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Future Warfighting in the 2030s: An Interview with Franz-Stefan Gady

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by Ed Stacey

British Royal Marines 45 Commando testing the Black Hornet 2 Unmanned Air System at the Army Warfighting Experiment 2017 (Image credit: Crown Copyright)

On 15 July 2020, Ed Stacey sat down with Franz-Stefan Gady to discuss the International Institute for Strategic Studies’ (IISS) upcoming future warfighting project. After introducing this new piece of work, Franz-Stefan offers some thoughts on the changing nature of warfare, the roles that emerging technologies and the nascent domains of space and cyber might play in future conflicts, and the need to move away from purely technological discussions about future warfighting.

For more information on the IISS and the latest analysis of international security, strategy, and defence issues, visit them here or follow them on Facebook, Twitter (@IISS_org), and Instagram (@iissorg).

 

ES: What is the IISS future warfighting project?

FG: The future warfighting project has just recently kicked off and looks at how great and medium-sized powers would fight high-intensity wars amongst peer and near-peer adversaries in the 2030s. So, what sort of capabilities will militaries need to develop over the next couple of decades in order to deal with specific operational problems in future warfighting scenarios? And how will these powers integrate emerging cyber and space strategies into existing, more classically conceived, options for kinetic and cognitive warfare?

The project explores future warfighting through three dimensions: space and cyber, kinetic and cognitive. Space and cyber refer to the application of primarily offensive cyber capabilities, supported by space assets, in cyberspace (including electronic warfare operations). Kinetic pertains to the use of conventional and nuclear weapons systems and the ‘traditional’ domains of air, land and sea. While the cognitive dimension includes an examination, not only of the use of information warfare but also the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning into military hardware to gain information dominance at the strategic level and to influence decision-making at both the civilian and military level.

It is a fairly broad topic, and notably, we take technology as a starting point. By this, I am referring to the fact that a lot of future warfare discussions focus mostly on technological capabilities and their impact on warfighting. Yet I believe that such capabilities in themselves are fairly agnostic when it comes to triggering change. You can only really trigger change when you merge technological capabilities with new tactics, the right operational concepts and the right organisational structure.

So, the project takes technology as the starting point of a much deeper analysis of these new ideas. In doing so, we are trying to fill a gap that not many other institutions talking about future warfighting are looking at.

ES: What is your methodology for the project?

FG: As I mentioned, we are principally looking at future warfighting through three dimensions: space and cyber, kinetic and cognitive. We use these three dimensions to conduct comparative case studies on how various countries are thinking about future warfighting; and to divide up the literature, all the documents and interviews, and the military capabilities.

The first part of the project looks mostly at how China, Russia and the US would fight a high-intensity war after a breakdown of conventional deterrence. So not really grey-zone scenarios or hybrid warfare (though these are relevant) but rather high-intensity combat between great powers, which we have not really seen for many decades.

ES: What are your main findings so far?

FG: It is very early on, and I am hesitant to draw firm conclusions. But one of my hypotheses is that these three dimensions will increasingly merge into one over the next decade, and simultaneously, we will see a rebalance of conventional kinetic operations vis-à-vis cyber, space and information operations in any high-intensity great power war scenario. At the operational level, this is a result of the presumptive Chinese emphasis on system destruction warfare, the US attempt to move towards decision-centric manoeuvre warfare and the Russian push towards new-generation warfare.

All three forms of warfare attempt to move away from an attrition-centric approach, that emphasises the kinetic annihilation of an adversary’s forces, in favour of an evolving model of dislocation and disruption, that entails undermining an adversary’s battle network in all three dimensions. In this new form of network-centric warfare, you do not try to destroy your enemy and its main force; instead, you try to disable its networks and compromise its ability to fight.

A second hypothesis is that all three great powers will be increasingly capable of fielding precision-strike capabilities in all three dimensions in the 2030s. This will culminate in the establishment of a multi-dimension precision-strike regime, defined by the ability of a great power to conduct precision-strikes in the kinetic, cyber, space and cognitive dimensions against platforms, networks and humans at all ranges and in all warfighting domains.

And these two hypotheses draw attention to a third, which is that armed forces have a cultural problem in being overly focused on kinetic capabilities. My question would be, is this going to be a disadvantage for militaries in the future, as we move from a platform-centric approach to a more network-centric approach? (By platforms I mean tanks, ships, missiles and so on, or how we usually assess the military capabilities of a country – and I think these sorts of assessments are going to become less relevant in the future.)

There is a lot of resistance to this shift. For example, I have just spent some time looking at what is happening in the US, and the US Congress, interest groups and people within the Department of Defense are hesitant to give up certain capabilities that might no longer work in future warfighting scenarios, so-called legacy platforms. It is a huge problem. How exactly can you phase out legacy platforms and what are you going to replace those platforms with?

For instance, are we really going to have manned aircraft in 20 to 30 years from now? The answer is yes, but maybe we need to have a new role for manned aircraft. And maybe we are going to have more autonomous systems operating in the battlespace. What is the role of these new armed platforms? Are they going to be flying command and control centres, controlling autonomous swarms in the air or on the ground or in the oceans?

This question of integration is going to be crucial. You are still going to have legacy platforms 20 years down the road: you are still going to have the F-35 and maybe the F-15; you are still going to have most of the ships that you see in navies today – the aircraft carriers, the destroyers and manned submarines. But how do you integrate these capabilities with new platforms that are being developed? And by integrating, I mean how do you come up with a good operational concept to conduct a successful campaign in the future against a potential peer or near-peer adversary?

You cannot really talk about future warfighting unless you start off with a problem statement. Essentially, what is the operational environment you are envisioning in the future? And from there you try to come up with the kind of force structure you need, the kind of operational concepts you need and then also doctrine (how you train your force to fight in these future conflicts). And, of course, you need the resources and the strategy that comes along with all of this. So, it is a long, long process – and that is what we are trying to shed some light on.

It is a huge problem. How exactly can you phase out legacy platforms and what are you going to replace those platforms with?

ES: Which domain, if any, will be the most important in future warfighting? And does any domain have revolutionary potential?

FG: As I said, I think a key question behind modernisation efforts in China, the US and Russia (and we will also look at medium-sized powers, such as the UK, Germany and Japan – states that have strong military capabilities and relatively high defence budgets) is how they integrate these different capabilities. Ultimately, there are going to be trade-offs. And countries like China, Russia and the US – mostly China and the US, but its partially true for Russia – can handle these trade-offs better than smaller powers because they have the resources to invest in both legacy platforms and new capabilities and create a better force structure. Most other militaries will not have the money to do both, so they have to be very careful about where and what they spend their money on.

This makes your question a pertinent one, in the sense that states do need to prioritise funding when it comes to these capabilities. You can have all the operational concepts in the world and the doctrine, but if you do not have the capability then it just does not work – it is impossible to become an effective warfighting force.

So, when we talk about a new age of network-centric warfare, we are really talking about the creation of what you would call a military Internet of Things (IoT). That is a virtual and kinetic kill chain that creates networks that link the sensor to the shooter in a triangular relationship, or a ‘system of systems’. The sensor identifies the target and then through a network relays that information to the shooter, whether a manned aircraft, a missile or an offensive cyber capability. And the idea behind this is that a military commander would much faster be able to identify a target on a sensor and then through the military IoT direct fire, whether virtual or kinetic strikes, to degrade the target or destroy it.

Obviously, this opens up new attack vectors in cyberspace. And so, you cannot really implement any of these concepts properly unless you have extremely strong cyber defences, and cyber defence almost always entails offensive cyber capabilities.

I think an important technological capability to develop and hone in the future will be AI-enabled cyber defensive and offensive capabilities. When we think about the first officially AI-enabled weapons platform, it is probably going to be an offensive cyber weapon because they are easier to deploy than, let us say, a lethal autonomous weapon system like an autonomous tank or missile. This is because of all the risks that are still involved and the fundamental lack of trust in these platforms unless you test them at great length.

So, to a certain degree, the foundational element of network-centric warfare will be strong cyber defences and, ultimately, AI-enabled cyber defence capabilities. This will entail advances in AI and cyber defence. But if you do not have these, your network is going to be immensely vulnerable and attacks from the electromagnetic spectrum could turn the lights off, so to speak, of any of your networks. At the same time, however, you cannot of course neglect any other capabilities or domains.

In terms of revolutionary new capabilities that are going to fundamentally change the future of warfare, I do not think you will find these in hypersonics, for instance, because they just improve existing capabilities – they will be evolutionary. But when it comes to AI-enabled cyber capabilities, I think these have revolutionary potential.

I have to caveat this, though, by noting that it is very difficult to assess these capabilities because we have not seen high-intensity combat between great powers in which they have been deployed. And this is true of even strategic offensive cyber weapons, let alone AI-enabled cyber weapons. One scholar once called it the ‘fog of peace’, and we really do operate in a fog of peace when it comes to deliberations about future warfighting.

In terms of historical context, we are very much like where we were in the 1920s and 30s when it came to airpower. Because in the First World War you had airpower capabilities but by no means did airpower reach its full potential. It took the Second World War and the aerial campaigns of the Allies and the Axis powers to see whether some of those propositions in the 1920s and 30s turned out to be true.

A lot people said that airpower was going to be the only necessary military capability in future wars; that you could essentially win any future conflict with bombers and fighter aircraft, and that you would not need land forces or sea forces anymore – that airpower makes everything obsolete. That turned out to be untrue. And then there were the others who said: ‘Oh, well, airpower is completely useless; you do not really need strategic bombing capabilities; we only use aircraft for tactical purposes, like reconnaissance and tactical strikes’. And that also turned out to be untrue. At the end of the day, airpower had a big impact but it was, I think, by no means the decisive factor in the Allies’ victory.

So, we are in a similar situation in the sense that there will be extreme positions when it comes to network-centric warfare and all of these new capabilities, particularly cyber capabilities. At the end of the day, the truth will also probably be somewhere in-between the two extremes: one side saying that cyber is not going to be that important, that it is really just an auxiliary to other capabilities, and then the other, saying that cyber is going to be a revolutionary capability.

The difference, though – and I think why cyber has the potential to be more important than airpower, for example, or even nuclear weapons – is that cyber permeates all other dimensions and warfighting domains. It really is a foundational element of warfighting. Without strong cyber capabilities today, you cannot conduct conventional military operations because every system that is in a tank or an aircraft or a ship – all command and control systems – are immensely vulnerable to cyber-attacks. Any idea of new warfighting has to take that into account.

So, I would say cyber and AI-enabled cyber capabilities probably have the biggest potential to revolutionise future warfighting. Of course, there are other capabilities of note as well. But cyber is slightly underestimated by a lot of military planners and defence departments, despite probably having the biggest potential.

ES: You note the revolutionary potential of AI-enabled cyber capabilities. More generally, do you think AI as a technology is a game-changer or is it overhyped? And is an AI arms race inevitable or perhaps already even happening?

FG: I generally do not like the idea that there is an arms race in AI happening. Firstly, AI is not a weapon system or a military capability per se: it is a general-purpose technology, as some scholars have pointed out. And so, we should not consider AI in isolation but instead how this technology might be combined with weapon systems.

In the short term, I do not foresee revolutionary changes when it comes to AI-enabled capabilities. But in the long-term, it is definitely possible.

In the short-term, what we are going to see is an accelerated pace of military operations from AI first arriving in non-lethal roles. And this is already underway when it comes to intelligence collection and analysis, support elements for command and control, decision-making support, and Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities – where I see huge potential for AI, such as in AI-enabled satellites.

It is a hugely important field, and AI does have the potential – just like the combustion engine 100 years ago – to revolutionise warfare. But I would not look at it in isolation, and that is an important point to note about discussions around future military technological capabilities in general. What people usually get wrong is not so much predicting a particular technology but rather how that technology will combine with the wider defence architecture to field an effective weapon system.

If you think about the Second World War, for example, you had radio communications, the combustion engine, advances in armour protection, as well as in the ballistics and mechanics of high-velocity guns. But it was only through merging all of these new capabilities that we created the tank – in other words, only in combination did they create a ‘revolutionary’ weapons platform. Yet even that alone did not do that much. All of the Western militaries had tanks and fairly advanced tanks that were relatively equal in terms of technical capabilities. The true change came when the Germans devised a revolutionary operational concept that later on was adapted to doctrine (operational concepts being the precursors to doctrine). By combing all of these technological developments with a revolutionary approach to warfighting, the Germans enabled not a revolution in military affairs but a decisive victory in the battlespace.

In the short-term, what we are going to see is an accelerated pace of military operations from AI first arriving in non-lethal roles.

So, I guess the major point here is that technology alone is not going to determine the character of future wars. It is really as much, and if not more, about how you change your organisational structures, adopt doctrine and so on. And within this, there is the key question of how you integrate all of these new platforms and approaches into an overall force structure that gives you the most capabilities to meet future operational problems.

To return to your question, I guess we have to ask: firstly, what are the most important technologies that AI could be combined with? Secondly, what would be the best operational concepts and doctrine to exploit the full potential of these newly combined technological capabilities? And thirdly, what sort of organisational structure and force posture does your military need to execute missions that exploit the full potential of these new capabilities?

ES: Thinking about other technologies, how significant is it that China is overtaking, or perceived to be overtaking, the US in various areas of research on quantum technology? In the context of the tech war too, is it significant that China is making ground in this space?

FG: Yes, I think so. Quantum technology is an interesting one because we are still probably many years away from fielding military capabilities when it comes to quantum radars or quantum sonar. There is also a debate over whether it will have any impact at all in the military domain. And so, I am hesitant to make any predictions about quantum technological capabilities and their impact.

To answer your point about competition between the US and China, as I mentioned earlier with regards to AI, I just do not see all of these tech races as really being tech races. Firstly, there is a lot of cooperation between the US and China in many fields, and there is more collaboration than you would think in developing these emerging technologies. Secondly, you have to question whether these technologies will actually have a significant impact on the modern battlespace and to what degree they will revolutionise future warfighting.

Just to illustrate why I always try to move away from strictly technological discussions when we talk about future conflict. My approach to military power is based on what the defence analyst Stephen Biddle called the ‘modern system’ of force employment. That is, military power is based, on the one hand, on combined arms operations that increase the effects of precision-guided munitions (what I call the multi-dimension precision-strike regime), whilst on the other, cover and concealment and the dispersion of your forces, for example through stealth technology or the suppression of ISR capabilities, simultaneously offer protection from an adversary’s precision-strike capability.

The aim of combined arms operations is to integrate different services, capabilities and platforms to achieve a decisive effect in the battlespace. In the modern battlespace, the emergence of precision-guided munitions requires militaries to conceal their forces because, in order to conduct these operations successfully, usually you need to be able to mass your forces to achieve a breakthrough on the frontline.

And combined arms operations are really difficult to pull off. Combining and coordinating capabilities and strikes from land forces, naval forces and air forces to achieve some sort of effect and a breakthrough in the battlespace is immensely difficult – and something only a few militaries have been capable of achieving.

To take the example of the first Gulf War, there was a decisive victory by the US and her allies, but this was not just down to superior technologies: it was technology integrated with combined arms operations, and the ability to hide forces and conceal movements, that achieved this one-sided victory. The other side, Saddam Hussain, also had a powerful military and fairly advanced technological capabilities (although not as powerful or advanced as the US). But it was impossible for him to achieve meaningful effects in the battlespace because, on the one hand, he failed to hide his forces from precision strikes, and on the other, to conduct combined arms operations to counter the US and her allies.

Saddam probably could have conducted some form of combined arms operations against elements of US ground forces, by using artillery strikes in combination with tanks, infantry and air strikes. But he failed to coordinate his attacks and successfully manoeuvre his forces. These are the key tenants of any military these days, and the ability of a military to execute these operations is currently the decisive factor in warfighting.

Revolutionary change in the future battlespace is most likely to happen if these warfighting methods are made ineffective by new technological capabilities. Ones that make cover, concealment and dispersion through camouflage or stealth technology, as well as combined arms operations in general, obsolete. That, in essence, are capable of detecting every move on the battlefield and provide complete situational awareness. To date, no such technological capability exists – but I accept that may change in the coming decades.

When it comes to stuff like AI-enabled ISR capabilities or quantum radar and quantum sonar, if these capabilities can facilitate that sort of situational awareness then you might have a revolutionary technology on your hands. Until such a technology exists, however, combined arms operations, or multi-domain operations, will remain the most important factor when it comes to military power.

ES: And finally, how important is space going to be as a future warfighting domain?

FG: New space-based capabilities are crucial to how all major military powers exercise command and control over their forces. They also directly link to the ability to conduct offensive cyber operations and campaigns, which will be a – and if not the – crucial component in any future military campaign. For one thing, space and cyber permeate all other war-fighting domains and so are the new centre of gravity for high-intensity military operations.

Whoever dominates space will have massive advantages in the cyber domain, and without space capabilities, you are essentially not capable of conducting modern military operations. So, all major military powers have been working to deny potential adversaries the use of these capabilities, which until recently basically meant GPS type satellites.

China and Russia have recognised the US is particularly vulnerable when it comes to space.

No longer in the future, however, are you going to have just a handful of GPS satellites you depend on for ISR capabilities, targeting, early warning detection systems and so on. A lot of current discussions in the US are about making ISR architecture less reliant on space capabilities and a desire to diversify and build more resilient space architecture. As a result, we will see a proliferation of smaller, cheaper, low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites in order to create more redundancy in capabilities and to increase the resilience of space architecture and battle networks.

Networks of hundreds to thousands of smaller, more expendable LEO satellites are much harder to disrupt than larger GPS-type satellites. LEO satellites, such as the ones to be developed by OneWeb in the UK, can increase situational awareness in the battlespace, for example by transmitting high-resolution, real-time video directly into the cockpit of military aircraft, such as the F-35, and decrease the reliance on GPS for these tasks. They could also be used to monitor the activities of adversaries and in developments in areas such as optical clocks, which are necessary for accurate positioning and enable high-precision, reliable navigation (and as a result precision-strikes) without the limitations of GPS systems.

China and Russia have recognised the US is particularly vulnerable when it comes to space. They have tested anti-satellite weapons and have been developing cyber capabilities to degrade and disrupt and manipulate satellites. Having said that, the US will continue to dominate the space domain for the foreseeable future.

So, it is going to be a hugely important warfighting domain because it links to other key capabilities: it is very difficult to pull off precision-strikes without space assets, and it is very difficult to conduct offensive cyber operations without space-based capabilities. And it is already a very important domain, which is why countries are working to build more resilient space architectures and, at the same time, looking at alternatives to existing platforms.

It is extremely difficult, though, to achieve uncontested superiority in space because of the nature of the domain – which makes assets immensely vulnerable to all sorts military operations, whether kinetic strikes, such as anti-satellite weapons, cyber-attacks or electronic warfare. And there is a ‘nuclear’ option in space too: a series of kinetic strikes against satellites causing massive debris, which would knock out a large percentage of existing space-satellite architecture.

Ed Stacey is an MA Intelligence and International Security student at King’s College London and a Student Ambassador for the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). The #IISStudent Ambassador programme connects students interested in global security, political risk and military conflict with the Institute’s work and researchers.

Franz-Stefan Gady is a Research Fellow at the IISS focused on future conflict and the future of war. Prior to joining the IISS, he held various positions at the EastWest Institute, the Project on National Security Reform and the National Defense University, conducting field research in Afghanistan and Iraq, and also reported from a wide range of countries and conflict zones as a journalist.

Cyber Security in the Age of COVID-19: An Interview with Marcus Willett

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by Ed Stacey

The World Health Organisation has reported a fivefold increase in cyber attacks during COVID-19 (Image credit: Getty Images)

On 22 April 2020, Ed Stacey sat down with Marcus Willett to discuss his recent article for the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). Marcus’ analysis draws parallels between the current coronavirus crisis and global cybersecurity challenges and warns against the Balkanisation of either response. In this exclusive interview, he expands on his thinking.

For more information on the IISS and the latest analysis of international security, strategy, and defence issues, visit them here or follow them on Facebook, Twitter (@IISS_org), and Instagram (@iissorg).

ES: In your article, you explore the idea of a global cyber ‘pandemic’ – what do you mean by this?

Marcus Willett: What the article tries to show is that we like to take a lot of language in the world of cybersecurity from the world of dealing with medical crises – like the horrible one we are currently facing. For example, terms like virus and infection. However, what we have not started doing is using words like endemic and pandemic. The article was merely trying to go that extra step and consider the applicability of these words to what is happening in cyberspace. If you just look at cyber-criminality, for instance, techniques that were developed by people in the most advanced and connected nations have now spread, and are being used, all over the globe, by individuals, hacktivist groups, criminals and, of course, states.

Sitting here at the moment, if a cybercriminal was to try and defraud us, that criminal is as likely to be in Eastern Europe, or Nigeria, or Vietnam, as anywhere else. So what I was trying to show is that the use of cyber has spread globally and that you can get infected – through your network or your device – from anywhere around the globe. ‘Pandemic’ feels like quite a good word to describe that phenomenon, particularly since we are all using it at the moment.

ES: Is there a cure for the cyber pandemic?

Marcus Willett: I do not think there is a silver bullet-like vaccine; a cure is more about how nations might approach the problem. The trouble with people who have worked in my sort of background is the thinking that there is always, waiting for you, some technical silver-bullet – a wonderful technical solution that will solve the world’s problems when it comes to cyber. I do not think that is right.

If you think about offensive cyber, for example, the incentives are not great for states to talk about their most sensitive capabilities. This is because the most advanced states still think they have got such an advantage in terms of cyber that it does not make sense to reveal what they have developed to the world. But I believe states need to start a dialogue about the risks involved in some of these cyber capabilities, building on stuff that is already being done around developing norms of behaviour, to think about how we might better manage them.

So, I think a cure is more in the territory of better understanding the risks and better managing those risks than pursuing technical solutions. And the only way we are going to get to that is to recreate the sort of cooperation we see with the response to the current health pandemic. Additionally, I think that the best way of having those sorts of conversations is not to start at the most difficult end, which is, say, to try and work out some big deterrence theory and proliferation control treaty around offensive cyber capabilities. Because that is going to get silence from some of the big actors from the very beginning.

Instead, it is better to pick an area like cybercrime, where all states have a vested interest in trying to combat the defrauding of their economies and use that as a way to start the dialogue between states about how we can better manage these risks. Always, however, with the goal of an internationally agreed regime over what is a responsible use of cyber capabilities. The same way we have ended up with the understanding that it is generally unacceptable that people use barrel bombs and cluster bombs – that a guided missile is more acceptable.

ES: Is the United Nations (UN) the best space for this dialogue to take place?

Marcus Willett: Whilst it needs to be under the auspices of the UN, I cannot help but feel there is a certain group of nations that need to start the conversation. I would love to see, particularly, the Americans and the Chinese talking about cybercrime. That would start a dialogue that might help bring some of the conversations they are having around technologies – take Huawei, for example – into a better place – and where they need to be. If we carry on with this sort of competitive conversation around the future of cyberspace, I think we will end up with results that are not very good for likeminded nations like ourselves and our allies.

ES: Russia has been quite active at the UN on cybercrime. Do you see their recent proposal as a viable alternative to the Budapest Convention?

Marcus Willett: One of the reasons I suggested the US and the Chinese are to draw that distinction with the Russians, who are quite fond of coming to the UN with grand proposals that are, frankly, a little bit transparent. I did a conference in Berlin last year on a panel around cyber and question number one from the audience came from the Russian cyber representative to the UN Group of Governmental Experts (GGE). She laid out, not a question, but a statement about how the Russians were the good guys around cyber, claiming that they had been arguing for all sorts of things – like the cybercrime treaty you just mentioned – and for the outlawing of any military use of cyber capabilities. This was just after the Skripal incident and when that GRU unit was exposed at the Hague. So you can imagine how the Dutchman to my right reacted; it was an ‘actions speak louder than words’ situation.

A more realistic conversation with the Russians, since a lot of cyber-criminality emanates from bits of their territory, would be around legal jurisdictions and Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters (MLAC) arrangements – to try and get their assistance in pursuing some of this criminal activity. As you know, they are very unlikely to agree to that. And these are difficult conversations because they are likely to end up in accusation and counter-accusation.

I like the idea of the Americans and the Chinese talking about it; both with a vested interest, both without the past of being connected to cybercriminal gangs. That has got a higher chance of success. Yes, the Russians need to be brought into those sorts of conversations, but I would not start there because, again, it feels like too difficult territory. Cybercrime between the US and China: easier territory. Cybercrime with Russia: very difficult territory. Offensive cyber and military capabilities: very difficult with everybody. It is about trying to find those baby steps.

ES: Is cooperation between the US and China on cybercrime possible in the current context of the ‘tech war’?

Marcus Willett: What I am trying to argue is that there is more potential for a conversation around cybercrime than there is for a conversation on anything else, given the context of the tech war. It would be the best way of starting a dialogue because it is a rare area of mutual interest. Of course, you would have to start the conversation with a very clear definition of what you meant by a ‘cybercriminal’. But there are millions being defrauded from the Chinese economy by cybercrime, just as there is from the US economy; they are both targets of cybercriminals. So, you have got a better chance of starting a conversation there than anywhere else.

Does that feel overly idealistic given what is going on? I would have thought there was a chance if you just had the tech war or even just the trade war. However, if this escalates into finger-pointing around COVID-19 and an inquiry turns into making China some sort of a pariah state, it would be less likely. And you can see already how some of the stuff coming out of the White House is only going to antagonise the US’ relationship with China even more. So, no – perhaps the prospects are not as good as they were a few months back, but it is about more than just the tech war.

ES: Why do states such as Russia and North Korea use cyber organised criminal groups (OCGs) – either by shielding or cooperating with, and perhaps even masquerading as, them – to augment their cyber capability?

Marcus Willett: Something you said earlier resonated with me. When you alluded to the issue of defining cyber-criminality and the Russians perhaps having a slightly different idea. I remember the same sort of trouble around early attempts to talk with the Chinese about counterterrorism. You had to be very careful to define what you meant by terrorism for them not to think that that was an excuse to go after Uighurs in their own country. For the Russians, unless you are very careful about defining cyber-criminality, for them, people that we might call cybercriminals are patriotic hackers – an extension of the Russian state. That definitional point is a problem.

Another thing to note is the sophistication of some of the capabilities that have been developed by the organised criminal fraternity. In a good, realpolitik way, a state like Russia can see an advantage in these sorts of capabilities being developed by people sitting on its own soil. As you know, beyond cyber, plenty of corruption goes on between criminal gangs and the Russian state – and has done for centuries.

I lived in Moscow in 1983-84 as a student, during the height of the Cold War. And even though you could not read about it in the press, every Russian you spoke to knew that all sorts of arrangements were going on between the Soviet government and people they called mafia bosses – the mafia boss in Leningrad, as it was then, or the mafia boss in Moscow. There was the official world and then there was what really happened. So, I cannot help feeling – as so often in cyber – what you see being played out in cyberspace is actually a reflection of what has been going on for a long time in the real world. Sorry to use this phrase and be the first one to use it, but cyber is just a new domain for old age stuff. It is an accident of history and culture, going back through Tsarist times, that some slightly shady stuff goes on between the Russian state and parts of its population. Why should we be surprised to see that being playing out in cyberspace?

In terms of the other point you are making, which is that some states pick up a modus operandi that makes them look like cyber OCGs – and I think you are mainly referring to North Korea there. Well, I wonder if that is out of choice or whether it is simply the case that the level of sophistication that they are able to attain is that of a cybercriminal group.

North Korea is a very interesting example. Everybody knows that they were behind WannaCry and the hack on Sony Pictures, and that they have been trying to defraud the global banking system – Swift and so on. I put it to you that North Korea is not able to do much more than that given its own massive vulnerabilities. For example, the number of connections that come out of North Korea to the global internet is extremely few, and so, for that reason, it often deploys its operatives overseas. It would certainly need to do that if it got involved in any sort of conflict, as it would have no chance of running offensive cyber operations from within its own territory if it was up against a capable cyber actor.

In other words, North Korea has had to develop these more distributed, low-level capabilities. I do not think they are deliberately trying to make themselves look like cybercriminals, it is just that is the sort of capability they know they can use and have access to.

Countries like North Korea and Iran have learnt from what other countries have done in cyberspace, which is perhaps not the lesson that was intended; it certainly was not the lesson intended for Iran around Stuxnet. They saw this activity and thought: ‘Oh, that is interesting. What could we do in cyberspace? And would that give us a reach beyond our own region that we have no chance of achieving with any of our other capabilities? Does it give us a reach even into the great Satan – the US?’. And low and behold, it does. Their attacks are not going to be of the level of sophistication that can bring down the US’ Critical National Infrastructure (CNI), but they can have strategic effect. Whether that is propaganda effect or just being an annoyance, it nevertheless can be used to say to their citizens: ‘Look, we can do harm to the US’.

It is the famous point about cyber, that what can look like unsophisticated capabilities can proliferate and be picked up easily by states, from groups like cybercriminals, and then utilised to have a strategic effect in the mainland of a superpower, in a way that they previously could not. So, North Korea, and I would add Iran, are very interesting studies in some of the risks associated with the proliferation of cyber capabilities.

Sitting in the back of our minds, always – and this is the other thing big, cyber-capable states need to talk about – is the proliferation of some of those more destructive capabilities to terrorist organisations, and what that could mean. Everybody always assesses international terrorist groups when they look at threat actors in cyberspace. And the answer for years has been: ‘They know about the potential; they are interested and looking for it, but they do not have it’. And so, every assessment ends with: ‘So there is no need to worry about them at the moment’. Well, that picture could change. If ever terrorists work out a means of delivering the same sorts of physical destruction that they can through the use of a bomb, with cyber means, that is a bad day for everybody.

ES: How real is the threat of a catastrophic cyber event?

Marcus Willett: Having talked about cyber-criminality, terrorism, and states realising the asymmetric advantages they can gain through cyber capabilities, nevertheless, these are not where I see the greatest risk of a cyber catastrophe. The greatest risk of a cyber catastrophe, in my mind, is what is happening every second of every day, with the reconnaissance and prepositioning by states against their potential adversaries’ CNI – infrastructure like power, transport, communications – the bringing down of which would have catastrophic humanitarian consequences, as well as technical dimensions. And, while I am sure no state short of a conflict situation would intend to do that, my worry is that – as has already been proven in WannaCry and NotPetya – states, in trying to either reconnoitre a network or preposition for a conflict scenario, may accidentally make a mistake.

Prepositioning is necessary because, to have an effect in a conflict situation, you cannot go from a standing start: you either have that presence in the network or you have not. In other words, you need to establish a presence in the network in peacetime to be able to have that capability should a conflict occur. So, states are not only doing reconnaissance, they are doing pre-positioning. And the chances of something going horribly wrong, I would say, are fairly high.

What worries me most about that is, even just the detection of that sort of activity – what some may define as a cyber attack – could cause escalation. And how states try and deescalate in a cyber catastrophe is still something we have not properly thought through. How a prime minister or a president would be brought into the discussions around such a technical subject, that had spilled out into real-world loss of life and escalation, in a way that could deescalate the situation, is an issue at the heart of where we need to get to around international conversations, under the auspices of the UN, for cyber.

My argument is that, although this is the biggest risk, you cannot start with this conversation amongst states. But you have to start the conversation somewhere, so have it about cyber-criminality. Do not be deceived, however, in forgetting that the biggest risk is the one I have just been through: a mistake by a state in cyberspace that is interpreted as a potential act of war. That is the biggest risk in cyberspace.

How likely is that sort of catastrophe? The sad thing is that we do not really know, except to say that it is probably more likely than we should be comfortable with. The problem is we still do not properly understand what is happening in cyberspace. But there is lots of reconnaissance and prepositioning going on, all the time, by states, against each other’s CNI. Do not be deceived as to what is reported in the press about there having been 200 cyber attacks in the last ten years, or whatever the figure is. It all depends on what you mean by a cyber attack.

ES: Your comment on translating technical information to world leaders really resonates with President Trump in the White House. With a lack of precedent for escalation in cyberspace, there is no knowing if and how he might act.

Marcus Willett: Unfortunately, if you are an official in the US administration at the moment, you know you dare not mention the word cyber to President Trump. Because – and this is a massive generalisation – to him, all he can equate cyber with is: ‘The hacking into of our electoral processes and people saying that cyber is the reason I got elected’. Whilst he has made statements about the use of cyber in the past, I know from private conversations with ex-colleagues who are in those positions, that cyber is a subject you have to handle very carefully. Otherwise, you press the wrong button with the President, and it ends up not being a conversation, but the receipt of an earful. So, it is a huge challenge.

ES: And finally, in the context of the coronavirus crisis – and discussions around sovereign capability, national tech companies, supply chains, and so on – is the Balkanisation of the internet preventable?

Marcus Willett: This is a very interesting question. Balkanisation, or even bifurcation of the internet, which is the other phrase that is thrown around, is the concept of two internets. One model is what we have at the moment: multi-stakeholder governance, free, with a balance between states, NGOs, the private sector and techy-coders; and then how that internet is developed and run, with a balance between the rights of individual citizens, the private sector and governments. And the second model, which is being pushed by the Chinese and the Russians, which entails greater state control over sovereign cyberspace. This can sound like just a technical issue, but the implications for how the global economy works, for example, are massive.

Why would states not want more control over the threats to them and their own sovereign bit of cyberspace? Well, the net result may be, instead of having a conversation about how you can achieve control with a single internet and a single global economy, you end up with two separate versions, then three, or four, and so on. And do not forget what the word Balkanisation means: it is the disintegration into individual components that compete, or even conflict. And if there were two separate internets, one Chinese and one US, broadly speaking (although there is talk of a RU.net and the Iranians have invested quite a lot of money into trying to develop their own intranet) the current risks around cyber that I described earlier, between states, become even greater.

Imagine if you had no vested interest in that other internet: it is not connected to your economy; none of your CNI is dependent upon it. What would the incentive then be for states to restrain themselves around their use of cyber capabilities?

That is my worry about Balkanisation and why I fear a tech war, to which the only solution is to ban bits of tech from your own networks, ends up being self-defeating. Not only immediately, as you can see with all the US tech providers, for example, going to the White House saying: ‘Do you not realise what that does to our own economy and our ability to export into those markets?’. That is almost putting an Iron Curtain down that virtual world of the internet. And if you think about how dependent we are all becoming – with the Internet of Things, smart cities, and smart homes, and so on – that virtual curtain could only be followed by a real-world equivalent. I think it is incredibly short-cited, and it can only lead to increased risk geostrategically.

Having said all that, if you are sitting here in a place like the UK you speak with two different voices. You certainly support the idea of a single, multi-stakeholder, free internet. But Ministers also worry about the UK’s ability to deal with terrorists and cybercriminals in its own bit of cyberspace because of issues such as the spread of ubiquitous encryption by big US tech companies. So, the UK also has a sovereign problem around understanding some of the biggest threats in cyberspace. It is a difficult question to answer, which becomes especially challenging for a middle-ranking country like the UK: one that instinctively does not want to see Balkanisation and cyber sovereignty, but also wants a bit more sovereign ability for national security reasons, over its little bit of cyberspace. It is a fascinating subject that is, I think, just going to roll. But I do not like the idea of banning tech from your own network; it is unrealistic and just not the way to go.

In some ways, the US has hit the strategic thing that is going on: a global competition about how the internet in the future will be developed, between itself and China – its main rival in this space. That is the big strategic point. And though the UK may not have woken up to that issue, the US tactic feels wrong. The UK tactic, ironically, perhaps not having recognised the strategic issue, feels better. And for those who love their deterrence theory, this is the idea of deterrence through entanglement – which everybody debates whether it really works or not. The notion that a potential adversary entangled with the global economy and in global cyberspace, is far easier to deter from bringing down that economy and that cyberspace than it would otherwise be.

And one more thing: look at this from China’s perspective. China is desperately dependent on eight US companies for how it runs its own networks. You could list them: Microsoft, Qualcomm, IBM, Intel, Cisco, and so on. They call them the eight guardian warriors. Yes, China does talk about having its own internet and ‘the Great Firewall’, and all that sort of stuff. But interestingly, two of those eight companies – Microsoft and Cisco, I believe – sit on China’s cybersecurity internal standards-setting body. IBM and the Bank of China develop technology supporting trillions of dollars of financial transactions around the globe. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) uses Microsoft. I mean, that is just how it is – they are thoroughly entwined. Why would you try and persuade the Chinese that the better solution is for them to start developing everything indigenously; to not use anything American and wipe out half of the world’s population from your markets? I mean, why would you do that?

Ed Stacey is a BA International Relations student at King’s College London and a Student Ambassador for the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). The #IISStudent Ambassador programme connects students interested in global security, political risk and military conflict with the Institute’s work and researchers.

Marcus Willett CB OBE is a Senior Adviser at the IISS. He helps to develop and deliver a programme at the IISS that researches the use of cyber and related technologies as levers of national power, including their role in future conflict. His initial focus is on developing a methodology for measuring cyber power to assist national-level decision-making.

The Future of Cyber Warfare – An Interview with Greg Austin

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by Ed Stacey

Lt. Col. Tim Sands (from left), Capt. Jon Smith and Lt. Col. John Arnold monitor a simulated test April 16 in the Central Control Facility at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla. They use the Central Control Facility to oversee electronic warfare mission data flight testing. Portions of their missions may expand under the new Air Force Cyber Command. (Image credit: U.S. Air Force/Capt. Carrie Kessler)

On 29 January 2020, the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) hosted an event on its upcoming Measuring Coercive Cyber Power Project (available to watch here). Ed Stacey sat down with Greg Austin, Senior Fellow for the Cyber, Space, and Future Conflict Programme at the IISS, the day after the event, for a discussion on this new project, cyber power and offensive cyber operations.

For more information on the IISS and the latest analysis of international security, strategy and defence issues, visit them here or follow them on Facebook, Twitter (@IISS_org) and Instagram (@iissorg).

ES: What is the Measuring Coercive Cyber Power project?

GA: This is a project that began at the IISS before I joined and has been run by a couple of very experienced professionals. Its purpose is to understand the basic fundamentals of cyber power. In other words: what are its economic, scientific, technological, and organisational underpinnings?

ES: What are your main findings?

GA: The main findings are a little obvious in one sense, but also a bit surprising. We have done thirteen country studies which include a review of the United States (US), China, Russia, Iran and North Korea – fairly obvious countries, perhaps – and then other states like Indonesia, India, Malaysia, Japan, and Canada. What we have found is that the US’ cyber power is miles ahead of any other country in the world; that the economic, scientific, and indeed, social underpinnings of cyber power are more powerful in the case of the US than any other country. That lead really revolves around the Information Communications Technology (ICT) industry – the fact that technologies like the Internet were devised in the US and that a very unusual relationship exists between its defence sector, industry, and universities. This relationship really does not exist anywhere else in the world. And the US has also been in the ICT industry longer than any other country – at the higher levels at least.

Whilst China is often regarded as a peer competitor of the US, it was in a political mess between 1966-76 (the Cultural Revolution), which has hindered its development of cyber power. During this period, they closed down their universities and persecuted scientists and researchers, calling them ‘stinking weeds’ – and that was only about 45 years ago. It is very hard for China, which was already a poor and developing country back in 1966, to overcome this negative legacy – one of ten years of persecution of its scientists and researchers, and ten years of closed universities.

ES: Were there any results which you found surprising?

GA: What I did not fully appreciate because there is so much public media coverage of countries like Iran and North Korea, is that these countries really are bit-players. By this I mean that, whilst they can certainly cause a lot of damage in cyberspace, they only do so every couple of years. And so, what we have seen over about the last ten years is that whilst countries like Iran and North Korea get a lot of headlines with their cyber attacks, they carry out these attacks very infrequently. Yes, they cause great damage and great disruption, but they do not seem to have a strong pattern to their non-espionage cyber activity.

ES: If you completed this study in another ten or twenty years time, what changes would you expect to see in your results?

GA: I think the most likely change is for the US and its allies to increase their lead over these disrupter countries, like North Korea, Iran and Russia; and for China to still be sort of struggling somewhere in-between. I think there will be political reversals in China which will undermine the strong push that we are currently seeing towards ICT improvements and the thrust towards China’s ambition to become a dominate player in cyberspace.

ES: What do you mean by cyber attacks or offensive cyber capabilities? Does this include, for example, information warfare?

GA: It certainly includes information warfare. Offensive cyber capabilities have a dualistic character. On the one hand, we can think of them as cyber attacks on cyber systems. On the other, certainly in American, Russian, and Chinese military thinking, information warfare effects (psychological effects as commonly understood) can also be delivered through cyberspace, in ways that we could not imagine thirty to forty years ago. And so, we are in a situation today where, as we struggle with the security of Information Technology (IT) systems, and ways of attacking and defending these systems, it is now also the case that politics is being played out in cyberspace.

ES: Is it problematic to call these capabilities weapons – to attach that label to them and the connotations that come with it?

GA: In an academic sense, it probably is. But I think the common person would understand a weapon as something that you can use to damage other people or things with. A hammer is a tool – it can be used for making things. But a hammer can also kill people. And code is the same: it can be a tool for making things and it can be a weapon that kills people. You can use code to turn off electric power stations and create negative health outcomes in hospitals. You can create negative health outcomes in hospitals by interfering with their basic computerised information. So, we are in an environment where IT, software and all the things around them can be seen as both tools for good and weapons for bad. I appreciate fully that arguments exist about the nature of violence and war; but I think, at the end of the day, the average person in the street – and certainly the average politician – would understand that the malicious things that are happening in cyberspace are weapons.

ES: Taking forward your example of a hammer: if I took a hammer and threatened you with it – that would deter you. Would this be the same in cyberspace, i.e. if a state has a ‘cyber-hammer’, does that deter other states? 

GA: The interesting thing about the hammer example is that you could hold up the hammer and appear to be threatening me, but there would have to be a lot of circumstances in place before I would see that as any sort of threat and actually take it seriously. For instance, I would have to understand what your record is of actually carrying out those sorts of threats, and I would have to make a calculation about how afraid you would be of my retaliation. What we are seeing in cyberspace – for example, with the American’s ‘Cyber Deterrence Initiative’ (which is, in a sense, not only raising the hammer but actually attacking countries like Russia and China to try and undermine their offensive malicious cyber activity) – is that it is difficult to tell whether they are actually working as deterrence policies.

That initiative involves what the Americans call ‘defending forward’ – attacking into the Russian and Chinese systems. It has been going on for over a year (around eighteen months) but we do not have enough information in the public domain – we do not have enough evidence – to determine whether the Russians or the Chinese are actually being deterred. So, it is a good place to start the argument: ‘If I raise a hammer, do I deter you?’. But we have to study what happens next.

ES: What potential is there for cyber to disrupt established practices of deterrence? I have in mind, particularly, nuclear deterrence, which was discussed during the event – the idea of a nuclear missile being in flight and then hacked and potentially redirected.

GA: I have actually written an article on this subject with a Russian scholar where we tried to understand how Russian military leaders actually think about this. There is very little evidence in the public domain, but we found enough to believe that some Russian military leaders think that cyber capability shifts the balance between offence and defence, and encourages states with nuclear weapons to strike pre-emptively before losing their command and control, or guidance systems. Now, the evidence is far from comprehensive – these are, in a sense, fragmentary thoughts. But from the US government’s point of view, we have to believe that they are using every technological lever they have to devise attack packages that could cripple the Russian government’s command and control of their nuclear weapons.

ES: Given the uncertain nature of cyberspace – as a highly complex, interconnected and evolving domain – is it possible to wield offensive cyber capabilities strategically?

GA: I certainly believe that it is possible to do that – but that is one of the big debates in the academic community. After last night’s seminar, for example, we received an email from a retired senior military officer in the UK who made the proposition that it is not possible to use cyberweapons strategically – that they are really just some sort of tactical, disruptive asset. But, in fact, the US government and the Chinse government are on the record as saying, planning and doing things which demonstrate their belief that cyber military capability is a game-changer. And that is very well captured in the Chinese statement in 2015 that outer space and cyberspace are the commanding heights of all international security competition. That was a statement in their official 2015 military strategy, and it was not on page 33 in a footnote – it was right at the beginning.

ES: How likely if at all is cyber war?

GA: According to the US government, cyber war is already happening. They believe that Russia and China have already launched open conflict with the US in cyberspace. Mind you, China and Russia believe exactly the same thing about the US. Whether or not we call that war, or some other form of conflict, is a point of debate. To go back to Thomas Rid’s book: even though Thomas’ arguments were valid as he constructed them, there is a whole realm of strategic thought and activity which he did not fully take account of, and that we are now seeing much more in the open. States believe that they can use these tools, as weapons, in a way that does not provoke an armed response. But, as we see in the American case, this is provoking some sort of retaliation in cyberspace through cyber attacks. As we experience year after year of this sort of interaction – of heightening tension and conflict in cyberspace – I think we are going to reach the point where one or other of these great powers decides that enough is enough in cyberspace and starts to take some non-cyber retaliatory measures. And you could argue that we are already seeing that in the case of the US’ policy on the ‘tech war’ with China.

ES: You spoke yesterday about cyber operations in the 1998-99 Kosovo conflict as being the first act of cyber war, which is interesting because Stuxnet is frequently cited as the first. Is there a certain threshold in cyberspace that you could identify, perhaps in terms of effect, where a cyber operation becomes an act of cyberwar?

GA: There are a number of international lawyers, more than a handful, who believe that the US’ use of Stuxnet against Iran was a breach of International Law. It was an act by one state against another causing damage in the second state. If you are not causing physical damage, then most states do not appear to regard that as aggression – it is something else. But where the US actually causes physical damage – sabotage of what was ostensibly a civil undertaking: the enrichment of nuclear fuel – that in International Law is plainly and simply a breach. Yet to find a level of escalation above that which would provoke an armed response is another question.

When security agents of the French government sank Greenpeace’s ship, Rainbow Warrior, in a New Zealand harbour in the 1980s, the French were held responsible for that in an international arbitration and paid damages – it was a breach of international law. That is really the same sort of act that the US perpetrated against Iran – creating physical damage, sabotage, and in the New Zealand case, they killed a couple of people – a similar sort of international tort. But we have not got to the point where any state has committed a cyber attack on the level that the receiving state has judged it to be a justification for an armed military response.

ES: Do you think that current international law is fit for purpose with regards to cyber conflict?

GA: Yes, I think it is – and I think the Tallinn Manual 1.0 proved that fairly conclusively. A whole range of international discussions suggest it is fit for purpose. But international law is not a perfect institution. And as in the Law of the Sea where there is lots of room for interpretation, and as in International Humanitarian Law where there is lots of room for interpretation, there is equally lots of room for interpretation in law applicable to hostile activities in cyberspace.

ES: Is there room to develop norms or specific agreements on activities in cyberspace?

GA: I think the conversation about norms has been productive and useful; but states signing up to new black letter international legal norms seems highly unlikely. There are several meanings of the word norm. One is that a norm, in a sense, sets a moral tenor for conduct. Another meaning of the word, of course, is a norm as enshrined in black letter law. I think that the future of the normative conservation in cyberspace will be about setting the moral tenor of action, rather than coming up with new black letter law.

ES: Marcus [Willet] spoke yesterday about the potential for distinguishing between discriminate [e.g. Stuxnet] and indiscriminate capabilities [e.g. WannaCry], which I think would be a good place to start.

GA: Yes, I think that is an excellent point.

ES: Are the US pre-eminent in cyberspace and, if so, do you think this will last?

GA: One of the reasons why it should last is that the US currently sits at the top of the most powerful intelligence alliance human history has ever seen – and that does not look like weakening anytime soon. Moreover, major adversaries, Russia and China, do not appear to be interested in crafting an intelligence alliance – in fact, the Russian government is very explicit that it does not see its military relations with China as an alliance. So, I think that as long as the US can maintain that very powerful intelligence alliance – and all of the signs are that it will – then Russia and China do not have a hope.

Just to clarify why that is important: the foundation of all effective operations in cyberspace is high-quality intelligence about the enemy’s information systems, their vulnerabilities, and how those vulnerabilities exist at any specific point in time. It is no good collecting intelligence about, say, the Iranian nuclear centrifuges on one day in 2006 and then arriving back in 2009 with the attack package because they might have changed the software configurations. You have got to keep assessing and reassessing, almost on a daily basis: ‘How is the offensive environment looking?’, so that any attack package that you do develop can be used at a later date. That requires a huge intelligence effort, and it is that intelligence effort that the US and its allies can deliver far better than any single country in the world – even one that looks as powerful as China.

ES: Is it the case at the moment, particularly in the context of the tech war, that cyberspace is just a two-horse race between the US and China?

GA: I think that China sees it as a two-horse race and many people in the US see it as a two-horse race – but it is really not. Modern technology and ICT represent globalised knowledge. And what we see with the US and its allies is that they are far better at exploiting that globally available knowledge. Almost everything around modern ICT science is equally available to China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and the US. The difference is that the US has sixty to seventy years of excellent performance in exploiting that knowledge and putting it into practice. What we have seen is that countries like South Korea, Malaysia, and Taiwan can come along and pick off pieces of that ICT pie and become world-class in that space. So, that is the phenomenon we are seeing: this sort of multi-horse race; or many horses in the race, all excelling in different parts of it.

We put together some information based on the 2019 Fortune Global 500 companies which shows that, out of the Fortune Global 500, the US has fourteen companies in the tech and telecoms sectors whereas China only has eight. And what is interesting about the other 28 companies in those sectors is that all but two of them belong to very close US allies – so, European, Japanese, South Korean or Taiwanese. Also really interesting about that data is that while mainland China has eight companies in the tech or telecoms sectors, Taiwan has seven… little Taiwan has seven! How many millions of people are there in little Taiwan versus big China with its massive financial resources? And it has only got eight. So, if it is a two-horse race then Taiwan could be considered to be in the race as well.

ES: How does the UK compare to other states at the top of the table?

GA: The UK is one of the top-ten countries in the world in, what you might call, the national security aspects of cyberspace. And it may well be in the top-ten countries in the world in other aspects of ICT development. But, rather interestingly, there are only two tech and telecoms companies in the Fortune Global 500 which are UK companies – I think one was BT and the other Vodafone – when, as I mentioned, you have got little Taiwan with seven. So, the UK is not that well positioned in some of the commercial aspects. That being said, we have got to be careful because the Fortune Global 500 reflects revenue from selling things and services. And, really, what is happening with companies in Taiwan is that they are selling many more expensive things than Britain.

While Britain sells a lot of good ICT services, they are just not sold on the scale that countries like South Korea and entities like Taiwan are. And then there is the question of, well, even if the UK’s not earning as much money from what it is doing in cyberspace, maybe what the UK’s doing is of much higher value. UK interventions are happening at a strategic level and it is no coincidence that companies like BAE Systems, BT and Vodafone are global brands that have a role in the economic, strategic, and scientific development of a very large number of countries around the world. So, Britain is a presence that cannot easily be summed up in gross statistics such as the Fortune Global 500.

ES: And finally, what role do you expect cyber to play in the UK’s upcoming Strategic Defence and Security Review?

GA: As I suggested last night, a lot really depends on leadership choices. You can have the objective reality of the technology but there is no revolution in military affairs unless you have got a military leader who recognises the military potential and exploits it. And it is a bit the same with economic policy. Australia provides an interesting case in point. Malcolm Turnbull, who was very briefly the Prime Minister of Australia, represented a level of technological awareness that no preceding prime minister or his successor have in any way, shape, or form. Malcolm Turnbull was probably the only member of his government, at cabinet level, who had any appreciation of technology. So, unless you have got that sort of leadership then it is going to be very tough.

Additionally, I am afraid to say that the Brexit decision was a repudiation not only of the concept of the EU but of the value of globally integrated science and technology. Just ask the people in the universities what they think of it, and the research community. People who backed the Brexit decision really represent the same sort of mentality as ministers in the Australian government who do not have a full appreciation of what is involved in modern science and technology – how it is an integrated, globalised activity. When you put up your national boundaries, you are really not equipping yourself or positioning yourself well for the future. Now, that does not mean that the British defence establishment cannot do that because the British defence establishment has a very different position as a part of the Five Eyes community. And that scientific and technical community – represented by the close military alliance – may deliver outcomes for Britain, and imperatives in a strategic and defence review, that go counter to the Brexit mentality. But I really think that the people who currently dominate the UK government are not the right people to lead Britain into a brighter technological future and are not the people to lead the British national security establishment to a brighter technological future – I am afraid to say.

Ed Stacey is a BA International Relations student at King’s College London and a Student Ambassador for the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). The #IISStudent Ambassador programme connects students interested in global security, political risk and military conflict with the Institute’s work and researchers.

Greg Austin is a Senior Fellow for the Cyber, Space and Future Conflict Programme at the IISS. Prior to joining the IISS, Greg worked at the University of New South Wales Canberra, as Professor and Deputy Director of its multi-disciplinary centre for cyber security research. He was a Senior Visiting Fellow in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London from 2012 to 2014.