Building on previous plans for strengthening the U.S. cybersecurity stance, Defense Secretary Ash Carter on April 23 rolled out the Pentagon’s new DoD cyber strategy targeting increasingly complex threats.
The new strategy “demonstrates that this is a high priority” and further clarifies the military’s cyber mission, senior defense officials speaking on background said in an April 22 media briefing. The plan is driven by increasing severity and sophistication of the cyber threat to U.S. interests and follows on previous government initiatives, including a 2012 presidential directive for cyber defense.
Deterrence is a central objective of the new strategy, with DoD playing a major contributing role to a national cybersecurity agenda. A senior defense official noted that the objective is different from the Cold War-era notion of deterrence because cyber represents a more complex threat than nuclear dangers of previous generations.
“The Department of Defense assumes that the deterrence of cyberattacks on U.S. interests will be achieved through the totality of U.S. actions, including declaratory policy, substantial indications and warning capabilities, defensive posture, effective response procedures and the overall resiliency of U.S. networks and systems,” a fact sheet sent to reporters on April 22 stated.
The strategy also emphasizes partnership with the private sector, particularly in helping to provide the cyber forces that represent another core strategic objective in the new guidance. That includes the launch of a U.S. Digital Service corps comprising tech pros that will target major DoD IT issues, starting with interoperability of electronic records between DoD and the Veterans Administration.
“The core [of USDS] came from the team assembled to make healthcare.gov work,” which was headed up by then-federal chief technology officer Todd Park, a senior defense official said. Since moving on to Silicon Valley, Parks has helped assemble a team of experts that first will tackle electronic health record interoperability, and could take on other DoD IT problems such as the military’s business systems, the official said.
“It’s a novel way of solving core problems,” the official said.
The new strategy additionally will define the development, build-up and maintenance of military cyber forces, specifically DoD’s Cyber Mission Force that eventually will include more than 6,000 military, civilian and contractor personnel. The CMF was initiated in 2013 to launch formal training and organization of cyber command and control capabilities and operations.
Furthermore, the strategy calls for defense of the DoD information network and mission-critical data, including the build-out of the Joint Information Environment, and for capabilities that prepare the military to defend U.S. interests if threatened or attacked. Among those capabilities are intelligence and warning capacities, partnership with other government agencies and international allies, and options for achieving “key security objectives with precision, and to minimize loss of life and destruction of property.”
