Strategic Empathy in Intelligence Analysis

TOPIC SPONSOR: HAF/A2/6

How should we develop strategic empathy, the ability to identify with a competitor or adversary, to optimize analysis capability?

• Cohan, Maj. Geoff, "Enhancing Critical Thinking Training for Intelligence Analysts: A DOD-Wide Solution," ACSC EL 2020, 21 pgs. 
  • Addresses the question by highlighting that cultural and strategic empathy can be actively developed through formal structured analysis training, specifically the practice of "Red Teaming." The paper points to the U.S. Army’s University of Foreign Military and Cultural Studies, which uses red teaming as a foundational technique to educate soldiers in fostering cultural empathy and mitigating groupthink. By training analysts to step into the shoes of the adversary—literally playing the "Red Force" during scenario-based exercises—they learn to think like the enemy, anticipate contingencies, and significantly optimize the accuracy of their intelligence assessments.
• Gronau, Maj. Mark A., "Strategic Empathy: Avoiding Pitfalls along the Competition Continuum," AFGC thesis, 2025, 34 pgs. 
  • Gronau answers this question by proposing that the Air Force formally integrate strategic empathy and perspective-taking into the Career Field Education Training Plan (CFETP) for operations intelligence analysts, a framework that currently lacks progressive requirements for developing this skill. He argues that to optimize analysis capability—specifically making intelligence assessments more anticipatory, accurate, complete, and relevant in accordance with Joint Publication 2-0 criteria—analysts must be trained to understand the overarching narratives through which adversaries and competitors view themselves. To practically develop this capability, Gronau recommends utilizing a historical "feedback" framework in initial and upgrade training, wherein analysts review past events, draft assessments based on the specific motivations of the actors involved, and then evaluate their assessments against the actual historical outcomes to continually refine their perspective-taking abilities.
• Hayward, Lt. Col. James Daniel, "Changing an Adversary's Behavior: A Taxonomy for the Human Domain of Warfare," SAASS thesis, 2021, 87 pgs. 
  • Hayward emphasizes that developing strategic empathy requires a robust, visceral understanding of the "observed system," which includes the target audience's culture, history, political composition, and geography. To avoid the trap of mirror-imaging bias, strategists must consciously step outside of the American perspective and view the operational environment from the adversary's point of view. By acknowledging that the environment appears differently to the target than it does to the US government, planners can better anticipate adversary decisions, thereby increasing the likelihood of successfully changing an opponent's behavior in the human domain.
• Hignite, Lt. Col. Greg, "Sustaining Relevance--Public Affairs and Information Operations in an Era of Great Power Competition," AWC SSP, 2020, 45 pgs. 
  • Hignite asserts that optimizing analysis requires replacing the military's current ethnocentric paradigms with an "ethnorelative frame of reference". To achieve this level of empathy, the Department of Defense must integrate cross-cultural and inter-cultural communication scholarship into its doctrine and training. By purposefully acknowledging the "well-heeled biases of American exceptionalism," communicators and intelligence analysts can break through their own cultural blind spots to craft tailored, culturally salient messages that more accurately inform and influence near-peer competitors like China.
• Jones, Maj. Brennan D., "Utilizing a Strategic Empathy Framework across Air University: An Analysis of SOS and ACSC Curriculum," SAASS thesis, 2024, 93 pgs. 
  • Emphasizes that developing strategic empathy requires a structured educational framework focusing on an adversary's emotions, aspirations, and ideologies. The paper advocates for training military professionals to systematically analyze how these three traits interact across an adversary's bureaucratic, personal, group/nation-state, and international environments. By formally embedding this framework into professional military education, officers can learn to identify their own cognitive biases, step outside their default paradigms, and actively practice seeing the world objectively through the eyes and mind of a competitor.
• Kirklin, Russell J., "It's a We Said, Xi Said King of Situation: Analyzing CCP Perceptions of US Freedom of Navigation Operations in the South China Sea," SAASS thesis, 2020, 107 pgs. 
  • Kirklin argues that strategic empathy can be developed by utilizing tools like the Narrative Matrix framework to systematically map out how an adversary might perceive and react to U.S. actions. To overcome inherent cognitive dissonance and institutional filters, analysts must gather "measurable, distinguishable, and empathetic trend data" regarding what a competitor says, writes, and does in response to U.S. operations. By meticulously anticipating an adversary's logic and the return messages they might want to send, strategists can mitigate perception challenges and gain accurate insight into how U.S. threats and narratives are truly being received.
• Kolesiak, Lt. Col., Patrick J., "What Called Nation-Building: Strategic Failures Faulty Assumptions and Six Critical Mistakes in Afghanistan," AF Fellows paper, 2020, 149 pgs. 
  • Kolesiak highlights that developing strategic empathy necessitates a comprehensive study of an adversary’s beliefs, hopes, fears, and recent history. Without this deep cultural comprehension, military analysts and strategists inevitably default to mirror-imaging, mistakenly projecting their own American values and organizational hierarchies onto the enemy. By rigorously integrating cultural understanding into strategic analysis, the United States can better anticipate how adversaries will respond in both peace and conflict, such as predicting how cultural honor might dictate their terms of surrender or shape the loyalties of a local population.
• Martinez, Capt. Kyle S., "An Air Operations Center Cultural Shift in Strategy," SOS AUAR, 2020, 12 pgs.
  • Martinez proposes an organizational solution to developing strategic empathy by advocating for the creation of a dedicated Strategic Design Team (SDT) within the Air Operations Center. To understand the complex operational environment and combat near-peer competitors, this specialized team would be explicitly tasked to "empathize with adversary planning cycles" and to understand the mental and emotional reactions of opponents. By empowering planners to think divergently and explore problem sets contextually—across physical, conceptual, and cultural systems—leadership can foster an adaptive environment that anticipates adversary actions and produces highly synchronized operations.
• Stinson, Joshua S., "Stubborn Giants: Assessing Resolve between the United States and China." SAASS, 2020, 123 pgs. 
  • Suggests that strategic empathy can be developed through the close observation of a competitor's behavior during "pattern break events" that punctuate international relations. These unique, non-routine events strip away normal posturing and provide clear insight into who the adversary is and what they value the most. The paper also argues that analysts must monitor the repeated interactions between senior decision-makers to understand how perceptions and misperceptions of the other party are shaped, recommending that these empathetic insights be directly incorporated into frameworks for assessing an adversary's will to fight and resolve.
• Walser, Jayson, "Alcibiades' Dark Empathy and Victory: Application of Strategic Empathy for Positional Advantage," SAASS thesis, 2024, 189 pgs. 
  • Suggests that strategic empathy is cultivated by deeply collating and analyzing information across a nation’s history, domestic politics, and geographic constraints. By achieving this comprehensive understanding of an adversary's vital interests and vulnerabilities, military and policy strategists can anticipate response options and even employ "dark empathy"—the use of emotional intelligence to manipulate, deceive, or exploit an opponent. The paper notes that by applying empathetic insights offensively, analysts can effectively disrupt adversary relationships, manipulate their domestic politics, and target operational actions with devastating accuracy.
• Willigenburg, Marije, "Thinking, Feeling, Caring: Strategic Empathy in Military Strategy," SAASS thesis, 2024, 193 pgs. 
  • ​​​​​​​Posits that developing strategic empathy involves cultivating three intertwined components: cognitive empathy (thinking), emotional empathy (feeling), and empathic concern (caring). At the individual level, analysts and strategists must actively practice self-awareness, emotional regulation, and motivation to overcome outgroup biases and avoid becoming overwhelmed by emotional distress. At the institutional level, the paper argues that bureaucratic military organizations must shift their culture by establishing new norms, promotion incentives, and knowledge structures that value emotional intelligence and active listening over purely quantitative metrics, thereby empowering strategists to safely challenge traditional hierarchies and groupthink.