August 31, 2017
Getting to Ground Truth on the Elevation of U.S. Cyber Command
One of my biggest frustrations during my time in the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s cyber policy office was the way elevating U.S. Cyber Command became overhyped. Cyber Command was created as a subordinate command within the military’s premier nuclear deterrence command, U.S. Strategic Command. There were good historical reasons for this, but my analysis convinced me there was nothing Cyber Command could undertake if it became a unified command that it could not already do as a subordinate command. Yet as cyber operations became more prominent, the chorus grew to elevate it to its own, independent command. While I never found reason to oppose such a move, I did not think the benefits were all that remarkable. The more consequential question would be when and how to separate the leadership of Cyber Command from the National Security Agency.
Read the full op-ed in War on the Rocks.
More from CNAS
-
Defense & Aerospace Air Power Podcast [Jun 26, 25] Season 3 E25: Focus Forward
Podcast
Just when people were saying the future of air power was small, distributed systems like UAVs, the US struck Iran’s nuclear program infrastructure with an old-fashioned manned...
By Stacie Pettyjohn
-
Podcast
Defense / Energy, Economics & Security
Tariffs & and the Defense Industrial Base with Becca Wasser, plus what’s new in the U.S.-China trade warGeoff and Emily debrief on the latest news in the U.S.-China trade talks. Becca Wasser, senior fellow and deputy director of the CNAS defense program, joins to talk about what...
By Emily Kilcrease, Geoffrey Gertz & Becca Wasser
-
Production Power: The Revitalisation of the U.S. Defence Industrial Base and the Consequences for Europe
Podcast
In episode 15 of Strategy Speaks, Becca Wasser from CNAS speaks with Daniel Fiott about the US defence industrial base and how its revitalisation could affect Europe. The conv...
By Becca Wasser
-
MWI Podcast: The U.S. Defense Industrial Base, from Steel to Software
Podcast
Mobilizing the U.S. defense industrial base. for a future large-scale conflict, however, will look very different than it has in the past. In the information age, data and sof...
By Becca Wasser
