The War for our Minds, Part 7: The Ghosts in the Machine
A closer look at that enigmatic video
By now we all have seen or at least read or heard about that weird video made by the 4th Psy-Op Group of the US Army, released on May 3, 2022 through YouTube.
It is full of apparent links, winks, symbols, hidden messages… As one would expect from a group that specializes in psychological operations (Psy-Ops). But I have to both slam the brake on some interpretations, as well as point at other very interesting elements that haven’t been mentioned yet. I am very grateful to Slag (see his own substack here) for his cooperation and added eye and thinking in writing this article. Several parts are his, either directly, or indirectly incorporated here.
First, a few corrections of claims that I have seen made.
A. The logo of the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops. (Linked with the image of the inflatable tank).
This is NOT about the deceptive moves to throw the Germans off track prior to D-Day. This has nothing to do with signaling that D-Day is coming. The 23rd was used AFTER D-Day, to mask troop movements from the enemy.
They confuse the 23rd with Operation Fortitude, which was conceived, led, and put into practice by a very different group of men. (And which also included ‘Fortitude North’, to fool the Germans into thinking the Allied were planning an invasion into Norway, to divert troops from mainland Europe.)
What the 23rd did, was different. On smaller scale, but repeatedly as circumstances on the front in Europe demanded their work to shield actual troop maneuvers from the Germans.
For example:
“The mission of the 23rd was to cover the movement of the 2nd Armored Division when it left a reserve position to go into the line between the FIRST U.S. and the SECOND BRITISH Armies. (See map: Operation ELEPHANT below) On 1 July the 2nd Armored began moving out of the Forest of Cerisy. As each unit moved, the 23rd attempted to replace dummies for real vehicles – tank for tank. In some cases they were successful. In others they were late or insufficient. Only one deceptive radio was used. Of course, no sonic deception was employed because HEATER (3132nd Sig Sv Co Sp) had not arrived. No attempt was made to duplicate shoulder patches, bumper markings or CP signs. Individual and vehicular play activity was not used to any important degree. In the meantime, the real 2nd Armored had moved only four miles away. Its artillery was firing and some of its infantry was in the line. (Therefore, assumed to have been identified by the enemy.) On 3 July elements of the 3rd Armored Division began to come into the phony 2nd Army reserve area so the 23rd "faded out" on the following day.”
(From the Ghost Army Legacy Project)
That was their first mission in Europe.
Not a success, per se, but they learned a lot that they put to very good use later, such as during ‘Operation Brittany’, where they helped fool the German 7th Army into staying where they were, instead of retreating, to give the Allied forced time to encircle them into a ‘cauldron’ or ‘pocket’ (this one became known as the Falaise pocket, a bloody episode in those early days after D-Day).
From the same legacy project website:
“The deception was done mostly with Special Effects and Radio. Each column was complete with signs, bumpers and shoulder patches. The visual display was excellent. If the 23rd did not fool the Germans, it certainly misled civilians and the rest of the Army. There were many tales of personnel from the real divisions getting mixed up with the phony columns.”
I am posting this, as it shows that in such actions civilians and friendly troops can and will be misled, just the same, and won’t be told about what is going on.
We have to be careful not to read our own wishes into this, but meticulously analyze the video first.
(And interestingly, Biden gave that very same unit, the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops, a Congressional Gold Medal this past January, for their role in WWII! This has been years in the making, but the fact that it was Biden who had to hand out that award, is full of irony.)
B. “Have you ever seen an official Delta Force recruiting video?”
A bit misleading. Delta Force has no direct pathway from civilian to their own ranks, to begin with. Only those already serving can apply, and mostly come from already specialized Spec Ops units such as the Green Berets. Of course, they would not put out ads to the broader public. That is NOT their target audience to recruit from.
It is better to compare with the Navy Seals, for example, hardly any less clandestine in their operations, as they DO have a much more direct pathway from civilian tot Seals. They DO advertise, albeit not often, through videos, documentaries, and ads.
Look at this brilliant 2006 video, for example: blink, and you missed the Seals infiltrating!
Psyops groups have used videos before for recruiting, as well, this is not something new, either.
(Look here and here for two recent examples, or this one, from 2020, which is a much better example of an actual recruitment video from the 8th PsyOp Group, the sister unit to the 4th PsyOp Group that made Ghost in the Machine. It should be clear: such recruitment videos, even for more secretive units, are not uncommon).
While such videos are indeed special, I would not give it more weight than is warranted.
And it really is simply part of a wider recruiting campaign.
The 4th POG is the sister group of the 8th POG, but the 4th clearly won the sibling rivalry between them for this particular round. The 4th produced this absolutely slick and masterful video, while the 8th at the moment (considering their video from 2 years ago that I referenced above ‘old news’) only got this typical recruitment poster, with an appeal to patriotism, adventure, training and curiosity, and of course the bonus money, with a thinly veiled nod to the famous ‘we want you’ posters of WWII (boring, right?):
Notice also the format of the ‘Text 8POG to 46269 for more information’, so similar to the ‘Text "4POG" to 462-769 or visit goarmysof.com’ underneath the video in the YouTube description. Both seems to have received the same general guidelines for a recruitment drive, but while the 8th remained boring and ‘classic’, the 4th really pulled out all the stops.
C. The video contains a Q easter egg.
That would have been really awesome, but it is not the case.
I came across this claim:
“Also the clock:
7:46
7+4+6 = 17
17th letter of the alphabet = Q
On an official US Army film about a clandestine PSYOPS unit, there’s a damn Q Easter egg.”
It refers to the clock visible in the subway station in the second clip showing that yellow subway car. The station is in Berlin, the Stadtmitte station.
Looks like 6:46 to me: the oblique sideways perspective makes the raised small arm look to be past the 7 marker, but it isn't. To be 7:46, it should be much closer to the 8, and it isn't.
Would be awesome if such an easter egg was present! But I don't think one can make that case here.
The Berlin subway imagery could, however, be a nod to Detachment-A, a US Army intelligence group that operated out of Berlin. In the event war broke out with the USSR, these troops would frustrate the Soviet Advance any way they could - in other words, stay behind troops. The unit were pioneers of methods that intelligence operators and special forces take for granted today. It’s another “patch”, a forerunner of 4th PSYOP.
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So, with that being said, and the most obvious errors in interpretation out of the way, I do highly recommend the article by PatelPatriot, Devolution Part 22, as he does a great job linking the 4th Psy-Op Group to Irregular Warfare and the broader context of what is going on right now.
In short, I would not want to try to take the most obvious elements from the video, and run with it. There is a lot contained in this video, but it is not, as far as I can tell, a secret message in the current struggle for the soul and future of the US. That doesn’t mean that the video isn’t without secrets and purpose.
The magazine Task And Purpose, focused primarily on the US military, spoke with the 4th POG, and wrote an article titled “This unsettling Army recruitment video is a master class in psychological warfare”, and subtitle: “Everything is a weapon. Even this video.”
“Col. Chris Stangle, commander of 4th PSYOP Group, told Task & Purpose on Friday that the video was created in-house, both as a recruitment effort but also to literally show people what they can do — part of psychological operations is creating persuasive media. Stangle said that the artist behind the video tailored it a bit after iconic horror film JAWS, where the filmmakers showed restraint in actually showing the shark. Instead, viewers knew it was lurking just below the surface.”
What I find interesting, are the clues it gives that confirm my take in my series ‘The War for our Minds’, down to the details.
First, with what this article tells us about Ukraine:
“Throughout the world, Stangle said, psychological operations are occurring “literally everywhere, every day, in every component of our lives.” We’re seeing it play out in real-time in eastern Europe, where Ukraine is proving much more successful in the information war than the Russians.”
This is a claim that we have heard often, and is not without merit. But the question was always how much of that was their own doing.
“That’s no coincidence. Stangle said after the annexation of Crimea in 2014, the U.S. PSYOP community, along with other NATO allies and special operations communities around the world, got to work helping Ukraine build their own abilities.
“We’ve helped them build their PSYOP force,” Stangle said. “We’ve helped through [military-to-military] partnerships, us as well as more than 12 allies and partners. And what we’ve been able to do is just sit and watch how amazing their arguments are … Ukraine has done a masterful job, they’ve taken the training and the work we’ve done with them, as well as their own inherent skill, and have just really blown it up.”
The US and NATO have been working on PsyOp capabilities, perfecting them, and teaching them to Ukraine. This was a MILITARY focus, and a military partnership. This is fully in line with what I described in my ongoing series ‘The War for our Minds’.
What is not mentioned in this interview, is the support of the media and big tech, to disseminate the efforts of those PsyOp efforts. Or perhaps they are included, silently, as part of the military apparatus.
Which is probably why the video started with the TV towers of Beijing and of Berlin… Their real target, or their main tool/weapon: the broadcasting of TV, radio, the internet... As a symbolic opening, that can count.
One of the leading officers in the US military PsyOps program, Lt. Col Michael Aquino, wrote in 1980 a paper, “From PSYOP to MindWar: The Psychology of Victory”, co-authored with his commanding officer, Paul E. Valley, that was meant to remain internal within the Army (but that somehow got leaked, and made some waves when made public). It can be described as visionary, and one can only imagine how the internet would really push the possibilities even further, had the authors know of the exponential increase in technology and it’s impact on people. If they could make such claims about the old TV technology, imagine what they would have devised with the modern technology and over-abundance of personal information we freely submit?
They wrote:
“In its strategic context, MindWar must reach out to friends, enemies and neutrals alike across the globe – neither through primitive “battlefield” leaflets and loudspeakers of PSYOP nor through the weak, imprecise, and narrow effort of psychotronics – but through the media possessed by the United States which have the capabilities to reach virtually all people on the face of the Earth.
These media are, of course, the electronic media – television and radio. State of the art developments in satellite communication, video recording techniques, and laser and optical transmission of broadcasts make possible a penetration of the minds of the world such as would have been inconceivable just a few years ago.”
The idea is to bypass traditional armies and soldiers, and to “attack population, culture, and institutions”. This is fully in line with the total war I have been described in The War for our Minds. Everyone of us becomes a target, a combatant, and this war is now constant, without beginning, without end.
The paper continues:
“For the mind to believe in its own decisions, it must feel that it made those decisions without coercion. Coercive measures used by the operative, consequently, must not be detectable by ordinary means. There is no need to resort to mind-weakening drugs such as those explored by the CIA; in fact the exposure of a single such method would do unacceptable damage to MindWar’s reputation for truth.”
We need to be made to think that we are making the decision to accept or reject a certain idea that is being injected ourselves. That makes the deception complete, and perfect: it is OUR idea. If others come forward, and expose the scheme, people will look bewildered: “What are they talking about?” Or they will become upset, at the attack on their own credibility and autonomy: “Who is this person alleging we are children, who are so easy to be influenced? No, these are our OWN ideas! Get out of here!”
It is easier to fool someone, than to explain they have been fooled…
It is striking how he emphasizes another very important point:
”Quite right, and so it must be axiomatic of MindWar that it always speaks the truth. Its power lies in its ability to focus recipients’ attention on the truth of the future as well as that of the present. MindWar thus involves the stated promise of the truth that the United States has resolved to make real if it is not already so.”
And:
“Unlike PSYOP, MindWar has nothing to do with deception or even with “selected” - and therefore misleading - truth. Rather it states a whole truth that, if it does not now exist, will be forced into existence by the will of the United States. The examples of Kennedy’s ultimatum to Khrushchev during the Cuban Missile Crisis and Hitler’s stance at Munich might be cited.”
Truth.
An effective MindWar campaign is based on TRUTH. And needs operatives committed to that truth to make the campaign a success.
I touched upon this before, notably in part 6 of this series, when we looked at memes. In that article, I wrote:
”Memes are boosters of truth or a narrative. The closer its message is to that narrative, the more effective the meme. And the more truth that narrative contains, the more effective the overall campaign. (Or: memes are condensed ‘summaries’)
Memes themselves, on their own, cannot affect change. The underlying narrative does. Or the truth they refer to.”
And in Part 4:
”counter cognitive warfare with knowledge and truth. Repair TRUST.”
This paper by Aquino only further supports that idea, that you need truth to make your messaging effective. Lies will work short term, but not long term. With very few exceptions (which involve pushing a lie to the point that people accept it as truth, at which point the lie starts behaving like a truth normally would).
A word of caution: Some people point at the very clearly and very involved Satanic interests of Col. Aquino. True, he is a committed Satanists, who fell out with LaVey because LaVey didn’t think of Satan as a real person, but more as an ideo or personification, while Aquino firmly believed Satan was a personal entity, a reality. Does that mean that the US Military was actively pursueing Satanic goals by Satanic means? Absolutely not. To make that case, you have to point at actual proposals that Aquino made to the Pentagon, and then link that directly to actual Satanic principles and methods. Simply because Aquino is a Satanist, doens’t make everything he says or does Satanic, as well. That, I haven’t seen yet. (On the contrary: when would a Satanist be pushing the importance of Truth in order to further the hellish aims of the Father of Lies? Makes no sense!) Be careful, and look deeper than superficial links.
One last element: the name of the video, Ghosts in the Machine.
SLAG wrote it nicely and succinct in his substack article:
”The phrase “Ghost in the Machine” was coined in 1949 by Gilbert Ryle, a lecturer at Oxford University in the field of Philosophy. Appearing in his paper, Concept of Mind, the ghost in the machine refers to a description of dualism that was made popular by René Descartes.
That’s the origin of the term - but the origin is not relevant to our discussion. What’s more relevant are the modern adaptations of the term “ghost in the machine”. To paraphrase Gilbert Ryle and also Arthur Koestler, the ghost in the machine refers to something ancient, primal, hard-wired into the cortex, the lizard-brain, brought to the surface of the psyche in times of extreme peril, and the ultimate fail-safe.
Taking a psychological survey of humanity what do we see? We see many people awake, and questioning the popular narrative. We are seeing a massive shift of power away from the government and to the people. That shift is to the detriment of the elites and the benefit of the people. I see 4th PSYOP involved in this. I see them telling us that they are influencing events.”
It is tempting to see a nod to current events as we see it, but it is also a nod to a typical term for such covert operators: ghosts. There, but invisible, intangible. No one sees them, many don’t believe in them. But they are present, in the machinations of this world. A fail-safe in times of peril? Yes, by deceiving the enemy and make them believe that the ghost poses no threat, or is at a different location than it really is. Or perhaps simply by tapping into such hardwired reflexes in their enemies?
Many options are possible.
While we were discussing this article, SLAG offered the following thought:
We ARE players, and we seem to be on the verge of getting orders from the commanders of all of this. MAGA, devolution, government in exile, whatever you wish to call it, they have announced through Gregg Phillips on Devolution Power Hour that MAGA influencers were going to be invited to a clandestine location and shown a part of the battle plan and their role in it, as well as how to push that information to individual anons (by this I mean not publicly announced - it’s not like they’re going to be in a bunker at Area 51 or something). The facts that a quiet bombshell such as that was dropped on the “devolution guy’s” show and that Gregg Phillips shoved Patel to the top of the interview list are significant. Like the video implying that “something stirs beneath the surface” I cannot get over the suspicion that there’s more to come. Do the ghosts play a role? Possibly, but if you want to know - pay close attention to Gregg Phillips. That guy probably drinks whiskey with real ghosts.
When you combine Gregg Phillip’s statement with the release of this 4th PSYOP video, I cannot shake the feeling that this is the opening musical piece the conductor uses to warm up the orchestra before a classical opera - and a conductor makes an appearance in the video. Do I have proof? Not at all - but when you combine data points:
1. The Gregg Phillips statement
2. The video being a form of propaganda - announcing to the enemy, “others can play this messaging game too”
3. Evidence being released about the stolen election and Biden is a Manchurian candidate
4. The convergence (some would call it a storm)
Add these together and what does it equal? I’m not entirely sure, but I know this; you cannot pump this much political energy into a topic without something happening. I also know that my comments in this section are not bolstering your argument. It’s just when I see multiple data points coming together in alignment that’s a indicator that I should pay close attention.
Still, we need to caution everyone to not jump to conclusions or to fall victim to confirmation bias. This is very important - and needed to be said.
As an update, since this part was written Gregg Phillips posted the following on his Truth Social account:
SLAG continued:
Are we being manipulated by the ghosts? Most certainly - that is, after all their trade. But plug into the equation that the elite PSYOP units most certainly have America’s best interests at heart, and I don’t mind a bit of manipulation from time to time. After all, I don’t need to know.
Another thought: it’s widely said in our community that we are watching a movie. I disagree. This is the biggest game of Dungeons and Dragons ever played. We have the Dungeon master who sets the stage (ha!) and we have players. The players cannot change the rules in the game, the pace of events, or control the environment; but they sure can influence the outcome - especially when they work together.
Let’s circle back to that interview in Task And Purpose. It contains this line, from a commenter on YouTube: "everything is a weapon, even this video".
"It accomplishes exactly what psychological operations soldiers set out to do: Influence an audience. As one commenter on Youtube pointed out: “Everything is a weapon. Even this video.”
Col. Chris Stangle, commander of 4th PSYOP Group, told Task & Purpose on Friday that the video was created in-house, both as a recruitment effort but also to literally show people what they can do — part of psychological operations is creating persuasive media."
Ok, what influence? What audience?
Perhaps the hints are campaigns where they WERE successful, a portfolio of sorts? Maidan, Hong Kong, China, Berlin Wall,...
I keep thinking about this video, for weeks now.
The more I work on it, the more angles to consider.
And I have to admit, the focus on Maidan makes me really wonder. Why would they emphasize the 2014 Maidan Color Revolution so strongly? Are they telling us to look at the REAL beginning and cause of the current war in Ukraine? This is too recent, and with too important a role in current (very) hot button issues, worldwide. War with Russia! So I cannot image that those links are simply about a nod to Psy-Ops work that they did in Ukraine, back in 2014. Same with the 2019 Hong-Kong protests. The messaging here must be something else, in order to preserve opsec and assets on the ground. So what is it? Forcing us to look closer? The beginning of the bioweapon labs? The role the US played in the revolution in Ukraine that refused to accept an election? That started a very strong and openly anti-Russian streak of violence in Ukraine, almost forcing Russia to step in to protect the ethnic Russians in the East of Ukraine?
(Or, perhaps, simply the use of society changing riots to show the extent of the power of PsyOps. But then: why so strongly emphasize the police presence and violence, instead of subtly hinting at the changing of minds the PsyOps work would do?)
An article in Atlantic, titled Project Troy: How Scientists Helped Refine Cold War Psychological Warfare, stated:
"If, as NSC-68, a key document of U.S. strategy, asserted in 1950, the United States and the Soviet Union were locked in an ideological clash of civilizations, a battle between “slavery” and “freedom,” a victory by force would be hollow. If the United States wanted to defeat communism, it needed to do so “by the strategy of cold war,” combining political, economic, and psychological techniques. “The cold war,” NSC-68 warned, “is in fact a real war in which the survival of the free world is at stake.”"
I think this might be a key to unlock some of what we see, and to answer the impatient nay-sayers.
And this video is part of that, then, a subtle hint and reminder. It would make sense of the Hong-Kong riots, as well, very clearly a struggle between slavery under the CCP, or freedom. Where the American Stars and Stripes was ubiquitously waved around. Not as a sign of support for our two-party system, or of Biden, or even of Trump. No, those protesters in Hong Kong waved Old Glory around, to show they were committed to the IDEA of Freedom, as embodied by the United States.
This is a red thread through Ghost in the Machine. From the views of Berlin and Beijing, the reference to the fall of the Iron Curtain, the Maidan protests, the Arab Spring (which takes on a whole new meaning in this context), and Hong Kong, and the rising threat of China: that battle is still being fought, and is about freedom. (And the 4th PsyOp Group would be engaged, full on, everywhere, as part of the recruitment showcase they make, while reminding us of what is really going on, behind the curtain.)
Allow me to end with a paraphrase:
This Cognitive War we are embroiled in, each of us as target and as combatant, is in fact a real war, in which the survival of the free world is at stake.
This is not an exaggeration. Yet many are waking up to that reality, and are fighting back. This video? Yes, I do believe it is part of that war. Perhaps not in the way some might have initially thought, but still reminding us of truths we should not forget.
All is well.
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Note: I will post a play-by-play look at the article in 2 days, as well, as the video contains absolute brilliant pieces. While strictly not part of my series The War for our Minds, it is a companion article to this one. Keep an eye out!
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Love this series/topic. Probably has been my favorite of all the different scenario situations, what the heck’s going on. There’s just such a mind bender to it. I love it thanks fellas. 
Regarding the 4th Psy-Op video. It is likely that the vast majority of the US population is not even aware of it. It is also true that those who are aware of it can't seem to agree what it means if it means anything. Therefore the video is either an abject failure or massively effective. I am still waiting to find out which and if effective, effective at what?