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

提议的项目将媒介化的战争通信作为参与者的真实和直接的实践进行调查。为此，它考察了现代空中支援（无人机打击和支持地面部队的有人驾驶飞行器）以及现代地面作战。重点是在行动和决策压力大的情况下，以及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”）中，相关各方如何产生与“情况”相关的共享证据和认知合理性，最终导致要采取的军事行动的专业决策。在战争紧张的情况下，无论是采取行动还是不采取行动，都必须立即作出这种决定。两者都会带来重大后果，从对本国或盟国军队的生存威胁到本国的攻击可能违反国际法。尽管有其后果性，但在压力情况下的决策在认知和沟通上仍然是脆弱的。这是因为它们几乎总是发生在不利于沟通的环境中（心理和生理压力；极端的时间压力；容易发生故障的技术；嘈杂的环境；工作人员分散在大陆距离；信息不完整等）。拟议的项目旨在调查参与攻击任务的与媒体有联系的人员做出决策的紧急微观情况。由于难以获得数据，这些动态和偶然性直到最近才被视为“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被科学所理解，并更广泛地进行批评，例如，通过确定攻击前决策的交互式协商中的强制性通道点。这将最终导致对这些做法的深入了解-因此与法律会计以及政治和道德反思有关。此外，该项目有助于在德语空间建立微观社会学相互作用研究的新兴领域，并将其纳入社会理论。为了捕捉“小决定大后果”的社会动态，该项目旨在重建真实战争发生的顺序。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员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.