Future Service Academies

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Idzak

10-Year Member
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Aug 1, 2010
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I have a Schwab account with a few stocks and CDs in it. Schwab warns me about secure communication with them about my account. Apparently they have tens of thousands of cyber attacks each day. Today the security firm MacAfee is telling us that our government and businesses are under attack and in many cases subverted and converted to the attackers’ uses.

So, the question for this forum is: will the SA of the future move from the current concept of war (occupying or destruction of geographical territory) to cyber-based war of economic destruction?
 
I personally have no faith in something MacAfee would say. I only put them 1 step above Symantec (Norton), and I put NO faith in them. The military and government has a lot of experience with cyber warfare. I trust them to secure information a lot more than I do McAfee. You're comparing Major league baseball with the Babe Ruth league.
 
Idzak said:
I have a Schwab account with a few stocks and CDs in it. Schwab warns me about secure communication with them about my account. Apparently they have tens of thousands of cyber attacks each day. Today the security firm MacAfee is telling us that our government and businesses are under attack and in many cases subverted and converted to the attackers’ uses.

So, the question for this forum is: will the SA of the future move from the current concept of war (occupying or destruction of geographical territory) to cyber-based war of economic destruction?
Click to expand...

Hate answering your question with a question, but what makes you think that the current concept of war is "occupying or destruction of geographical teorritory?" My two cents, a war is about beating your oponent anyway you can.

A dictionary defines War as a state of organized, armed and often prolonged conflict carried on between states, nations, or other parties typified by extreme aggression, societal disruption, and usually high mortality.

When you talk about geographical terriorty and cyber based, you are talking about current and future battlefields.

Are you referring to the Naval Academy requireing cyber-warfare related classes to all middies in the near future?
 
It seems to me that historically, with few exceptions, war has been based on destruction of buildings, fortifications, roads as well as military equipment and personnel. We continue to prepare to fight that kind of a war. The precursor of today’s cyber warfare would be cryptography. But I’m concerned about an unnamed, unidentified opponent(s) that attack the core of our economic engine through intrusion and control of our government and industrial computer systems.

Again, as a computer user not expert, it seems difficult to identify the specific sources of the current attacks. So how do we “beat our opponent” when we hardly know in which country he lives and what’s his name?

For example, in WW2 counterfeit money was planned by the Nazis as a means to destabilize the British economy by lowering the peoples trust in the printed money. Much, perhaps most, of our (my) money is a group of zeros and ones in somebody’s hard drive; a vulnerable hard drive. Consider the economic damage of run on the banks who cannot sustain their records of our deposits.

I applaud the Naval Academy for giving cyber-warfare classes but just as much as insurgency warfare is different from trench warfare, the many potential forms of cyber-warfare may leave us unprepared and vulnerable for serious economic damage. Yes this is the current battlefield and probable future battlefield.

Consider any individual or small group (wiki leaks) that has a grudge or hatred of the US wanting to create chaos. Hell, we can do that ourselves.:mad:
 
Idzak said:
So, the question for this forum is: will the SA of the future move from the current concept of war (occupying or destruction of geographical territory) to cyber-based war of economic destruction?
Click to expand...


Who says the SA of today does not already focus on that? Everyone has different skill sets. Some are best for knocking doors down and detaining people in person, others are best for using their knowledge of cyber systems to cause damage or collect information. Either way, I would say that SA's do their best to take advantage of the various skill sets in those who attend them.
 
It's not really the "future." The AF already has an entire career field on this.
Information and economic warfare are nothing new. The only real change is the environment for information and economic attacks. Yes, it requires a different approach than kinetic warfare, and we are still developing doctrine for it, but it is not something that is a complete surprise.

It is much like how air and space doctrine evolved from traditional land/sea warfare. Different methods, but the same overall goals.
 
Many thanks for the thoughtful discussion. However my Schwab account is still headed South.:shake::mad::shake:
 
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