For fascinating details on the episodes mentioned above, and to understand how deeply we have drifted into legally and politically uncharted waters, read Kaplan’s new book, “Dark Territory: The Secret History of Cyber War.” Three of its lessons are that cyberwar, much of it is very secret, resembles war and everything essential to the functioning of modern society is vulnerable.
The things controlled by or through computers include not just military assets but also hospitals, electric power grids, water works, the valves of dams and the financial transactions of banks. And, Kaplan notes, unlike nuclear weapons or the ballistic missiles to deliver them, cyberweapons do not require large-scale industrial projects or concentrations of scientists with scarce skills. All that is needed is “a roomful of computers and a small corps of people.”
Clearly the U.S. needs a cyberdeterrent capacity: the ability to do unto adversaries anything they might try to do unto us. One problem, however, is that it can be difficult to prove the source of a cyberattack.
Imagine what havoc can be wrought by battalions of militarized cyberwarriors implacably implementing a nation’s destructive agenda. It is long past time for public discussion of the many new meanings that can be given to Shakespeare’s “Cry ‘Havoc!’ and let slip the dogs of war.”
George F. Will is a columnist for the Washington Post Writers Group. Email: georgewill@washpost.com.