AJP-10 Allied joint doctrine for strategic communications

What it is

AJP-10, Allied Joint Doctrine for Strategic Communications, is NATO's keystone doctrine for how commanders and their staffs understand and shape the information environment. Strategic communications (StratCom) is defined as "the command group function responsible for understanding the information environment across all relevant audiences and, based on that understanding, using all means of communication - comprising actions, images and words - to appropriately inform and influence an audience's attitudes and behaviours through a narrative-led approach in pursuit of the desired end state." The Purpose clause is direct about who it is for: "AJP-10 provides guidance to NATO commanders and their staff at all levels of command." This is Edition A, Version 1, promulgated in March 2023 - the document's own Summary of changes page is blank, consistent with this being the first edition.

Who it is for, and who it is not

The Application clause states plainly: "AJP-10 is primarily for use by NATO commanders and their staff at the military-strategic and operational levels, but has equal relevance at the strategic and tactical levels." It extends more loosely from there: "It is also an important reference for Alliance and partner nations at all levels because it offers a useful framework for operations, missions and tasks conducted by a coalition of NATO partners, non-NATO nations and other organizations." No supplier, manufacturer or acquirer appears anywhere in the text; the roles it names throughout are military ones - commander, Director of Communications (DirCom), Chief Public Affairs Officer (CPAO), and the Information Operations, Military Public Affairs and Psychological Operations staffs that sit inside a communications directorate. This is guidance for a military chain of command, not a standard a company implements or is measured against.

How it acquires force

AJP-10 is doctrine, not a contract or a regulation, and it does not bind a company directly. NATO nations ratify a separate covering agreement: the Letter of Promulgation states, "The agreement of nations to use this publication is recorded in STANAG 6539," in a publication "which has been approved by the nations in the Military Committee." AJP-10 "is effective upon receipt" for the nations that have ratified. The partner nations, non-NATO nations and other organisations named in the Application clause have not ratified that STANAG, which is why the text offers them a "useful framework" and a "reference" rather than an obligation. Where a company meets this world of doctrine in practice, it is normally through a subordinate publication such as AJP-10.1 or a specific contract clause, not through AJP-10 itself.

The StratCom mindset and three main elements

Chapter 1 sets the concepts the rest of the document builds on. Activity is understood across "the continuum of competition" - a model running from cooperation, through rivalry and confrontation, to armed conflict - within an "information environment" defined as "an environment comprised of the information itself, the individuals, organizations and systems that receive, process and convey the information, and the cognitive, virtual and physical space in which this occurs." Audiences are segmented into three categories - public, stakeholder and actor - by their ability to affect the end state. NATO's approach to StratCom "consists of three main elements": Understanding ("decisions and actions are based on a thorough knowledge of audiences... and their perspective of the information environment"), Integrated planning (mindful of the behaviour-centric approach and "anticipating and mitigating second and third order effects"), and Narrative-led execution ("the narrative as an overarching expression of the whole-of-Alliance strategy"). Eight principles apply throughout: values-based, objective-driven, credible, aligned, informed, integrated, empowered and focused. The chapter closes on narratives - institutional, strategic and micro - each required to nest beneath and cohere with the one above it; NATO's own institutional "core" narrative is quoted as "a democratic, multinational alliance uniting across borders to guard, with courage and competence, against threats to our homes."

Roles across the NATO chain of command

Chapter 2 works down the chain: the North Atlantic Council and Secretary General at the political-strategic level, advised by the NATO Public Diplomacy Division and the Military Committee; Allied Command Operations, where Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) may develop Tier 2 frameworks; joint force commands and the Joint Support and Enabling Command; component commands; and Allied Command Transformation, responsible for StratCom education, training and doctrine development. Every level in the operational chain names a Director of Communications and, where military public affairs is separately headed, a Chief Public Affairs Officer, each with defined StratCom responsibilities.

The communications directorate and its products

Chapter 4 is the organisational core of the document: "each NATO military headquarters must have a communications directorate (or similar title) led by a director of communications (DirCom), reporting directly to the command group," grouping together, at minimum, the information staff function (information operations) and the communications capabilities (military public affairs and psychological operations). "DirCom holds the commander's delegated authority for J10-StratCom" and "reports directly to the command group and is not to be further subordinated." The directorate fulfils three staff functions - understand and assess, plan and integrate, communicate - and is responsible for StratCom frameworks, implementation guidance, integrated communications plans, and the StratCom annex (Annex SS) to an operation plan. Timing is explicit: "the StratCom framework and the narrative must be completed and endorsed prior to the conclusion of phase three of the strategic-level planning process and phase two of the operational-level planning process." A footnote is careful to separate the terms: "StratCom is the staff function; communication is the activity."

Frameworks, objectives and the information environment assessment

Annex B sets out three tiers of StratCom framework: Tier 1, "issued by NATO Headquarters under the authority of the Secretary General"; Tier 2, issued by SHAPE "under the authority of Supreme Allied Commander Allied Powers Europe (SACEUR)," only where no Tier 1 framework covers the issue; and Tier 3, which "NATO Command Structure and NATO force structure headquarters may generate... to support specific activities or issues relevant only to their organization," again only where no higher tier already applies. Chapter 3 sets a hard planning rule: objectives must be legitimate, realistic and measurable, and "there should be no more than five StratCom objectives" in a framework. The information environment assessment (IEA) - "people, processes and technology" used to identify and monitor audiences - feeds the comprehensive understanding of the operating environment alongside intelligence products, and Annex D describes the "battle rhythm" of boards and working groups (the Joint Coordination Board, the Strategic Communications Coordination Board and others) where DirCom or J10-StratCom staff sit, chair or provide input.

Education, training and what is genuinely unusual here

Personnel readiness runs through a named companion publication: NATO Allied Strategic Communications Publication (ASCP)-01 "defines the minimum level of proficiency for all personnel assigned to NATO J10-StratCom positions," and "Allies are individually responsible for ensuring personnel assigned to NATO J10-StratCom and DirCom positions meet the defined and agreed pre-assignment education and training competency standards... as set out in ASCP-01." The document is also careful about the integrity of psychological operations: NATO PsyOps "are based on true and factual information attributed to NATO or a concurring Ally, partner nation or organization" - a deliberate line drawn against manipulation of the Alliance's own audiences. Contracted or commercial activity is almost absent from the text; the one mention is in capability development, where NATO's CapDev directorate "collaborates with industry and the science and technology community to infuse innovative ideas and transformative principles into the StratCom developmental process."

What an assessor looks for

None, in the sense of a certification scheme for an organisation. AJP-10 names no accredited body, no notified body, no self-declaration route and no customer audit - it is doctrine for a NATO military chain of command, not a standard anyone outside it is assessed against. What it describes instead is internal to that chain: a continual process evaluation of StratCom-enabled activities, asking whether the audience analysis was incomplete, whether a vital factor was missed, or whether the execution of the activity was poor; and an assessment board where the operations assessment, underpinned by the IEA, is presented to the commander. For individuals rather than organisations, the nearest thing to an evaluation is ASCP-01's training standard, checking that personnel assigned to J10-StratCom positions meet a minimum competency level - a readiness check on people, not a compliance certification a company can hold.

Related NATO doctrine

AJP-10 "builds on the principles described by AJP-01, Allied Joint Doctrine," and is "adjacent to AJP-5, Allied Joint Doctrine for the Planning of Operations and AJP-3, Allied Joint Doctrine for the Conduct of Operations, on the Allied Joint Doctrine Architecture." It is cited directly for AJP-3.9, Allied Joint Doctrine for Joint Targeting, on how the joint effects and joint targeting function works, and repeatedly for AJP-10.1, Allied Joint Doctrine for Information Operations, covering the information environment assessment in detail and two of the four appendices to the StratCom annex of an operation plan. Personnel standards are set by ASCP-01, NATO Strategic Communications Training Standards. AJP-10 also names APP-11 (NATO Message Catalogue), AAP-47 (Allied Joint Doctrine Development, the process by which doctrine such as AJP-10 itself is produced) and AAP-77 (NATO Terminology Manual) among its related Allied administrative publications, alongside the wider family of companion Allied Joint Publications each covering a specific operational domain or discipline that StratCom coordinates with: AJP-2 (Intelligence, Counter-intelligence and Security), AJP-4 (Logistics), AJP-6 (Communication and Information Systems), AJP-2.9 (Open-Source Intelligence), AJP-3.1 (Maritime Operations), AJP-3.2 (Land Operations), AJP-3.3 (Air and Space Operations), AJP-3.5 (Special Operations), AJP-3.6 (Electronic Warfare), AJP-3.10.2 (Operations Security and Deception), AJP-3.19 (Civil-Military Cooperation) and AJP-3.20 (Cyberspace Operations).

Standards it references

• AJP-01Background
• AJP-2Background
• AJP-3Background
• AJP-4Background
• AJP-5Background
• AJP-6Background
• AJP-2.9Background
• AJP-3.1Background
• AJP-3.2Background
• AJP-3.3Background
• AJP-3.5Background
• AJP-3.6Background
• AJP-3.9Background
• AJP-3.10.2Background
• AJP-3.19Background
• AJP-3.20Background
• AJP-10.1Background
• APP-11Background
• AAP-47Background
• AAP-77Background
• ASCP-01Background