Medialized communication under pressure: Cultures of command, epistemic practices, and distributed decision-making in technically medialized warfare communication

拟议的项目调查媒介化战争通信作为参与者的真实和直接实践。为了做到这一点，它检查现代空中支援（无人机打击和载人飞行器支持地面部队）以及现代地面作战。重点放在如何在行动和决策的高压情况下，在两种不同的指挥文化（欧洲军队的“任务型战术”与北美军队的“指挥和控制战术”），共享的证据和认知的可验证性有关的“情况”是由有关各方产生的问题，最终导致专业的决定，军事行动将采取。在战争的压力下，必须立即作出这种决定，无论是通过行动还是通过不采取行动。这两种行为都带来了严重后果，从对本国或盟国部队的生存威胁到可能违反国际法的攻击。尽管有其后果，在压力的情况下，决策仍然是认识和沟通脆弱。这是因为这些活动几乎总是在不利于交流的环境中进行（心理和生理压力;极端的时间压力;容易出现故障的技术;嘈杂的环境;工作人员分散在大陆上;信息不完整等）。拟议的项目旨在调查紧急的微观情况下，参与攻击任务的中间连接的人员作出决定。由于难以获得数据，这些动态和突发事件直到最近还被视为“黑匣子”。因此，拟议项目的目的是使攻击任务的社会动态能够为科学所了解，并进行更普遍的批评，例如，通过确定在攻击前互动谈判决定的强制性通过点。这将最终导致深入了解这些做法-从而轴承相关的法律的会计和政治以及道德的反思。此外，该项目有助于建立德语空间战争的微观社会学互动研究的新兴领域，并将其置于社会理论中。为了捕捉“小决定大后果”的社会动态，该项目旨在重建真实的战争发生的顺序。为了确保在高度专业化和技术化的军事和战争领域进行全面和详细的经验重建，经验工作包括与该领域的专业人士和高级研究人员合作。在项目筹备过程中，已经确保了对相关数据的访问。

The proposed project investigates medialized warfare communication as authentic and immediate practice of the participants involved. To do so it examines modern air support (drone strikes and manned air vehicles supporting ground troops) as well as modern ground combat. The focus is put on the question how in situations of high pressure of action and decision and in two different cultures of command (“mission-type tactics” of European armies vs. “command and control tactics” of North American armies), shared evidence and epistemic plausibility in relation to “the situation” is produced by the parties involved, ultimately leading to professional decisions about military action to be taken. In the pressurized situations of war such decisions must be taken immediately, be it through action or through refraining from action. Both entail vital consequences ranging from existential threats for the own or allied troops to own attacks potentially violating international law. In spite of their consequentiality, decision-making in situations of pressure remain epistemically and communicatively fragile. This is due to the fact that they almost always take place in environments that are hostile to communication (psychological and physiological stress; extreme time pressure; failure-prone technology; loud environment; staff members spread in continental distance; uncomplete information, etc.).The proposed project aims at investigating the emergent micro-situations in which the medially connected personnel involved in attack missions takes decisions. These dynamics and contingencies were until recently regarded a “black box” due to difficulties of obtaining data. The aim of the proposed project is therefore to make the social dynamics of attack missions accessible to science and to critique more generally, e.g. through identifying obligatory points of passage in the interactive negotiation of decisions that precede attacks. This will eventually lead to insights into these practices – thus bearing relevance for legal accounting and for political as well as ethical reflection. Furthermore, the project contributes to establishing the emergent field of micro sociological interaction research on warfare in the German-speaking space and to contextualizing it in social theory. In order to capture the social dynamics of “small decision with big consequences”, the project aims at reconstructing the sequentially of real war occurrences. To ensure encompassing and detailed empirical reconstruction in the highly professionalized and technologized field of military and warfare, the empirical work includes cooperation with professionals and senior researchers of this field. The access to the relevant data has already been secured in the preparation of the project.