Update from the US Army War College’s Influence and Information Advantage Elective: Information Wargaming Lessons Learned

Authors: CDR Michael Posey, Mr. Joseph Wheaton, COL Jerry Landrum, PhD

In this article, we will discuss how we used three different influence wargames at the US Army War College to achieve learning objectives during an information-centric elective and share our reflections on the wargames and our own performance.

Military professionals understand the complexity and importance of influence. From the early stages of our military careers, we are exposed to leaders who shape our units and witness the effects of our military actions in the information environment. National security professionals intuitively grasp the “understand” and “leverage” functions of information described in Joint Publication 3-04 Information in Joint Operations.  These concepts are central to clarifying our own decision-making and altering the decision-making of our adversaries.  The U.S. Army War College extensively studies, discusses, and thinks strategically about influence. However, applying influence, especially offensively, is a complex and challenging task against a thinking adversary. Information advantage is a crucial factor that generates operational military advantage, especially as it relates to tempo and creating dilemmas for adversaries. It can be achieved when an adversary’s decision-making process is disrupted, usurped, corrupted, or influenced. Information advantage provides windows of opportunity for military commanders to achieve operational effects against their opponents, but like any military action, it requires practice and strategic thinking. 

Teaching national security professionals about information advantages is a daunting task. However, wargaming provides a low-risk, immersive, and participatory experience that enhances teaching cognitive influence techniques, inspires strategic thinking, and motivates students to understand the nuances of influence activities. Wargaming is not just fun but a tangible and dynamic way to practice decision-making and develop critical thinking skills. We firmly believe that wargaming can push influence lesson objectives higher up the triangle in Bloom’s Taxonomy (see Figure 1), a hierarchical educational classification learning model. In simpler terms, with wargaming, students can put what they have learned into action, not just understand it, thereby enhancing their retention of influence knowledge. In our Army War College elective, Influence and Information Advantage, we harnessed the power of wargaming to elevate our learning outcomes on Bloom’s Taxonomy for our thirteen students.

After teaching our information elective in 2023, we wrote for IPA about employing a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) wargame, War of Whispers. As our Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Christopher Grady, notes, wargaming allows for constantly improving concepts. We firmly believe in the importance of wargaming in educating the Joint Force, especially with an inherently human topic like influence. In 2024, we again leveraged wargames, which we see as a natural pairing to influence. After covering foundational readings on the history and philosophy of information, we focused academic inquiry on the technical aspects of a narrative, Military Deception (MILDEC) doctrine, and case studies like Fortitude and Desert Storm.  We also assigned readings about influence wargaming, such as that from the United Kingdom Ministry of Defense Influence and Wargaming Handbook.  Finally, we introduced new material from our colleague Allison Abbe’s brilliant piece that covers the importance of strategic empathy and perspective-taking.  We experimented with three information-related wargames to elevate learning from these assignments: War of Whispers (for a second time), NATO Mission: Debunk Twister, and Malign.

Revisiting War of Whispers

We played War of Whispers three times during our ten-class elective. We wanted to familiarize players with the rules, so we introduced the game as an icebreaker during the first day. Halfway through the elective, we played a second time following the persuasion and MILDEC lessons.  Beforehand, we reviewed Cialdini’s seven principles of influence and MILDEC basics. We encouraged table talk and negotiating for the second game. We thought this timing and the quick review might be appropriate because the players employ agents and use deception, concealment, influence, information, and misinformation to gain power over kingdoms.  Finally, we played War of Whispers a third time on our last day of class to see if the students could perform better after more practice with the game. For the winner, the player who can manipulate and orchestrate the rise and fall of the empires to that player’s secret advantage, we offered only the incentive of “bragging rights.”

In playing War of Whispers, our lesson objectives were to:

1. Apply OPSEC, MILDEC, and influence basics to gain an advantage over your classmates in a practical experiential learning exercise.
2. Understand the limitations of influence theory in a resource and time-constrained practical, experiential learning exercise.

While we definitively achieved lesson objective b, we struggled to meet lesson objective a. Although some students fully understood the game rules, many never fully comprehended them without a facilitator helping them. Our biggest mistake was not playing the game twice in a row during our three-hour sessions, as we did last year; instead, we played it once during each elective session after a seminar discussion beforehand. As we expected, during the first round of War of Whispers, the students were focused on understanding the rules and mechanics of the game instead of applying the information lessons and concepts. However, the students never became comfortable with the game mechanics.

To improve for AY25, we have three courses of action. First, we could record videos of sample War of Whispers gameplay—complete with table talk and samples of how to use influence and MILDEC/OPSEC within the game. Second, we could keep the game as an icebreaker but spend more time on the two other wargames we tried during our elective. Finally, and most likely, we will not play War of Whispers to dedicate more class time to the two other games we experimented with during our elective. 

Altering and Applying NATO Mission: Debunk Twister

Developed by Jānus Rungulis, Madara Šrādere, and Vitālijs Rakstiņš of NATO STRATCOM, NATO Mission: Debunk Twister is a card game that uses current real-world myths to guide gameplay.  The game designers advertise Debunk Twister as a tool to teach information resilience and media literacy through a “narrative battle” surrounding 14 myths about NATO-Russian relations. We thought this game would be useful to our graduates since there is no shortage of myths that Russia spreads about NATO, and NATO puts considerable effort into debunking Russian falsehoods.  These myths touch on well-known and contentious topics such as NATO expansion (past and future), NATO encirclement of Russia, and NATO’s purported post-Cold War purpose.  

 The game is straightforward to play and consists of each team receiving 30 cards with pictures of simulated social media posts.  After spending at least 10 minutes carefully examining the cards, the students begin playing the cards against each other, with the Red Team (Russia) moving first.  The Red Team is free to propagate any narrative they choose, and the Blue Team (NATO) must respond to the Red Team narrative.  After all the cards (see Figure 2) are played against each other, the instructors determine which team best executed their narrative strategy.    

Our lesson objectives while playing Debunk Twist were:

1. Understand how narratives are constructed and form the basis for themes, messages, and the military application of information from both theoretical and practical perspectives.
2. Understand Russia’s use of informational power prior to and during its 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
3. Analyze NATO’s use of informational power in response to Russian activities.
4. Apply narrative theory basics in practice using a NATO vs. Russia wargame.

Our assessment is that we only had moderate success in achieving the first learning outcome.  Only allowing the students 10 minutes to construct a coherent narrative is challenging.  More time allocation for creating a narrative strategy would be helpful.  For the second learning outcome, we assess a high level of success.  At the end of the wargame, all the students understood the myths surrounding the narrative battle between Russia and NATO.  The game only identified 14 myths, but the students inevitably extended the game boundaries and incorporated myths emerging from the ongoing Russo-Ukraine War.  The third outcome was also achieved in that the students analyzed how NATO might use social media to rapidly respond to Russian disinformation, primarily how this medium might be used to amplify pro-NATO narratives.  Finally, for the last learning outcome, the game successfully prompted the students to incorporate previous classroom discussions and material, which deepened learning across the board.

The simplicity of this game is its most significant advantage.  Most students can learn the simple rules in about five to ten minutes.  Also, the game’s simplicity allows moderators to modify the rules to best achieve the desired learning outcomes.  For example, we are experimenting with an idea to allow students more time to design an information campaign based on the USAWC curriculum related to strategy formulation, Cialdini’s principles of influence, and other related techniques to develop an information campaign to support an operational approach.  Allowing students additional time to create an information campaign would facilitate more coherent gameplay as each card play would theoretically relate to some information campaign objective.  We are also examining creative ways to distribute the cards to the team to drive gameplay better and allow moderators to inject unexpected events to see how each team adjusts its narrative strategy.  In summary, the NATO narrative game is easy to play and modify and provides an excellent opportunity to achieve desired learning outcomes comprehensively.

Finishing Strong with the Nation-State Game of Influence: Malign

Malign is an innovative card-driven educational game that explores the intricate world of malign influence, such as misinformation and disinformation. (Figure 3) Noted wargamer Sebastian Bae created the game with Emily Yoder, Grace Hwang, and Jared Cooper to teach influence in the information age. Students represent different fictional countries and engage in the competition continuum below the level of armed conflict. Students aim to increase their malign influence on other nations while simultaneously defending against influence attempts on their own populations by building resiliency through institutional strengthening and education campaigns. 

Students build influence campaigns by combining cards representing the campaign’s intent, method, and amplifier. They then activate these campaigns using creative storytelling, as students must justify their influence campaigns with realistic narratives. The game’s “effects result table” determines whether they successfully add malign influence, social resilience, or—with an unlucky die roll— campaign backlash, which does the opposite of what is expected of targeted population demographics. The game promotes a tense, engaging back-and-forth influence struggle. Through this immersive gameplay experience, Malign aims to educate students on the evolving threats of coordinated disinformation efforts while encouraging critical thinking on how societies can foster resilience against such tactics.

During this game, we sought to move the lesson objectives further up Bloom’s Taxonomy so students would retain and understand the lessons better than before. We designed the lesson objectives to equip students with the knowledge and skills necessary to navigate the complexities of the modern information environment. Our lesson objectives were:

1. Understand the role of information power in supporting integrated deterrence.
2. Comprehend narrative construction and how it applies to information advantage. 
3. Apply influence in simulated real-world scenarios with limited resources and time constraints.  

Through this set of objectives, we wanted students to develop a nuanced understanding of the role of information in strategic-level integrated deterrence, narrative construction, and influence theory.

Using Malign to achieve our lesson objectives above, we quickly discovered that it is a well-designed and thoughtful game that creates an immersive and engaging learning experience for students. We played the game over two class sessions within one week of each other, with the first as a chance for the students to understand the game and the second for them to apply influence techniques. While we struggled with students applying what was learned over the course, once we laid the foundation by ensuring the students understood the game mechanics, we began to see learning occur. Towards the end of the second playthrough of the game, students were applying and thinking through all the lesson objectives, especially the second and third ones. The game’s only downfall was that our students did not pick up the rules as quickly as we hoped. However, the students did grasp the rules faster than War of Whispers, the COTS game we played. As such, we assess that we achieved all three lesson objectives for Malign.

The game accomplishes the first objective of employing information power through integrated deterrence by allowing students to construct and execute influence campaigns using different components such as intent, method, and amplifier cards. Students must use information power, represented by these cards, to achieve their objectives and deter adversaries. Malign’s game mechanics encourage students to consider the relationship between military and non-military tools and the coordination of various information operations and strategic communication efforts.

The “narrative rule” in the game directly addresses our construction of the narrative lesson objective. Students struggled to vocalize a campaign via a concise narrative during our first playthrough of the game because they were trying to learn the game. After the first game, however, students started providing brief narrative explanations for their influence campaigns, encouraging them to develop compelling stories and themes aligned with their strategic goals. This aspect of the game helps students understand the importance of crafting realistic narratives and connecting with target audiences through strategic messaging. At a fundamental level, Malign aided students in understanding the importance of linking narratives to military planning and campaigns.

Finally, the game’s resource management system, which requires students to spend their limited resources to activate campaigns, simulates the constraints faced in real-world scenarios. Malign’s resource allocation system aided us well in achieving our third objective, ensuring students could apply their influence techniques in a resource-constrained environment. As the Government of Accountability notes, modernizing operations in the information environment with finite resources remains challenging for the DoD. Additionally, the turn-based structure and time limits imposed by the game create a sense of urgency and pressure, mimicking the time constraints often encountered in practical situations. By experiencing these limitations firsthand, albeit in an abstract manner, students can gain some understanding of the challenges of implementing influence strategies with limited resources and time.

Balance of Gameplay vs Student Learning: We May Alter Malign

During the AY25 electives period, we will emphasize our gameplay with Malign, and we may make three minor adjustments. First, to enhance the understanding of narrative construction, we may incorporate more detailed feedback mechanisms or peer review processes for the narratives developed by students. We believe that doing so could encourage more profound analysis and refinement of storytelling techniques. Second, to better simulate resource and time constraints, we may incorporate more dynamic and unpredictable elements, such as random events or unexpected challenges that disrupt player plans and force them to adapt their influence strategies on the fly. Finally, we may add to the friction between order and freedom in information control, as students must constantly be aware of the ethical, legal, and practical implications of controlling information. We find that the game does not address this topic, so we may add a small “event deck” directly related to specific scenarios that introduce ethical dilemmas or legal considerations related to government control. This change could prompt students to grapple with these issues more directly.  More importantly, this would allow for a rich post-game discussion of governments’ tensions in managing misinformation and disinformation as they balance public safety, national security, and freedom of speech.

Our recommendations might help achieve each lesson objective. Still, we must balance implementing them with the cost of time (perhaps doubling it) and disrupting the ease of gameplay, which we thought was a plus to playing Malign. The game does an excellent job of touching on each lesson objective to strike up a further discussion. In sum, Malign offers a comprehensive and engaging approach to teaching the complexities of misinformation and disinformation, influence campaigns, resilience, and strategic deterrence. 

Finally, regardless of any alterations we may make, when we play employ Malign during the next academic year, we will strive to connect the fictional scenario outlined in Malign with the real-world military or political activities that the game mirrors.  We will do so by finding a couple of required readings for the students to review beforehand and then providing a brief time to discuss those points during our Malign after-action review with the students. 

In sum, we play-tested three wargames this year. Wargames are a dynamic and immersive narrative tool that aids in educating students to apply influence. Although War of Whispers is a lot of fun, we had a more challenging time meeting our lesson objectives this year. So, we will choose to invest our time next year into the NATO Debunk Twister– primarily because of how easy it is and Malign. Malign is the best educational wargaming platform for Influence and Information Advantage because of its comprehensive, immersive play. (It’s fun!). Still, playing Malign is also relatively simple and sparks great discussion on nation-states and malign influence in the information age. 

About the Authors

CDR Michael Posey is an active-duty Navy officer. Mr. Joseph Wheaton is an Army civilian.  COL Jerry Landrum, PhD is an active-duty Army officer. All three currently teach in the Department of Military Strategy, Planning, and Operations at the School of Strategic Landpower at the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, PA.

Disclaimer

The views expressed are those of the authors and do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Army War College, Department of the Army, Department of the Navy, Department of the Air Force, Department of Defense, or U.S. government.