The Evolution of Cyber War

Cyber warfare is one of those best-kept little secrets of modern day militaries. Military might is no longer measured by just the number of military personnel you have on your side, or whether you have nuclear weapons. Our societies are under threat and can be paralysed by a relatively small group of people in a far off land, armed only with a keyboard, a connection to the outside world and a lot of skill.

The same cyber warfare specialists can, in peacetime, be gathering information about their possible enemies, working on destruction strategies as well as harvesting economically useful material.

This book takes a rather dry, academic look at the present day thinking about cyber warfare. Unfortunately the style and approach mean that it is going to restrict its appeal to a general audience. Even a switched-on academic who wants to consume this stuff might need a few cups of strong coffee to keep alert. The author examines the growing development of cyber warfare and tries to predict where this may lead to in the future, mixing in traditional military thinking, international legal treaties and research.

It was interesting to compare current day thinking and political rhetoric to the acts and behaviours of various governments in the past. Why, for example, did the United States talk a lot about banning the use of chemical weapons yet was very late to the party when it came to ratifying an international treaty banning it? Of course, it still holds stocks; apparently renewed and refreshed from time-to-time - just in case. Other important international treaties have had Uncle Sam talking a good talk, but being a little shy when it comes to putting his signature on to paper.

It took a very long time to get to the actual cyber warfare part of the book. Some of the preceding historical references were interesting, but effectively secondary to the book’s core and overall it left the reader fairly ambivalent to the whole thing. If you have a specific, focussed need it is possible that the book can deliver, but it is far from being something that a generalist, curious reader would be advised to look at.

The Evolution of Cyber War, written by Brian M. Mazanec and published by University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books. ISBN 9781612347639. YYY

The Evolution of Cyber War: International Norms for Emerging-Technology Weapons by Brian M. Mazanec is a look at the history of international norms and the future of Cyber Warfare. Mazanec is an assistant director for defense capabilities and management with the U.S. government and an adjunct professor in the School of Policy, Government, and International Affairs at George Mason University. He is the coauthor of Deterring Cyber Warfare: Bolstering Strategic Stability in Cyberspace, and his work has appeared in Strategic Studies Quarterly, the National Cybersecurity Institute Journal, Comparative Strategy, Politics and the Life Sciences, and the Journal of International Security Affairs.

Cyber Warfare became a reality with the Stuxnet attack on Iranian centrifuges. A clever attack that was intended to go unnoticed and it almost did. The attacks slowed down Iran's uranium enrichment program without causing any harm to the population. The possibility to attack a countries ability to make war or support war is a huge benefit. To do this without loss of life is a great accomplishment. The problem arises when the attack is not so covert and limited. An attack on a nation's infrastructure or air traffic control could be disastrous and cause a large loss of life. The Y2K scare is a decade and a half removed from us and we are even more dependent on our interconnected computer networks.

Mazanec looks to see what would stop cyber warfare in the next conflict. To do this, he examines the history of unconventional warfare and the norms for their use. Chemical, biological, and nuclear warfare are looked at and examined as to their use and status today. Chemical warfare was early on seen as a clear and sanitary form of warfare. It was viewed as a much cleaner death than bullet and shrapnel wounds. Soldiers felt much different about this and chemical warfare to the largest extent did not exist after the first world war. There have been incidents such as in Syria, Iraq, and in the Iraq-Iran War. The first two of these have been heavily condemned by the world at large.

Biological weapons have been used for centuries mostly in the form of catapulting diseased bodies over city walls and or dropping them in wells. On a large modern scale, these weapons are undependable, hard to store, very unpredictable and of little use in modern warfare. On the nuclear side, there have only been two incidents on their use, both by the US in Japan. The horror of this weapon has prevented its use. Couple that with the tense Cold War any use of a nuclear weapon by any nation might have triggered an all-out nuclear war.

The world or man has been fairly successful in ending the use of these weapons in warfare. Other weapons have not so successful. There has been a crusade against landmines. Although terrible and even worse they often active remain after hostilities end. The 1992 Ottawa Treaty banned the use of antipersonnel landmines, The US, Russia, China, Iran, and India have not signed. These nations not only represent the lion’s share of the world’s military and population. Strategic bombing has been another area of concern. This brings warfare to civilian centers. These civilian centers, however, produce war material. World War II removed much of the controversy as the allies bombed Germany into submission and fired bombing Japan. We look at the death toll from Nagasaki and Hiroshima in horror and do not realize the firebombing of Tokyo produced roughly the same number of casualties. Strategic bombings have improved accuracy with the latest generation of smart bombs, but there are still civilian casualties.

Some weapons earn a reputation and are viewed as unusable by many in the world. The first use of any weapon of mass destruction is widely seen as impermissible. Israel could have, but did not use it nuclear weapons. India and Pakistan have been fighting on and off and neither has used their nuclear weapons. Chemical weapons have been condemned when used in Syria and in Iraq against the Kurds. In the Iran - Iraq War there was not much of an outrage, perhaps, it was because as Kissinger hope that they both could lose the war.

What does all this have to do with cyber warfare? Cyber warfare can be deadly and it has no precedence in warfare. Unlike nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons there is no need for technical labs and centrifuges, and factories to produce deadly chemicals. There is not even a need for a central location. Countries as backward as North Korea have cyber warfare units. The problem is so far the use of cyber warfare has not created a single human casualty. There are no international norms for its use.

Mazanec should have called his book The History of International Norms and the Future of Cyber Warfare. This book spends the bulk of its pages discussing and defining international norms for other weapons of war and leaves the reader at the doorstep of cyber warfare. Mazanec sets the stage for the reader on what may be the future of warfare.

This is far less about the evolution of cyber war than it is an attempt to predict the norm evolution surrounding its use. Mazanec uses the cases of strategic bombing and nuclear weapons to track the ways in which states and non-state actors have responded, and how the international community places restrictions (which may or may not be honored, depending). Because of this focus, most of the book has to give background on IR theory, norms and the case studies, before getting to cyber war--and never really grapples with my main objection: that although cyber attacks can cause tremendous damage, I just don't think a public conceptualizes it the same was a a kinetic attack and believe that this colors their response significantly.