Mercy! Mercy! That Dang Nabed PERCY!

Cyberwar: Assumptions Bearing on the Problem

Often in the murky world of Classified Programs, disinformation and half-truths it is necessary to put more weight to bear on assumptions than might otherwise be warranted. When events take place where what actually happened is obscured (for the right reasons as well as the wrong) it is necessary to take the evidence and fit it into a hypothesis that fits best with the context of surrounding events.

Below is my opinion.

1.There is a distinction between offensive and defensive cyberwar activities.

An offensive cyberwar activity takes place where a nation state, enters the sovereign territory of another to kill inhabitants or destroy infrastructure. It is this physical destruction that identifies an activity as offensive in nature. Examples are sending a cloud of poison gas drifting across the border, detonating a nuclear device in the heartland, sending a drone to kill a terrorist, exploding a bomb in an underground cavern, or launching a cyber weapon to shake apart a centrifuge. It is fundamentally all the same thing. It is an overt act of aggression. The precision, collateral damage or nature of the attack is not the issue. The key words are, “Loss of Life” and “Destruction of Physical Infrastructure.”

2. Defensive cyber-activities include hacking, cyber snooping, and information gathering and to a limited extent computer degrading activities. These are more or less accepted and have historical precedent.

Whether it is getting into the mind of an individual, getting inside another’s decision cycle, examining the contents of a file or the information in a computer, efforts to determine another nation state’s intentions and capabilities are considered prudent and legitimate activities a nation can take in the interests of defense. The key word is that the activity stays within "A Computer."

However, the line is crossed when there are injuries or deaths among citizens of a foreign state or the result is a physical destruction of infrastructure. That is what Director Hayden described as, “crossing the Rubicon.” The distinction is made clear regarding the use of satellites or drones. Flying them high overhead is one thing. An offended state might rile and complain about airspace infractions, but as long as the activity is information gathering it represents a grey area. However when a drone fires a missile at a vehicle presumed to be carrying a terrorist, then that crosses the line. For this to be legitimate there needs to be a declaration of war.

A declaration of war does not necessarily have to be directed against a nation state. Terrorists are frequently not aligned with a Nation state, nor do they feel bound by the rules of land warfare. As a consequence it would seem a case could be made, once war is declared, for doing whatever it takes to neutralize their ability to exercise combat power… to include crossing boarders of states that offer safe havens which willingly or unwillingly permit them to operate.

3. That information gathering and defensive cyber-activities do not in themselves constitute an act of war.

Espionage is a well-known practice and a nation has a right to protect itself. Thus defensive cyber activities have some legitimacy. If the cyber infringement does not exceed changing source code that impairs a computer’s ability to function properly, that’s one thing, however getting a computer to tell a piece of ancillary hardware to destroy itself is quite another.