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Institute for National StrategicStudies

WHAT IS INFORMATION WARFARE?

MARTIN LIBICKI
Chapter 10

Summary

A summary evaluation of the various forms and subforms of warfare asks: which are real, for which the United States has an advantage, which are new, and how effective each might be. (i) Which wars are real and which are theoretical constructs, (which do not yet exist or, if it did, could stretch the definition of warfare)? Specifically, which are war as commonly recognized -- a destructive, extralegal struggle between two forces for control of a state's powers, its actions, or its assets (e.g., territory)? Real forms of warfare include everything under C2W, EW, IBW, and psychological operations against commanders and forces. Arguable forms of warfare include psychological operations against the national will and culture, as well as techno- imperialism. Hacker warfare, information blockades, information terrorism, and semantic attacks are potential forms of warfare. Finally, simula-warfare and Gibson-warfare are unlikely in the foreseeable future. (ii) How would the United States fare against a prototypical sophisticated foe of the future (e.g., a middle-income country with access to global markets for electronic equipment and engineering talent)? The United States is powerful at antiradar and cryptographic aspects of EW, offensive intelligence-based warfare, psychological warfare against commanders and forces, and simula- warfare; it has distinct advantages in kulturkampf and blockading information flows. The United States is both powerful but vulnerable when it comes to C2W, defensive intelligence-based warfare, hackerwarfare, techno-imperialism, and Gibson-warfare. The United States is vulnerable to psychological warfare against the national will, information terrorism, and semantic attack on computer networks. (iii) The following table lays out which of these forms are new in whole or in part. It also sketches the effectiveness of each form of information warfare against its likely defenses.

Table 1. Information Warfare -- What's New, and What is Effective


FORM      SUBTYPE     IS IT NEW?        EFFECTIVENESS



C2W       Antihead    Command systems,  New technologies of

                      rather than       dispersion and repli-

                      commanders, are   cation suggest that

                      the target.       tomorrow's command

                                        centers can be pro-

                                        tected.



          Antineck    Hard wired com-   New techniques (e.g.,

                      munication links  redundancy, efficient

                      matter.           error encoding) permit

                                        operations under reduced

                                        bit flows.



IBW                   The cheaper the   The United States will

                      more can be       build the first system

                      thrown into a     of seeking systems, but,

                      system that       stealth aside, pays too

                      looks for tar-    little attention to 

                      gets.             hiding.




EW        Antiradar   Around since      Dispersed generators and

                      WW II.            collectors will survive 

                                        attack better than

                                        monolithic systems.




           Anticomms  Around since      Spread spectrum, frequency

                      WW II.            hopping, and directional

                                        antennas all suggest 

                                        communications will get

                                        through.




          Crypto-     Digital code      New codemaking techno-

          graphy      making is now     nologies (DES, PKE) favor

                      easy.             code makers over code

                                        breakers.




Psycho-   Antiwill    No.               Propoganda must adapt

logical                                 first to CNN, then to

Warfare                                 Me-TV.




          Antitroop   No.               Propaganda techniques

                                        must adapt to DBS and

                                        Me-TV.




          Anti        No.               The basic calculus of

          commander                     deception will still

                                        be difficult. 




          Kultur-     Old history.      Clash of civilizations?

          kampf




Hacker                Yes.              All societies are be-

Warfare                                 coming potentially more

                                        vulnerable but good house-

                                        keeping can secure systems.




Economic  Economic    Yes.              Very few countries are yet

Infor-                                  that dependent on high-

mation                                  bandwidth information 

Warfare                                 flows.




          Techno-Im-     Since the      Trade and war involve

          perialism      1970s.         competition, but trade

                                        is not war.




Cyber-    Info-          Dirty linen    The threat may be a good

Warfare   Terrorism      is dirty       reason for tough

                         linen wheth-   privacy laws.

                         er paper or

                         computer files.




          Semantic       Yes.           Too soon to tell.




          Simula-        Approaching    If both sides are

          warfare        virtual        civilized enough to

                         reality.       simulate warfare, why

                                        would they fight at all? 




          Gibson-        Yes.           The stuff of science

          warfare                       fiction.
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