[iwar] Article

From: ellisd@cs.ucsb.edu
Date: 2001-08-27 04:33:19
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MSNBC.com August 20, 2001

The U.S.-China Information War By William Arkin and Robert Windrem, 
Special To MSNBC

`Machine-to-machine' battles a backdrop to EP-3 incident 

When the Navy's ill-fated EP-3E spy plane flew its last mission off 
the Chinese coast in April, the Pentagon defended it as a routine 
surveillance
flight. But interviews with dozens of senior government and military 
officials reveal that the plane's mission went well beyond 
"surveillance." In
fact, according to these officials, the confrontation over the South 
China Sea reflected a much larger struggle between the United States 
and
China for supremacy in the emerging realm of information warfare.

The EP-3E – code-named "Peter Rabbit" by the Navy – did in fact 
monitor the mainland's voice communications and radar signals, just as 
the
Pentagon described. But the plane's receivers also keyed in on a new 
form of data code named "Proforma," a source of electronic 
intelligence
that blurs the traditional lines between surveillance and preparations 
for warfare.

As modern-day computer networks pass data, those data are laced with a 
dial tone of protocols and link-ups that determine the paths and
speeds of the transmission. The dial tone is known as Proforma, and it 
can be used to manipulate, deceive and disable the sophisticated
computers that modern military forces now rely upon. In essence, this 
is the dawn of "machine-to-machine" warfare in which one side
manipulates data, thus penetrating the inner reaches of the enemy's 
central command and control systems. 

In a world where technologies change overnight, Proforma is just the 
tip of the information warfare iceberg. A senior official who has been
involved in the development of information warfare explains: "It's not 
a MiG-21 from the Cold War," where the United States obtained a Soviet
warplane, took it apart and exploited the technological knowledge for 
years. "Information technology changes too quickly," he said.

More Than A Hack

Information warfare goes well beyond the popular notion of "hacking" 
that most people associate with computers. "When I hear people talk of
frying hard drives and inserting viruses, I know they are amateurs," 
says a military officer who has been in the center of the development 
of U.S.
capabilities.

In fact, information warfare, or IW, is part of a larger category the 
military calls "full spectrum information operations," which combines
old-fashioned psychological, electronic and covert warfare techniques. 
In the ideal scenario, all of this data manipulation is coordinated 
with the
traditional weapons of the military. The combined effect would not 
only allow the United States to out-think an enemy; it would also 
allow the
United States to essentially program what the enemy is thinking about 
America's forces.

Internal Defense Department documents obtained by MSNBC.com describe 
IW as the process of compelling an adversary to take particular
actions rather than to impose a military defeat. Information warfare, 
the document continues, "must be carefully integrated into the overall
military strategy and closely coordinated with the associated 
diplomacy and international public information activities."

Mapping The Opponent

Acquisition of these new information warfare signals is a key building 
block in this new arena. Air Force Gen. Ralph Eberhart,
commander-in-chief of U.S. Space Command and the senior IW officer in 
the U.S. military, says: "First of all, you have to map the networks."

Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden, director of the National Security Agency, 
said at an intelligence symposium earlier this month that intercepted 
signals
"that used to be in the air are now in the ground, and what used to be 
in the ground is now in the air. We are turning our national SIGINT
[signals intelligence] system on its head chasing after the new 
telecommunications environment."

This turns unassuming aircraft like the Navy EP-3 into cutting-edge 
weapons. They are able to get closer to intelligence targets than 
satellites or
land stations, positioning themselves in what one signals intelligence 
expert calls the "antenna alleys" and "side-lobes" of adversary 
systems –
that is, the areas where microwave and other signals traverse the air 
and might be able to be intercepted.

For now, the United States is the only country with the computer 
capabilities and resources to put all of the pieces together.

China: Info-War Superpower

But the virulent Chinese reaction to the EP-3 incident, officials say, 
is a sign of just how critically important information warfare has 
become to
China.

Throughout the 1990s, information warfare theory grew in China, and 
its People's Liberation Army (PLA) began shifting its focus from the 
Mao
Zedong model of the "People's War," a protracted, large-scale 
conflict, to smaller-scale "local wars under high-tech conditions."

On the offensive side, according to the Defense Department's annual 
report to Congress on Chinese military power: "China appears 
interested
in researching methods to insert computer viruses into foreign 
networks as part of its overall [information operations] strategy." 
Some reports
suggest the Chinese military plans to elevate IW to a separate service 
on par with its army, navy and air force. This would include 
detachments
of network warriors organized into "shock brigades," says Timothy 
Thomas, an analyst at the U.S. Army's Foreign Military Studies Office.

Many Western specialists on China are more concerned about the pace of 
information warfare than the growth of Chinese nuclear or
conventional weapons modernization. At a 1995 Chinese military forum, 
more than 30 high-ranking experts called for the development of
weapons that can "throw the financial systems and army command systems 
of the "hegemonists" – i.e., America – "into chaos." U.S.
intelligence has since monitored China's own integrated IW effort, 
including, the Defense Department says, stepped-up "attempts to 
penetrate
foreign information systems" and the development of high-powered 
microwave and other directed-energy weapons to attack information
systems.

China's emerging IW capability was first detected during an October 
1998 exercise conducted in the Lanzhou Military Region in the far west 
of
China, where an electronic "confrontation" was simulated, including 
reconnaissance, interference and destruction. Chinese engineers are 
also
known to have conducted experiments in introducing viruses into 
adversaries' computer systems from long distances via wireless means.

Prelude To A No Contact War?

Today in China, secure communications, computer networks and a 
nationwide fiber-optic network reflect China's commitment to 
information
warfare, both offensive and defensive. Fiber-optic cables, in 
particular, are enormously effective because they transmit data that 
cannot be
remotely intercepted, the way radio or microwave communications can. 
In the 1998 exercise, the Beijing Military Region used its new 
fiber-optic
"military information superhighway" for the first time on a large 
scale. Intelligence sources say these and other exercises have 
demonstrated
that China's capabilities in "information denial" are now some of the 
best in the world.

A Defense Department assessment of these efforts concludes that "many 
officials in the PLA view the Kosovo conflict as the first example of 
a
purely `no contact' war, in which control of aerospace and information 
systems were the deciding factors."

In fact, the U.S. intelligence community's assessment of the EP-3 
incident is that China viewed it as part of a larger, ongoing struggle 
in which
Beijing's resolve and capabilities are constantly being probed and 
tested by the United States. Among the events that make up this 
Chinese
perception: the bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, 
Yugoslavia, during the Kosovo war, Chinese success in obtaining secret 
nuclear
and ballistic missile secrets from Washington, and the frictions 
surrounding the Wen Ho Lee case.

Rude Awakening

For China, integration into the global economy poses enormous 
tradeoffs. The proliferation of Microsoft and Intel technology in 
China's
national security network, for example, has been identified by Beijing 
as a cause for concern. China became aware of its vulnerability to
computer failures in 1992 when 12 national railroad computer systems 
failed and wreaked havoc on its transportation system. It was "a rude
awakening for China's leadership," says Mark A. Stokes, a Chinese 
intelligence expert and former U.S. air attaché in Beijing.

Today, more than 90 percent of computer users in China depend upon 
Microsoft Windows products, leading many in the Chinese military and
national security institutions to worry about foreign attempts to 
insert viruses into their information systems. Within the military, 
there are
efforts afoot to decrease dependence on external sources of software 
and integrated circuits. Chinese newspapers, too, have jumped into the
debate, fanning "rumors" of cyber "Trojan horses" embedded in Windows 
software. The newspapers alleged that these backdoors sent user
information back to a huge database at Microsoft headquarters, the 
Workers' Daily newspaper said last year. A spokesman for Microsoft
denied the rumors at the time.

(MSNBC.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and NBC News.)

For the time being, a high-ranking U.S. intelligence official says, 
U.S. info-war capabilities far outstrip those of China or any other 
potential
adversary.

"The countries who would pose the greatest threat to us in terms of 
information warfare are increasingly dependent on the same systems we
use," said the official. "Something like 90 percent of China's 
military computer systems use Windows and Intel chips. They know if 
they attack
us, we have an even greater capability at NSA [the National Security 
Agency] to go after them. No one has been working on offensive 
info-war
longer than we have."

But as in many things – from economic reform to military modernization 
to population control – China's planning appears to focus on the
distant horizon, and experts agree that their activity to date has put 
them on the info-war map in a very big way.



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Next message: ellisd@cs.ucsb.edu: "[iwar] Article about a lack of leadership"
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