Wall Street Journal Responses Student

Wall Street Journal Responses

Student Response #1

Becoming familiar with the Wall Street Journal was one of the most beneficial aspects of this course. Initially, I expected that the paper would be limited in its scope, mainly discussing business and finance. Certainly, the Wall Street Journal

does cover those topics very comprehensively, but I was very surprised to discover how thoroughly the paper also covers issues of more general interest to me. Some of the things I learned from reading the Wall Street Journal during this course included the degree to which Republican lawmakers are apparently violating their most fundamental obligations of their positions in their narrow objective of undermining the presidential administration of President Barack Obama.

Specifically, I learned that many Republican congressmen have forsaken the interests of most Americans expressly to protect the financial interests of the corporate conglomerates such as the major oil companies that contribute to their political re-election campaigns. Apparently, when John Boehner and Eric Cantor (for two of the worst examples) say that they are tremendously concerned about the national economy, they are being extremely disingenuous. On one hand, they continually criticize the Obama administration for failing to cut spending; on the other hand, they fight tooth and nail to protect tax cuts for the wealthiest one-percent of the population. In that regard, Boehner, Cantor, and their colleagues were actually ready to allow taxes for all Americans to increase, in effect, holding them hostage to ensure the continuation of many billions in tax cuts to millionaires and billionaires. The detailed and insightful articles about the duplicitous conduct of Republicans in Congress really opened my eyes about the way things work in Washington, DC.

Some of the other types of issues covered in the Wall Street Journal that I found particularly interesting include those that explain the implications of foreign affairs, the arguments over weighing our obligations in Iraq and Afghanistan against our own self-interest and the welfare of American citizens at home, and the implications of modern technology on national security. In particular, I appreciated the May 31, 2011 article by Siobhan Gorman and Julian Barnes entitled "Cyber Combat: Act of War: Pentagon Sets Stage for U.S.

to Respond to Computer Sabotage With Military Force." I had never realized how serious a threat cyber crime might be to national security. Prior to reading the article, I considered cyber crime mainly in connection with identity theft and other types of domestic economic crimes.

This article opened my eyes to the tremendous national security concerns related to computer system infiltration. Apparently, Israeli authorities (possibly with U.S. assistance) managed to disable the Iranian nuclear weapons production capabilities by infecting their computer systems with a virus called "Stuxnet." Of course, the same thing can happen to American computer systems and, in fact, both the Pentagon and major military contractors in the U.S. have already experienced significant cyber attacks. According to the article, the U.S. is currently in the process of establishing a formal national policy according to which the U.S. will respond to cyber attacks that cause serious harm to the U.S. with traditional military force, based on the growing erosion of any meaningful distinction between traditional acts of war and cyber attacks that, in effect, can be equally damaging and destructive to national security.

Article #1

Gorman, S. And Barnes, J.E. "Cyber Combat: Act of War: Pentagon Sets Stage for U.S.

to Respond to Computer Sabotage With Military Force." Wall Street Journal

(May 31, 2011). Retrieved online from:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304563104576355623135782718.html?mod=WSJ_hp_mostpop_read#printMode

WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon has concluded that computer sabotage coming from another country can constitute an act of war, a finding that for the first time opens the door for the U.S. To respond using traditional military force.

The Pentagon's first formal cyber strategy, unclassified portions of which are expected to become public next month, represents an early attempt to grapple with a changing world in which a hacker could pose as significant a threat to U.S. nuclear reactors, subways or pipelines as a hostile country's military.

In part, the Pentagon intends its plan as a warning to potential adversaries of the consequences of attacking the U.S. In this way. "If you shut down our power grid, maybe we will put a missile down one of your smokestacks," said a military official.

Recent attacks on the Pentagon's own systems -- as well as the sabotaging of Iran's nuclear program via the Stuxnet computer worm -- have given new urgency to U.S. efforts to develop a more formalized approach to cyber attacks. A key moment occurred in 2008, when at least one U.S. military computer system was penetrated. This weekend Lockheed Martin, a major military contractor, acknowledged that it had been the victim of an infiltration, while playing down its impact.

The report will also spark a debate over a range of sensitive issues the Pentagon left unaddressed, including whether the U.S. can ever be certain about an attack's origin, and how to define when computer sabotage is serious enough to constitute an act of war. These questions have already been a topic of dispute within the military.

One idea gaining momentum at the Pentagon is the notion of "equivalence." If a cyber attack produces the death, damage, destruction or high-level disruption that a traditional military attack would cause, then it would be a candidate for a "use of force" consideration, which could merit retaliation.

The War on Cyber Attacks

Attacks of varying severity have rattled nations in recent years.

June 2009: First version of Stuxnet virus starts spreading, eventually sabotaging Iran's nuclear program. Some experts suspect it was an Israeli attempt, possibly with American help.