Readying for the information war

Napoleon the patriarch of modern day battle philosophy had rightly observed over 200 years ago??The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who best controls such chaos, both his and that of his adversary?. Perhaps, his prophetic observations on battle craft were based upon the all-pervasive reality of mastering deceit as a major faculty essentially required to successfully practice the art of warfare.

Napoleon the patriarch of modern day battle philosophy had rightly observed over 200 years ago—“The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who best controls such chaos, both his and that of his adversary”. Perhaps, his prophetic observations on battle craft were based upon the all-pervasive reality of mastering deceit as a major faculty essentially required to successfully practice the art of warfare.

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Nothing could be truer in today’s context than such farsighted pronunciations.

Particularly when surprise and deception have virtually become the ultimate raison-de-etre for any modern army, considering that newer dimensions are getting added/refined with every passing day interfacing a plethora of genres such as propaganda or psychological warfare (psywar), electronic warfare (EW) and information warfare (IW), in that order.

As far as psychological warfare goes, the Allies best demonstrated it during the Second World War particularly during the riposte phase post 1944 up to the decisive Normandy landings leading to the annihilation of Hitler and his formidable Wehrmacht. Closely assisted by the French Resistance both USA and Britain intelligently used the lethality of psywar to cause the nemesis of the once invincible Axis.

Similarly electronic warfare also started to surface during the closing stages of the Second World War, though, in very limited form, as militaries were yet to perceive the power of 'radio waves' or electromagnetic propagation. However within the next two decades the world witnessed an 'electronic boom' and soon semiconductors found there way into the war zone.

The first devastating effects of electronics as a means of offensive and defensive warfare (electronic-counter-measures-ECM and electronic-counter-counter-measures-ECCM) were witnessed during the Six Day Arab-Israel Contest of 1967 when the Israelis played havoc by electronically degrading the Arab tactical Command and Control systems rendering the Arab forces 'hors-de-combat' sans any worthwhile resistance. No wonder the one sided battle lasted only six days.

The next authoritative bout of EW came during the Falkland imbroglio followed by a deluge during Gulf War I and II, which was witnessed ‘live’ by the entire world. Thus cascading into yet another hitherto unexplored avenue of 'warfare'- the sleekest of all- 'Information Warfare'!

While Asian nations were quick to seize the commercial and civilian opportunities presented by this unprecedented cyber revolution, they have been slower to appreciate the need to protect their infrastructure from the potential disarray that proactive IW can cause, leave alone develop their own counter attack capabilities.

In the context of the subcontinent, both India and Pakistan have been slow in recognising the military potential of information technology and the growing vulnerability of their respective infrastructure to manipulation, probably because we are far too unforthcoming in acknowledging the possibility of a full fledged outbreak of hacker-warfare with reference to what is being witnessed further East (Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea). Needless to mention that with Kashmir pot on a perpetual boil, such an eventuality cannot be ruled out, no matter what the peaceniks may keep saying.

Paradoxically though India was among the pioneers in Asia to realise the potential of IT, going on to produce over 100,000 IT professionals annually, the military for some inexplicable reasons chose to adopt a reticent attitude as late as up to the turn of the Century. However it realised its folly and has since attempted to redress the situation by at least producing a pilot document, 'IT Roadmap 2000' providing an outline for the introduction of IT into military. Yet half a decade later it is still a matter of conjecture as to what levels have actually been achieved in interfacing I W capabilities with the existing EW philosophy of the Indian Army.

In as far as Pakistan is concerned Pakistan's minister for science and technology, Dr Ataur Rahman, is also stated to have launched Pakistan's first IT policy and action plan starting with modernisation of existing telecommunications infrastructure. As a corollary Pakistan's military is also showing renewed interest in acquiring I W capabilities, though it was always stated to have had an edge over us in its EW capabilities. There are also reports that Pakistan government is clandestinely financing certain groups involved in hacking and 'cyber-crime', in much the same way as it does to the militant groups operating in Kashmir.

India though assessed as reasonably capable in areas of high-performance computing and software development does not yet possess the ability to undertake a defensive cyber-war or broader I W campaign, considering that not long ago the BARC network was hacked (milworm-1998), which leaves India's critical infrastructure exposed to further such attacks.
colfasih1@rediffmail.com