This picture is of a cell phone being used as a trigger for an IED in Iraq. If we think about who is really expert in the use of Social Media of all types - gangs and terrorists surely live in the top quartile of expertise. At the centre is their use of cell phones. Your local drug dealer and the men who ambush our troops use them as weapons and as communication devices. Pick up phones are untraceable. My bet is that they use all aspects of Social Software but that the phone is the main interface as I think that it will become for the rest of us.

We talk of community - think Gangs, tribes.

We dream that social software will enable community gain power - they are proving it.

What are Gangs or Tribes? Here is Steven Pressfield - the best historical writer living (His latest book is about Alexander’s Afghan Campaign) on his understanding of what we are up against:

The tribe is the most ancient form of social organization. It arose from the hunter-gatherer clans of pre-history. A tribe is small. It consists of personal, face-to-face relationships, often of blood. A tribe is cohesive. Its structure is hierarchical. It has a leader and a rigid set of norms and customs that defines each individual’s role. Like a hunting band, the tribe knows who’s the top dog and knows how to follow orders. What makes Islam so powerful in the world today is that its all-embracing discipline and order overlay the tribal mind-set so perfectly. Islam delivers the certainty and security that the tribe used to. It permits the tribal way to survive and thrive in a post-tribal and super-tribal world.

Am I knocking tribalism? Not at all. In many ways I think people are happier in a tribal universe. Consider the appeal of post-apocalyptic movies like The Road Warrior or The Day After Tomorrow. Modern life is tough. Who can fault us if now and then we entertain the idea of going back to the simple life?

The people we’re fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan live that life 24/7/365 and they’ve been living it for the past ten thousand years. They like it. It’s who they are. They’re not going to change.

Lined up against tribes/gangs is our law enforcement and our military. The hammer versus the network. No guesses as to who is winning.

What are the chances of them learning to be as networked? Until recently I thought not much. But there is progress. Look at the LA Fire Department.

(PC World) Humphrey said the department began looking at Web 2.0 technologies after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in August 2005. While those stranded at the Louisian Superdome in New Orleans were certainly hungry and thirsty, “they were dying a little bit at a time from a lack of information,” he said. “They thought they were on their own Gilligan’s Island.”

The LAFD uses four attributes to characterize the success of Web 2.0 tools: desirable, beneficial, justifiable and sustainable.

“We can no longer afford to work at the speed of government,” he said. “We have responsibilities to the public to move the information as quickly as possible … so that they can make key decisions.”

Interest in the LAFD’s effort has grown; its blog just logged its 1 millionth visitor this year, and photos on its Flickr account have been viewed 500,000 times in the past year, Humphrey said. The department has made widgets available with content it produces and uses RSS to allow more users to subscribe to updates.

But the most popular effort has been the Twitter account, which now has about 190 followers who can receive Twitter updates from a mobile device. For example, a Twitter will report that a structural fire is being battled by 30 firefighters, or that a car accident has occurred. It reads like a dispatch log of sorts from the calls the department receives and answers.

“The idea for us is that not everyone who is in need of information in times of distress will be sitting in front of a computer,” Humphrey said.

The New York Police Department have just published a 90 page report stating that they have to get inside the heads and the culture of the “enemy”. Here for me is the most telling idea - that the issue is cultural and it drives the need for a culturally aware response.

•The transnational phenomenon of radicalization in the West is largely a function of the people and the environment in which they live. Much different from the Israeli-Palestinian equation, the transformation of a Western-based individual to a terrorist is not triggered by oppression, suffering, revenge, or desperation.

• Rather, it is a phenomenon that occurs because the individual is looking for an identity and a cause and unfortunately, often finds them in the extremist Islam.

Gangs or Tribes give young men this identity. Here is the key.

Here then is the challenge for Law Enforcement and the Military. The conflict is cultural. The organizations are social networks that use social media brilliantly. To catch Geronimo, the US Army had to act like Apaches. To end the conflict, they had to find a cultural answer. This is their only response today.

We have to be them and better. So how and who?