Edward Lansdale | Weaponizing Belief

In the early 1950s, a body was left along a rural path in Luzon. By morning, a rumor had already taken shape.The Philippines was emerging from occupation and entering a new conflict. The Hukbalahap, once a resistance movement against Japan, had become a communist-led insurgency challenging the postwar government. Assassinations, land disputes, and rural unrest destabilized entire provinces.The United States, wary of communist expansion after 1949, sent advisers to assist Manila. Among them was Colonel Edward Lansdale — a former OSS officer who would later serve in the CIA and who believed that fear, rumor, and narrative could be as decisive as force.In his memoir, In the Midst of Wars: An American’s Mission to Southeast Asia, Lansdale described an operation designed to exploit belief in the aswang. A staged killing. A calculated rumor. A withdrawal achieved without a firefight.Historians such as Max Boot, Stanley Karnow, and Thomas Powers have reflected on Lansdale’s methods — some describing them as innovative, others as emblematic of the “black arts” of intelligence.There is no complete official file confirming the precise details of the so-called vampire operation. What remains is a convergence of memoir, memory, and reputation.This episode traces the insurgency, the reform campaign of Ramon Magsaysay, and the emergence of counterinsurgency doctrine that would later travel to Vietnam.In the jungles of Luzon, folklore intersected with geopolitics. And in the early Cold War, belief became an instrument of statecraft.For a more exhaustive cinematic version of this episode — including archival visuals and contextual graphics — visit the official YouTube channel, Empty Night.