and Racial/Ethnic/Religious Bias): Largely truthful, containing no information that can be proven wrong; the source is not identified.
3. Black propaganda (Commissions of falsification): Inherently deceitful, information given in the product is attributed to a source that was not responsible for its creation.

This is in line with JTRIG's goal: to "destroy, deny, degrade disrupt" enemies by "discrediting" them, planting misinformation and shutting down their communications. In March 2019, it emerged that the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) of the UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD) is tendering to arms companies and universities for £70M worth of assistance under a project to develop new methods of psychological warfare. The project is known as the human and social sciences research capability (HSSRC).

Cognitive warfare

Cognitive warfare (CW) consists of any military activities, conducted in synchronisation with other instruments of power, to affect attitudes and behaviours, by influencing, protecting, or disrupting individual, group, or population level cognition, to gain an advantage over an adversary. It is an extension of form of information warfare using propaganda and disinformation. NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) General Paolo Ruggiero distinguishes it from other information-related activities by its objectives:

Its goal is not what individuals think, but rather, the way they think.

Cognitive warfare refers to the way that human thought, reasoning, sense-making, decision-making, and behaviour may be engineered through not only the manipulation of information, but also by the A.I./ML network of algorithms which push information through the internet. Other methods of Cognitive Warfare include the targeted use of inaudible sound waves (frequency of <20 Hz) and microwaves to incapacitate enemy forces by disrupting the neurological functions of human targets without causing visible injury. According to the U.S. National Institute of Health, Infrasound’s effect on the human inner ear includes “vertigo, imbalance, intolerable sensations, incapacitation, disorientation, nausea, vomiting, and bowel spasm; and resonances in inner organs, such as the heart."

According to Masakowski, cognitive warfare is an extension of information warfare (IW). Operations in the information environment are traditionally conducted in five core capabilities - electronic warfare (EW), psychological operations (PSYOPs), military deception (MILDEC), operational security (OPSEC), and computer network operations (CNO). According to Masakowski & NATO Gen Ruggiero, cognitive warfare degrades the capacity to know and produce foreknowledge, transforming the understanding and interpretations of situations by individuals and in the mass consciousness, and has multiple agnostic applications including commercial, political and covert IW and CW military operations.

Using a psychological and psychographic profile, an influence campaign can be created and adjusted in real time by A.I. ML models until desired cognitive and behaviour affects on the individual and/or population are achieved. U.S. Army and Marine Corps counterinsurgency strategy calls for the use of automated biometric systems to separate insurgents and foreign fighters from the general population. In doing so, this helps counterinsurgents leverage the population and operational environment against the threat network. And because of these psychological perseverance mechanisms like confirmation bias, this can be very problematic based on the work of Nyhan & Reifler (2010). Nyhan & Reifler found that even attempting to correct false beliefs often reinforces rather than dispels these beliefs among those who hold them most strongly. This is known as the backfire effect – "in which corrections actually increase misperceptions.".

According to Masakowski, the objectives of cognitive warfare are to shape/control and enemy's cognitive thinking and decision-making; to manipulate and degrade a nation's values, emotions, national spirit, cultural traditions, historical beliefs, political will; to achieve adversarial strategic geopolitical objectives without fighting; to influence human/societal reasoning, thinking, emotions, et al. aligned with specific objectives; and degrade a populations trust in their institutions. In doing so, Masakowski claims that this allows for the weakening/distruption of military, political & societal cohesion; and undermining/threatening of democracy. Masakowski alleges that cognitive warfare has also been used by authoritarian societies to restructure society and groom populations to accept "continuous surveillance" and that this allows these authoritarian societies to "remove individuals/outliers who resist and insist on freedom of speech, independent thinking, etc.".

Smear campaign

A smear campaign, also referred to as a smear tactic or simply a smear, is an effort to damage or call into question someone's reputation, by propounding negative propaganda. It makes use of discrediting tactics. It can be applied to individuals or groups. Common targets are public officials, politicians, heads of state, political candidates, activists, celebrities (especially those who are involved in politics), and ex-spouses. A smear campaign is an intentional, premeditated effort to undermine an individual's or group's reputation, credibility, and character. Like negative campaigning, most often smear campaigns target government officials, politicians, political candidates, and other public figures. However, private persons or groups may also become targets of smear campaigns perpetrated in companies, institutions, the legal system, and other formal groups. Discrediting tactics are used to discourage people from believing in the figure or supporting their cause, such as the use of damaging quotations.

Smear tactics differ from normal discourse or debate in that they do not bear upon the issues or arguments in question. A smear is a simple attempt to malign a group or an individual with the aim of undermining their credibility. Smears often consist of ad hominem attacks in the form of unverifiable rumors and distortions, half-truths, or even outright lies; smear campaigns are often propagated by gossip magazines. Even when the facts behind a smear campaign are demonstrated to lack proper foundation, the tactic is often effective because the target's reputation is tarnished before the truth is known. Smear campaigns can also be used as a campaign tactic associated with tabloid journalism, which is a type of journalism that presents little well-researched news and instead uses eye-catching headlines, scandal-mongering and sensationalism. For example, during Gary Hart's 1988 presidential campaign (see below), the New York Post reported on its front page big, black block letters: "GARY: I'M NO WOMANIZER.".

Smears are also effective in diverting attention away from the matter in question and onto a specific individual or group. The target of the smear typically must focus on correcting the false information rather than on the original issue. Deflection has been described as a wrap-up smear: "You make up something. Then you have the press write about it. And then you say, everybody is writing about this charge".

Fifth-generation warfare

Fifth-generation warfare is warfare that is conducted primarily through non-kinetic military action, such as social engineering, misinformation, cyberattacks, along with emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and fully autonomous systems. Fifth generation warfare has been described by Daniel Abbot as a war of "information and perception". Alex P. Schmid said that fifth-generation warfare is typified by its "omnipresent battlefield", and the fact that people engaged in it do not necessarily use military force, instead employing a mixture of kinetic and non-kinetic force. he term 'fifth-generation warfare' was first used in 2003 by Robert Steele. The following year, Lind criticised the concept, arguing that the fourth generation had yet to fully materialise.

In 2008, the term was used by Terry Terriff, who presented the 2003 ricin letters as a potential example, but stated that he was not entirely sure if it was a fifth-generation attack, claiming "we may not recognise it as it resolves around us. Or we might look at several alternative futures and see each as fifth generation.". Terriff argued that while fifth-generation warfare allows "super-empowered individuals" to make political statements through terrorism, they lack the political power to actually have their demands met. In the 1999 book Unrestricted Warfare, by colonels Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui of the People's Liberation Army, they noted that in the years since the 1991 Gulf War, conventional military violence had decreased, which correlated to an increase in "political, economic, and technological violence", which they argued could be more devastating than a conventional war.

On the contrary, Thomas P. M. Barnett believes that the effectiveness of fifth-generational warfare is exaggerated, as terrorism conducted by individuals, such as Timothy McVeigh or Ted Kaczynski, lacks the support of more organised movements. This was seconded by George Michael, who noted that in the United States, gang violence was responsible for far more deaths than lone wolf terrorist attacks. L.C. Rees described the nature of fifth generation warfare as difficult to define in itself, alluding to the third law of science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke – "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.". Decades of peer-reviewed research show that echo chambers, in the physical world and online, cause political polarisation, extremism, confusion, cognitive dissonance, negative emotional responses (e.g. anger and fear), reactance, microaggressions, and third-person effects.

New generation warfare

New generation warfare or NGW (Russian: Война нового поколения) is a Russian theory of unconventional warfare which prioritises the psychological and people-centered aspects over traditional military concerns, and emphasises a phased approach of non-military influence such that armed conflict, if it arises, is much less costly in human or economic terms for the aggressor than it otherwise would be. It was first enunciated in 2013 by Valery Gerasimov as part of his Gerasimov Doctrine. According to one analyst:

the Russian view of modern warfare is based on the idea that the main battlespace is the mind and, as a result, new-generation wars are to be dominated by information and psychological warfare, ... morally and psychologically depressing the enemy’s armed forces personnel and civil population. The main objective is to reduce the necessity for deploying hard military power to the minimum necessary.

The term new generation warfare was first introduced in Russian (Война нового поколения) in 2013, as synonyms for grey zone and hybrid warfare in the Gerasimov doctrine. These are all terms that refer to modern military theories of warfare that go beyond conventional warfare. The terms began to spread and take on various meanings, and were not always used with clarity. Since being introduced, the term hybrid warfare has become trendy and is used often in debates on modern warfare. The term has gone through various stages of evolution of its meaning, and has been criticised for being overused. The term is used in official doctrines of nations, and permeates academic and policy discussions. The meaning has been extended to non-state actors, and shifted to be synonymous with "malign Russian activities" under Vladimir Putin.

At first, the term was not used in Russia, but has recently been adopted and undergone its own shifting usage: before the Russo-Ukrainian war it tended to refer to trends in American military thinking, but after 2014 Russia views hybrid warfare as entirely emanating from the West, in that every conflict anywhere in the world, from hot wars to sports to vaccination to the Eurovision song contest are all aspects of "hybrid warfare" waged against them by the West. The West on the other hand views it more as a way of preventing subversion and interference from Russia, including cyberwarfare. Russia created the concept of new generation warfare, but has also absorbed the hybrid warfare term. According to Suchkov (2021), the difference for Russian analysts is that new generation warfare is outward-facing, i.e., it's about "how to pro-actively engage with foreign adversaries", whereas hybrid warfare is about how to defend against interference from the West.

The very 'rules of war' have changed. The role of nonmilitary means of achieving political and strategic goals has grown, and, in many cases, they have exceeded the power of force of weapons in their effectiveness. … All this is supplemented by military means of a concealed character.

Many analysts consider the Gerasimov doctrine the best description of Russia's modern strategy of total warfare, which uses politics as well as war, and attacks on multiple fronts at once including hackers, business, media, disinformation, as well as military means. The internet has made available the possibility of new tools and approaches to destabilise or influence foreign actors, and the Gerasimov doctrine describes a framework for using them, and says that they are not just adjuncts of military force, but are in fact, the primary or preferred means to victory. The strategy is to foment chaos within an enemy state, and develop permanent unrest and conflict there. The prime example of the use of the Gerasimov doctrine in the field, is the 2014 unrest in Ukraine, where Russia supported extremists on both sides to exacerbate tensions and create unrest, and then used the unrest as a pretext to take over Crimea. Previous military strategies focused on traditional military concerns such as logistics, strength and location of enemy forces, whereas new generation warfare identifies the battleground as the mind of the civilian public. One analyst wrote:

Thus, the Russian view of modern warfare is based on the idea that the main battlespace is the mind and, as a result, new-generation wars are to be dominated by information and psychological warfare, in order to achieve superiority in troops and weapons control, morally and psychologically depressing the enemy’s armed forces personnel and civil population.

Characterising this emphasis on the mind, Berzins describes the theory as prioritising "influence over destruction; inner decay over annihilation; and culture over weapons or technology", and is a "total war battlespace" that includes "political, economic, informational, technological, and ecological" aspects. The goal is to implement the theory via eight phases, starting long before there is any military conflict. "Phase Zero" is about preparing the terrain by implementing psychological, informational, and other measures that prevent conflict. Chambers views New generation warfare as designed to use grey-zone hybrid threats, and "is focused on using non-military means of achieving political and strategic goals as well as military means 'of concealed character' to include the open use of forces 'often under the guise of peacekeeping and crisis regulation' to accomplish objectives. These tactics and techniques are particularly effective against the United States in the gray zone due to laws and regulations affecting our ability to act in Phase 0.".

Defense and national security expert on Ukraine Phillip Karber identified five elements of New generation warfare:

• political subversion – intelligence agents; agit-prop operations using mass media to exploit internal differences; corruption, bribery and intimidation of local officials; kidnapping, assassination and terrorism; creating local opposition cells from discontented elements
• proxy sanctuary – seizing local government centers of power, airports and military depots; arming and training insurgents; creating checkpoints; destroying ingress transportation infrastructure; cyberattacks; phony referendums; establishment of a "People’s Republic" under Russian domination.
• intervention – deploying Russian forces to the border with large-scale exercises involving ground, naval, and air force troops; clandestine introduction of heavy weapons to insurgents; creation of training and logistics camps adjacent to the border; integrating proxy troops into Russian equipped and led formations.
• coercive deterrence – secret strategic force alerts; deployment of tactical nuclear delivery systems; theater and intercontinental maneuvers; aggressive air patrolling of adjacent areas to limit their freedom of movement.
• negotiated manipulation – use and abuse of Western negotiated ceasefires to regroup and rearm their proxies; using violations as a tactic, while inhibiting other states from helping due to fear of escalation; split the Western alliance by using oil or economic incentives; selective and repetitive phone negotiations that go nowhere.

Chambers compared New generation warfare planning processes with American processes, and identified an eight-phases construct on the Russian side, and six phases on the American side. They don't line up well, and the first four phases of New generation warfare all fall within Phase 0 of US planning, the latter requiring a lot of interagency planning and communication, slowing it down, while the Russian process is designed to be nimble and work within the US phases. As Chambers puts it:

The fundamental problem with countering operations in the gray zone takes place when the United States cannot clearly identify gray-zone actors and actions (ambiguity) nor develop a clear common operating picture of actions taking place. In this case, the United States will be constrained by a bureaucracy that will likely not authorise operations until there is a clear threat. At this point, it is too late and the adversary has already used gray-zone operations to shape the battlefield and achieve its strategic objectives.

New generation warfare doctrine differs from hybrid warfare in that it combines both low-end, clandestine operations with high-end direct superpower involvement. On the other hand, William Neneth in 2015 wrote of "Russia’s State-centric Hybrid Warfare", while in the same year Balasevicius wrote of "state level hybrid war doctrine". Before May 2015, USAREUR commander Ben Hodges, who was particularly interested in the Russian plan for the "simultaneous employment of multiple instruments of war, including non-military means where information warfare, such as mass political manipulation", had referred to it as "hybrid or multidimensional war". However, in 2016 McDermott opined that hybrid warfare was alien to Russian military theory.

Information Weapons

Russia attempted to get the concept of information weapons introduced into United Nations resolutions, which at the time helped to guarantee Russian information and national security. This occurred in the 1990s when Russia was at its weakest and unable to compete with other nations in information weapons capabilities. At this time, Russia’s information weapons weakness was so pronounced that a prominent Russian scientist stated the following at an international conference in Moscow in 1995:

In studying the potentially catastrophic consequences from an enemy’s use of strategic information weapons systems on, for example, the economy or government control...we must unequivocally declare that in the case of their use against Russia, we reserve the right to conduct a first strike (nuclear) against the information weapons system and forces which are directing that weapon, and then also against the aggressor-government.

According to Russian new-generation warfare expert Vladimir Slipchenko, information weapons have also enabled a shift from a “quantitative-force sphere to a quantitative-intelligent sphere.” He adds that countries are creating “strategic non-nuclear forces, which will find wide use in new-generation wars and subsequently also will take on a deterrence function.” Numerous weapons depend on information technologies. Acoustic, electromagnetic effect, radiation, beam, and heat weaponry are under development as is the “unity of intelligence collection and destruction,” namely the development of reconnaissance-strike and reconnaissance-fire complexes.

Detailed descriptions of information weapons and their uses began to develop slowly in the 1990s. One of the first (and still considered outstanding) Russian articles to define and discuss an information weapons is the article by Major S.V. Markov, which was authored and published in 1996 in the journal Bezapasnost (Security). Leading specialists still refer to his many thoughts and definitions. Markov defined an information weapons as:

A specially selected piece of information capable of causing changes in the information processes of information systems (physical, biological, social, etc.) according to the intent of the entity using the weapon.

This understanding of information weapons and its impact on the information-technical and information-psychological activity of Russia produces a much different national will and language of dialogue than that to which the West is accustomed. Markov is convinced that international and state control over the creation and use of information weapons is essential. authors classified information weapons based on several attributes to include single and multi-mission/universal purposes; short and long range operations; individual, group, and mass disruption or destruction capabilities; various types of carriers; and destructive effect. They further classified information weapons as belonging to one of six forms:

1. Means to precisely locate equipment that emits rays in the electromagnetic spectrum and destroy that equipment by conventional fire.
2. Means to affect components of electronic equipment.
3. Means to affect the programming resource control modules.
4. Means to affect the information transfer process.
5. Means to disseminate propaganda and disinformation.
6. Means to use psychotronic weapons.

Propaganda and disinformation, can change the information component of command and control (C2) systems by creating a virtual picture that alters reality, changes the system of human values, and manipulates the moral-psychological life of the enemy population. This type of weapon can create disinformation in secure systems and alter navigation systems, information and meteorological-monitoring systems, precision-time systems, and so on. Psychotronic weapons that leverage psychology and the subconscious to attack a person’s will, and otherwise suppress and/or temporarily disable or zombify that person.

The data captured by the sensory organs or internally generated stimuli becomes information after it is processed by the cerebrum, or a myriad of lower-level processors that the human body is endowed with. When information is sanitised and divested of 'noise' or unwanted meme, it becomes intelligence. The data, before or after it is processed, can be manipulated or changed just as the data in any hardware system can be altered. Further, 'noise' can be induced with a view to corrupting the mind. This is precisely how the various cults work; This is what PSYOPS is all about.

A Russian military article declared that "humanity stands on the brink of a psychotronic war" with the mind and body as the focus. That article discussed Russian and international attempts to control the psycho-physical condition of man and his decisionmaking processes by the use of VHF-generators, "noiseless cassettes," and other technologies. An entirely new arsenal of weapons, based on devices designed to introduce subliminal messages or to alter the body's psychological and data-processing capabilities, might be used to incapacitate individuals. These weapons aim to control or alter the psyche, or to attack the various sensory and data-processing systems of the human organism. In both cases, the goal is to confuse or destroy the signals that normally keep the body in equilibrium.

We are on the threshold of an era in which these data processors of the human body may be manipulated or debilitated. Examples of unplanned attacks on the body's data-processing capability are well-documented. Strobe lights have been known to cause epileptic seizures. Not long ago in Japan, children watching television cartoons were subjected to pulsating lights that caused seizures in some and made others very sick.

One of the principal open source researchers on the relationship of information warfare to the body's data-processing capability is Russian Dr. Victor Solntsev of the Baumann Technical Institute in Moscow. Supported by a network of institutes and academies, Solntsev has produced some interesting concepts. He insists that man must be viewed as an open system instead of simply as an organism or closed system. As an open system, man communicates with his environment through information flows and communications media. One's physical environment, whether through electromagnetic, gravitational, acoustic, or other effects, can cause a change in the psycho-physiological condition of an organism, in Solntsev's opinion.

Change of this sort could directly affect the mental state and consciousness of a computer operator. This would not be electronic war or information warfare in the traditional sense, but rather in a nontraditional and non-US sense. It might encompass, for example, a computer modified to become a weapon by using its energy output to emit acoustics that debilitate the operator. It also might encompass, as indicated below, futuristic weapons aimed against man's "open system.". Solntsev also examined the problem of "information noise," which creates a dense shield between a person and external reality. This noise may manifest itself in the form of signals, messages, images, or other items of information. The main target of this noise would be the consciousness of a person or a group of people.

Behavior modification could be one objective of information noise; another could be to upset an individual's mental capacity to such an extent as to prevent reaction to any stimulus. Solntsev concludes that all levels of a person's psyche (subconscious, conscious, and "superconscious") are potential targets for destabilisation. According to Solntsev, one computer virus capable of affecting a person's psyche is Russian Virus 666. It manifests itself in every 25th frame of a visual display, where it produces a combination of colors that allegedly put computer operators into a trance. The subconscious perception of the new pattern eventually results in arrhythmia of the heart. Other Russian computer specialists, not just Solntsev, talk openly about this "25th frame effect" and its ability to subtly manage a computer user's perceptions. The purpose of this technique is to inject a thought into the viewer's subconscious.

UVB-76, also known by the nickname "The Buzzer", is a shortwave radio station that broadcasts on the frequency of 4625 kHz. It broadcasts a short, monotonous buzz tone, repeating at a rate of approximately 25 tones per minute, 24 hours per day. Sometimes, the buzzer signal is interrupted and a voice transmission in Russian takes place. It was allegedly reported to have started broadcasting in the late 1970s.

The term "psycho-terrorism" was coined by Russian writer N. Anisimov of the Moscow Anti-Psychotronic Center. According to Anisimov, psychotronic weapons are those that act to "take away a part of the information which is stored in a man's brain. It is sent to a computer, which reworks it to the level needed for those who need to control the man, and the modified information is then reinserted into the brain." These weapons are used against the mind to induce hallucinations, sickness, mutations in human cells, "zombification," or even death. Included in the arsenal are:

• A psychotronic generator, which produces a powerful electromagnetic emanation capable of being sent through telephone lines, TV, radio networks, supply pipes, and incandescent lamps.
• An autonomous generator, a device that operates in the 10-150 Hertz band, which at the 10-20 Hertz band forms an infrasonic oscillation that is destructive to all living creatures.
• A nervous system generator, designed to paralyze the central nervous systems of insects, which could have the same applicability to humans.
• Ultrasound emanations, which one institute claims to have developed. Devices using ultrasound emanations are supposedly capable of carrying out bloodless internal operations without leaving a mark on the skin. They can also, according to Chernishev, be used to kill.
• Noiseless cassettes. Chernishev claims that the Japanese have developed the ability to place infra-low frequency voice patterns over music, patterns that are detected by the subconscious. Russians claim to be using similar "bombardments" with computer programming to treat alcoholism or smoking.
• The 25th-frame effect, alluded to above, a technique wherein each 25th frame of a movie reel or film footage contains a message that is picked up by the subconscious. This technique, if it works, could possibly be used to curb smoking and alcoholism, but it has wider, more sinister applications if used on a TV audience or a computer operator.
• Psychotropics, defined as medical preparations used to induce a trance, euphoria, or depression. Referred to as "slow-acting mines," they could be slipped into the food of a politician or into the water supply of an entire city. Symptoms include headaches, noises, voices or commands in the brain, dizziness, pain in the abdominal cavities, cardiac arrhythmia, or even the destruction of the cardiovascular system.

There is confirmation from US researchers that this type of study is going on. Dr. Janet Morris, coauthor of The Warrior's Edge, reportedly went to the Moscow Institute of Psychocorrelations in 1991. There she was shown a technique pioneered by the Russian Department of Psycho-Correction at Moscow Medical Academy in which researchers electronically analyse the human mind in order to influence it. They input subliminal command messages, using key words transmitted in "white noise" or music. Using an infra-sound, very low frequency transmission, the acoustic psycho-correction message is transmitted via bone conduction.

It is completely clear that the state which is first to create such weapons will achieve incomparable superiority.

Solntsev's research, mentioned above, differs slightly from that of Chernishev. For example, Solntsev is more interested in hardware capabilities, specifically the study of the information-energy source associated with the computer-operator interface. He stresses that if these energy sources can be captured and integrated into the modern computer, the result will be a network worth more than "a simple sum of its components." Other researchers are studying high-frequency generators (those designed to stun the psyche with high frequency waves such as electromagnetic, acoustic, and gravitational); the manipulation or reconstruction of someone's thinking through planned measures such as reflexive control processes; the use of psychotronics, parapsychology, bioenergy, bio fields, and psychoenergy; and unspecified "special operations".

The last item is of particular interest. According to a Russian TV broadcast, the strategic rocket forces have begun anti-ESP training to ensure that no outside force can take over command and control functions of the force. That is, they are trying to construct a firewall around the heads of the operators.