Qatar’s
Shadow War

This short book is about Qatar, a country from where Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood are able to use tremendous oil and natural gas wealth to promote its dangerous ideology around the world.

Using the sophisticated infrastructure of modern political warfare, Qatar also advances its own national interests against its chief regional rival, Saudi Arabia, as it bucks to replace one of America’s most important strategic alliances.

Due to their policy biases—as well as the friendly intellectual environment created and nurtured by petrodollars inside the Beltway—American elites and policymakers have been soft targets for Qatari influence and information operations.

Information operations use media and traditional tools of public relations to advance policy interests through narratives. They take place primarily within the confines of public discourse, using mass media to disseminate weaponized information. It is weaponized, meaning, it leads one to a conclusion about the topic at hand.

In an information operation, the consumer or the target is given information with which he will determine a course of action. In basic scope, information operations are campaigns of mass influence like any other, not unlike a shoe company would undertake to sell more sneakers. That shoe company is providing prospective customers, on a large scale, with public information about their product which will lead them to making the decision to purchase their product. In electoral politics, this kind of campaign is undertaken to convince a citizen to cast a vote for a particular party, and to shun another. In public affairs, a campaign would be undertaken to agitate for a policy change—either stoking public pressure on policymakers to make the change, or directly targeting the policymakers themselves.

In today’s media environment, that information might be in the form of news articles on websites, newspapers and magazines; commentary on blogs, in podcasts or on YouTube; or in television segments on cable news broadcasts. What distinguishes the information operation from other influence efforts, however, is the basis in reported news; these are wars waged primarily using the raw materials provided by the media. Reporters provide the ammunition, and then a chorus of voices move the weaponized information through the public. Sometimes this process is staged, pay-for-play, or the result of bribery; often they’re not. This effort forms part of a campaign and is in contrast to or complementary with traditional advertising. It is used because it appears to be organic and genuine and, in many cases, it comes pretty close.