The Cyber Pearl Harbor

Abstract

The article describes the incentives that would motivate an opponent to incorporate a surprise cyber attack into a conventional operation to defeat US deterrent strategies by presenting the United States with a fait accompli. In describing this ‘Cyber Pearl Harbor’, the article explores the organizational and intelligence constraints that make it difficult to respond to the prospect of a combined cyber surprise attack and conventional operation. The article suggests that a cyber surprise attack will not occur in a political or strategic vacuum. Instead, weak opponents will use it to achieve objectives that could not be attained if US and allied forces were fully alerted.

Notes

1. Alexander, Memorandum for Record, Subject: United States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) Commander’s Strategic Assessment for Operating in Cyberspace – Preventing a Pearl Harbor Environment.

2. Navy officers called for a return of the Pacific fleet to the West Coast to prepare for a potential war with Japan. They believed that the lack of adequate facilities at Pearl Harbor made forward deployment a hollow deterrent that only served to give the American public a false sense of confidence in US defenses in the Pacific. When the Commander of the US Navy in the Pacific, Admiral J.O. Richardson, failed to convince his superiors to reposition the fleet in California, he penned a message to President Franklin D. Roosevelt that led to his relief: ‘The senior officers of the Navy do not have the trust and confidence in the civilian leadership of this country that is essential for a successful prosecution of a war in the Pacific’, see Baer, One Hundred Years of Sea Power, 151.

3. Wirtz, “Deterring the Weak: Problems and Prospects.”

4. For a full description of how the strategic setting shapes the perceptions of the strong and weak parties in a looming conflict see Wirtz, “Theory of Surprise,” 101–116.

5. Adamsky, The Culture of Military Innovation.

6. Watts, The Maturing Revolution in Military Affairs.

7. Perrow, Normal Accidents; and Sagan, The Limits of Safety.

8. Lewis, Bak’s Sand Pile.

9. Smith, “How Russia Harnesses Cyberwarfare,” 7–8.

10. According to Paul Saunders, ‘Russia’s seizue of Crimea happened very quickly. US and European decision-making processes just don’t move at that speed, particularly when facing ambiguity. Once a Crimea-style operation has begun, it will be extremly difficult if not impossible for Western decision-makers to be sufficinetly confident about the other side’s intent to take consequential action before it’s too late’, Saunders, “Why America Can’t Stop Russia’s Hybrid Warfare.”

11. Barry Posen posited that a similar risks existed during the latter stages of the Cold War. NATO’s plan to undertake precision-strikes against Soviet command and control systems could have produced inadvertent escalation when Soviet loss of situational awareness could have been interpreted by Moscow as a harbinger of nuclear attack see Posen, Inadvertent Escalation.

12. The opinions expressed here are the author’s alone. An earlier version of this manuscript was disseminated as James J. Wirtz, “The Cyber Pearl Harbor,” in Emily O. Goldman and John Arquilla (eds.) Cyber Analogies Naval Postgraduate School Technical Report NPS-DA-14-001, February 28, 2014, pp.7–14.