The Sunday Deep Read: Reorienting Resistance
Countering leadership failures with Dixon's insights
In 1976, Norman F. Dixon, a psychologist and former British Army officer, published The Psychology of Military Incompetence, a sharp critique of leadership failures in military history. Dixon dissected how emotional immaturity, authoritarianism, and rigid hierarchies led to catastrophic decisions in warfare, using psychological theory as well as historical context.
Fifty years later, his insights remain vital, not just for state militaries but for activist movements, resistance cells, and decentralized groups. Here, on The Shepard Scale—a Substack dedicated to counterintelligence for political activists and underground resistance—we adapt Dixon’s framework to analyze and counter dysfunction in these modern spaces, ensuring groups maintain morale, operational integrity, and cohesion.
Dixon's Core Findings Then and Now
Dixon identified psychological traits in incompetent military leaders: fear of failure, need for approval, excessive conformity, and obsession with order over effectiveness, often tied to childhood trauma or authoritarian upbringings.
In modern resistance groups, these traits appear in leaders who prioritize control, enforce ideological purity, react aggressively to dissent, or impose hierarchy in flat structures. Recognizing these red flags early prevents environments where dissent is stifled and innovation punished.
Unlike military hierarchies, activist and resistance groups often embrace flat structures and consensus-driven models. Yet, as Dixon observed, these are vulnerable to covert authoritarianism. Emotional immaturity manifests as passive-aggressive manipulation masked as consensus, demonization of former members to enforce control, or trauma language used to dodge accountability.
For example, in an anonymous resistance campaign, a leader’s fear of dissent led to loyalty tests that expelled skilled organizers. Misinterpreting critique as betrayal (a hallmark of Dixon’s incompetent leaders) fractured the group, derailing its mission.
While Dixon relied on Freudian models, modern trauma-informed psychology and neuroscience offer deeper insights. Emotional regulation issues, attachment trauma, or complex PTSD often drive behaviors resembling authoritarianism. By integrating these tools, The Shepard Scale equips activists to intervene before dysfunction spreads, strengthening resistance in today’s open-source battlefield.
What Does Modernized Dixon Look Like?
First, we need to upgrade the framework.
Dixon relied on Freudian and authoritarian personality models. Here, we integrate trauma-informed psychology, neuroscience, and contemporary behavioral profiling, as well as modern OPSEC principles and deception detection techniques. These methods allow us to identify and address dysfunction before it corrodes a group from within.
Second, we must broaden the application.
Dixon focused on formal military hierarchies. This work applies his core insights to activist movements, resistance cells, and decentralized groups—contexts where traditional command structures don’t exist, but the same pathologies thrive under different masks.
Third, we need to expose the mechanisms themselves, not just identify the symptoms.
Dixon cataloged what happened; the modernized framework explains why with the updated research we now know about trauma-informed psychology. By exploring trauma loops, manipulation tactics, group dynamics, and infiltration strategies, we can identify the underlying engines of dysfunction rather than merely documenting their outcomes.
Lastly, we must provide tools, not just the diagnosis.
Dixon left readers with a sobering portrait of systemic failure. The addition of practical tools offers proactive countermeasures: orientation resets, vetting frameworks, emotional recalibration, and internal counter-insurgency tactics. The result is a faster and more effective reorientation.
Applying Dixon’s lens reveals the psychological fragility that plagued historical military leaders. The terminology has shifted, but the pathology persists because human behavior patterns endure, from ancient texts to modern headlines. In the OODA Loop, Orientation is where leaders filter observations through biases, experiences, and emotional states. Dixon’s incompetent leaders failed here, misreading situations due to fear or rigidity. Resistance groups face the same risk when internal dysfunction corrupts orientation before they engage anything external. In short, they’re dead in the water.
Resistance leaders with flawed orientation driven by trauma or insecurity will misinterpret dissent as betrayal. This leads to decisions rooted in ego (e.g., punishing critics) and actions that alienate allies (e.g., expelling organizers), fracturing groups and derailing missions. Constantly reassessing orientation ensures leaders adapt to evolving realities, aligning decisions and actions with mission-driven goals.
Psychological Counterintelligence for Resistance
In order to modernize Dixon’s work and use his premises to practically hone resistance group dynamics while still honoring his original research, we must integrate tools from psychological operations and counterintelligence.
Profile the Leader, Not the Persona. You can use psycholinguistic cues and behavior patterns to distinguish genuine leadership from the emotional compensation and authoritarianism that Dixon described.
Watch for Triangulation. Incompetent or toxic leaders often manufacture interpersonal conflict to distract from their failings. This splits groups and weakens cohesion. Along with this often comes loyalty tests; incompetent leaders use them often as part of the groupthink that ends up running the group.
Audit the Group and its Leader for Red Flag Behaviors.
Is dissent punished, exiled, or shut down?
Are decisions in the group data-driven or are they driven by ego and emotion? How does the group finish the sentence, “Our actions are dictated by whatever course will_____”? (If the answer is not “move the needle of our stated, clear, specific goals,” you have the wrong answer.)
Are boundaries respected or weaponized?
Apply deception analysis techniques. Evaluate leader statements for linguistic markers of deception, evasion, or manipulation. Deception analysis can reveal motive long before behavior makes it obvious.
From Analysis to Action: Creating Resilient Resistance Structures
Resilient groups actively prevent incompetence by:
Encouraging internal critique without reprisal
Training members in psychological self-awareness and basic profiling
Encouraging individual members to do the work necessary to profile themselves first and fix the holes.
Operational integrity requires more than strategy—it demands psychological maturity, structural safeguards, and a refusal to normalize dysfunction.
Dixon’s The Psychology of Military Incompetence is more than a military critique; it’s a roadmap for understanding leadership failures across all contexts and group types. By integrating his insights with modern psychology and counterintelligence tools, The Shepard Scale empowers activists to preempt dysfunction and build resilient groups.