[SCADASEC] Welcome to Cyberwar Country, USA

[Bob Radvanovsky]

** MODERATOR'S NOTE:  Interesting article from our friend over at Wired...

> http://www.wired.com/politics/security/news/2008/02/cyber_command
> 
> By Marty Graham   
> Wired.com
> 02.11.08 
> 
> BARKSDALE AIR FORCE BASE, Louisiana -- When a reporter enters the Air 
> Force office of William Lord, a smile comes quickly to the two-star 
> general's face as he darts from behind his immaculate desk to shake 
> hands. Then, as an afterthought, he steps back and shuts his laptop as 
> though holstering a sidearm.
> 
> Lord, boyish and enthusiastic, is a new kind of Air Force warrior -- the 
> provisional chief of the service's first new major command since the 
> early 1990s, the Cyber Command. With thousands of posts and enough 
> bandwidth to choke a horse, the Cyber Command is dedicated to the 
> proposition that the next war will be fought in the electromagnetic 
> spectrum, and that computers are military weapons. In a windowless 
> building across the base, Lord's cyber warriors are already perched 24 
> hours a day before banks of monitors, scanning Air Force networks for 
> signs of hostile incursion.
> 
> "We have to change the way we think about warriors of the future," Lord 
> enthuses, raising his jaw while a B-52 traces the sky outside his 
> windows. "So if they can't run three miles with a pack on their backs 
> but they can shut down a SCADA system, we need to have a culture where 
> they fit in."
> 
> But before Lord and his geek warriors can settle in for the wars of the 
> future, the general has to survive a battle of a decidedly different 
> nature: a political and cultural tug of war over where the Cyber Command 
> will set up its permanent headquarters. And that, for Lord and the Air 
> Force, is where things get trickier than a Chinese Trojan horse.
> 
> With billions of dollars in contracts and millions in local spending on 
> the line, 15 military towns from Hampton, Virginia, to Yuba City, 
> California, are vying to win the Cyber Command, throwing in offers of 
> land, academic and research tie-ins, and, in one case, an $11 million 
> building with a moat. At a time when Cold War-era commands laden with 
> aging aircraft are shriveling, the nascent Cyber Command is universally 
> seen as a future-proof bet for expansion, in an era etched with portents 
> of cyberwar.
> 
> 
> Russian Hackers and Chinese Cyberspies
> 
> The news is everywhere. When Russian hackers were blamed for a wave of 
> denial-of-service attacks against Estonian websites last spring, 
> President Bush voiced concern that the United States would face the same 
> risk. The national intelligence director, Michael McConnell, recently 
> claimed a computer attack against a single U.S. bank could cause more 
> economic harm than 9/11, and called for more National Security Agency 
> surveillance of the internet. A CIA official followed up with a tale 
> about cyber attackers causing multi-city power failures overseas. Some 
> in the military believe Chinese cyberspies have already penetrated 
> unclassified Pentagon computers.
> 
> Where buzz flows, money follows, and the investment in info-war comes as 
> the Air Force cuts back personnel elsewhere to fund new aircraft: The 
> service just finished phasing out 20,000 enlisted men and women, with 
> plans to dump 20,000 more by 2011. The effect of military cutbacks on 
> the surrounding communities can be devastating. "If you gain or lose a 
> unit in a place where the military is already a major employer, it has a 
> huge impact," says Chris Erickson, a New Mexico State University 
> professor.
> 
> Unofficial estimates say 10,000 military and ancillary jobs could clump 
> around the 500 posts at the Cyber Command's permanent headquarters. The 
> governors of California, New Mexico and Louisiana are pitching their 
> locales directly to the secretary of the Air Force. In December, 
> Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal took advantage of a meeting with 
> President Bush on Katrina recovery to lobby for the Cyber Command. A 
> dozen congressional delegations have weighed in as well. Lord is feeling 
> the heat.
> 
> "Oh Lord," the general sighs, "there's congressional pressure."
> 
> [...]
>