“…Group Mind Theory or Crowd Psychology is exceptionally well studied. Few people have ever heard of it.”
The General scanned the students and cleared his throat.
“You are all familiar with General Psychology, with psychologists, therapists, maybe the concept of depression. You might be aware of anxiety medications, therapy sessions, or rehabilitation treatments. You might know of therapists guiding alcoholics or drug addicts along more socially acceptable life-paths. Maybe, you have seen a child psychologist yourself.
“If you are not personally aware of psychology, you are aware of it due to a family member or friend, someone who may have undergone treatment at some point. You may only know of Psychology through television. Entire multi-season shows are based on the Patient-Therapist premise. If not through television, you may have learned of psychology in school. Our school systems have in-house therapists—counselors—who guide children’s minds along predetermined paths. Our Social Welfare System too, employs thousands of psychologists.
“The idea of Psychology is well known in our culture. Opinions of it vary in a plethora of attitudes. As for the practice of psychology, however, most people believe it ends at the level of the individual, at a single person dealing with a disease, trauma, or some type of psychosis. This is False.”
The General scanned the auditorium. The Cadets were holding their pencils, ready to scribble whatever notes were prompted. The General continued.
“Psychology does not end at the Individual Level. That is where it begins. And from that point, the study moves in two paths.”
The General clicked the projector remote.
“The first path is, Deeper In—the study of the mind at unconscious levels beyond that of an individual’s known perspective.
“The second path is, Greater in Number—the study of Group Mind Theory and the mental states and behaviors that individuals express when they are a part of a collective. We will be discussing this Greater in Number side.”
The General walked to the front of the stage.
“When I was a boy, not much younger than you Cadets, thousands of people gathered in Trade Square not far from where I lived, from where my father, mother, three brothers, and my grandfather all lived in a small apartment.
“Most of the people at Trade Square came from Hoovervilles. Those were ‘tent cities’, Cadets. At the time, these homeless camps had sprouted up in the parks, alleyways and along public lands close to the docks and rail-yards. This was the Great Depression, 1930, New York. Many were jobless and homeless during that time. Many sat in-wait of an economic weather change.
“My brothers and I worked for our father. Our family business was patching and tarring the roofs of buildings. Our bodies smelled of pitch and sulphur. Our clothing creased with hardened tar. It was a humble life.
“The Trade Square gathering was a protest organized by Communist Party members as an unemployment rally. Communist sentiments were growing in the country at that time, similar to how they are beginning to grow again today. There were twenty-five-thousand people at Trade Square, or that’s what the newspapers reported.
“Not long after assembling, the crowd changed from a docile collection of people into a rioting mob. They marched on City Hall, looted along the way, set fires to everything.
“I watched it with my own eyes. I watched it from the rooftop of a building that no longer exists.
“Many at the protest were angry, Cadets, righteously angry. But in the beginning, they were all standing and listening to rally speakers as calm and collected as a church choir. Everyone was composed. No one seemed violent in the beginning. Most looked bored. Then, as if by magic, someone yelled, ‘Let’s Go!’, and I watched twenty-five-thousand people turn and move in a unified direction. It was like watching a school of fish or a flock of birds change direction. There was no thought, no conversation, barely any discernment. The thousands moved as if under remote control. It was the craziest thing my thirteen-year-old eyes had seen, watching that mass of humanity roll like a wave.
“I told my grandfather about it later, how strange it was to see that many people move as one. He made a statement then that I have now remembered for eighty years.
“’People are not people in a crowd, Xavier,’ he said.
“I didn’t understand what he meant by that. It took two decades and a world war for me to grasp just how profound of a statement that was.”
The General walked back to the podium and stood beside it.
“Before we discuss Psychological Crowds, we must first discuss Instincts. The two most fundamental instincts are Self-Preservation and Survival-of-the-Species. It is arguable that all other instincts fall in some way under these two.
“Self-Preservation is the instinct to protect oneself from harm or death. Survival-of-the-Species is the instinct of genetic propagation, to produce viable offspring. Both instincts are as old as life itself.”
The General scanned the auditorium.
“If you will indulge me, I would like to add an observation.”
The General stepped forward.
“Many of the social dilemmas in our culture today, especially in the political realm, use these fundamental instincts in direct opposition to one another—Self-Preservation versus Survival-of-the-Species, so-to-speak. It is so common it should be considered a political trope. How many aggrandizing campaigns have you witnessed? How many classroom discussions have you been a part of that call for the sacrifice of The Individual in regard for a more flourishing, strengthened, or healthy species?”
The General raised his hand, showing his palm to the auditorium.
“Any argument propagating the threat of climate change, of environmental catastrophe, of an approaching danger from a disease, every argument you have ever heard where individuals must sacrifice in order to save the species or save the planet or Save-the-Children—how it is often proposed—is the pinning of these two basic instincts against each other.
“There are inverse campaigns as well. The demand for deregulation of gun control or self-defense tactics, the championing of personal responsibility against group pressures, the my-body-my-choice movement, or any argument you have ever heard promoting the Primacy of the Individual over a proclaimed need by the masses, is too, the battling of these fundamental instincts.”
The General dropped his hand.
“To remain objective and dispassionate, Cadets, it is beneficial to understand that political and ethical arguments are sometimes invented through a lens of Instinctual Bias. Some arguments are intentionally engineered in this manner to produce a maximum potency on the public mind.”
The General stepped back and glanced at the podium.
“Now, beyond the two instincts, Self-Preservation and Survival-of-the-Species, others arise. Hunger and Adaptability are the most basic of them. The instinct we will be discussing arose when unicellular organisms began evolving into the multicellular. This, is the Instinct of The Herd.”
The General clicked a remote. An image of microscopic life appeared on the screen behind him.
“Long ago, due to environmental factors, it became advantageous for some prokaryotic life to aggregate, to gather. Maybe, it was due to a thermal current? Maybe, it was a nutrient rich area? This is not known. However, in this gathering, symbiotic relationships formed. One of the most important symbioses pertained to cellular nutrition and the emergence of mitochondria. A Mitochondria is a sort of a cell inside of another cell, Cadets. It’s an Organelle. Its main function is the production of energy, specifically, Adenosine Triphosphate. There is little doubt that mitochondria began with the merger of two cells and not through genetic mutation. Mitochondrial Symbiosis was the beginning of Eukaryotic life, that is, unicellular life with a make up far more complex than that of the common Prokaryote. With the gained energy capabilities of Mitochondria, new avenues for evolutionary change opened.
“Cells once needing the entirety of their surface for nutrient absorption no longer needed as much surface area. Eukaryotes began joining, giving up some surface, mobility, and autonomy, for a shared nutrient absorption. This was also an obvious tactic against phagocytic predation. A phagocyte is a predatory cell that consumes its prey by envelopment, by swallowing it whole, so-to-speak. The larger an organism is, the harder it is to swallow. This simple fact-of-nature not only holds true at a microscopic level but can still be seen in our oceans today and most emphatically, on land, in ancient times, in the scale of the dinosaurs.”
The General scanned the auditorium. The Cadets were staring at the screen. The General shook his head and clicked the remote.
“As eukaryotic cells joined, multicellular life began. This was the birth place of The Herd Instinct.
“The Herd Instinct is the tendency of organisms to gather, organize, and conjoin, forming a more complex organization. At a microscopic level, it is difficult to label something as an instinct. Rather, any instinct might seem like nothing more than chemical interactions and environmental pressures. There is truth in this line of thought. However, what is important to understand is that every cell composing complex life, every animal, plant, and mushroom, every dog, cat, cow, and fish, every human who has ever walked the face of earth, walked it, with cells that herded themselves long ago in their evolution. Whether you call it an instinct, or a chemical mechanism, is beside the point.”
The General clicked the remote. An image of various animals appeared on the screen.
“The Herd Instinct can be seen more clearly at the level of the complex organism. Cattle herd themselves due to environmental pressures. Wolves cooperate and hunt in packs due to collective benefit. Fish swim in schools. Birds fly in flocks. Humans were tribal long before they were ever human.
“Some of the most striking examples of Extreme Heard Instinct involve the phylum, Hexapoda,—Insects—specifically ants and bees.”
The General clicked the remote.
“Within these species, The Herd Instinct is so overbearing, that the individual cannot survive alone. The ant or bee lost its traits for solo survival, or Autonomy, long ago. This is not surprising. As organisms trend further into Herd Instinct behavior, individual Autonomy diminishes. Reliance on The Herd eventually takes precedence over Self Reliance. For animals capable of critical thought, like humans, individual intelligence decreases. As for ants and bees, they are nothing more than clumps of cells. They are only cellular machines of the much greater and more complex organism, The Hive, or The Collective.
“Now, I would like you to take a moment and think of Man, of the human species in its current state, of its categorizations, its rules and organization, its freeways, grocery stores, and monetary systems. Think of the jumbo jets, the cargo ships, the massive farms. I want you to think of school systems and work forces and law enforcement agencies. I want you to think of all the differing levels of government and military. I want you to think about, how the world is, and I want you to think about all the information everyone is bathed in everyday through mass communication…”
The General scanned the students.
“Now, what if, all of that organization suddenly vanished?… What if all of these inter-connectivities of life disappeared? Could an individual survive?… Would the species survive?… Is our Herd Reliance so great that individual survival depends solely upon Herd Survival?… Are we just cellular machines? Are we just small pieces of some greater organism?… To be blunt, is Man an Ant?”
The auditorium was silent. The General smiled and strolled along the stage.
“The truth is, we are somewhere in the middle, somewhere in-between the extremes of complete herd organization and complete autonomy. If all of these systems failed, well, many would not survive. But some would. The ancient blood of self reliant ancestors course in every vein. We have not undergone the evolutionary changes of the ant or the bee. Most observations of extreme herd instinct in our species is the result of technological advancement and Mass Manipulation. It is not the result of Genetic Mutation. There are, however, powers who endeavor for this to be so, groups who seek to increase the Herd Reliance of Man.”
The general stopped and stood at center stage. He put his hands inside his pockets and lifted his head as if in deep thought.
“There have been many debates in science and philosophy concerning the nature of man, what is Instinct, and what is Thought. There are some who believe that man does not truly make any decisions at all, that every action is just the result of millions of cells responding to environmental factors, that you, yourself, are only a passenger, or an anomaly in the cellular machine, that you might not actually exist, that your perspective is just an illusion in the background static, something that serves some trivial purpose, or no purpose at all.”
The General removed his hands from his pockets and lifted his palms to the students.
“To this, I respond, ‘So what!?!’ You still have to get out of bed in the morning. You still have to walk out the door and do what you have to do. Whether life is just a movie on a screen, one you are helpless to change, or if you do have some control, if you do have some power over your life, if you do possess free will, if you do have a soul, if there is some emergent property, twinkling somewhere inside of you, it all comes down to a basic choice. Whether you make that choice yourself, or if it is your cells debating it, back-and-forth, inside the chemical meatloaf of your head, it does not matter. What matters is this… Do you still want that twinkling to continue? That is where the fight is, Cadets. To be, or not to be.”
The General walked back to the podium. The students sat with their mouths open.
“Now, with all of that explained,” The General gave a short chuckle. “… maybe some of you might understand the words of my grandfather a little better. At least better than I did.
“’People are not People in a crowd,’ my grandfather said.
“He was not talking about crowds in the general sense. He was talking about Psychological Crowds and their distinct characteristics.”
The General clicked the remote and words appeared on the screen behind him.
“A Psychological Crowd is a gathering of individuals whose sentiments or ideas organize and align in a specific vector. This alignment does not occur before or after the gathering. This alignment is solely the product of the gathering and the environmental factors of the gathering place. With this alignment, an individual’s personality diminishes, their intelligence lowers, their skills of critical thought vanish. They form a single being, like cells of an organ, or parts of a machine. A Group Mind is formed between them, composed by them. This Group Mind is transitory in nature. It can only exist as long as the personalities of group members remain diminished.”
The General turned and looked at the paragraph on the screen.
“I realize that might read like science fiction to many of you. I would like to remind you, however, that at least seventy-percent of all perceived communication, either conscious or unconscious, is non verbal. Tones, grunts, facial expressions, body language, crowd movement, existential fears or desired collective goals, all of these have tremendous influence over the mental state of an individual.”
The General clicked the remote again.
“There are various levels of psychological crowds. The definition I have just given is for a psychological crowd nearing complete organization. The unemployment rally I witnesses as a boy was this type of psychological crowd, or, it transformed into this type.
“Most psychological crowds have less organization and less alignment. A weaker group mind is the result. To a lesser degree, elements of individual personality will remain with group members.
“A good example of this can be seen in factory-line workers. While at home, a worker may exhibit strong independence and be robust in critical thought, but when at work, they may not think critically at all. They may put their bodies on autopilot and repeat the same movements they have been trained to repeat. Their occupation is not actually the creation or assemblage of any product. Their true occupation is the trade of their time and energy to some greater organization. Like cells, they do this with an understanding, either consciously or unconsciously, that there will be some gained security or benefit in the exchange. While on the job, workers may let their own personalities diminish. They may become a part of a collective. They may be guided by the commands placed on that collective.
“This is not to say that factory workers are unintelligent. I have met many with astounding mental prowess. Some of the greatest poets, artists and inventors have hailed from the routine of hard labor. Intellectual achievement is not generally accompanied by comfortable surroundings, Cadets. It is usually created through shear will, necessity, and quickened by hardship.
“In the perspective of Command Structures over a psychological crowds, it is usually not beneficial for a line worker to be intelligent or free thinking while on the job. In its basic form, Higher Intelligence requires a questioning of the world. On a factory line, with timetables to keep, and production numbers to meet, workers that question commands could inhibit production. Laborers exhibiting high intelligence (while on the job) are usually not beneficial to the collective in that specific occupation. This holds true in all workforces. It certainly holds true in the Military. In general, it is good practice to reposition individuals who exhibit High Intelligence into occupations that require critical reasoning and problem solving abilities.”
The General walked to the lectern. He took a sip of water and clicked the remote. A photo of a basketball game appeared.
“Now, familiar examples of Psychological Crowds that exhibit intermediate to strong group-mind-influence… These psychological crowds are most common in team centered athletics. A rousing speech, a pep rally, a pregame warm-up routine, the charging onto the field as a fight song blares and applause roar, their are countless rituals that teams perform before going-out and engaging in combat. All of these factors exist to further the organization of the psychological crowd and strengthen the group mind influence. It is in this environment where one begins to see true personality diminishment. It is here where you see the most self-centered sacrifice for the group. It is here where you see the most humble become the most flamboyant. It is here where you see the pacifist become violent. This, is where Alignment and Vector are understood by all group members. In the case of athletics, the alignment and vector coalesce into one goal—WIN!
“As for other psychological crowds with strong group-mind-influence, examples are abundant throughout history. Tribes don war paint, consume mind altering substances, scream war cries, and beat their chests and drums in unison. They march together into battle. The crews of warships are so tightly organized it is hard to imagine a more powerful group mind. Seamen will stay at their posts, even as a vessel sinks, because no command of ‘abandoned ship’ has been given. A regiment under heavy attack will dig-in and defend a hopeless position all due to command orders. A single soldier will dive on top of a grenade, sacrificing themselves, for the benefit of the group.
“In 480 BC, a famous example occurred. In Thermopylae, seven-thousand Greeks squared off against two-hundred-thousand invading Persians. That is twenty-eight invaders for every Greek soldier, Cadets. Imagine, that with sword, spear and arrow, you would have to best over twenty-eight men with similar armaments. Not only this, but each man around you would have to do the same. Yet, the Greeks held their ground. They stayed and fought. I promise you, they did not hold position out of rational debate and critical reasoning. I doubt any Greek was lost in intellectual pondering. They stayed because they were of strong group mind, a highly organized psychological crowd, and because of this, they believed they were invincible. Which leads us to our next point of discussion.
“First and foremost, it should be understood that psychological changes occur when an individual becomes a member of a psychological crowd. One of these changes is, the feeling of invincibility. This feeling can be weak or strong. It hearkens back to the Herd Instinct, to safety-in-numbers, to the security one experiences when being part of a group or Herd. In the case of humans, the tribe provides this experience. This feeling can be realized at an unconscious level, and the conscious mind can remain completely unaware of its emergence. It is this perspective change where an individual perceives themselves as no longer an autonomous being, but as a small, anonymous part of something much greater, like a molecule of water in a crashing wave. It is this perspective change that diminishes Personality, and in consequence, it diminishes Personal Responsibility. The diminishment of Personal Responsibility is the weakening of the Self Preservation Instinct. This mechanism allows for new behaviors, behaviors that stand in stark contrast to the behaviors an individual exhibits when in an Autonomous State.
“When personality is diminished, the accountant may become the arsonist, the shy may become the exhibitionist, the drug dealer may become the savior, the law abiding citizen may become the criminal. False heroes and villainous saints jump from the pages of history with concern for psychological crowds and personality diminishment.
“There are propositions that suppose the behaviors of individuals in these states of diminished personality are influenced by repressed emotional urges. It is argued that this is why violence and degeneracy can be common behaviors of individuals with diminished personality states. This is a Freudian line of thought. It has merit. But regardless of psychoanalysis, it is abundantly clear that the behaviors of individuals with diminished personalities run in stark contrast to the behaviors of the same individuals when their personality is vigorous and Autonomous.”
The General raised his palms to the students.
“There is a reason why crowds clap and chant in unison, Cadets. There is a reason for soldiers marching in-lockstep. There is a reason for warriors screaming war cries all at the same moment.”
The General dropped his hands and put them inside his pockets.
“There is a reason for how docile gatherings transform into rioting mobs. The reason is this… It is your psychology.”
The auditorium was silent. The General stepped to the lectern and took a sip of water.
“While we have all been a part of a psychological crowd, few know of their military application.”
The General clicked the remote.
“The following is a hypothetical stratagem of how public psychological crowds can be manifested, and how they can be used.
“1. A Gathering is organized by whatever forces, be it a political organization, social movement, religious sect, worker’s union… Any age, sex, race, creed group, or any combination there of. The mixture of the people does not matter. What is important is the Concentration or Density of the gathered. The concentration must be high enough and dense enough for individuals to lose their sense of Autonomy and heighten their feelings of Anonymity. A common theme is waiting for nightfall. Darkness itself can catalyze feelings of anonymity.
“2. An atmosphere of Expectant Attention must be created. This could be an empty stage with the gathered expecting someone speak. It does not have to be a stage at all. It could be the New Year’s Eve ball dropping in City Square. It could be a parade route with citizens waiting on the side-walks. It can be an airpot runway, a shipping dock, a train station, all of these can be focal points of Expectant Attention. What is important is that there is a physical location at which the gathered focus their attentions.
“3. The Spectacle is the arrival and performance of the anticipated event. It is what all those in the gathering focus their attention on. It is what takes up the majority of their conscious thoughts.
“Remember Cadets, the individuals in the gathering will have, in-the-least, some diminishment of personality. Their intelligence will have lowered. Their critical reasoning skills will be retarded. They will have feelings of anonymity. They will feel a release from personal responsibility. The gathering may not be a completely organized psychological crowd as of yet, but it may be transforming into such a being. This organization is nurtured and grown by The Spectacle itself.”
The General walked the stage.
“The next time you go to a music concert, I want you to listened to what the performer says at the beginning of the show. They usually make a statement of how fantastic the city is—the city in which they are now performing. They usually make a statement about how spectacular the crowd is—the gathering at which individuals are now a part of.
“At some point during the concert, the performer may get the audience to clap in unison or sing together or chant a phrase. These are all tactics used to incorporate individuals further into the psychological crowd, to increase its numbers and strengthen the group-mind-bond.
“The collective beliefs of the crowd will change. They will no longer think of themselves as just a gathering. They will become a city. The concert will no longer be a concert. It will become a moment in history. As individuals, crowd members will think very little about themselves, but as a crowd, as a collective whole, they will believe they are awesome. They will believe they are invincible. They will believe they have power.
“The clapping, the singing, the chanting, the synchronized dancing to the same beats and rhythms, a Pie’d Piper directing and guiding the experience… Cadets, the individuals of the gathering will perceive themselves as being a small part of something much greater than themselves. That entity is the Psychological Crowd.
“As a psychological crowd moves toward complete organization, the group-mind-bond can reach a certain action potential. This phenomenon is similar to hypnosis. It is called High Suggestibility.”
“4. High Suggestibility is a trait characterized by an individual’s willingness to be influenced by outside factors. With advanced personality diminishment, an individual will not critically analyze the actions or ideas they are faced with. They will be incapable of it. They will perceive what others in the crowd around them are doing and mimic the behavior. They will follow commands (or Suggestions) placed upon them. They will obey orders. They will follow the herd’s movement. They will run-off a cliff if they perceive others around them doing so.
“As individuals, they will be perceiving the world in a very odd way. They will be perceiving it in a State of Fascination. It will be like their perception, their Mind’s Eye, is watching a movie in a theater, or riding in the backseat of a car. Individuals describing their own experiences after being inside a completely organized psychological crowd have reported, ‘It all felt like a dream,’ or ‘It was like an out of body experience’. Consciousness and higher brain function will not be in command of the body.
“Furthermore, due to the state of High Suggestibility, actions and behaviors of psychological crowd members are contagious in nature. Imagine a herd of cattle that are beginning to stampede. One head of cattle has to move first. Then all others follow. Why are herds of cattle not stampeding all of the time? It is because they must be in a state of high suggestibility for it to happen.
“In the case of cattle, the state of high suggestibility can be instigated by a perceived threat. Not all of the herd has to perceive the threat. It can be just one herd member who’s behavior changes, whose head rises, whose snout sniffs the air, whose tail twitches differently. This behavior will be noticed by other members in close proximity and mimicked, spreading like a contagion throughout the herd.
“You might take note of that. For all animals that exhibit strong Herd Instinct, a common trigger for organizing collective behavior is Fear. This is certainly true for humans.
“The function of The Spectacle is the direction and guidance of behaviors, thoughts, and actions leading up to and during the state of High Suggestibility. This is the process of fine-tuning the Alignment and Vector of the psychological crowds.
“In the case of a music concert, The Spectacle’s function is to deliver an experience of communal entertainment. With organized religion, The Spectacle’s function is to produce a transcendental experience and communion. For a political rally, The Spectacle’s function is to coerce the psychological crowd into whatever behaviors, thoughts, or actions the organizing forces wish to produce. These behaviors might be looting or arson or all-out Anarchy. It could also be a call-to-peace, a blockade of traffic, or the occupation of a symbolic place. It may be as simple as posturing and letting The People’s voice be heard in a unified manner.
“While psychological crowd behavior can be constructive in nature, its propensity for destruction is well documented.
“You should understand, Cadets, behaviors and actions that require critical thought are impossible for psychological crowds. You cannot coerce a psychological crowd into solving a mathematical theorem. You cannot expect a psychological crowd to rationally debate or produce a logical argument. If attempts are made at such an endeavor, you risk degrading the Group Mind and destroying the bond that holds the psychological crowd together. You will break it into a collection of reemerging autonomous individuals again.
“Simple commands, similar to hypnotic suggestion, are most effective when influencing psychological crowds.”
The General clicked the remote and more words emerged on the screen. The General took a sip of water and continued.
“5. As the Specticle’s performance nears its end, the psychological crowd may be at its maximum organization. Spectacle Performances are usually designed to climax the group-mind-bond to its utmost potential. At The Spectacle’s end, just after the climax, a window of opportunity arises. This window is where other influencing tactics can be initiated. This is the most critical moment in determining the later behaviors and actions of a psychological crowd. It is this point where Military significance can most easily be understood.
“Will the psychological crowd disassemble like a bubble popping? Will personality and autonomy return to the individual? Will they go off on their merry ways? Or will the psychological crowd continue on under the prompting and guidance of hidden factors embedded within it?
“Bulls, Handlers, Plants, Shepards, Wolves, (as in ‘wolf-in-sheep’s-clothing’) these are all terms used to describe individuals embedded inside psychological crowds. These are Operators, Cadets. They are a part of an operation. They are not a part of the psychological crowd. They are not a part of the group-mind. They are free-thinking, autonomous individuals, usually following pre-set orders or strategies from a hidden command structure. Some may be in direct communication with command itself. Inside the psychological crowd, they are foreign entities, but they are perceived by psychological crowd members as part of the group-mind-collective.
“Remember!… Personality Diminishment, Decreased Intelligence, Loss of Critical Reasoning Skills, these are the current characteristics of a psychological crowd member. Where a rational world might see a wolf, they will perceive a sheep. Also, remember, Actions are Contagious. The thoughts that run through the group mind are not complex. They will be blunt and immanent. They will be thoughts like, Run, Hide, Charge, Attack, Burn, Shield, March, Go, Stop, Clap, or Yell… There is no philosophizing. There is no should, or should not. There is no internal calculation. There is only the movement of the crashing wave.
“Operators in this environment are able to direct the movement, behaviors, actions, and simple thoughts of psychological crowd members, which brings us to a very important point.
“Psychological Crowds can be commandeered. There can be multiple operations running simultaneously by hidden factions that are at war with each other.”