James Mulvenon has written a chapter for a book published last week: Beyond the Strait: PLA Missions other than Taiwan:
Theorists in the Chinese military have long been at the forefront of doctrinal thinking about cyber conflict, arguing that computer network attack offers Beijing some important asymmetric advantages against adversaries with superior technology. Yet the actual manifestations of this theorizing have been heretofore restricted to interesting but relatively minor hacking by Chinese patriotic hacker groups during crises or the alleged, large-scale cyber espionage against unclassified Department of Defense (DoD) computer systems. The well-publicized cyber attacks against Estonia in April 2007 and Georgia in July 2008, however, raise the specter of the use of cyberspace for state-level conflict, particularly as globalization raises the stakes by compelling greater electronic dependencies and interdependencies. This chapter examines computer network operations (CNO) as a tool of Chinese state power, outlining the possible scenarios, doctrinal concepts, organizations, and capabilities being developed by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Specifically, the chapter explores the use of computer network exploit and computer network attack as missions designed to coerce Taiwan toward reunification on China’s terms, while deterring or disrupting U.S. military intervention on Taiwan’s behalf. In terms of assumptions, therefore, this chapter begins from the premise that we live in the “A” quadrant of Dr. Andrew Scobell’s matrix (Chapter 2), since cyber operations often simmer beneath the surface of a cross-strait conflict that can neither be fully resolved or permitted to break out into all-out war between China, Taiwan, and the United States. . .
Twitter: @jmulvenon