42 ◾ Global Information Warfare: The New Digital Battleeld
considered. However, even in the West, there are signicant dierences in the
actual meanings of the terms.
In most countries, CW is seen as a subsection of IW, with IW spanning a much
broader eld of action than CW.
Today, most armed forces view information operations (IW) as a core military
competency. ey see information as both a weapon and a target in warfare, and
they believe that information and knowledge dominance can win conicts. ere
are a range of factors that make the concept of CW attractive:
◾ It is cheaper to deploy than conventional weapons as it utilizes “o the shelf”
technologies and freely available tools.
◾ It has a low entry cost.
◾ It does not require large ...