False flag
A false flag operation is an act committed with the intent of disguising the actual source of responsibility and pinning blame on another party. The term "false flag" originated in the 16th century as an expression meaning an intentional misrepresentation of someone's allegiance.
The term today extends to include countries that organize attacks on themselves and make the attacks appear to be by enemy nations or terrorists, thus giving the nation that was supposedly attacked a pretext for domestic repression or foreign military aggression.[7] Similarly deceptive activities carried out during peacetime by individuals or nongovernmental organizations have been called false flag operations, but the more common legal term is a "frameup", "stitch up", or "setup".
Use in warfare
In land warfare, such operations are generally deemed acceptable under certain circumstances, such as to
Another notable example was the
The British used a Kriegsmarine ensign in the St Nazaire Raid and captured a German code book. The old destroyer Campbeltown, which the British planned to sacrifice in the operation, was provided with cosmetic modifications that involved cutting the ship's funnels and chamfering the edges to resemble a German Type 23 torpedo boat. By this ruse the British were able to get within two miles (3 km) of the harbour before the defences responded, where the explosive-rigged Campbeltown and commandos successfully disabled or destroyed the key dock structures of the port.[10][11]
Air warfare
Between December 1922 and February 1923, a commission of jurists at the Hague drafted a set of rules concerning the Control of Wireless Telegraphy in Time of War and Air Warfare. They included:[12]
- Art. 3. A military aircraft must carry an exterior mark indicating its nationality and its military character.
- Art. 19. The use of false exterior marks is forbidden.
This draft was never adopted as a legally binding treaty, but the International Committee of the Red Cross states in its introduction on the draft: "To a great extent, [the draft rules] correspond to the customary rules and general principles underlying treaties on the law of war on land and at sea,"[13] and as such these two non-controversial articles were already part of customary law.[14]
Land warfare
In land warfare, the use of a false flag is similar to that of naval warfare: the trial of
In the transcript of the trial,
As pretexts for war
Russo-Swedish War
In 1788, the head tailor at the
Franco-Prussian War
On July 13, 1870, Otto von Bismarck published the Ems Dispatch – an internal message from King Wilhelm I to Bismarck regarding certain demands made by the French ambassador. In the version purposefully released to the public, Bismarck instead made it sound like the King had gravely disrespected the ambassador – a ploy to trick Emperor Napoleon III into declaring war on the North German Confederation, with the end goal of unifying the northern and southern German states. This ploy would be successful, as Napoleon III would declare war six days later; and six months later, the Confederation would win and unify the German states.
Second Sino-Japanese War
In September 1931,
World War II
Gleiwitz incident
The
The operation failed to convince international public opinion of the German claims, and both Britain and France – Poland's allies – declared war two days after Germany invaded Poland.[19]
Winter War
On 26 November 1939, the Soviet army shelled Mainila, a Russian village near the Finnish border. Soviet authorities blamed Finland for the attack and used the incident as a pretext to invade Finland, starting the Winter War, four days later.[20][21]
Cuban Revolution
Operation Northwoods
The proposed, but never executed, 1962
Russian invasion of Ukraine
In January and February 2022, Western government agencies predicted that Russia would use a false flag operation in Ukraine.
As a tactic to undermine political opponents
Operation TPAJAX
On 4 April 1953, the
The CIA operation was code-named
However, as "the C.I.A. burned nearly all of its files on its role in the 1953 coup in Iran," the true extent of the tactic has been difficult for historians to discern.[34]
Lavon affair
In the summer of 1954, a group of Egyptian Jews recruited by Israeli army intelligence were caught with plans to bomb American, British, and Egyptian civil targets in Egypt. The bombings were to be blamed on the
Pseudo-operations
Pseudo-operations are those in which forces of one power disguise themselves as enemy forces. For example, a state power may disguise teams of operatives as insurgents and, with the aid of defectors, infiltrate insurgent areas.[38] The aim of such pseudo-operations may be to gather short or long-term intelligence or to engage in active operations, in particular assassinations of important enemies. However, they usually involve both, as the risks of exposure rapidly increase with time and intelligence gathering eventually leads to violent confrontation. Pseudo-operations may be directed by military or police forces, or both. Police forces are usually best suited to intelligence tasks; however, military provide the structure needed to back up such pseudo-ops with military response forces. According to US military expert Lawrence Cline (2005), "the teams typically have been controlled by police services, but this largely was due to the weaknesses in the respective military intelligence systems."[39]
of Haiti was assassinated in 1919 after checkpoints were passed by military disguised as guerrilla fighters.The State Political Directorate (OGPU) of the Soviet Union set up such an operation from 1921 to 1926. During Operation Trust, they used loose networks of White Army supporters and extended them, creating the pseudo-"Monarchist Union of Central Russia" (MUCR) in order to help the OGPU identify real monarchists and anti-Bolsheviks.[40]
An example of a successful assassination was
During the
Another example of combined police and military oversight of pseudo-operations include the
Some offensive operations attracted international condemnation, in particular the Selous Scouts' raid on a Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) camp at Nyadzonya Pungwe, Mozambique in August 1976. ZANLA was then led by Josiah Tongogara. Using Rhodesian trucks and armored cars disguised as Mozambique military vehicles, 84 scouts killed 1,284 people in the camp, registered as a refugee camp by the United Nations (UN). Even according to Reid-Daly, most of those killed were unarmed guerrillas standing in formation for a parade. The camp hospital was also set ablaze by the rounds fired by the Scouts, killing all patients.[43] According to David Martin and Phyllis Johnson, who visited the camp shortly before the raid, it was only a refugee camp that did not host any guerrillas. It was staged for UN approval.[44]
According to a 1978 study by the Directorate of Military Intelligence, 68% of all insurgent deaths inside Rhodesia could be attributed to the Selous Scouts, who were disbanded in 1980.[45]
If the action is a police action, then these tactics would fall within the laws of the state initiating the pseudo, but if such actions are taken in a
"Pseudo-operations should be distinguished," notes Cline, "from the more common police or intelligence infiltration of guerrilla or criminal organizations. In the latter case, infiltration is normally done by individuals. Pseudo teams, on the other hand, are formed as needed from organized units, usually military or paramilitary. The use of pseudo teams has been a hallmark of a number of foreign counterinsurgency campaigns."[38]
Similar false flag tactics were also employed during the Algerian civil war, starting in the middle of 1994. Death squads composed of Département du Renseignement et de la Sécurité (DRS) security forces disguised themselves as Islamist terrorists and committed false flag terror attacks. Such groups included the Organisation of Young Free Algerians (OJAL) or the Secret Organisation for the Safeguard of the Algerian Republic (OSSRA).[46] According to Roger Faligot and Pascal Kropp (1999), the OJAL was reminiscent of "the Organization of the French Algerian Resistance (ORAF), a group of counter-terrorists created in December 1956 by the Direction de la surveillance du territoire (Territorial Surveillance Directorate, or DST) whose mission was to carry out terrorist attacks with the aim of quashing any hopes of political compromise".[47]
Espionage
In
According to ex-KGB defector Jack Barsky, "Many a right-wing radical had given information to the Soviets under a 'false flag', thinking they were working with a Western ally, such as Israel, when in fact their contact was a KGB operative."[49]
Civilian usage
The term is popular amongst conspiracy theory promoters in referring to covert operations of various governments and claimed cabals.[50] According to Columbia Journalism Review, this usage mostly "migrated to the right", however because some historical false flag incidents occurred, historians should not fully cede the usage of the term to conspiracy theorists. Perlman says "The real danger is if we use the nonattributive 'false flags' as shorthand for conspiracy theories, without explaining what they are and who is promoting them." At the same time, Perlman writes that "people yelling that any attack attributed to someone on 'their side' was committed by 'the other side' drown out the voices of reason."[2]
Political campaigning
Political campaigning has a long history of this tactic in various forms, including in person, print media and electronically in recent years. This can involve when supporters of one candidate pose as supporters of another, or act as "straw men" for their preferred candidate to debate against. This can happen with or without the candidate's knowledge. The Canuck letter is an example of one candidate's creating a false document and attributing it as coming from another candidate in order to discredit that candidate.[citation needed]
In 2006, individuals practicing false flag behavior were discovered and "outed" in New Hampshire[51][52] and New Jersey[53] after blog comments claiming to be from supporters of a political candidate (Charles Bass) were traced to the IP address of paid staffers for that candidate's opponent (Paul Hodes).
On 19 February 2011, Indiana Deputy Prosecutor Carlos Lam sent a private email to Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker suggesting that he run a "'false flag' operation" to counter the protests against Walker's proposed restrictions on public employees' collective bargaining rights:
If you could employ an associate who pretends to be sympathetic to the unions' cause to physically attack you (or even use a firearm against you), you could discredit the unions ... Employing a false flag operation would assist in undercutting any support the media may be creating in favor of the unions.[54][55]
The press had acquired a court order to access all of Walker's emails and Lam's email was exposed. At first, Lam vehemently denied it, but eventually admitted it and resigned.[55]
Some conservative commentators suggested that pipe bombs that were sent to prominent Democrats prior to the 2018 mid-term elections were part of a false flag effort to discredit Republicans and supporters of then-President Donald Trump.[56] Cesar Sayoc, motivated by his belief that Democrats were “evil”, was later convicted of mailing the devices to Trump's critics.[57]
On the internet, a
Ideological
Proponents of political or religious ideologies will sometimes use false flag tactics. This can be done to discredit or implicate rival groups, create the appearance of enemies when none exist, or create the illusion of organized and directed persecution. This can be used to gain attention and sympathy from outsiders, in particular the media, or to convince others within the group that their beliefs are under attack and in need of protection.
In retaliation for writing
According to PolitiFact, some false flag conspiracy theories (such as claims that mass shootings are hoaxes) are themselves spread by astroturfing, which is an attempt to create false impression of popularity in a belief.[60]
See also
Concepts
- Agent provocateur
- Black propaganda
- Casus belli
- Denial and deception
- Fear mongering
- Frameup
- Front organization
- Joe job, a similar online concept
- Mimicry
- Red herring
- State terrorism
- Strategy of tension
Examples
- Celle Hole
- Istanbul Pogrom
- Marxist-Leninist Party of the Netherlands(fake party set up by the Dutch security service)
- Masada Action and Defense Movement(French white supremacists, under the guise of a fake extremist Zionist movement, conducted bombings of Arab targets in France in an attempt to start a war between French Arabs and Jews.)
- First of the Baralong incidents
References
- ^ a b O'Conner, Patricia; Kellerman, Stewart (11 May 2018). "The True History of False Flags". Grammarphobia.com. Retrieved 9 June 2020.
- ^ a b c "How the term 'false flag' migrated to the right". Columbia Journalism Review. Retrieved 23 December 2021.
- ^ "False flags: What are they and when have they been used?". BBC News. 18 February 2022. Retrieved 20 May 2022.
- ISBN 978-1-136-88577-8.
- ISBN 978-1-4214-1747-9.
- ISBN 978-1-317-70198-9.
- ^ deHaven-Smith, Lance (2013). Conspiracy Theory in America. Austin: University of Texas Press. p. 225
- ISBN 9781871891034).
- ^ Squires, Nick. "HMAS Sydney found off Australia's west coast", The Telegraph, 17 March 2008.
- ^ Guinness World Records (2009), p.155
- ^ Young, P (Ed) (1973) Atlas of the Second World War (London: The Military Book Society)
- ^ The Hague Rules of Air Warfare, 1922-12 to 1923-02, this convention was never adopted (backup site).
- ICRC. Retrieved 30 October 2010.
- doi:10.1017/S0020860400091075. Archived from the originalon 25 April 2013.
- ^ Law Reports of Trials of War Criminals. United Nations War Crimes Commission. Vol. IX, 1949: Trial of Otto Skorzeny and others. Archived 2 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine. General Military Government Court of the U.S. zone of Germany 18 August to 9 September 1947.
- ISBN 951-99487-0-8.
- ^ Weland, James (1994). "Misguided Intelligence: Japanese Military Intelligence Officers in the Manchurian Incident, September 1931". Journal of Military History 58 (3): 445–460. doi:10.2307/2944134.
- ISBN 0-415-22405-5, Google Print, p.39
- ISBN 1-84176-408-6, p. 39
- ^ Turtola, Martti (1999). "Kansainvälinen kehitys Euroopassa ja Suomessa 1930-luvulla". In Leskinen, Jari; Juutilainen, Antti (eds.). Talvisodan pikkujättiläinen. pp. 44–45.
- OCLC 1261364794.
- U.S. Department of Defense, 13 March 1962. The Operation Northwoods document in PDF format on the website of the independent, non-governmental research institute the National Security Archive at the George Washington University Gelman Library, Washington, D.C. Direct PDF links: here and here.
- ^ "Operation Northwoods: Justification for U.S. Military Intervention in Cuba, 3/13/62".
- ISBN 978-0984314447. Retrieved 30 October 2018.
- ISBN 978-0-385-49907-1.
- ^ Walton, Calder. "False-Flag Invasions Are a Russian Specialty". Foreign Policy. Retrieved 14 March 2022.
- ^ a b Gilbert, David (21 February 2022). "Russia's 'Idiotic' Disinformation Campaign Could Still Lead to War in Ukraine". Vice Media. Archived from the original on 21 February 2022. Retrieved 22 February 2022.
- ^ a b c "Four Russian false flags that are comically easy to debunk". The Telegraph. 21 February 2022. Archived from the original on 22 February 2022. Retrieved 22 February 2022.
- ^ "Russia says it prevented border breach from Ukraine, Kyiv calls it fake news". Reuters. 21 February 2022. Archived from the original on 21 February 2022. Retrieved 21 February 2022.
- ^ Bellingcat Investigation Team (23 February 2022). "Documenting and Debunking Dubious Footage from Ukraine's Frontlines". Bellingcat. Archived from the original on 23 February 2022. Retrieved 24 February 2022.
- ^ "'Dumb and lazy': the flawed films of Ukrainian 'attacks' made by Russia's 'fake factory'". The Guardian. 21 February 2022. Archived from the original on 21 February 2022. Retrieved 22 February 2022.
- ^ a b c Callanan, James (2009). Covert Action in the Cold War: US Policy, intelligence and CIA operations, London: I.B. Tauris. p.115
- ^ a b Risen, James. Secrets of History: The C.I.A. in Iran – A Special Report; How a Plot Convulsed Iran in '53 (and '79). The New York Times, 16 April 2000
- ^ Weiner, Tim (1997). C.I.A. Destroyed Files on 1953 Iran coup, The New York Times, 29 May.
- ^ The encyclopedia of the Arab-Israeli conflict: a political, social, and military history. ABC-CLIO. 2008. p. 610.
- ISBN 978-0-8021-3286-4. Retrieved 19 June 2011.
- ISBN 978-0-231-10464-7.
- ^ a b c Cline, Lawrence E. (2005) Pseudo Operations and Counterinsurgency: Lessons from other countries, Archived 16 November 2016 at the Wayback Machine, Strategic Studies Institute.
- ^ "Excerpt – Pseudo Operations and Counterinsurgency: Lessons from Other Countries". ssi.armywarcollege.edu. Archived from the original on 2 May 2017. Retrieved 16 October 2019.
- ISBN 0-465-00312-5.
- ISSN 0458-3035. Retrieved 7 November 2017.
- ^ Cline (2005), p. 11.
- ISBN 978-1-919874-33-3).
- ^ Cline (2005), who quotes David Martin and Phyllis Johnson, The Struggle for Zimbabwe: the Chimurenga War, New York: Monthly Review Press, 1981, pp. 241–242.
- Croom Helm, 1985, pp. 60–77. Cline also quotes Ian F. W. Beckett, The Rhodesian Army: Counter-Insurgency 1972–1979 at selousscouts.
- ISBN 2-7071-4747-8. Extract in English with mention of the OJAL available here.
- ^ Luonis Aggoun and Jean-Baptiste Rivoire, ibid., quoting Roger Faligot and Pascal KROP, DST, Police Secrète, Flammarion, 1999, p. 174.
- ^ Crawford, Angus (20 March 2009). "Victims of Cold War 'Romeo spies'". BBC Online. Retrieved 10 April 2009.
- OCLC 979545331.
- ^ Usckinski, Joseph (27 October 2018). "Five things to know about 'false flag' conspiracy theories". The Washington Post. Retrieved 9 June 2020.
- ^ Steele, Allison, "Bass staffer in D.C. poses as blogger: Bogus posts aimed at his political opponent"Archived 12 March 2007 at the Wayback Machine, Concord Monitor, 26 September 2006 (URL last accessed 24 October 2006).
- ^ Saunders, Anne, "Bass aide resigns after posing as opponent's supporter online", The Boston Globe, 26 September 2006 (URL last accessed 24 October 2006).
- ^ Miller, Jonathan, "Blog Thinks Aide to Kean Posted Jabs At Menendez", The New York Times, 21 September 2006 (URL last accessed 24 October 2006).
- ^ Golden, Kate (24 March 2011). "Indiana prosecutor resigns over Walker email". WisWatch.org. Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism. Retrieved 21 June 2016.
- ^ a b Montopoli, Brian (25 March 2011). "Indiana prosecutor resigns for encouraging fake attack on Wisconsin governor". CBS News. Archived from the original on 12 April 2012.
- ^ Collins, Ben; Abbruzzese, Jason. "After 'false flag' narrative takes hold, some conservatives scramble to drown out far right". nbcnews.com. NBC News. Retrieved 9 July 2021.
- ^ "Cesar Sayoc, who mailed explosive devices to Trump's critics, sentenced to 20 years in prison". The Washington Post. 5 August 2019. Retrieved 7 August 2019.
- ^ Cox, Ana Marie (16 December 2006). "Making Mischief on the Web". Time. Archived from the original on 13 January 2007. Retrieved 24 March 2009.
- ^ United States of America v. Jane Kember, Morris Budlong, Sentencing Memorandum; pp. 23–25.
- ^ "PolitiFact - Why do some people think mass shootings are staged every time?". @politifact. 2019.
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External links
- at Wiktionary
The dictionary definition of false flag
The dictionary definition of 
