فصلنامه مطالعات عملیات روانی
پیاپی 21 (زمستان 1387)

Islam is capable of satisfying all needs of man all through ages. The general practice in Islamic seminaries is to draw the Islamic legal rules from the four well-known sources: the Quran¡ sunnah¡ reason¡ an consensus of the religious authorities. Shiite jurisprudence has shouldered the responsibility of protecting Islam and the teachings of the Prophet of Islam and the infallible Imams against the erroneous ideas. At present¡ the religious scholars are expected to shoulder the responsibility of scrutinizing psychological operations as a modern phenomenon. This article aims at examining the Islamic legal rules corresponding with psychological operations.

The US national security strategy published every four years is a major plan determining the foreign policies of this country. This plan includes the estimation of threats and opportunities¡ challenges the US government may face¡ and a collection of strategies and strategic recommendations for the US president. The post-cold-war and particularly the 2002 and 2006 versions of this plan incorporate some special features. This article examines the software approach in threat estimation and the 2006 version of the US national security strategy. The first part of the article looks into the theoretical issues influencing the development of the US national security strategies and doctrines and the background leading to the formulation of their national security documentation in different periods. Next¡ we examine the post 11/9 incident world atmosphere from the viewpoint of Americans especially neoconservatives and we also examine the threats from the viewpoint of new American administrators. Finally¡ the content of the 2006 version of the US national security documentation is analyzed. It needs to be mentioned that the US national security strategy is only published to familiarize researchers with the general outlook of this country. It is evident that the publication of boastful and lofty ideas about this country corresponds to this fact.

To reinforce capitalism and to confront other political and economic systems such as the Islamic ones particularly the Islamic Republic of Iran¡ the PSYOP theorists of the domineering powers seek to lead the opponents towards their own intended goals and to take advantage of them in order to reinforce and perpetuate their domination and¡ in turn capitalism¡ making extensive use of software and media mechanisms and symbolizations. Today¡ exploitation of symbolization techniques and symbolic systems by means of media such as cinema has become much easier. This article seeks to explicate the concept of domination¡ and theoretically examine its relationship with PSYOP¡ semiotics¡ and its use in cinema and symbolization. Using semiotics¡ the article also looks into the way domination is internalized through symbolization.

This article aims at explaining the theory of cultural hegemony and its means of implementation¡ i. e. the Hollywood cinema. Following the Cold War¡ the unyielding ideologic rival of this hegemony (the Soviet Union) has been replaced by another ideologic and political adversary¡ i. e. the Islamic Republic of Iran. Since the Hollywood cinema is controlled by some powerful American Jews¡ the level of confrontation needs to be attributed to the subsidiary actor (the Zionist regime) in the modern¡ political scenario of the US (the leading role). Following the Cold War¡ the cultural policy of the US has aimed at confronting the actors whom they consider axis of evil. Examining some outstanding American movies against Iran such as 300¡ Alexander¡ Wrestler¡ etc. ¡ in this article¡ we attempt to offer a well-documented analysis of the theory of conflict of civilizations and the Western cultural hegemony.

This article looks into public relations as a neglected element in modern wars; and instead of focusing on conventional military approaches¡ it attempts to find out how public relations is accepted by business firms. These firms try to look positive in the eyes of people so that they can attract the minds and hearts of customers (consumers). This article examines the public relations tactics and techniques used in the field of business during the last decade. It also examines the way the messages and marketing plans are developed¡ the messages are disseminated¡ and the techniques are used by PSYOP experts. Public relations is among the information and psychological operations fields of study which is not really developed. Military forces are afflicted with panic¡ doubt and uncertainty when they are faced with the media. A few decades ago¡ the same atmosphere dominated the business firms. This article seeks to prove that if the public relations techniques are used in battle environments¡ it will be as efficient as military arms. These techniques are the main elements of psychological operations and modern wars.

Lack of leadership in human institutions is the main problem of the West. For the first time¡ Joseph Nye defined ''soft power'' and its relationship with leadership duties. Leadership together with attraction creates a gradual process which can help leaders create soft power at different organizational levels. Joseph Nye also delineated how soft power can be practically employed by leaders as any action without soft power is like staggering in darkness and leadership devoid of soft power and inducement is similar to poor¡ meaningless poetry. In this article¡ considering Western norms and the function of the power of inducement and attraction in leadership process¡ he has tried to describe¡ explain¡ and predict leaders'' conduct.

Rumors constitute a major part of daily conversations. Although rumor circulation is always a multi-dimensional social and psychological issue¡ such dimensions are exaggerated under critical conditions. Whenever the society encounters problems and pressure¡ untrue reports get venomous. During the war time¡ rumors demoralize people by giving them wrong warnings and illusory hopes and thus threaten national security. Rumors threaten intelligence agencies and above all enhance hostility and hatred among different ethnic groups. The principle on the basis of which all these rumors are shaped is far-reaching and has extensive application. The kind of misrepresentation that rumor illustrates in its course of reminding¡ forgetting¡ imagining¡ and making excuses is exactly the one that is utilized in most of human communications. In this article¡ we examine the rumors created by the propaganda machine of the British government so that we may learn some lessons to fight back the rumors created by the PSYOP organization of this country against Iran.

This article looks into the US propaganda war following the 11/9 attacks. This incident provided the White House with the opportunity to reinforce its hegemony in the strategic Middle East on the pretext of fighting against terrorism¡ weapons of mass destruction and Islamic fundamentalism. The United States takes the best advantage of media publicity to extend its domination hegemony. Psychological propaganda is one of the soft power instruments which is used beside other political¡ economic¡ and military mechanisms in order to fulfill the goals of foreign policy. The US soft strategy was based on media work and it paved the way for the hegemonic system of politico-military objectives. On the basis of Antonio Grumchy’s theory¡ this piece of writing provides an analysis of the US propaganda war in the process of occupying Afghanistan and Iraq on the pretext of wiping out weapons of mass destruction and creating tension with the Islamic Republic of Iran after the 11/9 incident. In the case of Afghanistan and Iraq¡ the strategy that the US employed was to start a media war and then it used military forces to attack and occupy these countries. The research question in this military and media soft war atmosphere is whether the US can use the same strategy against Iran. Although the White House knows the Islamic Republic of Iran has put its interests in danger in the Middle East¡ it prefers soft and media wars to military operations since such operations are extremely costly and the right conditions for them don’t exist at present. Besides¡ the US has sufficient technological preparedness for an organized media and propaganda war.