For the US Army, Cyber War Is Quickly Becoming Just War

[rug]

Combat brigades will soon head into firefights with cyber specialists…and possibly IT lawyers.



FEBRUARY 9, 2017
BY PATRICK TUCKER

The next great conflict will play out not just on physical terrain but also in the electrical pulses of cyberspace and the electronic spectrum. But while anonymous enemies like ISIS or Russia’s “little green men” are free to use the digital space as they like, U.S. Army leaders say legal requirements and a pre-digital structure of rules complicate their response. That’s why, for the last 18 months, the Army has been experimenting with different concepts of operations for the cyber units that will be on the front lines of tomorrow’s fights.

The Army, which already has 30 teams at full operational capability and 11 more at initial operating capability, is aiming to have 41 fully operational Army teams by year’s end.

“As soon as we create them they are in operational use” in both offense and defense, said Brig. Gen. J.P. McGee, the deputy for operations for Army Cyber Command. “We have Army soldiers delivering effects against ISIS and ISIL.”

Last April, the New York Times reported that military cyber teams are helping Iraqi Security Forces and Kurds fight ISIS by working to “to alter [ISIS fighters’] messages, with the aim of redirecting militants to areas more vulnerable to attack by American drones or local ground forces.”

http://www.defenseone.com/technology/2017/02/us-army-cyber-war-quickly-becoming-just-war/135314/

[Sherman A1]

1. This is most certainly an area

that needs serious attention. The game is not just always about the shiny new and vastly overpriced fighter plane.

[Lurks Often]

2. In the end, it's almost always about those on the front line with a rifle.

Everything else, in some form or another, is there to support the person who carries that rifle and holds or takes the ground.

Be it aircraft dominating the airspace and destroying ground targets that endanger that infantryman, cyber warfare specialists confusing the enemy and disrupting their operations, to artillery and tanks reducing the enemy to reduce the losses the infantry would take.

[bigbrother05]

3. Military construction for the Army has dropped from a peak of $12B in 2009 to $1B

Outside of critical infrastructure, the bulk has gone to Cyber Command in the last 2-3 years. Now tell me that Obama is gutting the military to make them weak.

BTW, the military construction budget is approved by Congress on a line by line basis for each project. Translation: the GOP controlled House and Senate are the ones that have capped spending on defense building.