Posted on Sep 14, 2015
Are we still preparing for 20th Century Wars in the 21st Century?
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http://www.valuewalk.com/2015/09/us-vulnerable-to-china-russia-iran-n-korea-cyberwarfare/
We've spent billions on the latest and greatest airframes, tanks and land weapons to destroy equipment and people. How far behind our "enemies" have we slipped because we have failed to recognize that the next "war" will be fought in Cyberspace and not on the ground. At this point, ground forces are more of a distraction or harassment action rather than the main effort.
We've spent billions on the latest and greatest airframes, tanks and land weapons to destroy equipment and people. How far behind our "enemies" have we slipped because we have failed to recognize that the next "war" will be fought in Cyberspace and not on the ground. At this point, ground forces are more of a distraction or harassment action rather than the main effort.
Cyber
Future
Warfare
Posted 10 y ago
Responses: 3
Keeping the following to publicly disclosed information.
MAJ (Join to see), most of your comments above are seriously out of date. The Air Force is NOT DoD's main proponent of cyberspace, that role belongs to USCYBERCOM (the Air Force made a bid to be DoD's proponent, but that was officially nixed when USCYBERCOM was stood up). Each of the Services DO have cyber warfare within their mission and have been preparing for it for years (research various public release statements about DoD Cyber Mission Forces(CMF), National Mission Teams (NMT), Cyber Protection Teams (CPTs), and Cyber National Mission Forces (CNMF)). In this same vein, MAJ Ken Landgren, USCYBERCOM is the principle agency for organizing cyber warfare.
I chuckle every time I see an article in the press about "China is in our networks" or such. Really? This is news? DoD networks are under constant pressure/attempted intrusions/attacks. This has been going on for many, many years and will continue until we perfect brain to brain transfer over large distances (in which case, it will only move to that neural network).
In the late 80s/early 90s, the military had evolved to being a "net-centric" military. Many of the combat multipliers we had were due to the increase in combat power that information sharing brought to the table. We have continued to evolve and have become a "net-dependent" military in many cases. Our multipliers due to information sharing are so tied to integrated networks that if you deny the use of those networks then you have severely reduced (or even crippled) those capabilities. Frequently, those severe reductions in capability will actually take us to a point that we are less effective than a like unit of 20 years ago because along with increased combat multipliers from information, force reductions were implemented because "we can do more with less"
DoD is building many cyber capabilities for the force. Some are Service specific while other are focused at the national level. From an awareness point of view (maybe good, maybe bad), much of that information does not filter down to those outside the cyber community except at the higher levels (I guarantee you that your senior leadership is at least aware of the capabilities if they aren't very familiar with them).
Cyberspace operations are seen as a the great equalizer by those that have no hope of competing with us otherwise on the battlefield. Developing traditional combat power takes an exceedingly long time where only near-peers have a hope of matching our capabilities on the battlefield, and even then only with some other multiplier on their side (no, ISIS does not have the capability for armored warfare development. They can capture tanks on the battlefield and develop their own rudimentary tactics for their employment, but that's going to be the limit of their options).
MAJ (Join to see), most of your comments above are seriously out of date. The Air Force is NOT DoD's main proponent of cyberspace, that role belongs to USCYBERCOM (the Air Force made a bid to be DoD's proponent, but that was officially nixed when USCYBERCOM was stood up). Each of the Services DO have cyber warfare within their mission and have been preparing for it for years (research various public release statements about DoD Cyber Mission Forces(CMF), National Mission Teams (NMT), Cyber Protection Teams (CPTs), and Cyber National Mission Forces (CNMF)). In this same vein, MAJ Ken Landgren, USCYBERCOM is the principle agency for organizing cyber warfare.
I chuckle every time I see an article in the press about "China is in our networks" or such. Really? This is news? DoD networks are under constant pressure/attempted intrusions/attacks. This has been going on for many, many years and will continue until we perfect brain to brain transfer over large distances (in which case, it will only move to that neural network).
In the late 80s/early 90s, the military had evolved to being a "net-centric" military. Many of the combat multipliers we had were due to the increase in combat power that information sharing brought to the table. We have continued to evolve and have become a "net-dependent" military in many cases. Our multipliers due to information sharing are so tied to integrated networks that if you deny the use of those networks then you have severely reduced (or even crippled) those capabilities. Frequently, those severe reductions in capability will actually take us to a point that we are less effective than a like unit of 20 years ago because along with increased combat multipliers from information, force reductions were implemented because "we can do more with less"
DoD is building many cyber capabilities for the force. Some are Service specific while other are focused at the national level. From an awareness point of view (maybe good, maybe bad), much of that information does not filter down to those outside the cyber community except at the higher levels (I guarantee you that your senior leadership is at least aware of the capabilities if they aren't very familiar with them).
Cyberspace operations are seen as a the great equalizer by those that have no hope of competing with us otherwise on the battlefield. Developing traditional combat power takes an exceedingly long time where only near-peers have a hope of matching our capabilities on the battlefield, and even then only with some other multiplier on their side (no, ISIS does not have the capability for armored warfare development. They can capture tanks on the battlefield and develop their own rudimentary tactics for their employment, but that's going to be the limit of their options).
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Profound disagreement with the next war philosophy. You always fight the war you are not prepared for. We fought a short but difficult conventional fight in Iraq and Afghanistan, since we were well prepared for that fight it was over quickly. Not because we had accomplished the mission but because the Taliban and Iraqi insurgents switched tactics. If we spend all our efforts on cyber defense Russian, China, ISIS will prepare with tanks. We don't choose the next war, we have never chosen how the next war will be fought. Future wars are always fought in a manner where our enemy thinks they can win. Tanks are not outdated nor will they ever be in our lifetime. And no cyberspace action has ever defeated a column of tanks. Our military needs to be prepared for the full spectrum of war (or whatever full spectrum ops is called this hour)
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MAJ Bryan Zeski
I agree that we need to be prepared for "full spectrum" operations, however, I feel that we are currently OVER-prepared on the types of historical combat we've known all along. And because it's what we know, we keep pushing that training and funding. There is currently no other military in the world that comes close to being capable of a sustained near-peer conflict - including Russia and China. However, both China and North Korea are AT LEAST near-peer capability in terms of cyberwarfare - and they are possibly even beyond us in some capacities.
Now, I'm not advocating that we STOP our ground warfare, but reduce it in order to compete in the cyberwarfare capacity that we don't currently have.
Now, I'm not advocating that we STOP our ground warfare, but reduce it in order to compete in the cyberwarfare capacity that we don't currently have.
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MAJ (Join to see)
I may be wrong but cyber warfare isn't in the Army's mission, we do limited reconnaissance but that's about it. The Air force is DOD's main proponent of cyberspace, with NSA really taking the lead. I certainly feel great about constant and bold cyber attacks on North Korea's cyber infrastructure and Iran's as a state sponsor of terrorism. however I don't think the Army is the correct bureaucracy to support it.
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MAJ Bryan Zeski
MAJ (Join to see) - I think you bring up another good point about how we've segmented and separated our forces and have created multiple groups of people doing the same thing for each of the forces - that overlap is sapping strength from the military as a whole. It might be time that we consider rejoining our military forces under one integrated military structure. Do Finance personnel from the Navy and Air Force really do anything different than finance personnel in the Army? Probably not. Do the IT guys in the Army do different security and admin tasks than the Air Force and Navy? Probably not. Combining forces would cut down on overhead and make the military a much leaner, but still equally capable force. But, I think that's another topic.
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Unfortunately, it seems that the US is often more reactive than proactive in its preparation for future conflict. We were not truly ready for a desert conflict when operation Desert Shield commenced. Much of the military was still training for a conflict in Europe.
Fortunately, the US is nothing if not adaptive. It will cost us many more victories than would be otherwise possible, but it seems that we are at least starting to realize that the entire future of our country may depend on how quickly we are able to engage in the "Cyber Wars".
Fortunately, the US is nothing if not adaptive. It will cost us many more victories than would be otherwise possible, but it seems that we are at least starting to realize that the entire future of our country may depend on how quickly we are able to engage in the "Cyber Wars".
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MAJ Bryan Zeski
I agree. And I think part of the problem is that there is no clear way to engage in "Cyber War" at this time... everything is very ephemeral. If a powergrid goes down in NYC and we THINK Iran did it... what are our options? Bomb them? Take down their power grid? Nothing? We probably wouldn't even be able to confirm that is WAS Iran....
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PVT Robert Gresham
MAJ Bryan Zeski - It appears however, that at least China and North Korea have been gearing up for this "Cyber War" for some time. With specifically trained divisions of the military who have actually been training for over 10 years, the US is absolutely trying to play catch up.
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