Cyberwarfare

[DMT]

A discussion has started among my friends of whether we have in fact already started a war with Iran through our use of cyberwarfare.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/middleeast/obama-ordered-wave-of-cyberattacks-against-iran.html?_r=1&hp

From his first months in office, President Obama secretly ordered increasingly sophisticated attacks on the computer systems that run Iran’s main nuclear enrichment facilities, significantly expanding America’s first sustained use of cyberweapons, according to participants in the program.

The people who are against this bring up the fact that Congress has ceded War declaration powers to the Executive. I agree that this is true and unacceptable, and I am about as anti-war as it gets, but at the same time, this is a situation where Israel is just itching to attack Iran militarily and drag us into it. Taking out Iran's centrifuges without killing anyone likely reduced the likelihood of an Israeli military attack. So, even if Iran isn't trying to develop weapons (which remains in question), this seems like a preferable option (if in fact Israel would have invaded otherwise, which is unknown).

[chancellor]

A discussion has started among my friends of whether we have in fact already started a war with Iran through our use of cyberwarfare.

I'd say no - an act of war does not necessarily correlate to starting a war, either by the Constitutional definition of a "declared" war, or by the Executive Order of a "war". IMO, it equates to sending in troops to a country to rescue hostages that aren't necessarily American - sending in armed forces to a country that has not approved is essentially an invasion, and a act of war. But that's always fallen outside the bounds of a declared war.

Now, Iran could decide to "declare" war on the US based on the US committing an act of war against them.

I'm going to be verrry curious how the Obama administration handles this leak.

[chancellor]

Isn't Israel assassinating Iranian scientists, like they did some years ago with Egyptian scientists? Not quite invading, but definitely an aggressive stance.

It's widely believed Israel is behind it, as it's commonly held we don't have the humint in Iran to pull it off. Kohm had a good post on this sometime back - I don't know if it was on the old board or this one.

[Bob Kohm]

Cyber attacks are, in my mind, akin to the kind of economic & industrial sabotage that empires & nations have engaged in against each other for as long as there have been empires & nations and fall well short of wartime operations for the most part.

What I will say about Stuxnet and what I would guess are the half dozen or so other ongoing "attacks" is that they have likely slowed Israel in its desire to attack Iran, which is a good thing for all of us. As I've been saying for a few years now, Israel cannot by any stretch of the imagination do major damage to Iran's nuclear program with the conventional weapons at their command. They have no strategic bombers like the B-2 or even B-52, they have no deep penetrating conventional bombs to drop from the lighter aircraft they do have (the US F-15 is their best strike platform, and it was designed primarily as an air to air fighter)-- it's impossible to carry them due to their weight even if they had them, and their naval weaponry is irrelevant except for the nuclear cruise missiles deployed on their Dolphin class subs. The major question about Israel vis-a-vis attacking Iran is simply, "Are they full of sh*t and trying to get the US to strike, or are they crazy enough to go nuclear"? If the Israelis are serious about hitting Iran themselves, they will have to either draw us into the fight or use their nuclear arsenal-- they literally have no other military recourse. They cannot damage Iranian facilities buried in extremely hardened bunkers with what they have. They cannot invade Iran. All of the talk of Israeli military options is bullsh*t, unless and until they use their nukes. Would they do that? I highly doubt it as the political cost to them would be tremendous, but the current Israeli government is arguably every bit as irrational as the Iranians and if they believe their own rhetoric about Iran being an existential threat then they just might. In all honesty I think they're just trying to keep the pressure up on the US & Europe to continue to use Iran as an economic pinata and topple the ayatollahs from within, but trying to understand what the Israelis are thinking is every bit as hard as trying to understand the Iranians or Chinese. ElD is also right, they (or Mossad & CIA) are killing Iranian scientists, techs & missile engineers and blowing up military installations, but again, that's really closer to espionage than military conflict and all in good fun from the perspective of history.

All that being said, anyone who believes that the US hasn't been launching cyber espionage and attacks for the past ten years is delusional; the Chinese get the bad rap for it, but that's because they're so damned ham fisted with this stuff. If we ever fight a large war again, you can bet we'll be fighting against an enemy whose society goes batsh*t haywire the hour before the first US bomb drops.

Remember how the lights went out in Baghdad during the first hours of DS91 when the carbon fiber spewing Tomahawks shorted out the electric transmission wires? Interesting that we don't have that incredibly effective weapon or a follow-on in our inventory anymore, isn't it? I guarantee that we didn't simply lose the capability to do what those things did, we just changed the delivery method from jet powered cruise missile to code.

[Bob Kohm]

I'm going to be verrry curious how the Obama administration handles this leak.

By creating it in the first place.

[Bob Kohm]

Kohm had a good post on this sometime back - I don't know if it was on the old board or this one.

It was on this board and my thinking on what Israel would do is evolving. I still think an Israeli conventional campaign would look like what I described in that thread. Lately I'm just having trouble believing that the Israelis don't know and accept that, too.

[The Feral Slasher]

I'm going to be verrry curious how the Obama administration handles this leak.

Just like they do all the other leaks

http://www.salon.com/2012/06/01/toug...ing/singleton/

That’s the lesson the Obama administration is sending to America’s media and political class: if you publish secrets that we feed you and which make us look good, you will be rewarded; if you publish secrets which make us look bad, we will punish you.

[JudeBaldo]

Cyber attacks are, in my mind, akin to the kind of economic & industrial sabotage that empires & nations have engaged in against each other for as long as there have been empires & nations and fall well short of wartime operations for the most part.

What I will say about Stuxnet and what I would guess are the half dozen or so other ongoing "attacks" is that they have likely slowed Israel in its desire to attack Iran, which is a good thing for all of us. As I've been saying for a few years now, Israel cannot by any stretch of the imagination do major damage to Iran's nuclear program with the conventional weapons at their command. They have no strategic bombers like the B-2 or even B-52, they have no deep penetrating conventional bombs to drop from the lighter aircraft they do have (the US F-15 is their best strike platform, and it was designed primarily as an air to air fighter)-- it's impossible to carry them due to their weight even if they had them, and their naval weaponry is irrelevant except for the nuclear cruise missiles deployed on their Dolphin class subs. The major question about Israel vis-a-vis attacking Iran is simply, "Are they full of sh*t and trying to get the US to strike, or are they crazy enough to go nuclear"? If the Israelis are serious about hitting Iran themselves, they will have to either draw us into the fight or use their nuclear arsenal-- they literally have no other military recourse. They cannot damage Iranian facilities buried in extremely hardened bunkers with what they have. They cannot invade Iran. All of the talk of Israeli military options is bullsh*t, unless and until they use their nukes. Would they do that? I highly doubt it as the political cost to them would be tremendous, but the current Israeli government is arguably every bit as irrational as the Iranians and if they believe their own rhetoric about Iran being an existential threat then they just might. In all honesty I think they're just trying to keep the pressure up on the US & Europe to continue to use Iran as an economic pinata and topple the ayatollahs from within, but trying to understand what the Israelis are thinking is every bit as hard as trying to understand the Iranians or Chinese. ElD is also right, they (or Mossad & CIA) are killing Iranian scientists, techs & missile engineers and blowing up military installations, but again, that's really closer to espionage than military conflict and all in good fun from the perspective of history.

All that being said, anyone who believes that the US hasn't been launching cyber espionage and attacks for the past ten years is delusional; the Chinese get the bad rap for it, but that's because they're so damned ham fisted with this stuff. If we ever fight a large war again, you can bet we'll be fighting against an enemy whose society goes batsh*t haywire the hour before the first US bomb drops.

Remember how the lights went out in Baghdad during the first hours of DS91 when the carbon fiber spewing Tomahawks shorted out the electric transmission wires? Interesting that we don't have that incredibly effective weapon or a follow-on in our inventory anymore, isn't it? I guarantee that we didn't simply lose the capability to do what those things did, we just changed the delivery method from jet powered cruise missile to code.

Uh huh. The Chinese are a bunch of clumsy oafs when it comes to this stuff. They don't even reroute the IP half as well as some slimy Ukrainian gangsters. Same with the Russians and what they did to Georgia. America is still the big boy on the block.

[Bob Kohm]

Just like they do all the other leaks

http://www.salon.com/2012/06/01/toug...ing/singleton/

That’s the lesson the Obama administration is sending to America’s media and political class: if you publish secrets that we feed you and which make us look good, you will be rewarded; if you publish secrets which make us look bad, we will punish you.

It amazes me that people still read and absorb Glenn Greenwald's shrill, one note writing. It's actually remarkable that GG criticizes the Obama Admin and the US in general for screaming that they are the target when they are the aggressors yet manages to simultaneously preserve his reputation as the voice of reason while spewign someof the most one sided trash out there. It's a shame-- he's a smart guy, but he's turned himself into the "None of the Above's" version of Matt Drudge.

[Bob Kohm]

Care to explain why? Seems to me that he's pretty well versed in what he's talking about and is a credible source of information and opinion.

Given that you're the local chair of our RotoJunkie None of the Above Party I'm not surprised by your post but by the fact it took you something like five minutes to get it up after mine

Greenwald is a one trick oppositional pony-he endlessly tries to take the realities of governance-- realities that he clearly understands-- and tries to make the mundane nefarious at every turn. To many of us he's gone from being an intelligent, well versed analyst and become, as I said, Matt Drudge, sensationalizing and creating conspiracies left and right, willy-nilly. Yawn. The main reason he survives unscathed is because whereas Matt Drudge has become just one in a face in a blizzard of right wing nutbags playing this game, Greenwald is one of the earliest mainstream adopters from the libertarian left.

[chancellor]

Sorry, but I don't see any real evidence here, just name calling. I guess I'll continue to view Greenwald in the same light that I have been until I see actual evidence that would steer me in a different direction.

One thing we can agree on politically! I disagree with Greenwald a lot, but his writing still is very good. And I give him kudos for remaining remarkably consistent on privacy rights and whistleblowing, when many on the left have taken the view "everything Bush did was bad and everything Obama does is good" and vice-versa on the right.

[chancellor]

Viruses that hit Iran's nuclear plants force computers to play AC/DC's "Thunderstruck" at full volume. Now THAT'S cruel and unusual.

Whatever CIA geek that came up with that should get a Security Star. AC/DC in Iran...pure genius.