Military Cyber Operations: A Primer

American Foreign Policy Council Defense Technology Program Brief, No. 14, January 2016

11 Pages Posted: 3 Feb 2016

See all articles by Trey Herr

Trey Herr

Hoover Institution at Stanford University

Drew Herrick

George Washington University - Department of Political Science

Date Written: January 30, 2016

Abstract

Military Cyber Operations (MCO) is an umbrella term for the acquisition and use of cyber capabilities at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels of conflict. MCO is not the same as “cyber war.” Cyber war, as usually articulated, focuses on two (or more) combatants exclusively deploying malicious cyber capabilities against the other side’s systems, resulting in death and destruction, in order to achieve a set of explicit political goals. This formulation, however, ignores both existing U.S. military doctrine and the manner in which modern forces actually deploy such capabilities. In fact, there are potentially good reasons to think that cyber war, when properly defined, won’t actually take place or may constitute an ineffective policy tool.

Keywords: milware, cyber security, military operations, cyberwar, offensive cyber operations,

Suggested Citation

Herr, Trey and Herrick, Drew, Military Cyber Operations: A Primer (January 30, 2016). American Foreign Policy Council Defense Technology Program Brief, No. 14, January 2016 , Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2725275

Trey Herr (Contact Author)

Hoover Institution at Stanford University ( email )

Stanford, CA 94305-6010
United States

HOME PAGE: http://https://www.hoover.org/profiles/trey-herr

Drew Herrick

George Washington University - Department of Political Science ( email )

Monroe Hall #422
2115 G Street NW
Washington, DC 20052
United States

HOME PAGE: http://www.drewherrick.com

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
393
Abstract Views
1,327
Rank
137,863
PlumX Metrics