Iraq war is fought on the Internet

Military delivers its own message on Internet
The military itself, he said, has found the Internet to be an extremely effective way to deliver its message on Iraq and has its own sophisticated Web site, http://www.mnf-iraq.com/.

"The Internet allows me to reach a much broader audience," Smith said. "A tremendous amount of Americans go to Web sites, our Web site included ... Iraqis now have access to the Internet and they are looking at other news sources than just the local newspapers."

The Iraq portrayed on the official Web site is very different from what the infantrymen describe — but that's the point. No single source can explain what is happening in Iraq. Now that journalists no longer hold a monopoly on news from the front, a smorgasbord of variations of the truth is spread across the Web.

"The enemy uses (the Internet) to their advantage because it reaches a worldwide audience, very economically and very efficiently," Smith said. "Here in Iraq we have been very successful in taking down the media networks that provide much of the material ... I'd say we have degraded al-Qaida in Iraq's media network by some 80 percent."

Islamic Army encourages recruits on Web site
The Islamic Army of Iraq, however, maintains an English Web site http://iaisite-eng.org/ where it assesses daily attacks on U.S. forces and encourages recruits for a regional Holy War that stretches across the Middle East.

"Today the nation is bleeding from Baghdad, from Gaza and from all the areas in these two countries, so it is a duty on us that we send a message to our brothers in religion and in jihad, (which) says: `Our arrows are aimed toward the necks of the enemies of Allah,'" one entry said.

But that's not the worst of it.

The site also offers videos of attacks on U.S. troops. The camera focuses on a U.S. soldier standing up in a turret, sometimes eating a meal or otherwise letting his guard down. Then a puff of dust — and the soldier's body slumps.

When these videos appear on mainstream outlets — and dozens do, on sites like YouTube — American bloggers contact service providers and demand that they be removed. Or they may seek help from sites like http://stop-internet-terrorists.blogspot.com/ which points to the videos and encourages people to flag them for removal.

Hackers attacked Estonian serviers
There are fears that warfare is coming to the Internet literally; last year, Estonia was the target of denial of service attacks that some authorities blamed on Russia.

By directing a flood of computers to connect with Estonian sites, the attackers overwhelmed computer servers and shut down Web sites belonging to the president, parliament, ministries, political parties, major news outlets and the country's two dominant banks.

Though the U.S. Department of Defense, has some of the strongest Internet defenses available, Smith said, the Pentagon is preparing for iWar v2.0.

This month the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security will conduct a multimillion dollar war game called Cyber Storm 2. The first time this war game was conducted, over five days in February 2006, the results were bleak. It showed how hackers and bloggers could use the Internet to take control of public services and the media to dominate the battlefield.

The military hopes to do better this time around.

"It's a fact of life now in warfare that the enemy will use the Internet," Smith said. "The question is making sure that he does not get exclusive use of it, he does not deny our access to it and that we have as much freedom to maneuver in that world as they do.

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