Wars rarely follow straight paths from beginning to end. Belligerents constantly shift, seeking advantage and adapting to change, and the interaction takes its participants to places unimagined at the war's inception. Such has been the case for the American' war in Afghanistan. The U.S. started with clear strategic aims: defeat al-Qaeda and their Taliban hosts. Within months, military action had accomplished both. Yet, having achieved those aims, the war continued to escalate, and the war deviated from its expected path.
The Russian DNC Hack: An Opportunity for Cyber Deterrence
Deterrence strategy, too, is essentially timeless, which inherently means it is applicable even to cyber warfare. While a legitimate threat of force lies at the heart of deterrence, different modes of warfare may be necessary to accomplish the true purpose of strategy as Clausewitz saw it: the accomplishment political goals. The U.S. political goal in this case is to prevent attacks and other wicked acts perpetrated against America in the cyber realm. Though the U.S. definitely has heavy hands in the cyber boxing arena, a better strategy is to avoid punches altogether, rather than slugging it out in the middle of the ring.