Center for Strategic Communication

A Tale of Two Places – Dabiq and Rumiyah

[ by Charles Cameron — Rumiyah is a city for sure, Dabiq not so much ] . The Islamic State has a new magazine out, and it’s titled Rumiyah, not Dabiq. Here’s the first inside page of the first issue of Dabiq, together with the cover of the first...

Syria and drawing the web of tensions

[ by Charles Cameron — with a Magnus Ransdorp squib in its tail ] . The issue is complexity, and how you represent it. The case in point is Syria. Here’s a diagram that suggests complexity as a sort of crazy weaving, all straight lines and colors: This...

New York Times correction ouroboros

[ by Charles Cameron — irresistible but sad, sad, sad ] . Gary Johnson, Libertarian Party presidential candidate, flubbed a question about Aleppo in an interview: That’s not great. The New York Times then corrected him: Gary Johnson, the former New Mexico...

Quick notes on intelligent intelligence, 2

[ by Charles Cameron — on a quote from my fellow whacky Brit, Geoffrey Pyke ] . Whacky? From a short description of the man by his biographer, Henry Hemming: Geoffrey Pyke, an inventor, war reporter, escaped prisoner, campaigner, father, educator–and all-around...