Tag: Cybersecurity
Stevenson’s army, June 12
CRS has new study of China’s PLA.
WSJ tells how FBI captured the ransom Bitcoin.
WSJ says Turkey is key to Afghan pullout.
In FP, SAIS prof Edward P. Joseph discusses Balkan policy.
DOD announces security assistance to Ukraine.
NYT has special anniversary report on Pentagon papers. Here’s online link. Haven’t seen a hard copy.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, June 8
– Two Senate committees have issued a bipartisan staff report on the January 6 insurrection. Politico summarizes.
– FBI seizes most of the Bitcoin paid as ransom by Colonial Pipeline. [See, it’s a criminal matter, not national security retaliation.]
– FP reports internal dissent over Pacific basing plans.
– Biden overturns Trump plan to put Greenland under NorthCom.
Some of you may remember my stories about how Walmart, Microsoft, Apple all had DC offices with fewer than a handful of people in the early 2000s. Then they learned that what the govt did could affect their businesses. Now they — and Facebook and Amazon — have big DC offices. And they know how to grow their businesses. See what Amazon does.
A pro-foreign aid group [yes, it exists] has a summary of the administration budget.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, June 4
Reuters says Justice Dept will elevate ransomware investigations. [Good & right because these are criminal not military matters.]
Another proper assignment: Biden shifts Chinese investment oversight from Defense to Treasury.
NYT says autonomous lethal drone strike may have occurred in Libya.
Former Senate staffer urges filibuster reform.
How do people get their news? CJR has an interesting report.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, June 2
Ransomware is big business. New Yorker explains how it works and how payments are negotiated.
Israel is asking for extra military aid.
Fred Kaplan lists the laws limiting military freedom of speech.
Bloomberg says Iran expects nuclear talks to continue in July.
Late addendum:
Summertime means more time to read books stacked in my study. Here’s another book worth checking out.
For me, the 1962 Cuban missile crisis was the two weeks of American crisis decision-making detailed by Graham Allison, Bobby Kennedy, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., and Ted Sorensen. Now we have a superb account that includes what was happening in Moscow, and on the ground in Cuba.
Serhii Plokhy, a Ukrainian-American history professor at Harvard, has written Nuclear Folly. Instead of the typical story of smart decisions that avoided nuclear war, Plokhy says he wants to tell about the many mistakes that came close to making that catastrophe a reality. And there were many, at the strategic and operational levels.
Graham Allison explored the bureaucratic behaviors and missteps over U-2 flights that were foolishly cancelled when needed and carried out when they were quite provocative and Navy blockade rules that almost triggered a Soviet nuclear exchange. Plokhy shows the same for the Soviet military.
His basic conclusion is that Kennedy and Khrushchev deescalated the crisis because both feared nuclear war. Both overcame strong pressure to risk actual combat.
Plokhy also details Kennedy’s extraordinary efforts to keep secret the fact that he agreed to withdraw medium-range Jupiter missiles from Turkey as part of the deal. The media seized on the narrative that Kennedy won by being tough while Khrushchev backed down. In fact, there was a deal which gave important concessions to both.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, June 1
– The tech press analyzes the Biden budget proposals for the Space Force and for cyber stuff.
– A former marine, now NYT reporter, returns to Afghanistan. And WSJ analyzes the Taliban today.
All the budget details are in the links at the side of this page.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, May 30
We really need to be careful about distinguishing between cyber thefts and cyber attacks as well as between criminal and governmental cyber attacks. NYT makes clear that ransomware is a criminal enterprise.
Politico says US is monitoring Iranian ships heading toward Venezuela.
Matt Yglesias has good explanation of how the Wuhan lab culpability got caught up in the media’s search for a Vovid narrative and blinded reporters to important questions.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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