As I write, Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander is giving Senate testimony about why he’s qualified to lead Department of Defense’s new Cyber Command. He undoubtedly fits the bill and is probably about the most qualified senior-level military man in the country to serve in this capacity. He’s led the National Security Agency for the last four and half years, and has 35 years of experience within the ranks of Army Intelligence.
That’s why the issue isn’t with Lt. Gen Alexander’s qualifications, but whether the structure of the whole cyber defense enterprise is the right one. The Pentagon stands up its new Cyber Command to coordinate all cyber activities under its umbrella, but he’ll also remain in his job at the NSA. He believes his new organizational mission is to integrate:
[C]yberspace operations and synchronizing warfighting effects across the global security environment; providing support to civil authorities and international partners; directing global information grid operations and defense; executing full-spectrum military cyberspace operations; serving as the focal point for deconfliction of DOD offensive cyberspace operations; providing improved shared situational awareness of cyberspace operations, including indications and warning.
… which sure sounds a lot like his old organizational mission at Ft. Meade.
And Alexander is christened with his new duties as Noah Shachtman has actually proposed to separate powers within the cyber community:
There’s the signals-intelligence directorate, the Big Brothers who, it is said, can tap into any electronic communication. And there’s the information-assurance directorate, the cybersecurity nerds who make sure our government’s computers and telecommunications systems are hacker- and eavesdropper-free. In other words, there’s a locked-down spy division and a relatively open geek division. The problem is, their goals are often in opposition. One team wants to exploit software holes; the other wants to repair them. This has created a conflict — especially when it comes to working with outsiders in need of the NSA’s assistance. Fortunately, there’s a relatively simple solution: We should break up the NSA.
While it would seem that these two actions — elevating the NSA’s director to oversee the whole kit-and-caboodle while keeping him entrenched in his old job and thus creating overlapping bureaucracies — are working at cross-purposes, it’s quite possible that perhaps we’re moving in that direction, albeit in measured fashion.
Sounds crazy? Think of it this way — in order to separate the NSA’s directorates, there would have to be political breathing space within the cyberspy bureaucracy to break them up. So instead of appearing like Alexander is getting a demotion by only controlling whichever half his old agency he ends up with, he gets a new title and the current directorate heads get elevated to new positions.
This surely isn’t gospel, but remains an interesting possibility.
