NSA Chief: Rules of War Apply to Cyberwar, Too

In June 2011, the Pentagon acknowledged the existence of a list of secret weapons and offensive capabilities but didn’t detail what the items were. Probably the most famous cyber weapon of all time, the Stuxnet worm that crippled Iranian nuclear enrichment at the Natanz facility in 2010, remains officially unattributed despite wide suspicion that it was built and deployed by the United States, Israel, or both.  

In the tightly controlled discussion about cyber weapons, this counts as a step toward transparency.

The Pentagon keeps its rapidly expanding cyber arsenal almost entirely secret, which helps keep U.S. capabilities potent but also hinders the public’s ability to meaningfully discuss their use and costs. The development of new worms or viruses doesn’t show up in the President’s annual budget request in the same way as does money for jets and tanks; and cyber weapons don’t grace the cover of magazines.

Is there a way to discuss publicly what the future of cyber operations will look like? Defense One recently put the question to Adm. Michael Rogers, commander of U.S. Cyber Command and director of the National Security Agency, at the Navy League’s Sea Air Space conference outside of Washington, D.C.

Rogers indicated, unsurprisingly, that full transparency will remain impossible. But he also opened up, ever so slightly, in promising that Cyber Command would follow international norms in determining how the U.S. uses what are sometimes called offensive cyber capabilities. “Remember, anything we do in the cyber arena … must follow the law of conflict. Our response must be proportional, must be in line with the broader set of norms that we’ve created over time. I don’t expect cyber to be any different,” he said.

Rogers framed the development of cyber weapons as simply the next evolutionary step in warfare, replete with all the ethical concerns that accompanied other milestones in weapons development. “I’m sure there were huge reactions to the development of mass firepower in the 1800s as a new kind of warfighting implement. Cyber represents change, a different technical application to attempt to achieve some of the exact same effects, just do it in a different way. Like those other effects, I think, over time, we’ll have a broad discussion in terms of our sense of awareness, both in terms of capabilities as well as limitations,” he said.

The cyber chief downplayed the difference between offensive cyber capabilities and more familiar types of weapons. “We tend not to get into the specifics of some kinetic systems. I don’t think in that regard that cyber is any different,” he said. (Kinetic weapons cause real physical damage; think bombs and other munitions.)

Rogers’s willingness to speak about the subject at all marks another small step forward in transparency about cyber operations, according to Shane Harris, author of @War: The Rise of the Military-Internet Complex. “In just the past few years, U.S. officials have been talking much more openly both about the use of cyber weapons and what they think the restraints on them should be. Rogers is doing exactly that here,” Harris told Defense One. “There was a time not so long ago when you wouldn’t hear a senior U.S. even acknowledge that we engage in offensive cyber operations.”

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The Result Of Bad Monetary Policy: Prices Are Going Up In Canada

Many Canadians are feeling the sting in their wallets now that they are seeing higher prices at the grocery store for their basic necessities. Meat prices in Canada are up at least 12 percent over the last year alone. That isn't the only product, the overall cost of food has gone up roughly 4 percent in the country. “There doesn't seem to be any end in sight”, says one Canadian butcher, over the increasing prices. Unfortunately, things are only expected to get much worse as we continually lose purchasing power with our Canadian Loonie and destructive fiat monetary policy; we've already lost over 96 percent.

“Pork prices are so high, more people are buying beef and chicken causing those prices to be higher,” says Windsor, Ontario butcher Ted Farron. Thanks to the increasing cost of pork, Canadians will also see lighter packages of bacon on the shelves. Rather than raising the price of the package, the food companies have been quietly reducing theweight of the bacon in the packs, in an effort to regulate the price and keep it unchanged. Ryan Odette, a restaurant owner from Ontario, says that he's also feeling the sting from the price increases, “meat has become a luxury item” he says. He has subsequently started a loyalty program in order to help customers deal with the rising food costs. Brian Hyland, who sits on the Essex County Federation of Agriculture, is a grain farmer who raises about 40 head of cattle each year outside Windsor, Ontario. Hyland says that today’s beef prices are the highest that he has seen in over 30 years of farming.

Supply, feeding costs, and a myriad of other issues (like the porcine epidemic in the US) have been blamed for the increasing prices on food, which isn't anything new. Similar tactics have been employed previously by the state, in an effort to blame anything but the central planning. Surely these circumstances mentioned above do play some role in the market, but when prices continue to increase year after year, then you can be sure that the negative results you are seeing are a direct result of the failed central planning for the market. The overall lingering reality is that our currency itself breeds inflation and prices can only be expected to get worse. One lingering worry, is that prices are hurting now while gas prices are low, so when oil prices increase then we know that we can expect to see another spike in prices on the shelves. Canada is likely to import over $40 billion worth of food products in 2015 alone. Among the shipment will be a variety of products including fruits and nuts, coffee, fish, chocolate, vegetables, specialty meats, alcohol beverages, and more. Thanks to the weakening dollar, we will also see increases on vegetables, fruits and nuts, and processed foods. 

 As the Bank of Canada continues to operate under the illusion that inflation is a healthy thing for the economy, we can be sure that a solution to this problem isn't coming around the bend anytime soon. This doesn't mean that there aren't efforts being made to change the system, there are solutions being sought (like with the Bank of Canada lawsuit), but we are still a long way off from seeing a strong currency that isn't founded upon debt.