In first, France’s aircraft carrier to deploy under NATO command

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  August 6, 2020 | International, C4ISR, Security

  New England guardsmen test their skills in Cyber Yankee 2020

  Mark Pomerleau Members of the National Guard from New England states concluded a two-week cyber exercise that sought to test the cyber skills of guardsmen and critical infrastructure operators. Cyber Yankee 2020, which took place July 21-31 in New Hampshire, involved more than 200 National Guard members and their civilian counterparts from across New England states, along with some active-duty partners and participants from local, state and federal agencies. In its sixth year, there was less attendance than previous years due to the coronavirus pandemic, but several were able to participate remotely. “Cyber Yankee is primarily a hands-on keyboard cyber incident response exercise for National Guard soldiers and airmen in FEMA Region 1, which are the six New England states,” said Lt. Col. Woody Groton, a member of the New Hampshire National Guard and the director for Cyber Yankee, according to a Facebook post by the New Hampshire Air National Guard. Groton said in a video that the exercise is primarily focused on the electrical and water sector. The exercise is “a great training opportunity for us to work with those people who would actually own the network that we would potentially respond on and for our soldiers and airmen to get that experience and for the engineers from those various entities, they get the training in working with us,” he said. The Guard units within the various states are a critical resource to defend against cyberattacks when they overwhelm localities. “If a large-scale attack happened against a power company, water company, or any other critical department around the state, we would be able to get activated and help them mitigate the threat,” Capt. Frederick Bond, 103rd Air Control Squadron cyberspace operator and exercise Team 3 lead from the Connecticut National Guard, said in a release. “It's similar to when a storm comes and we help remove fallen trees or shovel snow from roofs to help get critical infrastructure going again.” The friendly blue team had to deal with simulated attacks from an opposing red team. Social media posts were used to simulate a real internet environment, where forces must sift through the noise and discern what information is needed to make decisions and identify threat actors. In one case, these actors defaced a public website. “We found some discrepancies including website, it looks like it may have been defaced. The team is digging into finding the source of that defacement and then making steps to correct it,” Master Sgt. Eric Lewis, a blue team member in the New Hampshire Air National Guard, said in a video. Other actions tested included protecting computer files from being stolen or manipulated. “We received intel that potential threat actors may be using a certain capability to transfer files,” said Senior Airman Stephen LaLuna, 103rd Communications Flight cyber systems operations specialist with the Connecticut National Guard. “We see the traffic that's using it, that sets off a flag on our end to look deeper into that. If we determine it is malicious, we send it up the chain with our findings and recommendations to block it.” Officials explained that one of the most critical aspects of these training events is the partnerships built between Guard units, critical infrastructure operators and government entities so that when a crisis breaks out, everyone is acquainted. “We have built enduring partnerships with state government and the critical infrastructure sector. Something that if we did have a major cyberattack against one of those, we would be ready to respond and already know each other,” Groton said. Correction: An earlier version of this story misidentified Lt. Col. Woody Groton. He is with the Army National Guard. https://www.c4isrnet.com/cyber/2020/08/03/new-england-guardsmen-test-their-skills-in-cyber-yankee-2020

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  January 30, 2023 | International, Aerospace

  US Air Force awards Boeing $2.3B contract for 15 more KC-46s

  The award brings the number of KC-46s under contract with the U.S. Air Force to 128.

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  August 21, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Naval, Land, C4ISR, Security

  Money and missions: NATO should learn from Europe’s pandemic response

  By: Charles V. Peña The first COVID-19 clusters appeared in Italy in late February, and by early March the Italian authorities issued a decree to install strict public health measures, including social distancing first in the affected regions and then nationwide. Soon afterward, Spain, France and many other European countries instituted similar public health measures. Without debating the efficacy of those measures, the important takeaway is that when faced with what was viewed as a clear and present danger, European countries acted in their own self-interest without having to depend on the U.S. to counter the threat posed by COVID-19. They need to take that same approach for their own security and responsibilities under NATO. It is not a question of resources or capabilities — it is largely a matter of political will. The low hanging fruit for our European NATO allies is to meet their pledge of spending 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense. Currently nine countries meet that threshold: the United States (3.42 percent), Bulgaria (3.25 percent), Greece (2.28 percent), the United Kingdom (2.14 percent), Estonia (2.14 percent), Romania (2.04 percent), Lithuania (2.03 percent), Latvia (2.01 percent) and Poland (2 percent). Noticeably absent are Germany (1.38 percent), France (1.84 percent) and Italy (1.22 percent) — the fourth, seventh and eighth largest economies in the world. These are wealthy countries that can afford to make the necessary investment. Indeed, the combined GDP of NATO Europe is nearly on par with the U.S. — about $17.5 trillion versus about $20 trillion. Yet, the U.S. spends more than double on defense than our European NATO allies. Other than political will, there is no real reason that European NATO countries cannot spend 2 percent of their GDP for their own defense. Yet, even though Germany previously pledged to meet its 2 percent obligation, Berlin is proposing a new metric based on a country's defense needs — perhaps because U.S. President Donald Trump has stated that he wants European allies to spend 4 percent of their GDP on defense (a metric even the U.S. does not meet). Beyond spending, there is the question of what threat NATO should counter. Originally created in 1949, NATO was intended to counter the Soviet military threat and communist expansion. At the height of the Cold War, the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies had some 4 million troops and 60,000 main battle tanks deployed against Western Europe — and threatened invasion via the North German Plain, Hof Corridor and Fulda Gap. But today's Russian Federation is not the Soviet Union. Nonetheless, NATO's European countries have the resources to counter a Russian military threat (although it's worth noting that NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg recently said: “We don't see any imminent threat against any NATO ally.”) NATO Europe's combined GDP is 10 times larger than Russia's — more than $17 trillion versus $1.7 trillion. And current defense spending is also in Europe's favor by more than 4-to-1 ($287 billion versus $65 billion). Again, there is no practical reason why NATO Europe cannot make the necessary investments to provide for its security. It is more a question of political will. Moreover, if NATO is concerned about Russia as a potential threat, it should think twice about continuing to expand the alliance eastward onto Russia's doorstep. Rather than providing increased security, it may do more to provoke the Russian bear. Part of the problem is that NATO has largely strayed from its original purpose of collective defense against the Soviet Union (and now Russia). According to the NATO website, the organization is “an active and leading contributor to peace and security on the international stage” that “promotes democratic values and is committed to the peaceful resolution of disputes” with “approximately 20,000 military personnel ... engaged in NATO operations and missions around the world.” If Russia is deemed a threat to Europe and NATO, then the European members of NATO need to take primary responsibility for defending themselves against that threat — and they should view that threat widely to include Russian cyberthreats as well as misinformation and disinformation campaigns meant to undermine elections. That doesn't mean a U.S. withdrawal from NATO. But it is long past the post-World War II era when European countries were struggling to regain their footing and needed America to be the bulwark of its defense. Europe as a whole is today an economic powerhouse — second only to the United States. NATO Europe can and should do more to provide for its own security rather than depending on the U.S. to act as the front line of its defense. All that needs to happen is for those countries to be as serious as they were with COVID-19 and take the same approach to national security as they did when the pandemic began. Charles V. Peña is a senior fellow with Defense Priorities. He has experience supporting the U.S. departments of Defense and Homeland Security. He previously served as the director of defense for policy studies at the Cato Institute, and he is author of “Winning the Un—War: A New Strategy for the War on Terrorism.” https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2020/08/20/money-and-missions-nato-should-learn-from-europes-pandemic-response/