We Need To Prepare for the Future of War, NSA Official Says (nytimes.com) 57
Glenn S. Gerstell, the general counsel of the National Security Agency, writing at The New York Times: The threats of cyberattack and hypersonic missiles are two examples of easily foreseeable challenges to our national security posed by rapidly developing technology. It is by no means certain that we will be able to cope with those two threats, let alone the even more complicated and unknown challenges presented by the general onrush of technology -- the digital revolution or so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution -- that will be our future for the next few decades.
The digital revolution has urgent and profound implications for our federal national security agencies. It is almost impossible to overstate the challenges. If anything, we run the risk of thinking too conventionally about the future. The short period of time our nation has to prepare for the effects of this revolution is already upon us, and it could not come at a more perilous and complicated time for the National Security Agency, Central Intelligence Agency, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, Federal Bureau of Investigation and the other components of the intelligence community.
Gearing up to deal with those new adversaries, which do not necessarily present merely conventional military threats, is itself a daunting challenge and one that must be undertaken immediately and for at least the next decade or two. But that is precisely when we must put in place a new foundation for dealing with the even more profound and enduring implications of the digital revolution. That revolution will sweep through all aspects of our society so powerfully that our only chance of effectively grappling with its consequences will lie in taking bold steps in the relatively near term. In short, our attention must turn to a far more complex set of threats of multiple dimensions enabled by the digital revolution. While the potential consequences are less catastrophic than nuclear war, they are nonetheless deeply threatening in a range of ways we will have trouble countering.
The digital revolution has urgent and profound implications for our federal national security agencies. It is almost impossible to overstate the challenges. If anything, we run the risk of thinking too conventionally about the future. The short period of time our nation has to prepare for the effects of this revolution is already upon us, and it could not come at a more perilous and complicated time for the National Security Agency, Central Intelligence Agency, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, Federal Bureau of Investigation and the other components of the intelligence community.
Gearing up to deal with those new adversaries, which do not necessarily present merely conventional military threats, is itself a daunting challenge and one that must be undertaken immediately and for at least the next decade or two. But that is precisely when we must put in place a new foundation for dealing with the even more profound and enduring implications of the digital revolution. That revolution will sweep through all aspects of our society so powerfully that our only chance of effectively grappling with its consequences will lie in taking bold steps in the relatively near term. In short, our attention must turn to a far more complex set of threats of multiple dimensions enabled by the digital revolution. While the potential consequences are less catastrophic than nuclear war, they are nonetheless deeply threatening in a range of ways we will have trouble countering.
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We need advanced body armor that can absorb a blaster hit.... unlike that useless crap they have in Star Wars that appears to be more for show than anything.
Don't discount "for show". Those Hugo Boss uniforms the Nazis wore didn't stop bullets, did they?
and what about pow rules for hackers? you can't pu (Score:3)
and what about pow rules for hackers? you can't put them in the normal system and you have to let them out when it's over.
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A hacker could be considered a spy and executed.
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A hacker could be considered a spy and executed.
Only when hacking while out of uniform.
Re:Give peace a chance (Score:5, Insightful)
It's certainly more in our interest to get along than to do otherwise, but humans have different value systems and these naturally come into contention with each other. Unless you're willing to submit each time this occurs, it will eventually escalate into some greater conflict, but even that doesn't necessitate outright war when there are economic sanctions and other avenues towards resolving those conflicts that don't result in bloodshed. But being defenseless is no answer, or you will find yourself forced to submit to those who can exert power and authority over you. To paraphrase Teddy Roosevelt, speak softly to be sure, but also carry a big stick in case those soft words are met with harder action.
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humans have different value systems and these naturally come into contention with each other. Unless you're willing to submit each time this occurs, it will eventually escalate into some greater conflict, but even that doesn't necessitate outright war when there are economic sanctions and other avenues towards resolving those conflicts that don't result in bloodshed. But being defenseless is no answer, or you will find yourself forced to submit to those who can exert power and authority over you
Really.
First: nukes aren't useful. Let's get that one out of the way. You can't stop a nuke with another nuke, and you can raise plenty of hell with conventional weapons. So we can ditch all the nukes.
From that standpoint, what next?
Well, economic sanctions aren't an answer. Economic sanctions are war crimes. They injure the weakest and most-vulnerable while the military-industrial machine in the target nation flourishes and the elites drink expensive champagne. Economic sanctions are essentiall
Re:Give peace a chance (Score:5, Insightful)
First: nukes aren't useful. Let's get that one out of the way. You can't stop a nuke with another nuke, and you can raise plenty of hell with conventional weapons. So we can ditch all the nukes.
I'd disagree. Nukes are immensely useful, because they tell everyone else not to fuck with your country. If you look at things from the perspective of Iran or North Korea it's quite evident to see why they want nuclear weapons of their own because it means that the U.S. or other foreign powers cannot meddle in their affairs to the extent that the U.S. historically has.
The capability for an adversary to annihilate you is one hell of a deterrent. Bullies are never going to pick on the biggest, strongest kid and it's no different at a nation level. Getting your own nuclear weapons means not being shoved around in the lunch line.
If war is obsolete then there's no need to ban it since no one would care to engage in it, but I feel as though most of your post is just wishful thinking. Making something illegal doesn't stop anyone from doing it. Iraq used chemical weapons against the Kurds and it's been suspected that they've been used in Syria as well. So what do you do to the rule breakers if not going to war with them. The only choice is economic sanctions otherwise your rules are utterly toothless and only their to provide the illusion of safety and comfort.
Re:Give peace a chance (Score:5, Insightful)
First: nukes aren't useful. Let's get that one out of the way. You can't stop a nuke with another nuke, and you can raise plenty of hell with conventional weapons. So we can ditch all the nukes.
I'd disagree. Nukes are immensely useful, because they tell everyone else not to fuck with your country. If you look at things from the perspective of Iran or North Korea it's quite evident to see why they want nuclear weapons of their own because it means that the U.S. or other foreign powers cannot meddle in their affairs to the extent that the U.S. historically has.
The capability for an adversary to annihilate you is one hell of a deterrent. Bullies are never going to pick on the biggest, strongest kid and it's no different at a nation level. Getting your own nuclear weapons means not being shoved around in the lunch line.
Nukes are the real world equivalent of the movie trope of a guy holding a grenade with the pin pulled. It says "if you mess with me I might go down, but you'll go down with me". But it doesn't mean you'll magically have a peaceful coexistence. It means you'll get into proxy wars, use symbolic measures (like missile tests in the case of NK), or get into economic warfare. But you'll still be fighting.
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A few nukes are a deterrence. A stockpile of big bombs is terminal disaster but with delays. An arsenal of various sizes is terminal disaster made attractive. That's the US now.
Re: Give peace a chance (Score:1)
This wouldn't be ideal in war because it would render an area uninhabitable and destroy the usefulness of natural resources in the affected area.
Nukes exist to maintain a stalemate while EMPs will be the true weapon of the future.
People dont understand that 5 well placed EMPs in the US would cause nationwide blackouts, disable automobiles, destroy communications, and
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People dont understand that 5 well placed EMPs in the US would cause nationwide blackouts, disable automobiles, destroy communications, and ultimately cause mass disruption of transportation of goods/food.
People don't understand that the electrical and communications infrastructure has all kinds of ferrules and large inductors, as well as periodic grounding at regular intervals, and the surge would dissipate into the earth.
Also: an EMP requires as much energy as you're going to put on the grid. The easiest way to generate an EMP is with a nuclear detonation. The EMP from a nuclear detonation is insufficient to damage anything as it stands. The power grid might experience some trouble with a massive ge
Re: Give peace a chance (Score:1)
The reason EMP threats are
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and the EMP countermeasures built into the grid? physical destruction with conventional explosives by an enemy operation
Do you know what the grid countermeasure is?
On every single electrical wiring pylon, which are spaced at a few hundred feet and are those tall ass poles that hold the wires above the ground, there's a glass insulator.
On every single neutral line, spaced repeatedly every 3-4 poles, there's a ground cable.
The countermeasures aren't a facility somewhere that you blow up; they're part of the design. You basically suggested we could halt communications by blowing up the Internet with conventional explosives
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The capability for an adversary to annihilate you is one hell of a deterrent.
I live in a country that could annihilate Russia off the face of the earth without nukes, and it wouldn't really take any longer than with nukes. It also wouldn't be as expensive.
what do you do to the rule breakers if not going to war with them
It is illegal to kidnap people, to restrain them against their will, or to use violence against them.
What do we do if people do that?
We send the police to kidnap and restrain them against their will, and to use violence if necessary.
Imagine if going to war with Britain meant that France, Spain, Iran, Iraq, Norway, Denmark,
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WW2 precipitated the United Nations, which was created to establish a global overarching body, as well as the enablment of free trade to make nations interdependent in such a way that another major war would be unsustainable from an economic standpoint.
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except for the part about lesbian studies; 'toxic' in the latest sjw sense is a perjorative with a vague meaning similar to 'asshole' and is therefore subjective and can be discarded as the nonsense it always was
has anyone else noticed that some folks will believe in functional equality between the sexes but at the same time believe that we should let women run the world cuz they're different? the same but better?!? that's a tough sell to anyone old enough to know how the world real
Re:Give peace a chance (Score:4, Insightful)
It dropped to a fraction of what it was before.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=... [google.com]
If you want peace, prepare for war.
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Perhaps instead of having toxic men running the world, we should have more women making these basic human decisions.
Like Mrs Thatcher for example? Women who get to the top are toxic too.
"We came, we saw, he died. HAHAHA!" (Score:2)
Poison is also a woman's murder weapon of choice. There's your equality.
In case you're also wondering how a woman with unquestionable authority can rule [wikipedia.org], here you go.
Pay special attention to the list of people burned alive [wikipedia.org].
Try to learn a little from history, would you?
Cowbell (Score:5, Insightful)
Database vendors say you need more databases, surgeons say you need more surgery, and weapons makers/managers say you need more weapons.
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Addendum: we may need to reshuffle our military spending to modernize, but we don't need a bigger military in general.
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There's a time to ignore them and a time to listen. In 1940, the French army was superbly prepared to fight a repeat of WW1, while ignoring the signs of the 'future of war' as that future war was being prepared for just over the border.
This one's easy... (Score:2)
Zombie Apocalypse Survival Kit (Score:2)
Nope. That may be old school (Score:4, Insightful)
I didn't at all. He didn't point to ANY particular category of programs, much less any specific program. He said the government is behind the times and new, very different threats are rising. That is indisputably true. I'm a security analyst at an insurance company and we get attacked all day, every day.
Now what to DO about it. There are two large groups of people with largely opposite opinions, and one small group. Those who work at the NSA and other government agencies tasked with protecting the country want all the best, most effective tools they can get to do their job. They are focused on protecting from threats, not on civil liberties.
Then there are those focused on civil liberties, who often don't know much about the threats. They would generally prefer that those tasked with protecting us have no tools at all. They'd like to eliminate the NSA and other agencies. And leave the country utterly defenseless, vulnerable.
There is a small group of people who understand the threats, to varying degrees, and see the obvious need for protections, while also being concerned about civil liberties.
Here's the big challenge. The federal government is takes with doing 18 things. One of those things is protecting the country from foreign threats. They *will* put programs in place. Your choice, the choice for each person, is whether to engage as part of the discussion on how to defend ourselves while protecting civil liberties. If you choose not to engage in a constructive way, not to talk about how we can have protections from threats both external (China) and internal (civil liberties), you leave the NSA as the only one making usable suggestions. You take yourself out of the discussion if you pretend there aren't threats.
MAD in InfoSec (Score:3)
Transportation, energy, commerce, finance, entertainment... these are all possible to shut down almost entirely now with unclear time to recovery. We are now working on self-driving connected cars and autonomous delivery drones. More systems we connect, more disruption can be caused remotely. I think in another decade or so, as legacy 80s and 90s offline control systems are getting retired and replaced, this will reach MAD levels.
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Step back, get some perspective. Look at all the things hurting and killing people without any help from hackers. Ordinary stuff like bad weather and accidents. People will whine about hackers, because they're a cool boogeyman, and it's something they think they can control, but they won't put an anti-slip mat in their bathtub. Let me know when hacking shows up here: https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/overview/key_data.html [cdc.gov]
NSA is already at war with civil liberties... (Score:4, Insightful)
for many decades now. I guess spying on every American in violation of the 4th Amendment isn't enough for them.
Now they want to go to war with everyone else. Bunch of ambitious if incompetent fascists. Remember Equation Group everyone? The more power the NSA gets, the worse it is for everyone else.
Re:NSA is already at war with civil liberties... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm more worried about their response to the threats than the threats themselves.
War is big business in the US (Score:2, Flamebait)
The psyops continue at /. We need to prepare for war! Please folks, it's the US that is starting wars all over the globe. You want peace? Eliminate the DoD.
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true but we don't need to be the ones maiming and killing and throwing people off their land for power and profit. there was a time when we claimed to be on the side of people receiving that kind of oppression
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This evil crap always starts again when people that have actually experienced the horrors of war become scarce.
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That didn't stop WW2, though.
And the USA has been at peace for what, 17 years in its history?
So pretty much always at war?
Pretty sure that would leave a LOT of veterans who know about 'evil crap'. But they don't stop it happening again.
How about stop electing idiots (Score:1, Flamebait)
Just when you think that you can't get any worse you get another president that manages to be worse. Please stop electing these idiots and the world will be a better place. A lot of the recent tensions with Iran came from Trump pulling out of the six nations agreement. Iran was complying with the agreement yet Trump had to get out. He's causing problems on the environmental front, on immigration, with a large number of other countries, with trade, and so on. I really hate to see the one to replace him that
Just sink all their shipping and ground transport (Score:2)
Everything else is a waste of time
The future war is already here...and in progress. (Score:4, Insightful)
All informational/social media based and exploiting our lack of critical thinking skills / education.
Fake news and "Fake News", alternative facts, alternative perceived realities, echo chambers..fear, prejudice and greed.
We do live in interesting times...
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Started in the classrooms and in the campuses to soften people up into believing that they need to redeem themselves for past actions they had no part of, and subject themselves to a new moral authority of 'social justice' that serves only its own political interests.
Now we have unassailable global corporations who capitalize on surveillance and are tied into NSA projects, who also happen to be the gatekeepers for the modern public square. By no coincidence they've taken it upon themselves to decide who is
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that would be nice, except we have an ongoing agenda of war-mongering and attacking those that didn't attack us, and even supporting other governments who do the same. Since that hasn't changed since 1950s what hope is there now?
No... (Score:5, Insightful)
What we really need to prepare for is the future of peace - the kind of peace enforced by corporate dominance, social credit scores, and a 24/7 absence of privacy.
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Some people might say that if you want a peaceful society (I grew up during the Cold War - there are certainly people who insist on "peace at any price") that's what you need, cf Singapore.
The utopian ideal of a perfectly peaceful society that's bottom-up and some sort of odd Thoreau-vian pacific splendor doesn't exist: your choices are libertarian and full of conflict because people are individuals who have different views about what's important, or fascistic and peaceful (as long as you color inside the l
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The world has studied the NSA (Score:1)
Expecting the crypto to work for the USA and the NSA gets to read along for free due to junk crypto by design?
An embassy to keep sending back communications to their own nation using junk banking grade crypto?
For any nation to allow its troops and special forces to use consumer smartphones/fitness app?
To allow its navy to bring consumer smartphones/fitness app with them to help wi
Reality check (Score:2)
Unless a fully functional AI is deployed (Skynet anyone?) the threat will still be from people, just like it always has. They will use new technology but it will still be people operating it.
Go after them, plain and simple.