Revealing NATO's Militarization of the Electromagnetic Spectrum: Safeguarding a Global Commons
Imperialism goes electromagnetic in the brave new world of the 21st century.
The electromagnetic spectrum (EMS) is an intangible yet all-encompassing network of electromagnetic waves that permeate our world, facilitating communication, navigation, broadcasting, and numerous other crucial functions. It is an invaluable resource that knows no borders, one that has the potential to unite humanity and raise living standards and the quality of life on a global level.
The EMS is a particularly fascinating resource because it is necessarily finite in nature and yet, unlike physical resources like land or water, which can be divided and owned by specific individuals or nations, the EMS is not something that can be exclusively owned or controlled by any single entity. It exists naturally both within and beyond our planet, permeating the atmosphere and space. Electromagnetic waves don’t recognize national boundaries or ownership and yet, being finite, it must be regulated in order to be used effectively.
Let me give you an example of what I mean.
Each type of radio station operates on a specific frequency, and these frequencies are allocated by regulatory authorities to prevent interference and ensure efficient use of the spectrum. Think of the EMS as a highway with different lanes for different types of communication. To avoid collisions (interference), each radio station (or communication device) needs to stay in its designated lane (frequency).
So how does this increasingly technological world go about regulating this resource fairly? Or does it? Recently leaked NATO documents detail the alliance’s view on EMS regulation (or lack-there-of) in great detail. Below are some direct quotations from some of these documents with note the spectrum for it’s destructive capacity, as well as the potential use in controlling, identifying, protecting, sensing, positioning, navigating and timing, or deceiving, degrading, disrupting, denying, and destroying enemy forces.
NATO’s military freedom of action on the modern battlefield is underpinned by maintaining a sufficient degree of superiority within the Electromagnetic Spectrum (EMS) to enable joint force commanders to gain advantage across the levels of warfare.
The current lack of regulation of the EMS has lead to a situation wherein powerful countries disproportionately benefit from access to the EMS, thus furthering the global power imbalance between these countries and smaller, less affluent countries. Furthermore the clear double-standard shown in the current structure of international organizations offers little hope for a future wherein imposed regulations do anything but further imperialist agendas rather than even out the global playing field.
Unequal and unregulated access and control over the EMS has further implications than interference with military communications such as intercepting enemy communications by controlling the corresponding “lanes” of the EMS “highway.” Governments with advanced control over the EMS could gain steal access to vital infrastructure or locations such as areas possessing natural resources or strategic military sites. This is done by controlling the radio wave or other electromagnetic spectrum resources within these locations.
There is a vast mount of documentation to sift through and I intend to publish updates on what I uncover over the next few weeks, In the meantime, it’s vital that the collective public keep NATO militarization of the EMS in mind as they read global headlines. Understanding the capabilities of Western hegemonic governments provides a more comprehensive understanding of the allocation of resources and access to technology, both globally and in space. Hegemony is antithetical to peace and if we are to aim for a world as unmarred by military conflict as possible we must all do everything we can to notice, expose, and combat such arrogant ideologies.
-The Shultz Report by M. Shultz