10th Man View of National Security (Part-2)

March 28, 2023 Devsena Mishra

An interesting thing about Success Models is that those who pursue them, live in an illusion of ‘control’ and think that whatever they are getting is due to the pain and hard-work they are putting into it. Why? Because their schedule of ‘rewards’ is not fixed! It’s not that they are sure to be rewarded for each and every actions, sometimes they get nothing and sometimes a lot – this unpredictable nature of rewards make them more devoted pigeon, who try hard and thinks may be I have not pecked enough, it is for them there are some motivation quotes available in the market too, such as “No Pain, No Gain.” This is the idea of Variable Ratio Reinforcement theory, which in Skinner’s view yields maximum response rate and maximum sustainability!

We have experienced many such Success Models in the past, and today with Technology, producing these Success Models in any part of the world is only a matter of a few clicks!

Creator Economy – Early Signs

Over the last few weeks, some headlines are flashing in the mainstream media about the Tulsi Village of Chhattisgarh. The village is now called a YouTubers’ hub, YouTuber Hot Spot, and Content Capital of India, as one in every three residents of village is now a Youtuber, a member of Creator Economy. There are over 1000 Youtubers in the village with a population of approx 3000. And these days all national media outlets are filled with the Success Stories of this village. There are stories from an 85-year-old grandmother to a 15-year-old boy, from people leaving government jobs and farming types routine professions to earning the name, fame, and celebrity status. And the village is now promoted as a Model Village for the country! Some outlets have mentioned that every kid born in this village and its surrounding, now aims to be only a Youtuber in life. After all, those who used to earn 10-15 thousand in a month, today earning 35-40 thousand, and as the number of their subscribers/followers is ramping up, there is no limit to their Success!

The whole scheme of the creator economy looks like nothing less than a dream for the residents of this small village of Bharat, at least in numbers and narration. This is a classic case of a ‘Success Model’ in making!

Creator Economy has already started setting its footholds in our small towns and villages, the Tier II/Tier III towns and villages are their main target! One can say that this is a unique model of ‘AatmaNirbharta’, which is developed by, nurtured by, and promoted by foreign platforms!

Now the question comes how we will convince a kid growing up in these villages, to perform the real work in life, when everyone around him/her is earning not just 100 times more money but name/fame and celebrity status too. And what all it takes is a Smartphone and some ‘fakeness’ before the camera!

We cannot ignore the fact that it is our Small Towns and Villages which produces our farmers, our soldiers, our craftsmen, and our Industrial clusters, so giving the foreign tech platforms’ Creator Economy a free runway here is like leasing out the potential of Bharat! And if these viral trends of today become ‘Success Models’ of tomorrow, it will probably take another War of Independence in future to bring our people back on track!

Addiction is a neurological process, which can shattered the life of individuals, societies and nation and it is generally irreversible! Drug Addiction in some of our border states like Punjab is one of our key national security issues, and we have seen our rural Punjab falling in the grip of this menace before our eyes!

Now these platforms of virtual dopamine- are another man made calamity in making, gradually spreading in the villages and small towns, under the shadow of ‘Creator Economy.’

Our inability to not see these trends can be called nothing but our intentional or unintentional ‘Vision Blindness.’ And it’s a matter of National Security concern!

‘Pit bull’ Controversy -– Uttar Pradesh

A few days back, news about a gym trainer’s 80-plus-year-old mother getting killed by their American bully dog pit bull surfaced in the media. The way hundreds of dog/cat lovers, across social media platforms, started a campaign to stand with the killer dog, started showing empathy with the owner for keep showing love to his dog despite losing his mother, and the way entire focus of discussions shifted toward pit-bull’s emotions, it makes one to wonder that what caused our society to become so insensitive, inhuman and immoral! From day one, the young man was pretending to be more ‘unusually’ caring and loving toward his killer pet, and his whole focus was on showing himself ‘cool’ and saving his and his American pit-bull’s brand image.

After all, he was in the center of a viral trend, how can he pretend to be a normal human!

This is the reality of this token economy, where being viral is more important than living as a normal human!

“With nothing else to seek but attention, ordinary people tend to become assholes, because the biggest assholes get the most attention. This inherent bias toward assholedom flavors the action of all the other parts of the BUMMER (Behaviors of Users Modified and Made into Empires for Rent) machine,”

Jaron Lanier, author ”Ten Arguments for Deleting your Social Media Account Right Now” and creator of Virtual Reality.

If we take the above case as a symbolic reference then the young man represents our Gen Z and emerging Creators’ community, his pit bull represents American tech platforms, and the old mother can be seen as a symbol of our National Interests. With whom do you think our youngsters will stand in the future?

“The mob rushes in where individuals fear to tread.” ― B.F. Skinner, Walden Two

There are many such early warning signs related to Creator Economy that exists, and it will need a separate case study of its own for those signs alone.

But in a nutshell, Creator Economy is now turning into the most upgraded engine of producing new/improved Success Models! Bit by bit, Success Models that it produces are tapping our society, politics, economy, religion, spirituality, cultural and civilizational symbols, and every single aspect of our National Identity, is being covered!

Observing these early warning signs/ symptoms with a System thinking mindset is beyond the capacity of traditional strategic security frameworks! A fresh approach is needed. And perhaps, this time, we will have to borrow the 10th Man View in our National security related issues!

The 10th Man View of the National Security

“If nine of us who get the same information arrived at the same conclusion, it’s the duty of the tenth man to disagree. No matter how improbable it may seem. The tenth man has to start thinking about the assumption that the other nine are wrong.”

This popular dialog is from the movie ‘World War Z’ is basically about an alternative method of intelligence estimates (also called critical method) developed by the team that was formed to analyze the intelligence failure of the Yom Kippur War (1973). The logic behind this approach was based on the idea of “refutation” not verification or human tendency to generalize from the experience, and it says that: “from all the hypotheses that can explain what is happening, one must choose not necessarily the one that is better supported by information, but the one that has no information that refutes it,” as shared by Major Gen. (Res.) Professor Isaac Ben-Israel (a member of that team) in his paper ‘Philosophy and Methodology of Intelligence.’

It is important here to note that Israel is an example of the western bloc’s traditional partnership. It’s a nation whose dependency on the western world is crucial for its existence, in the most complex region and among the most complex neighbors in the world! But despite that, when it comes to their National Security, they work on two key doctrines: the 10th Man View and Rise and Kill First principles. No strategic calculations can stop them for not pursuing that. So this idea that bearing the burden of US Partnership is more important than our National Security priorities belongs to an obsolete outlook. It’s a moral hurdle that needs to be discarded!

Some of the early signs of the creator economy that we discussed above, are also based on this 10th Man View! At a moment, when everyone around seems becoming an active participant in the Creator Economy and its Success Models, then it is the job of a 10th Man, to suspect and reject them!

[Note: this article is an introduction to this view; we will continue to explore case by case situation/ trends/ early signs of technology shift, with a 10th Man’s perspective in the upcoming set of articles]

Invisible Success Models – A Case of Bharat

A unique case about Bharat is that more than 85 percent of our people are patriotic and possess a great love for their nation, which reflected on all major events/calamities, local or global, and it is this core element of our instinct that as a nation, we always bounce back stronger!

Now the question comes if there are numerous visible Success Models of outside forces around us, then what happens to those who reject them? Who have faith in everything that belongs to their mother land- what references exist for them? How they are motivated to follow a path of no rewards, and no return? Reason, it is generally a blank space for them, which one can fill as per his/her motivation! So, from where this motivation really comes from? How that blank space is so special than any reward/recognition? And why no Skinnerian Model works for them?

The one-line answer can be it cannot be defined- those who pursue it, know it!

But if we have to put it in words, then we can recall a small story, which our current NSA Ajit Doval once shared in a talk. He said that once there was a grand Banyan tree (Vat Vriksha) in a forest. As the time passed, it got encircled by many weeds and small trees (Khar-patwar) here and there. At one time, the presence of those small trees and weeds expanded to an extent that they overshadowed the Banyan Tree itself, and soon the entire existence of the Tree turned blurred, almost invisible, some people started saying that this area belongs to only those small trees and weeds, Banyan tree never existed here! But the truth is that the Banyan tree was always there. It stood there for ages; and will stand forever! Few small trees and weeds could never uproot the Tree from its roots, what all they can do is that they can overshadow its existence for some time!

That Banyan Tree, the Vat Vriksha, represents the Invisible Success Models of Bharat, which are planted by, nurtured by our great visionary ancestors, and to see their Invisible Success Models, the need is to cut the weeds that surround it, with the sharpness of self-consciousness and wisdom! The Tree also represents our national cultural civilization identity, the roots of which are so deep down in the earth, that even we have no idea how deep they are! Our job is to clean the weeds and small trees down, so that Tree shines with full glory before our young generation, and we need to ensure that it is from this Tree they derive their inspiration to put Bharat back on the throne of Superpower, not from the Artificial Success Models of outside forces!

When such a day will come, when Bharat will start identifying, acknowledging and working on their own Success Models, when we will start choosing our own problems, challenges, and even our enemies, that will be called the first Shankh Naad of a powerful Bharat!

Conclusion

“In such things as War, the errors which proceed from the spirit of benevolence are the worst!” – Karl Von Clausewitz

Whenever the issue of tech-related challenges comes, the most dominating thought in our security establishment is that we must be aware and educate the people! This idea that aware and enlightened people, can fight their own battle often comes as the first reaction in everyone’s mind, and the whole process of figuring out solutions ends with this conclusion. We cannot forget that there was a time when a similar Educate and Awareness campaign model was presented for our J&K Terrorism-related challenges too! A whole lobby in Lutyens’ Delhi, developed, nurtured, and promoted those false promises and those fancy solutions, and previous governments, unfortunately, gave enough space to those recommendations in their policies too (when ‘Pyara Gulshan Apna’ kind of song were used to frequently aired in Doordarshan around the mid 90s). Those models cost us so dearly!

It is only after 2014, when the outlook and methods of our National Security challenges response changed when we adopted an action-oriented mindset, implemented needed policies/reforms in that direction, and most importantly when we reflected the right leadership intent, only then the whole situation started improving and today we can say that we are genuinely on the path of peace, prosperity, and security in the region!

Something similar is the case with Education and Awareness solutions to tech-related challenges! An educated and aware public can do nothing that can stop the Tsunami of improvisations coming from an engine, which is based on not some technical skills/competencies but on the craft of psychologists and behavioral experts! In one line, expecting common people to fight their own battle in this domain- is an unfair demand!

On a global level, Bharat, which is ready to lead in all major problems, from climate change to terror to food and fuel/energy security, always prefers to present itself as a mute follower on matters related to technology! A country that believes in the ‘Let noble thoughts come to us from all sides,’ mantra since Rig Veda times, surprisingly turn deaf/ dumb on Technology related challenges! The reason for this can be anything but not our inability, or lack of intellect.

There are many such discussions about the trajectory of technological/ psychological innovations of our time, that are going on all over the world, and a majority of these debates are going on at the HQs of these very technologies, their home countries themselves! Today, there is a whole lobby of Silicon Valley’s Hippies (the founding members, ex-executives of Big Tech corporations, scientists, and inventors) that exists, who are on a campaign to find a global solution for the menace that their products have created, and are in search for a human-centric perspective, which rests with the Bharat!

The world is looking at Bharat to provide a perspective, and a template to follow and this is the right time to introduce our Human Intelligence improvisation as the Success models to the world!

[Also Published at : Indian Military Review]