Word of the day: Oxymoron
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US Army is itching for cyber war
THE FORMER BRITISH COLONY of Virginia thinks it should be allowed to declare war on whoever attacks it over the Internet, even if it does not know who that is.
US Army Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander, who is the Obama administration's nominee to take on additional duties as head of the new Cyber Command, said the US should attack countries such as Iran and North Korea if it thinks they might launch online attacks.
He said that even with the clear understanding that the US could experience damage to its infrastructure, it must be prepared to fight through in the worst case scenario.
According to a Senate document obtained by the Associated Press, Alexander said that the US had already "responded to threats, intrusions and even attacks against us in cyberspace." He admitted that it was unclear if those actions had scared anyone.
In cyberspace, he said, it is difficult to deliver an effective response if the attacker's identity is not known. But that did not really matter as commanders have clear rights to self-defence.
After all coppers don't have to know the identity of a shooter in order to shoot back. Of course coppers are usually shooting at someone who is at the scene of a crime.
However a cyber attack might be conducted by someone who is in a different place and has framed another person or organisation. Also it is not clear whether an attack is conducted by an individual or a government.
Under Alexander's rules of engagement, his fearsome US cyber warriors should have wiped out the UK after Gary McKinnon hacked into US defence computers looking for pictures of UFOs. µ
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Err....... if you spend about half an hour of your life reading this treatise by Two-Time Congressional Medal of Honor Recipient, Major General Smedley D. Butler, United States Marine Corp, Retired ........ http://tinyurl.com/War-Racket ..... you'll know why cowardly idiots far away from the deadly action start wars in their arrogance, and heroic fools falling foul to the madness and losing everything at the front, allow them in their ignorance.
Nah, a good part of the US population (who after all often also came from europe, many not that long ago) felt for the normal people suffering under the Nazi regimes, but there was also a reluctance to get into that mess, and who can blame them? But I do think that there was a general empathy too, empathy didn't die yet in the US at that point.
So I think saying it was ONLY for their own good is not fair, but obviously they were confronted with it, and bloody well knew they would not be safe in a world where insane expansionist dictator fascist had half the planet, a conflict WOULD arrive eventually if they weren't defeated, the US just hoped initially the local population would fix things, and rushing into conflict isn't a smart strategy I must agree, it's the locals who made the mess and the locals you hope would fix such things.
@american I hope you aren't put off by the attitude here, please don't let my outspokenness turn you away.
"Furthermore, yeah the US fought in europe, because it was in their own interest too..."
Sorry to do this point to death, but that is a fundamental understatement. The ONLY reason the USA fought in Europe (or anywhere else) was because the Axis powers declared war on the USA. The war in Europe began on 1st September 1939, and the USA remained happily neutral for the following 2 years, 3 months, and 6 days. Count 'em - that's 27 months! Over 820 days! Right through the Battle of France, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain, the Blitz, and the invasion of the USSR. Without lifting a finger to intervene in the "war for democracy".
On 7th December 1941 Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, thereby declaring war on the USA, and a few days later Adolf Hitler personally declared war on the USA in support of his ally. Later that day, the US Congress declared war on Germany - even though a state of war already existed - purely so that, in future, they could talk about "when we declared war on Nazi Germany".
First of: it's a joke, the virginia reference, how obvious is that? Need a laughtrack before you get a joke?
Furthermore, yeah the US fought in europe, because it was in their own interest too, and they certainly would not have been able to defeat the nazi regimes (the eastern part didn't feel very free under the russians anyway I might point out) in europe without the russian and canadian and british andsoforth, who actually did most of the work mind you (look at the deathtoll to see that point).
Not that it isn't appreciated, but that doesn't mean that when the US turns mad and became the bad guys the euros had to support them, and yet they did, but once or twice is enough, sometimes you can help a friend better with an intervention than assisting him with his madness or addiction after all, right?
Plus what will the european politicians say when the US actually does a first strike and starts a nuclear war with iran/north-korea? They will say 'great job brownie' is what, instead of the sane response: 'HAVE YOU LOST YOU FREAKING MIND? Enough, this went too far, our friendship is kaput and over', like the sane (=non-christian?) european population would want their politicians to do.
The state of Virgina, part of the United States of America, the states that fought in WWII to free most of the European countries, says
The following was Wired to Uncle Sam, but it appears to have been spirited away [which never happened so strangely before whenever posting comment on an article aired and inviting readers views ] ..... It is also a good fit for here.
Posted by: amanfromMars | 04/16/10 | 01:26 am [0626 GMT]
"But the reality is a bit more prosaic. Those probes don’t necessarily translate into hostile action, Alexander added: “They may scan the network to see what kind of operating system you have to facilitate … an attack.”"
........................................
SMARTer Probes will also carry Sticky Sweet Paylodes Betatesting Innovative dDevelopment Systems for their Future Perfect MkUltraSensitive Requirements ....... http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/1/2010/04/15/ibm_i7_1_os/ ..... and there is Presently, No Greater nor More Important Innovative dDevelopment on this tiny planet than Cyber Command and Control of Civilisation, ......... and that is in Reality, a Virtual Space Application for the ESPecially Gifted to Driver and Program/Supply and Build to Worthy Customer Specifications, if not merely to One's Own.
........................................
Of course, when in Control of such a Driver's Seat, does the Decision on What and/or Who would be a Worthy Private Public Pirate Customer for JOINT System Build become more Significantly Weighted towards the Altruistic Philosophical with the Politically Expedient and Extremely Rewarding being Tailored/Groomed to be Class Supporting Acts so as to ensure a Conflict Free Zone of Future Field Operations ....... Live Operational Virtual Environments.
........................................
"Sen. Carl Levin (D-Michigan), the chairman of the committee, quizzed Alexander on how the military might respond if an adversary launched an attack through a neutral country — or through computers owned by U.S. entities. Would the U.S. military have the authority to mount a defense, or stage a possible counterattack?" ..... The question as to who would have the official stamped authority, so beloved of petty dictatorships and autocratic bureaucracies, is a moot point if they do not have the knowledge to effectively defend against and defeat an attack. And how much it would be to have a Systems Commander able to Provide ProgramMING which Prevents Any Possible Attack with Novel HyperRadioProActive IT Forces/Disruptive Cloud AIgents.
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/04/pentagon-networks-targeted-by-hundreds-of-thousands-of-probes/
A cyber attack on America would be far more devestating than one on Nth Korea or Iran. America's infrastuctures are built around the Internet, less freedom loving countries like the afore mentioned may be slightly inconvenienced but they wont have as much to fix.
The only countries they could really hurt this way are their friends.
Buy a General for $5mil, he gets your "defence product" bought by a special group for $50mil a year. Sit back and enjoy your amazingly good lifestyle funded by taxpayers who have no rights to see where their money goes.
If you want to get rich then just scam some tax payer's money. All the big boys do it, you can too.
How else can they explain where all the money goes? It has to be on mansions and high living, shurely ;-)
"...when we fired, the Germans ducked. When the Germans fired, we ducked. When the Americans fired, everyone ducked".
That sounds like Montgomery whinging about how he would definitely have kicked the Germans out of Tunisia on his own.... eventually....
Took Patton and Bradley to provide Monty with some motivation, though.
in their right mind would hook up power plants and air traffic control to the internet?
That would be suicidal.
It's not the military who are supposedly at threat, it's everything that's hooked up to the net like the powerplants and air-traffic control and emergency response systems and so on, that is what they claim is the risk, and seeing they use pis-poor security on these systems it seems they are right it's at risk, but I bet the highest risk is their own insane population and militias and such, but that doesn't matter, you can always attack a random country you 'never liked anyway' no matter who is responsible, it's the american way, and they WILL get full support from most politicians around the world regardless.
And nobel peace prizes to complete the butter joke.
The Yanks always like to get their retaliation in first. If they do it hard enough, there is nothing left by which to tell if the victim (sorry, enemy) really meant to attack them or not.
As someone was recalling the other day, during WW2 "when we fired, the Germans ducked. When the Germans fired, we ducked. When the Americans fired, everyone ducked".
Actually, it's a rather different Sam this article reminds me of:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eo0OY8GOuc
what? america itching for war?
never!
only joking, i'd gamble my pension on it! if the odds werent so bad
Digital Britain Bill will protect ya
It's not a secret that the US military does have their own networks, their own OSs and their own network protocols.
As for nonmilitary, IDK, likely windows ME and Vista all the way lol.
america frequently uses fear of the unknown to pass harsh laws. these laws eventually get used on its citizens for whom the law was originally passed to protect(!)
maybe if they didnt go around the world shooting people then they wouldnt have anything to fear?
Or Cheney's 1% chance of attack policy. As is cringing at every shadow. We lived for 50 years with the real threat of Soviet Russia and its tens of thousand of nuclear weapons, but now a few cheese-puff eaters at computer consoles are going to bring us down, eh?
The "warriors" who pretend to be defending us are overtly and covertly provoking reactions, with the real goal being suppression of domestic liberties. -- It's just what governments do.
Further, it's an immoral policy. The "bad guys" always get to strike the first blow, whether a fist fight or war. The US is large enough to absorb a first blow (oh, restrict it "cyber", though the fear-mongers do inevitably escalate to a nuclear boogeyman). Nor is it applicable (in the US's twisted view) if reversed, but a paranoic US is right now the biggest threat to world peace.
Any country would be *quite* wise to get nuclear weapons if they can, to forestall a US invasion.
If our networks are so vulnerable but yet so vital to our Army, why are they on the Internet in the first place? Why does the Army not simply build their own network and keep it separate from the Internet?
Or better yet, just cut off the rest of the world from the US network. Not firewalled, disconnect the cable.
You can't have it both ways. You can't desire to eat your cake on the grass, then complain when ants crawl on it, then vow to kill all ants for their acts of aggression. Either eat your cake elsewhere or else learn to deal with the fact you're not the only being in this world.
It's like the nerd generation have just been given nuclear ray-guns; between rabid pentagon-sanctioned war-gamers and UFO nuts how can we possibly get out of this alive? Being in touch with reality might help; Gary McKinnon, bless his cotton socks, is not being persecuted by the US military because he found evidence of flying saucers; he's being persecuted by the US military because he inadvertently proved them to be utterly inept, and they're trying to conceal their embarrassment by 'poisoning his mind, giving him mental diseases'.
Remember Citizens, the fact that Big Brother is watching you is NOT the problem; the problem is that Big Brother is incompetent.
"Gary McKinnon hacked into US defence computers looking for pictures of UFOs"
The reason they want him extradited is because he found them. Now, while they wait to get their grubby hands on him, they are poisoning his mind, giving him mental diseases.
(proxy)