Security & Defense

Useless Speculation on Twitter Standard Time

By James Joyner

Since the news broke this morning that the likely perpetrators of the Boston Marathon bombing are two brothers from Chechnya, speculation has been rampant about their ties to militant groups there. That zero evidence supports that proposition seems irrelevant. We’re on Twitter Standard Time and we expect answers instantaneously.

Lyndon W. Obama

By Harlan Ullman

The shadow of North Korea’s latest provocations for the moment has obscured Iran and its nuclear ambitions. Another war on the Korean Peninsula would be a disaster for the Korean people even though the military defeat of the North that is sure to follow would no doubt end the Kim ruling dynasty.

Chinese Cyber Espionage: US Must Shout but Also Listen

By Jason Healey

After years of silence, the United States has finally had enough of Chinese cyber-theft of trade secrets. American officials have repeatedly raised the issue with their Chinese counterparts in language that is increasingly frank.

Should the U.S. use autonomous cyber weapons?

By Jason Healey, New Atlanticist

From Jason Healey, New Atlanticist:  Stuxnet, part of the "Olympic Games" covert assault by the United States and Israel on Iranian nuclear capability, appears to be the first autonomous weapon with an algorithm, not a human hand, pulling the trigger.

General Gurganus: There’s Still More to Do in Afghanistan

With ISAF’s withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2014 fast approaching, it is useful to look back and see what failures and successes there have been. Have certain challenges been overcome? How do the Afghans see ISAF’s mission? On April 17, the Atlantic Council’s Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security hosted Major General Charles Gurganus, commanding general, […]

Stuxnet and the Dawn of Algorithmic Warfare

By Jason Healey

Though autonomous, destructive robots are a long-time, hackneyed science fiction plot, for some time, this new kind of warfare has been shifting from yesterday’s movie to today’s reality. But unforeseen by the imaginations of both headline and science fiction writers, it was not a missile-laden drone or humanoid Terminator that introduced this new kind of […]

To Stop North Korean Cyber Attacks, Start in Beijing

By Jason Healey

The recent cyber attacks on South Korea highlight four truths of cyber conflicts as they have actually been fought. The implications of three of them are obvious, the fourth not yet so. Such conflicts are disruptive, but far from warfare. And cyber conflicts are both easier to predict than popular myth has it and the […]

China: US pivot to Asia ‘frequently makes the situation there tenser’

By Xinhua

From Xinhua:  The global trends toward economic globalization and multi-polarity are intensifying, cultural diversity is increasing, and an information society is fast emerging.