Silly stories during GWOT era that seem scientifically impossible make me think of the "Voice of God" thing, about a system to beam sound into a targets head to make them think god was speaking to them directly, or similarly project a hologram of God in the sky to tell opposing religious fighters to lay down their weapons.
But the "radio propagation" part makes me think this isn't the right one.
That is a pretty good guess, if I remember that story correctly "radio propagation" wouldn't totally discount its candidacy - with fillings and dental implants being in the mix. But that would be a very ambitious force protection program - trying to impersonate God.
What I have in mind is far more modest - like "We have a really effective, non-technical, targeting methodology against very loosely connected cells that are receiving foreign assistance but also exercising increasing more effective opsec. How do we keep them from accurately attributing their misfortune to the vulnerability we are exploiting?"
On a related note: you remember when the rebuilt Iraqi military insisted on going with NATO everything for personal equipment (M16, AT4, body armor, etc), against the advice of NATO military advisors? That is because they were convinced that their repeated defeats could only be ascribed to a technological outclassing that bordered on the magical. They weren't the only ones, and it was unhelpful in most instances - like civilians somehow getting it into their heads that our super conspicuous sunglasses weren't for protecting our eyes from tiny bits of flying concrete during firefights. No, they were x-ray glasses that we were using to peep on their ladies. Easy fix, right? Just let them try on the glasses themselves. Nope, we obviously disabled the functionality using the very same magical technology before handing over the porno-shades.
But the "radio propagation" part makes me think this isn't the right one.