Slashdot Mirror
Meet the Military's Cyber-Security Forces
destinyland writes "How exactly would the military fight a cyber war? In August 2009, the U.S. Air Force activated its new cyberspace combat unit, the 24th Air Force, to 'provide combat-ready forces trained and equipped to conduct sustained cyber operations.' It's commanded by former Minuteman missile and satellite-jamming specialist Major General Richard Webber. (And under his command are two wings, the 688th Information Operations Wing and the 67th Network Warfare Wing, plus a combat communications units.) Meanwhile, to counter the threat of cyber warfare, DARPA is still deploying the National Cyber Range, a test bed of networked computers to test countermeasures against 'cyberwar.' (According to one report, it provides 'a virtual network world — to be populated by mirror computers and inhabited by myriad software sim-people "replicants," and used as a firing range in which to develop the art of cyber warfare.') The Obama administration has even added a military cybersecurity coordinator to the National Security team."
That word bugs the hell out of me. It's like watching a "hacker" in the movies waving around a power glove while a graphic of a virus attacks things. And you used it 9 times in that summary. Just stop it.
So are they now going to propose a Homeland Defense Firewall, to protect and defend american business and citizens against foreign cyber attacks? Or will they be "simply monitoring" the routers coming in and out of the country? I wouldn't be surprised. Of course, no privacy invasions, no espionage will occur over the monitoring channels. Only criminal and terrorist investigation. And even then, only with a warrant. Of course we can be assured of that. Of course you can trust the military to always defend Americans and respect American law and use of decency. Of course. We all agree on that.
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to be populated by mirror computers and inhabited by myriad software sim-people 'replicants,' and used as a firing range in which to develop the art of cyber warfare.")
Oh, yeah, I remember these guys. We invited the general to come and post on slashdot a few years back. They never did come up with a good answer to how they can recruit the necessary talent when the aforementioned is generally anti-authoritarian. Hacking, or "cyberwarfare", or whatever you want to call it, all requires a high degree of creativity combined with the ability to see patterns in seemingly random information. Both of these skillsets are a rarity in the general population -- most people are linear sequential thinkers, which means they can't start one task without stopping another. Everything about this theatre is contrary to conventional military discipline.
This is an organization that still believes that only men should be in their little club, gays are bad, and if you're over 30 you're too old. Maybe that works well when you're comparing gun sizes, but in this theatre the groups they're excluding have exactly the human resources such an operation needs: Women are generally able to multitask and see the "big picture" easier than men, gays stereotypically gravitate towards creative endeavors (theatre, graphic design, etc.), and the over 30 crowd has exactly the kind of in-depth understanding of the technology and experience necessary to use it that a bunch of twenty-somethings just can't match, no matter how good the training.
They're putting themselves at a huge handicap -- and they can't afford to do that. Especially when China has more honor students than we have students in whole. They can afford to be prejudiced. They can afford to throw a million people over a cliff to fund public works projects. Meanwhile, our antiquidated notions of what a soldier is puts us at a substantial risk of being obliterated in the global theatre.
Sad. Where's an angry four star general when you need one?
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