2016-12-29 By Robbin Laird

As we end 2016 and look forward to 2017, it is difficult not to believe that we face a year of upheaval.

Several dynamics in play at the same time and these dynamics will interact with one another to generate profound change in the world as we know it.

With the collapse of the Soviet Union, we had a period up to 9/11 where the world was characterized by the increasingly power of the United States and Europe while China emerged as a global economic power.  The Islamic-Western conflict was already there but with the 9/11 crises it emerged full blown.

And then the two decades of the war on terrorism entered the Western agenda, with the strikes in Afghanistan and the ill fatted invasion of Iraq.  As the Middle East began to resemble the 12th century landscape of the crusades (a period which generated even more intra-Muslim conflict than that between Christians and Muslims), the ability to manage the geopolitical landscape became secondary to the struggle against various brands of Jihad, something not reducible to geopolitics.

The new phase of global development sees the continuing influence of the conflict with the Jihadists for sure, but with the inevitable collapse of the “deal” with Iran, the Israelis and key Arab states are very likely to confront the Iran leadership directly.

How violent the confrontation will be is anybody’s guess, but the challenge for the outside powers is direct: who is supporting whom and for what purpose?

The anti-terrorism paradigm and the flawed from the start policy of putting Western forces into the Middle East to reform societies that do not share Western values is over.

It has FAILED and both the military which has been sent on these missions and the citizens that support them recognize this, although many American strategists somehow think this will go on.

Certainly, Europe and the United States will accelerate their efforts at energy independence from the Middle East which poses significant challenges as well for the Middle Eastern and Russian oil producers.

What Western policies will be crafted to deal with the Iran conflict and with other Muslims and the Israelis?

And how best to define one’s interests in the Middle East when you are not largely dependent on energy imports from the Middle East?

Also changing are the global macro-economics as industry is starting to come back from Asia to the West, and both the Chinese and Russian leaders face significant economic challenges.

Their response to failure to meet these challenges are that they very likely to use military means to gain domestic support in the face of declining economic performances at home.

Europe is in fundamental change.

With the Brexit negotiations to start this year and with a new French Preisident for certain and a new German Chancellor probably, the Prime Minister of the UK will look to those two leaders for shaping what form Brexit actually takes.

At the heart of the change certainly will be the end of the free flows of people which was never part of the Treaty of Rome in any case.

Domestic security will return with a vengence with states having to demonstrate to one another that the proteciton of the lives of their citizens matters more than excessive protection of individual privacy rights.

Europe could divide on this issue and as it does, Britain could work with those states serious about domestic security and be part of a new European coalition.

The Euro will not survive in its current form, and how growth will be generated will be a serious issue in the period ahead.

It is into this world where Mr. Trump is becoming President of the United States.

His election should provide cautionl to those over confident in their predictive abilities.

One book which I just read is Imperium by Robert Harris which is the first of a trilogy which I now will have to acquire and read all of the volumes.

It is a book from the perspective of Cicero’s (slave) secretary and tells the story of Rome in the period of the late Republic and early Empire, in other words, the time where the public life of Rome’s most famous lawyer and orator unfolded.

There are many good comments throughout the book but this seems especially relevant now:

“You can always spot a fool, for he is the man who will tell you he knows who is going to win an election.

But an election is a living thing you might almost say, the most vigorously alive thing there is — with thousands upon thousands of brains and limbs and eyes and thoughts and desires and it will wriggle and turn and run off in directions no one ever predicted, sometimes for the joy of proving the wiseacres wrong.”

Trump is more of an independent than a Republican and has come to power promising significant change.

But then again so did President Obama (Remember Change You Can Believe In?)

But Trump certainly is different in that he ran against the leadership of the party whose nominee he eventually became.

It is somewhat akin to the Progressive era in the late 19th century where both parties where in meltdown over corruption and other issues and the election of President Theodore Roosevelt opened a new era.

In this sense, Trump is somewhat akin to his New York predecessor, although TR was known for his famous statement about speaking softly and carrying a big stick.

TR came to power by accident and in a period of Western ascendancy and self-confidence and relative calm.

Trump is not coming to power in such a period of history.  

And although to date his discourse about defense seems to revolve around cost, he will quickly find that capability and skill will matter more and are in short supply.

After a long period of fighting land wars against locals and jihadists expeditionaries, neither the U.S. military nor diplomatic elite are well prepared for the decade ahead.

This is one in which armed conflict with peer competitors has already started and skill in maneuver warfare and diplomacy will be learned or not.

Contemporary history is learned on the fly; it is not about inherited skills; it is about shaping skills appropriate to one’s age and with an old one ending a new one opening we shall see if we are up to the challenge.

2016-12-13 The Congress, pundits and others are focusing on Russia and cyber and the recent Presidential election.

Before one rushes to ascribe real impact from this variable, it should be noted that Hillary Rodham Clinton lost in 2016 the same way she lost in 2008.

To quote Newsweek from 2008:

While Hillary turned out to be a much stronger candidate as time went on, one thing never changed: the sense that the Clintons felt they were owed the nomination. 

By repeatedly moving the goal posts on party rules, sideswiping Obama at every turn, whining about rampant sexism on the basis of two or three anecdotes, and claiming that the Florida primary resembled the 2000 fiasco and a rigged Zimbabwe election, Clinton continued to reinforce the impression that she considered the title hers no matter what.

If the Congress wishes to focus on cyber threats to democracy, that is fine.

But just focus on the real issue: the need to shape comprehensive cyber defense.

In this piece by Secretary Michael W. Wynne, a way ahead which the Congress could focus upon is the focus of attention.

Cyber Security: Really Protecting Democracy

By Michael W. Wynne, 21st Secretary of the US Air Force

Summary: The CIA recently summarily accused Russia of hacking into the Democrat and Republican E-mails in an attempt, as they describe it, to bias the election.

The root of this issue is a total lack of protection that our leaders and technologists have offered users of every stripe on the internet.

This is unconscionable as a technology nation when we know with certainty that vulnerability is a choice, not a given.

What calamity will we wait for before we opt for a simple, permanent, cyber defense called analog?

Where are the innovators to stop the madness of trying to band-aid solutions, or re-discovering that hacking has occurred.

This problem has been known and understood since 1934, and the solution has literally grown up technically next door.

Because of Moore’s Law, both digital and analog devices have grown smaller yet more powerful.

We’ve tried digital; now let’s choose analog.

Background:

The pursuit of precise information regards Hackers as a art form, akin to looking for complex brush strokes to detect forgeries.

This latest allegation is curious, as it plays into an expectation.

That said, it is at heart an admission of a failure that started way back when Turing Computing was first designed and implemented.

Academicians knew at once that the Mathematics were imperfect.

They provided copious proofs about the flaws that would allow mischief into the fundamental Turing Machines.

Yet, this flaw was allowed to flourish, like an electronic disease, that really was able to multiply as flawed computing devices became interconnected, and multiply again as domains became interconnected; and now again as the Internet Of Things proliferates.

Also we have ample evidence of mischief, with early calls for cross border law enforcement; and our major computer makers working with Interpol to round up hackers.

State players as well began to employ hackers magnifying the myth of a null solution set, see ‘Hack the Army’ as the latest waste of capital.

We know very well that the best Hackers don’t fess up; they lay in wait for the order.

Current State:

The current state is denial.

As society wallows in the deceit that a software patch can save the Turing Computing Machines that underlay the present internet, we find even senior security officials such as the Chair and Co-Chair of the Intelligence Committee espousing the thought that protection is simply unavailable.

Get real!

Our technologists deny that they are capable of inserting a fix, while essentially destroying $18 Billion a year in capital knowing it is a fruitless pursuit to fix a hardware problem with software.

Corporate Boards are leery of liability, and thus either in denial or becoming part of the herd of software patch payers.

But society is slowly becoming aware that this is a scam, that they are riding an unending strife curve; and the alarms are beginning to sound as if the end of life as we know it is nigh again.

It is finally seeping into engineering and into systems design that those that have stayed with Analog are immune to this Internet, distant and malicious, threat.

Whether aircraft safety systems, or in some of the most carefully protected areas; suddenly what is old is new again.

Meanwhile, our Society awaits Armageddon, lamenting the lack of BIG IDEAS while one sits like the elephant in the room, let’s save ourselves from Cyber with Analog.

This means being protected using frozen (e.g.; non reprogrammable) complex analog circuitry mimicking and replacing currently installed Turing Computing Based internet appliances.

The National Institute of Standards has essentially declared out loud the futility of the many solutions it has encountered, citing the patience of the Advanced Persistent Threat in many papers.

It as well stipulates that many penetrants never realize for many months or years that a penetration has occurred, until it becomes advantageous for the agent to disclose the information or act maliciously on command.

At best, a separate patch unwittingly discovers the loss of data.

Many times the victim has no idea there was an issue.

Academics have known since 1934 that Turing computers were and remain inherently vulnerable to hacking as Godel and Keene Mathematically proved, and confidently expressed that proof in the years following.

The times were different; and computers were just aborning, and abandoning a rule of circuit design to firmly comprehend the relationship of every input to every output seemed acceptable when operating in isolation.

This is a marked departure than “crowd sourcing” corrections to flawed software, which by its very nature invites malicious activity, while waving the flag of cooperation and collaboration.

When it comes to National Security or to Public Infrastructure, this is flawed policy and needs to change dramatically.

Even the internet of things (IoT), now popular, requires re-evaluation when public safety in the form of vehicle control, or Grid, or Pipe, or Dam, is at risk.

Looking Forward:

We are increasingly desperate for leadership in Cyber Defense.

One who will say, ‘Enough is Enough” and refuse to accept designs that are inherently insecure.

We lean on our President, and President-Elect Trump has highlighted the need for Cyber Defense. he is aware of the suffering, and upset that there is whining but not solutions.

What then do we need, we need a academic or government research agency thought leader to certify the protective capability that the complex frozen analog appliance offers.

To be able to testify, if you will, that using frozen (e.g.; non reprogrammable) complex analog circuitry mimicking and replacing currently installed internet appliances satisfies the pent up desire for a corrective action against hacking.

In other words, we need designed in Cyber Security, not a software patch.

There will be upcoming congressional hearings into the latest allegations but if only narrowly focused will fail the historical challenge.

Political maneuvering and grandstanding is not a policy.

Addressing a fundamental redirection of systems for built in by design cyber defense is.

Let’s hope they demand action in the form of a commitment to stop the madness, and endorse the mathematically correct response, complex analog circuitry that has the capability to protect our democracy, our infrastructure, our intellectual property, and our ability to communicate freely.

Ask, why don’t our executive branch leaders demand that security be designed into systems?

Why don’t industrial leaders be held liable to loss of the future value through intellectual property loss, such that they demand an available solution?

Since it is now becoming known that vulnerability is a choice, not the standard, lets get on with the fix.

What calamity will we wait for before we opt for a simple, permanent, cyber defense called Analog.

Editor’s Note: Wynne’s appeal for the Congress to focus on the underlying challenge rather than shuffling political musical chairs highlights a strategic opportunity or failure point for the Congress.

A hearing that just focuses on the Russians will simply highlight the CIA and its institutional shortfalls versus the FBI which simply does not believe the CIA allegations, in large part because of the nature of cyber threats and how they are executed.

The FBI did not corroborate the CIA’s claim that Russia had a hand in the election of President-elect Donald Trump in a meeting with lawmakers last week.

A senior FBI counterintelligence official met with Republican and Democrat members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence in order to give the bureau’s view of a recent CIA report. The official did not concur with the CIA, frustrating Democrats.

The CIA believes Russia “quite” clearly intended to send Trump to the White House. The claim is a bold one, and concerned Democrats and some Republicans who are worried about Trump’s desire to mend relations with an increasingly aggressive Russia. The CIA report was “direct, bald and unqualified,” one of the officials at the meeting told The Washington Post Saturday.

The FBI official was much less convinced of the claims, providing “fuzzy” and “ambiguous” remarks.

For a look at the nature of cyber threats and the challenges which they pose by state actors, see the following:

afa-110401-timperlake

For the past quarter century, we’ve tried digital; now let’s choose analog.

A Two-Time Loser: Putting Hillary Rodham Clinton in Perspective