Stepping On Legos: The All Too Familiar Pain of Being Behind the Curve in the Information Environment

Small Wars Journal | Jayson Warren

Operation Epic Fury has exposed critical shortfalls in U.S. military preparedness within the information environment as Iranian information warfare campaigns flood social media with high-quality, low-cost AI-generated propaganda. Tehran’s prolific output, featuring viral Lego-style videos and targeted persona-level harassment, has severely strained U.S. Joint Force defensive mechanisms. This breakdown highlights structural deficiencies in integrating information as a core line of effort alongside kinetic operations.

Operational planners still treat information as a supporting function rather than a primary operational pillar. U.S. capabilities are lagging. If current military processes buckle under Iranian pressure, they will prove entirely untenable during a high-intensity conflict against China in 2030 or beyond. Beijing already possesses vastly superior online disinformation infrastructure, including network-synchronised troll campaigns and massive stolen intelligence databases from events like the 2015 Office of Personnel Management hack. Consequently, the Joint Force must immediately re-evaluate its operational information procedures and command structures.

Comment

The integration of information as the seventh joint function alongside kinetic fires under U.S. Joint Publication 3-0 reflects a persistent institutional misalignment between doctrine and execution. During Operation Epic Fury, joint force commanders continued treating information operations as a subordinate capability rather than an operational primary line of effort. This operational friction stems from rigid risk-approval hierarchies within the U.S. Joint Staff that delay public messaging cycles while adversary campaign cycles operate in near-real time.

This structural latency is exacerbated by delegated targeting authorities that isolate information warfare units from frontline air and maritime components. Operational clearance for counter-disinformation messaging during Operation Epic Fury required multi-echelon coordination through U.S. Central Command, whereas Iranian information assets operated with decentralised authority. Consequently, the clearance protocols established after the 2015 Office of Personnel Management hack fail to match the velocity required for peer information warfare.

Strategic Question for Discussion

Which factor exerts greater influence on joint force responsiveness during Operation Epic Fury — centralized interagency approval authorities or theater-level execution delays — and why?

The available evidence points toward institutional interagency clearance protocols as the primary source of operational friction during Operation Epic Fury. While theater-level communications units possess the technical capacity to deploy counter-narratives rapidly, risk-averse approval hierarchies within multi-echelon commands repeatedly stalled responsive releases. This systemic delay indicates that authority delegation, rather than technical capability, remains the critical bottleneck in high-tempo information environments.

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