Now we are used to the fact that the word “networks” is associated with social networks on the Internet. However, even social media is a broader phenomenon than internet apps. First of all, it is about social interaction among various groups of the population.
It is believed that research on network policy first appeared in 1950, in connection with the interaction of certain interest groups with the US government. Initially, this policy was associated with relatively small and stable groups of corporate actors, immersed in regular interaction around a set of rules and laws in some particular sector.
Such strong and institutionalized ties between these actors have led to the emergence of the term “sub-government” or “iron triangle” in relation to them. The entire domestic and foreign policy of the United States is built on the active dynamics of these “iron triangles”.
Fritz Schapf, developing this theme, describes the politics of networks as actions in the “shadow of the hierarchy”. Such networks are involved in the negotiation and decision-making process, but only within the framework of the law. If regulations do not allow such actions, then the development of a shadow infrastructure of a criminal and corrupt nature is likely. [i]
In addition, the creation of shadow networks could be within the framework of some secret agreements between Washington and its satellites, for example, as in the case of Operation Condor in Latin America.
In the region, the Condor Plan was a U.S.-backed strategy to counter the spread of leftist ideas by attacking activists in six countries. Through coordination between governments, their respective intelligence services, and the FBI, the identification and prosecution of left-wing activists has become transnational.
The Founding Act was signed in 1975 in Santiago by representatives of the intelligence services of Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Uruguay and Paraguay, and later Brazil joined the agreement. The participating military powers exchanged valuable information about the “saboteurs” in their countries, revealing their whereabouts and identities.
The goal was to eradicate any trace of leftist, communist and Marxist ideology. During this time, the U.S. government, through the CIA, also provided technology and expertise.
In fact, it was a network across the region that was constantly evolving throughout the 1970s. Latin American dictatorships, at the behest of the United States, did not simply react to what they considered significant political threats to their power.
Instead, they carried out active and systematic actions to kidnap, torture, kill, and disappearance political, social, trade union, and student activists, and with them the eradication of left-wing political thought throughout the region. The methods used by the Condor operatives included some of the most horrific tactics of state terror known in recent history. [ii]
And all this at the suggestion and direct instructions from the United States.
Having extensive experience in creating and managing such networks, since the 90s, that is, after the disappearance of the bipolar world order and the beginning of the globalization process, the United States began to create its networks around the world. The emergence of new means of communication has contributed to this process.
The Pew Research study noted that “participants who viewed globalization as an opportunity rather than a threat also spoke of the personal forms of the international community made possible by advances in communication technology.
For some, this seemed like an alternative to a sense of local or national solidarity weakened by global forces. The speed and ubiquity of social media has been described as allowing for instant communication “around the world” and creating the possibility of a “worldwide community” that can provide “support when something happens around the world.” [iii]
Thus, the phenomenon of mutual development and influence of networks appeared – as actively developing means of communication and as political or quasi-political structures. Washington, exploiting these means, on the one hand, tried to establish long-term strategic political influence. And on the other hand, to have financial and economic control over as many sectors as possible.
Networks as such can have different configurations, for example, all-channel, where each node of the network is interconnected with the others. Or in the form of a star, when all information and resources pass through one point. [iv] It was this form that was most beneficial to the United States in order to control the passage of all information through its filters.
On the example of the work of the US State Department, we can see how various projects are being implemented to create networks of global influence.
We read on their official website: “EducationUSA is a network of the U.S. Department of State consisting of more than 430 international student counseling centers in more than 175 countries and territories. The network promotes higher education in the U.S. to students around the world by offering accurate, comprehensive, and up-to-date information on study opportunities at accredited higher education institutions in the United States.
EducationUSA also provides services to the U.S. higher education community to help school leaders achieve their campus recruitment and internationalization goals. EducationUSA is your official source of information about higher education in the U.S.” [v]
Actually, this is a project better known as a brain drain, since many foreign students, if they are competent and able-bodied enough, are immediately recruited for further work in the United States.
But there are other networks for those who came to the United States on any programs (these could be journalists, representatives of local authorities or business). For example, Alumni is “an exclusive online community for anyone who has participated in and completed an exchange program funded or sponsored by the U.S. government. Join more than 500,000 fellow alumni in this community to network, get the opportunity to develop skills learned while sharing experiences, and be inspired.” [vi]
The U.S. Agency for Global Media is an international network that connects six entities, including Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the Cuban Broadcasting Office, Radio Free Asia, Middle East Broadcasting Networks, and the Open Technology Foundation. [vii]
All of them carry out the interrelated tasks of disinformation, propaganda, incitement to speak out against governments and the imposition of the American way of life.
A number of U.S. think tanks working for the government and defense sector are directly engaged in network analysis to study current trends.
The RAND Center for Applied Network Research promotes the application of formal network analysis to individuals, organizations, and systems across the spectrum of RAND research. They study questions such as: “What relationships matter for policy outcomes?” and “How do relationships create communities?”
Network methods treat systems holistically, rather than focusing on individual characteristics, which allows for comprehensive information and solutions on important policy issues.
The Center’s website states that “our researchers are experts in fields such as policy analysis, mathematics, behavioral and social sciences, medicine, physics, statistics, and engineering, bringing a vital interdisciplinary spirit to the work.” [viii]
At the same time, the interests are quite broad – from the use of drugs in the United States and models of social learning to the propaganda of extremism on social networks to attempts to reduce the influence of the Russian media and build detailed maps of business structures in South Asia in order to counteract the growth of Chinese influence in the region.
The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments conducts a thorough analysis of the development of U.S. military and political strategies (both global and regional, relying on networks of partners) at a cost. [ix]
If we look at the infrastructure of the U.S. military, we find that it is a complex network. It’s not just about the Internet itself, which grew out of the bowels of the Pentagon and was originally envisaged as a backup communication channel in the event of a nuclear war. The US military bases themselves, scattered around the world, are also a network of installations, military airfields and ports, warehouses and special centers with various equipment.
The very strategy of US nuclear deterrence is based on the presence of networks. A recent study by the Federation of American Scientists states that “under this revised nuclear posture, the credibility of the United States’ deterrence will be largely ensured by the survivability of its nuclear command, control, and communications (NC3) infrastructure, as a devastating attack on the U.S. NC3 could prevent the president from ordering retaliatory strikes from U.S. nuclear submarines. Thus, upgraded NC3 systems, combined with the adoption of NC3 safeguards and support measures, would help strengthen the conditions under which the United States could abandon damage-limiting nuclear strikes.
Such an investment would help build confidence in the United States’ deterrent, because as long as the adversary is not confident in its ability to destroy every American nuclear submarine or disable the American NC3 network, a stable deterrence relationship will theoretically be maintained. Under this revised position, any attempt at a first strike against U.S. strategic nuclear forces, likely to still leave most of the U.S. ballistic missile submarine forces relatively unscathed and ready to launch.” [x]
You can also recall the underwater listening network of the US Sound Surveillance System (SOSUS), which has undergone significant improvements since the 60s, and listening stations detected unwanted mechanical tones during the first sea trials of the Thresher submarine. This prompted the U.S. Navy to abandon these tonals for all its future submarines, while the USSR did not attempt to create a Soviet version of SOSUS and therefore used submarine designs where they could not eliminate undesirable effects until the early 1980s.
Another example shows that Boeing’s combat command and control systems relied on a redundant matrix of hardened underground cables connecting launch pads and launch control centers. The General Electric configuration, on the other hand, used a single-core network of hardened buried cables with a mid-range radio station to provide command, control, and monitoring of the system. Both communication systems also required their own unique training programs for maintenance personnel and launch crews, as well as a separate logistics supply chain.
There are indirect networks that the U.S. stands for. In particular, in 2001, NATO launched a networked computer project for academic institutions in the Caucasus and Central Asia called the Virtual Silk Road. When the first communication within the network from Turkmenistan was received in August 2003, NATO declared that its scientific programme had been successfully implemented. [xi]
Supplying equipment to post-Soviet countries, NATO specialists also established contacts on the ground, conducted propaganda and collected various information. Needless to say, surely all the equipment had Trojan horses and backdoors for remote tracking and penetration. And, if necessary, for virus infection of computers with subsequent use as a local node. To date, we cannot be sure that these regions do not have computer systems infected with NATO viruses.
Now let’s look at the issues of the financial sector and business through the prism of US interests.
In general, the appeal to reflexive social practices in business management, according to the American authors, turned out to be fruitful, especially where the legal concepts of the network phenomenon need to be developed in accordance with the motivation of the participants.
Taking normative benchmarks, in particular efficiency considerations, as a starting point, legal studies of remittance systems and other networks in the private sector seek to analyse and agree on the innovative category of “network contract”.
Other studies of symbiotic contracts, inspired by institutional economics, have successfully demonstrated an increase in the efficiency of networking and, therefore, advocate their legal institutionalization. Economic studies of network effects and their various legal implications also provide a clearer understanding. [xii]
For this reason, there is a great deal of interest in network theories on the part of modern economists.
The SWIFT banking system is also a network. SWIFT, or the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, is a secure system that helps make cross-border payments, allowing international trade to flow more smoothly. The system is used in more than 200 countries.
But since it is effectively controlled by the United States, it was easy for them to disconnect the Russian banking system from this network, which is why Russian citizens cannot use their bank cards abroad.
In general, the American financial system is formulated as a means of involving global institutional investors in the development and use of the large amounts of liquidity that they control. Now, the so-called Wall Street Consensus reflects, or at least reverses, the rise of asset manager capitalism and the expansion of shadow banking, especially since the 2008 global financial crisis.
Researcher Ilias Alami believes that in order to understand the working methods of Wall Street, that is, global capital, headquartered in the United States, it is necessary to look at capitalist transformations outside the sphere of money and finance. He believes that Wall Street’s heavy emphasis on infrastructure is not accidental.
Ряд комментаторов утверждают, что мы вступили в “эпоху логистики”, когда оптимизация оборота капитала приобрела отчетливо стратегический характер. С ускорением развертывания Нового международного разделения труда мы также являемся свидетелями серьезного смещения центра тяжести мировой капиталистической экономики с Северной Атлантики на Тихоокеанский регион, что требует огромных потребностей в инфраструктуре для того, чтобы опосредовать эту новую модель неравномерного географического развития.
Consequently, the return of spatial planning and a new emphasis on large-scale interconnecting infrastructure (such as ports, canals, railways and integrated logistics systems) in development policies and practices to integrate remote areas are facilitating capital inflows and facilitating the strategic engagement of firms with global value chains. [xiii]
He finds it useful to see financialization as a form of expression of the innate capitalist tendency, which is the desire of capital to reduce human life and worlds to economic resources and monetary abstractions through privatization, commodification and marketization, as part of its irresistible impulse to increase value.
And all this is nothing more than network marketing, where the manipulation of consumer tastes works in the interests of multinational corporations and the banking sector. However, if we talk about geopolitics, then it is important for Washington to draw its partners and satellites into various contractual obligations, alliances and alliances.
Under the rule of Donald Trump, the Clean Network program was launched in the United States, which, as stated in the official presentation, “represented a comprehensive approach of the administration to protect national assets, including the privacy of citizens and the most confidential information of companies, from aggressive intrusions by malicious actors, such as the Chinese Communist Party.
The clean web eliminates the long-term threat to data privacy, security, human rights, and principled cooperation posed to the free world by authoritarian malevolent actors. The clean grid is based on internationally recognized standards of digital trust. It represents the implementation of a multi-year, nationwide, long-term strategy based on a coalition of reliable partners and based on rapidly changing technologies and the economy of global markets. [xiv]
Both American technology concerns and foreign countries and companies joined the program.
True, often US partners are not allowed to conduct business the way they want, and are almost accused of unacceptable actions. At bilateral summits between the EU and the US, officials from Washington expressed concern about the “duopoly” of Ericsson and Nokia 5G. In response, their European counterparts said that “Big Tech” has become overly dominant in a multitude of important sectors.
The Digital Services Act and the Digital Markets Act adopted in the EU, which combine search engines, shopping and booking sites, operating systems and many other services, did not please American diplomats.
Despite de facto monopolies in search engines, social media, operating systems, and certain internet software, U.S. lobbyists believe that internet giants operate in well-functioning markets.
At the same time, the US Innovation and Competition Act provides for billions of dollars in subsidies, which potentially does not meet WTO requirements for creating domestic alternatives and eliminating the dominance of European and Korean players in the market. [xv]
Biden’s main foreign policy priority is also networked: “to consolidate its network of alliances in an attempt to maintain the dominant position of the United States in forcing the West to confront China.” For commentators on Chinese state media, for example, the communiqué of the G7 summit was “the most systematic condemnation of China and interference in the country’s affairs by major Western powers.”
The U.S. “Build Back Better World” initiative, “based on values, high standards, and transparent infrastructure partnerships, led by major democracies,” signals “the U.S. intention to maintain hegemony in the post-COVID world.” Washington is “politically exploiting” weaker allies in NATO, where “the U.S. wants to create a narrative that equates its own hegemony with the West’s collective strategic advantage. [xvi]
As you can see, the United States has quite a lot of experience in constructing various political networks. And all of them represent instruments of influence and manipulation. To get rid of them, it is necessary not only to destroy the nodes of these networks and disconnect various communities (business, media, ethnic groups, political organizations, etc.) from them, but also to create their own networks that could serve as a more attractive alternative. Especially when it comes to the need to constantly broadcast your own ideas in the external environment.
[i] https://www.geopolitika.ru/book/setecentricheskie-metody-v-gosudarstvennom-upravlenii
[ii] Lucía Cholakian Herrera. The Condor Trials: Transnational Repression and Human Rights in South America (Review). July 29, 2022.
https://nacla.org/condor-trials-transnational-repression-and-human-rights-south-america-review[iii] In U.S. and UK, Globalization Leaves Some Feeling ‘Left Behind’ or ‘Swept Up’
https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2020/10/05/in-u-s-and-uk-globalization-leaves-some-feeling-left-behind-or-swept-up/[iv] https://www.geopolitika.ru/books/setecentrichnaya-i-setevaya-voyna-vvedenie-v-koncepciyu
[v] https://educationusa.state.gov/
[vi] https://alumni.state.gov/
[vii] https://www.usagm.gov/who-we-are/organizational-chart/
[viii] https://www.prgs.edu/research/methods-centers/network-analysis.html
[ix] https://csbaonline.org/research/publications
[x] Matt Korda. Siloed Thinking: A Closer Look at the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent. FAS, March 16, 2021. p. 34.
https://man.fas.org/eprint/siloed-thinking.pdf[xi] https://www.nato.int/science/virtual_silk/index.htm
[xii] Marc Amstutz and Gunther Teubner. Networks. Legal Issues of Multilateral Cooperation. Hart Publishing, 2009. p. 12.
https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/networks-legal-issues-of-multilateral-co-operation/ch1-hybrid-networks-beyond-contract-and-organisation[xiii] The Geopolitics of Financialisation and Development: Interview with Ilias Alami. OCTOBER 19, 2021
https://developingeconomics.org/2021/10/19/the-geopolitics-of-financialisation-and-development-interview-with-ilias-alami/[xiv] https://2017-2021.state.gov/the-clean-network/index.html
[xv] Hosuk Lee-Makiyama. National Insecurity: Transatlantic Distress over Market Concentration. November 2021.
https://ecipe.org/blog/transatlantic-market-concentration/[xvi] See-Won Byun. Chinese Views of Hegemony and Multilateralism in the Biden Era. July 7, 2021
https://theasanforum.org/chinese-views-of-hegemony-and-multilateralism-in-the-biden-era/#113