How the United States Can Win the Cyberwar of the Future

Cold War-era deterrence theory won't cut it anymore.

• By P.W. Singer
• December 18, 2015 | https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/12/18/how-the-united-states-can-win-the-cyberwar-of-the-future-deterrence-theory-security/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=New%20Campaign&utm_term=*Editors%20Picks

There is perhaps no national security problem more 21st century in both its definition and form than cybersecurity. And yet to solve it, the ready solution in nearly every U.S. national security conversation today is that tried and true 20th-century framework of deterrence.
The conventional wisdom echoes back to the Cold War, the last period of long-term conflict. It argues that the best way to stop the frustrating array of cyberattacks on the United States — ranging from credit card theft, to emails stolen from Hollywood studios, to the millions of security clearance records lifted from the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) — is to demonstrate the capability and willingness to hit back just as hard. This rhetoric of Cold War deterrence by retaliation is appealing not just in its simplicity, but also because it seemingly demonstrates strength and resolve. It pervades the U.S. body politic, has become a staple of presidential candidate statements, and has appeared in multiple debates. Consider Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush’s call for the use of “offensive tactics as it relates to cybersecurity [to] send a deterrent signal to China,” or Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) promise at a recent debate: “Make me commander in chief and this crap stops.”
Likewise, on Capitol Hill, the same idea of returning to visions of Cold War-style deterrence holds sway. Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Ed Royce (R-Calif.) angrily lamented the absence of a coherent national cyber-deterrence strategy and demanded “why aren’t we hitting back?” Some of his Senate counterparts, including John McCain (R-Ariz.), agree. President Barack Obama is failing in his job as commander in chief by not doing “his part to deter the belligerence of our adversaries in cyberspace,” McCain said in August.
But the search for cyber-deterrence by overwhelming response is no partisan issue: Indeed, it may be one of the few bipartisan areas of foreign policy today. “We need to figure out when we’re going on an offensive,” Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said after the discovery this summer of the massive OPM breach.https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/12/18/how-the-united-states-can-win-the-cyberwar-of-the-future-deterrence-theory-security/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=New%20Campaign&utm_term=*Editors%20Picks