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ABSTRACT
How states employ coercion to achieve a position of advantage relative to their rivals is changing. Cyber operations have become a modern manifestation of political warfare. This paper provides a portrait of how a leading cyber actor, Russia, uses the digital domain to disrupt, spy, and degrade. The case illustrates the changing character of power and coercion in the twenty-first century. As a contribution to this special issue on twenty-first century military strategy, the findings suggest new forms of competition short of war.
KEYWORDS:
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1 Mike Isaac and Daisuke Wakabayashi, ‘Russian Influence Reached 126 Million Through Facebook Alone’, New York Times, 30 Oct. 2017.
2 Gerasimov, ‘The Value of Science in Prediction’, Military-Industrial Kurier (27 Feb. 2013).
3 George F. Kennan on Organizing Political Warfare, ‘History and Public Policy Program Digital Archive, Obtained and contributed to CWIHP by A. Ross Johnson’, Cited in his book Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty, Ch1 n4 – NARA release courtesy of Douglas Selvage. Redacted final draft of a memorandum dated 4 May 1948, and published with additional redactions as document 269, FRUS, Emergence of the Intelligence Establishment, 30 Apr. 1948.
4 Erik Gartzke and Jon R. Lindsay, ‘Coercion through the Cyberspace: The Stability-Instability Paradox Revisited’, in Kelly Greenhill and Peter Krause (eds.), The Power to Hurt in the Modern World (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2017).
5 Thomas Schelling, Strategy of Conflict (Cambridge: Harvard University Press 1960), 9.
6 Brandon Valeriano, Benjamin Jensen, and Ryan Maness, Cyber Strategy: The Changing Character of Cyber Power and Coercion (New York: Oxford University Press 2018).
7 On Stuxnet, see Jon R. Lindsay, ‘Stuxnet and the Limits of Cyber Warfare’, Security Studies 22/3 (2013), 365–404; Rebecca Slayton, ‘What is the Cyber Offense-Defense Balance? Conceptions, Causes, and Assessments’, International Security 41/3 (2016), 72–109.
8 Jon R. Lindsay, ‘The Impact of China on Cybersecurity: Fiction and Friction’, International Security 39/3 (2014), 7–47.
9 On the Sony Pictures Hack, see Travis Sharp, ‘Theorizing Cyber Coercion: The 2014 North Korea Operation against Sony’, Journal of Strategic Studies 40/7 (2017), 898–926. For an extensive overview of a known APT linked to North Korea, see Kaspersky Labs, Lazarus Under the Hood (25 Nov. 2017).
10 The idea of strategy as a dialectic come from Andre Beaufre, An Introduction of Strategy (London: Faber and Faber 1965 R.H. Barry translation), 22.
11 Lawrence Freedman, ‘Strategic Studies and the Problem of Power’, in Thomas Mahnken and Joseph A. Maiolo (eds.), Strategic Studies: A Reader (New York: Routledge 2008), 31.
12 Robert Osgood, The Entangling Alliance (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1962).
13 Schelling, Strategy of Conflict, 3.
14 On theories of victory, see Benjamin Jensen, Forging the Sword: Doctrinal Change in the U.S. Army (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press 2016).
15 Beatrice Heuser, The Evolution of Strategy: Thinking War from Antiquity to the Present (New York: Cambridge University Press 2010), 19–24.
16 For empirical data on rival state use of cyber, see Valeriano, Jensen and Maness, Cyber Strategy.
17 Schelling, Strategy of Conflict.
18 Martin Libicki, Crisis and Escalation in Cyberspace (Santa Monica: Rand Corporation 2012), xvi.
19 Libicki, Crisis and Escalation in Cyberspace, xv.
20 Erica Borghard and Shawn Lonergan, ‘The Logic of Coercion in Cyberspace’, Security Studies 26/3 (2017), 452–481.
21 Gartzke and Lindsay, ‘Coercion through the Cyberspace’, 26.
22 Valeriano, Jensen, Maness, Cyber Strategy.
23 On coercive diplomacy, coercion, and cyber coercion as they relate to one another, see Valeriano, Jensen and Maness, Cyber Strategy.
24 James D. Fearon, ‘Rationalist Expectations for War’, International Organization 49/3 (1995), 379–414; James D. Fearon ‘Signaling Foreign Policy Interests Tying Hands versus Sinking Costs’, Journal of Conflict Resolution 41/1 (1997), 68–90.
25 George Downs and David Rocke Downs,Tacit Bargaining: Arms Races, Arms Control (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press 1990), 3.
26 Robert Pape, Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War (Ithaca: Cornell University Press 1996).
27 On how covert action can signal resolve through sinking costs, see Austin Carson and Keren Yarhi-Milo, ‘Covert Communication: The Intelligibility and Credibility of Signaling in Secret’, Security Studies 26/1 (2017), 124–156.
28 Jack Levy, ‘Deterrence and Coercive Diplomacy: The Contributions of Alexander George’, Political Psychology 29/4, 539.
29 BAE Systems, The Snake Campaign (Feb. 2014); David Sanger and Steven Erlanger, ‘Suspicion Falls on Russia as Snake Cyberattacks Target Ukraine’s Government’, The New York Times, 9 Mar. 2014.
30 Brian Prince, ‘“Operation Armageddon” Cyber Espionage Campaign Aimed at Ukraine’, Security Week, 28 Apr. 2015.
31 Kim Zetter, ‘Russian Sandworm Hack Has Been Spying on Foreign Governments for Years’, Wired, (14 Oct. 2012.
32 John Hultquist, Sandworm team and the Ukrainian Power Authority Attacks (FireEye 7 Jan. 2016).
33 Pavel Polityuk, Ukraine Investigates Suspected Cyber-attack on Kiev Power Grid (Reuters 20 Dec. 2016).
34 Threat Intelligence, APT28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations (FireEye 27 Oct. 2014).
35 James Scott and Drew Spaniel, Know Your Enemies 2.0 (Institute for Critical Infrastructure Technology 2016).
36 MSS Global Threat Response, Emerging Threat: Dragonfly/Energetic Bear – APT Group (Symantec 30 Jun. 2014).
37 Scott and Spaniel, Know Your Enemies 2.0, 29.
38 Sarah Peters, ‘MiniDuke, CosmicDuke APT Group Likely Sponsored by Russia’, in Dark Reading (17 Aug. 2015).
39 Sean Gallagher, ‘Seven Years of Malware Linked to Russian State-Backed Cyber Espionage’, Arstechnica, 17 Sept. 2015.
40 Feike Hacquebord, Operation Pawn Storm Ramps Up its Activities, Targets NATO, White House, (Trend Micro 16 Aug. 2015).
41 Adam Hulcoop, John Scott-Railton, Peter Tanchak, Matt Brooks, and Ron Deibert, Tainted Leaks: Disinformation and Phishing With a Russian Nexus (Citizen Labs May 2017.
42 Thomas Rid, ‘Disinformation: A Primer in Russian Active Measures and Influence Campaigns’, Hearings before the Select Committee on Intelligence, United States Senate, One Hundred Fifteenth Congress, 30 Mar. 2017.
43 David Sanger, ‘D.N.C. Says Russian Hackers Penetrated Its Files, Including Dossier on Donald Trump’, New York Times, 14 Jun. 2016.
44 Adam Greenberg, ‘Russia Hacked “Older” Republican Emails, FBI Director Says’, Wired, 10 Jan. 2017.
45 Eric Lichtblau, ‘Computer Systems Used by Clinton Campaign Are Said to Be Hacked, Apparently by Russia’, New York Times, 20 Jul. 2016.
46 David Sanger and Charles Savage, ‘U.S. Says Russia Directed Hacks to Influence Elections’, New York Times, 7 Oct. 2016.
47 Kaveh Waddell, ‘Why Didn’t Obama Reveal Intel About Russia’s Influence on the Election?’, The Atlantic, 11 Dec. 2016.
48 Patrick Healy, David Sanger, and Maggie Haberman, ‘Donald Trump Finds Improbable Ally in WikiLeaks’, New York Times, 12 Oct. 2016.
49 Judd Legum, ‘Trump Mentioned WikiLeaks 164 Times in the Last Month of Election, Now Claims it Didn’t Impact one Voter’, Think Progress, 8 Jan. 2017.
50 Aaron Rupar, ‘Former FBI agent Details How Trump and Russia Team Up to Weaponize Fake News’, Think Progress, 30 Mar. 2017.
51 Ben Collins, Kevin Poulsen, and Spencer Ackerman, ‘Russia’ Facebook Fake News Could Have Reached 70 Million Americans’, Daily Beast, 8 Aug. 2017.
52 Thomas Rid, ‘How Russia Pulled Off the Biggest Election Hack in U.S. History’, Esquire, 20 Oct. 2016.
53 Director of National Intelligence, Background to Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections: The Analytical and Cyber Incident Attribution (6 Jan. 2017).
54 Kier Giles, ‘Putin’s Troll Factories’, Chatham House 71/4 (2015).
55 Andy Greenberg, ‘How an Entire Nation Became Russia’s Test Lab for Cyberwar’, Wired, 20 Jun. 2017.
56 Nikolay Koval, ‘Revolution Hacking’, in Kenneth Geers (ed.), Cyber War in Perspective: Russian Aggression against Ukraine (Tallinn: NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Center of Excellence 2015).
57 Koval ‘Revolutionary Hacking’, 55.
58 Koval ‘Revolutionary Hacking’, 50.
59 CrowdStrike, 2015 Global Threat Report (2015).
60 CrowdStrike, 2015 Global Threat Report.
61 Sam Masters, ‘Ukraine Crisis: Telephone Networks are First Casualty of Conflict’, The Independent, 25 Mar. 2014.
62 Cory Bennett, ‘Hackers breach the Warsaw Stock Exchange’, The Hill, Oct. 2014.
63 Vitaly Shevchenko, ‘Ukraine Conflict: Hackers Take Sides in Virtual War’, BBC, 20 Dec. 2014.
64 Shaun Waterman, ‘Russia Seeks to Discredit, Not Hack Election Results’, Cyberscoop, 7 Nov. 2016.
65 Mark Clayton, ‘Ukraine election narrowly avoided “wanton destruction” from hackers’, Christian Science Monitor (17 Jun. 2014).
66 Koval, ‘Revolutionary Hacking’, 60.
67 Giles, ‘Putin’s Troll Factories’.
68 Patrick Tucker, ‘The Same Culprits That Targeted US Election Boards Might Have Also Targeted Ukraine’, Defense One, 3 Sep. 2016.
69 Jeff Stone, ‘Meet Fancy Bear and Cozy Bear, Russian Groups Blamed for DNC Hack’, Christian Science Monitor, 15 Jun. 2016.
70 Chris Baraniuk, ‘Could Russian Submarines Cut off the Internet?’, BBC, 26 Oct. 2015.
71 Pakharenko, 55.
72 Adam Myers, Danger Close: Fancy Bear Tracking of Ukrainian Field Artillery Units (CrowdStrike 22 Dec. 2016).
73 Hultquist, Sandworm team.
74 Rami Kogan, Bedep Trojan Malware Spread by the Angler Exploit Kit gets Political (Trustwave 29 Apr. 2015).
75 Nick Biasini, ‘Connecting the Dots Reveals Crimeware Shake-Up’, Talso, 7 Jul. 2016.
76 Nigel Inkster, ‘Information Warfare and the US Presidential Election’, Survival 58/5 (2016), 23–32.
77 Inkster, ‘Information Warfare’.
78 Nadia Kostyak and Yuri Zhukov, ‘Invisible Digital Front: Can Cyber Attacks Shape Battlefield Events?’, Journal of Conflict Resolution (Forthcoming).
79 Gartzke and Lindsay, ‘Coercion through the Cyberspace’.
80 Austin Carson, ‘Facing Off and Saving Face: Covert Intervention and Escalation Management in the Korean War’, International Organization 70/1 (2016), 105.
81 Austin Carson, ‘Obama Used Covert Retaliation in Response to Russian election Meddling. Here’s Why’, Washington Post, 29 Jun. 2017.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Benjamin Jensen
Benjamin Jensen, Ph.D., holds a dual appointment as an associate professor at Marine Corps University and as a scholar-in-residence at American University, School of International Service. He is also a senior nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council.
Brandon Valeriano
Brandon Valeriano, Ph.D., is the Donald Bren Chair of Armed Politics at Marine Corps University.
Ryan Maness
Ryan Maness, Ph.D., is an assistant professor at the Naval Postgraduate School.