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From Athlete to International Sport’s Leader: An Interview with Sir Philip Craven (Part 2)

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by Timothy Moots

Sir Philip Craven at an awards ceremony in the Kremlin 2014. Vladimir Putin stands in the background. (Image credit: Alexei Druzhinin/AP)

The first part of his interview explored the start of Sir Philip Craven’s life, from an athlete to sport’s leader, and the road to the London Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012. In part II, we discussed the Russian doping scandal that culminated at the Rio 2016 Games, to current affairs and world leadership today.

Rio 2016: Russian ‘medals over morals’

Philip had good working relations with the Russians and their national sport committees. Prior to the Sochi Winter Games, he had been awarded the Russian Order of Friendship 2009 during his work with the Russian Paralympic Committee. At Sochi, Philip recalls how the Games were a great success, and also delved into the inside politics of the organising committee. ‘The person who was really running the show at Sochi was Putin’s key man, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak, who is in fact a Ukrainian. He differed from Putin’s inner circle, who are all from St Petersburg.’ In his Closing Ceremony speech, Philip made reference to the progress Russia had made since their 1980 memo. ‘Now we are in a different time and things have changed. I wasn’t being critical. But it was made in the main stadium, to Putin and his inner circle.’ A week later, Philip was whisked back to Moscow for the Order of Honour in the Kremlin.

However, fast forward to the 18 July 2016, and two things came to the IPC’s attention on the same day. The first was on a conference call where the Rio Organising Committee said there was no money left for the Paralympics, it had all been spent on the Olympics. The second was the unfolding of the massive Russian state-sponsored doping scandal, that included athletes from the Olympics and Paralympics, many of whom were due to compete at the upcoming Games.

When the information first came out, Philip travelled to Rio for the Olympics as an IOC member. On 3 August 2016 there was an IPC board meeting, held virtually in the Bonn offices. ‘The Russian Paralympic Committee were called to give their side of the story, and the meeting lasted more than three hours, accompanied by lawyers.’ The Board reconvened again on the 5 August. For Philip, ‘this was the critical meeting where the IPC board took its unanimous decision that the Russian Paralympic Committee would be suspended immediately and thus the Russian para-athletes could not compete at the Rio Paralympic Games. They had contravened the basic principle of sport, fair play. And this wasn’t just me. It was most gratifying for me as President to see that every board member backed that decision. It gave me great strength.’

This was different to the International Olympic Committee. While the IPC instigated a blanket ban on the Russian athletes competing in the Paralympics, the International Olympic Committee had already decided, six days after the publication of the McLaren Report, this was a decision they would not be taking.

But was pressure applied on the International Paralympic Committee to not pursue a blanket ban? ‘Pressure was applied before the final vote was taken on the 5 and announced on the 7 August. And on the morning on the 7th before the press conference. Because of the unanimous support of the IPC board these efforts to change the IPC’s united position had no chance of success.’

The IPC’s decision was televised on the 7 August 2016. As Philip stated in the press conference, ‘the Russian government has catastrophically failed its Para athletes. Their medals over morals disgusts me.’ This was a decision not expected in Russia. Philip recalls how the Russian Minister of Sport Vitaly Mutko stated, ‘out of a clear blue sky came the IPC.’ For many, the decision taken by Sir Philip and the IPC showed the seriousness of the movement. Philip spent a lot of time in Rio meeting various national sports ministers after this announcement. What were their reactions to the IPC decision? He remarked that the majority were: ‘Thank God you’ve done that.’ This is how the world saw the IPC’s decision.

But in Philip’s opinion, why did the Russians compromise the principle of fair play? ‘National prestige wins out over sports integrity. But now we know that national prestige has suffered a heck of a hammering because of the original decision. If you do it illegally and against the spirit of sport, it doesn’t work out for you.’

Despite the controversy, the Russian state-sponsored doping scandal was not the biggest hurdle to the Paralympic Games. As Netflix’s Rising Phoenix examines, the biggest controversy turned out to be the Rio Organising Committee spending the pot saved for the Paralympics on the Olympics. ‘Let’s not think that all of Brazil was not good at organising the games, thank god they were! The fantastic Brazilian and non-Brazilian employees and volunteers, the international federations, and national committees all stepped up to the plate. It was just a poor decision made at the very top of the Rio Organising Committee that led to all the trouble”. As the documentary explores, and I urge you to watch, the Rio 2016 Games turned out to be a major success, the ‘People’s Games,’ as Sir Philip named them.

As Jonnie Peacock, the English sprint runner who won gold at the 100m T44 final in 10.90 seconds recalled, ‘the largest amount of people who went into the Olympic Park was not during the Olympics… it was during the Paralympics.’

Leadership today: ‘Paralympians don’t worry about what doesn’t work, they maximise what does.’

In 2017, Philip stood down as President of the IPC, having seen out his maximum four term limits. As a leader in his field on the world stage, it would be a missed opportunity if I did not turn the conversation to topics such as world leadership and the delayed Tokyo Games.

First, to his tenure at the IPC. Throughout our interview, teamwork is a core principle of Philip’s life and his career. He formed a great team with his wife Jocelyne, as he tells me ‘teams start with two.’ Also at the IPC, he developed this team of two with CEO, Xavier Gonzalez. ‘If the President and the CEO don’t click, then you can forget it.’ So, when I asked Philip what was he most proud of, he introduced his answer with the theme of teamwork, referencing the Rio Games. ‘There was no money left at Rio. The top of the IPC - Xavier, Andrew Parsons (then Vice-President at the IPC) and myself - had to sort out this major problem which was a total lack of money – otherwise, the Games would not take place. I was involved at the highest level with the federal government of Brazil in finding additional funding. However, not only had the organising committee spent all our money, but Brazil was going through political instability with the impeachment of the President of Brazil. So, we had to deal with a government that was in crisis mode. But what I had was an effective team, and we could all trust each other to pursue the tasks we had been assigned. Andrew Parsons with his knowledge both of the Brazilian political steam and its judicial structure was able to free up the transfer of the additional funding finally to both the IPC and the organising committee. Over the fifteen years that I had been president I had always strived to unite the movement, which it definitely wasn’t in 2001. The manner in which National Paralympic Committees, and the manner in which the Paralympic sports united with the IPC board and staff to ensure the success of the games along with a highly competent organising committee at the middle management and below level, filled me with great pride. When I left as president, I was aware we had reached that unity.’

As discussed in Part 1, Philip talked about one of the biggest challenges at the start of his presidency. Financially, this was the lack of money in the IPC coffers and sponsorship. I asked Philip if governments and large companies see the Paralympics as a platform to show off innovation and technological advantage to the world. He told me that as president, he wanted to attract partners because of the way the Paralympics projected sport. His intention was to build a foundation of what the IPC was as an organisation, and then attract others to ‘come together with likeminded ideas.’ However, building a brand takes time. It was only really during his second term 2005-2009, when the Paralympics started to attract commercial partners. But for Philip, he states ‘I think its deeper than that. I think some of the companies that are partners with the IPC see it far more that there is a great fit between the ethics and the principles of their company with the ethics and principles of the IPC. They are here as a company, not to just maximise the highest price they can possibly gain from that product they are producing but have thought about the products that society requires. They feel deep down that they have this partnership built on trust and on principles between the two organisations. That’s how I feel with several of the companies I have been involved with and getting them on board with the IPC. The bottom line is the Paralympics are definitely a platform for companies to show what they are about and what products they produce, but it is definitely important that they have aligned with the IPC to show how they desire to contribute to the betterment of society.’

The unity built over the last fifteen years and seen in Rio is essential in setting up the next Paralympic Games in Tokyo. The Games were originally supposed to have taken place on 24 July 2020, but because of the coronavirus outbreak, they were pushed back to 2021. The hosting of the Games is an important challenge for Japan, especially for the new Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga. As seen in Suga’s address to the United Nations, Suga stated his determination to host the Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games, putting it at the top of his agenda. I asked Philip what he thought were the biggest challenges in getting the Games going. ‘Well you have securing everything and keeping it available for the further year, this includes the training facilities and the same accommodation but also keeping on the organising committee for another year of employment. But then you have the massive question; can it take place anyway? It’s not going to be easy. But I firmly believe the Japanese organisers and the Japanese people deserve every effort from all over the world as these games deserve to take place and they need all the support we can give them.’

Next, we talked about how society can help further develop and support the movement. For Philip, we all had a part to play. He stated how not only governments but everyone should ‘work far harder with our national Paralympic committees and their national governments and show that there is a different way than just caring for people with impairments. We must through positive energy encourage as many people as possible to care for themselves. Through the vehicle of practising sport to a far more fulfilled life. They don’t have to be permanently involved in sport, but it gives them that self-confidence to get into the world and do what they do. We’re about showing the way to a far more active future. You make do with what is left and that is a hell a lot of stuff.’ Philip shared with me the game-changing advice he received from Donna Ritchie, the Aussie captain of the women’s wheelchair basketball team, in Sydney 2000. She said: ‘you maximise with what you’ve got, you don’t worry about what you haven’t got.’

With a wealth of leadership experience, I took the opportunity to ask Philip to reflect on what he thinks of world leaders today. ‘We don’t see much true leadership out there. There is no good in saying there is bad leadership. Leadership can’t be bad. If it’s bad, then that individual or group is not leading. One thing that struck me during COVID-19 is how women have demonstrated that they are far greater at leading than men, who have been incompetent. They’ve got the nation at their heart. We’ve seen women take the lead with the early decisions that have turned out to be right, whereas we’ve seen men mess around, these men who are supposed leaders, but rather have got rid of any competence within their team so they can have people follow their supposed lead. And what you end up with is the second or third raters.’

And what advice would he give aspiring leaders today? ‘Follow your spirit, follow your passion. Don’t let anybody deter you from your feeling for your freedom of thought and your freedom of action within the constraints of what is right for human society. There are certain controlling factors that have to be there otherwise we would be getting nowhere. But believe in yourselves, have a basic principle, learn life skills, learn to get on with people. Positive energy is the greatest energy source in the world. If you’re positive and work with others you can move mountains, and don’t let anybody say that you can’t. And if you feel that you are being controlled unfairly, then fight it. Sometimes you have to be clever about it because the people you are fighting have a bigger arsenal than you have, but you have to be careful, pick the right time to assault the bastion of what’s wrong. You have to fight for the bigger future. What is key here is when the shit hits the fan, you stick together, you work things out from the inside out. Don’t leave the party and try and lead from the outside.’

Having stolen Philip’s morning from him, his wife enters the room. A great opportunity to ask my final question. How would his wife describe him? Jocelyne replied ‘he believes in what he is doing and he does what he believes. He sticks to it and it doesn’t matter what people say to him—trust me. He will carry on.’

Philip breathes a sigh of relief.

Timothy Moots is a Senior Editor at Strife and a PhD Candidate at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London. The author would like to thank Chris McBride for his continued friendship and support in reviewing his work.

From Athlete to International Sport’s Leader: An Interview with Sir Philip Craven (Part 1)

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by Timothy Moots

Sir Philip Craven (Image credit: Athletics.org)

Rising Phoenix, the brand-new Netflix documentary directed by Ian Bonhôte and Peter Ettedgui, combines a history of the Paralympic Games with the personal stories of several of its more famous athletes. The history focuses on the pioneering efforts of Dr. Ludwig Guttman, a neurologist who fled Nazi Germany because he was Jewish and spent the entirety of his life during and after the Second World War caring for British soldiers and advocating for the use of sports for patient rehabilitation. His tireless efforts brought the games to life in 1948, gave them meaning, and made them an official international event at the 1960 Rome Paralympic Games. The documentary is a masterclass of storytelling.

Interspersed with the historical telling of the Paralympics, the documentary tells the stories of Paralympians of the recent past. French long jumper Jean-Baptiste Alazie, who, as an infant, lost his right leg and his mother to a machete attack in Burundi. Italian fencer Beatrice ‘Bebe’ Vio, who despite losing both her hands and legs to meningitis competed for the Gold Medal in the Paralympic Games in Rio 2016 (No spoilers: watch the documentary). These stories, and those of the other participants, will leave you in tears. The Duke of Sussex, Prince Harry, and the former head of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), Sir Philip Craven, offer some background on the behind-the-scenes work done on behalf of the Paralympics.

The desire to celebrate these individuals and the entire concept of the Paralympics, however, misses the same dark side that all sports face. While the build-up, organising, and sporting elements of the documentary revolve around the 2016 Rio Games, one controversy of the Games was entirely missing: the Russian doping scandal. In July 2016, weeks before the Olympic and Paralympic Games were due to commence, Professor Richard McLaren, a sports lawyer and member of an independent commission of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) presented his report on allegations of state-sponsored doping in Russia. The McLaren Report concluded ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ that Russian institutions including the Ministry of Sport and the Federal Security Service (the FSB) had ‘operated for the protection of doped Russian athletes’ within a ‘state-directed failsafe system.’[1] Largely as a result of the decisions taken from the top, the McLaren Report had different consequences for athletes competing in the Olympic and Paralympic Games. While the International Olympic Committee (IOC) cleared two-thirds of the Russian athletes to compete by the start of August, on 7 August 2016, Sir Philip Craven took to the stand at a now-famous press conference to announce that the International Paralympic Committee was to instigate a blanket ban on Russian athletes competing in the Paralympic Games.

This article focuses on an interview I carried out with Sir Philip, exploring the life and mindset of an athlete turned international sports leader. Under Sir Philip’s administration, the Paralympic Games were transformed into one of the largest sporting competitions in the world (in terms of ticket sales, the Paralympic Games is only behind the FIFA World Cup and the Olympic Games). The Paralympics has not been without international challenges, global controversy, and conflict. This interview explored Sir Philip’s life, his motivation, his time competing, to President of the International Paralympic Committee.

‘A First-Class honours in wheelchair basketball’

Sir Philip was born in Bolton in the North of England. He sticks to his northern roots, residing now in Cheshire, and as a Knight of the Realm, he maintains his straight-talking strong northern accent. ‘I have never lost my accent, when anybody tries to talk posh to me then I put it on even more. I’ve met a lot of people who would talk awfully like that, but as a result, my accent became broader.’

During his teenage years, he had been a keen swimmer, tennis, and cricket player (noticeable in our interview is Philip’s fierce English­­‑Aussie rivalry). At the age of 16, he had a rock-climbing accident. The year England won the FIFA World Cup in 1966, he discovered he had severed his spine and could probably no longer use his legs. For most of us, this would have been life-changing news. But for Philip, there was no dwelling on the past. Rather, ‘what’s next?’ was his response.

As he told it: ‘Within two or three days of my accident when I was lying in a hospital bed I saw wheelchair basketball being played outside. Something clicked inside. Nobody told me that I would be in a wheelchair, but that’s how it worked out. There was still sport and I always loved sport. With wheelchair basketball, I found a sport I loved playing. It was no effort to me, I would train with the stand-up basketball team at the University of Manchester, and I would absolutely kill my body in training. I used to do 70 sprints at eighty per cent up and down the court before I started doing free shots. I could hardly lift my arms after that, but that is the way to do it, that is what happened in a tournament.’

Philip’s motivation came from a love of sports, the desire to win when he was competing. For him, ‘if you lost, you learnt. There is always the next game. Even if you won a big tournament, there is always what’s next. And that is what my life has always been like. My wife can’t understand it.’ He had tried other sports, as a natural breaststroker he tried swimming, and as a cricketer, he could catch and throw anything, but he admits he wasn’t as good a batsman. But it was wheelchair basketball he fell in love with ‘like a duck to water.’ Before his first Paralympic Games in Heidelberg, Germany, in 1972, he completed his Geography degree at the University of Manchester, which he admits ‘really was a First-Class honours in wheelchair basketball.’

However, Great Britain never played France in the 1972 Games at Heidelberg. And, as the French had challenged the GB team with sporting chants of ‘we’re better than you,’ for any Englishman this had to result in a match. So, Philip and the team went out to St. Malo in September 1972 but letting the nation down, lost by two points. At that match he signed a contract to play for the Club Olympique de Kerpape in South Brittany, where he played for two seasons, winning the French league and cup two years on the run. On day two he met ‘a wonderful young French woman, Jocelyne. We had a pretty turbulent six months, but then we finally got our act together and she’s been my wife ever since for the last forty-six years.’ However, with no job prospects and wanting to avoid the pathway of a geography teacher, he applied for jobs back in Britain. In 1974, he took a management position at the Coal Board. ‘I chose the Coal Board because I thought they would give me the most time off to play international wheelchair basketball.’

For Philip, time at the Coal Board was a learning opportunity. He was interested in economic history, having studied it at school, learning about the miners and their struggle. He recalled ‘I was a management trainee, but I was certainly not on the side of the management, but the men.’

‘I believe in fighting for freedom. Freedom to do what you want. I suppose people look down on you because you’re in a wheelchair. They still do that by the way, not to me, but others. Perhaps they feel sorry for you and all that, but what they don’t realise is there is a fighting spirit there ready to fight their way out. And it doesn’t matter who you are, watch out if you get in the way.’

Competing as an athlete: ‘You can only reform an organisation from the inside’

From the perspective of an athlete, he saw first-hand the way countries organised the Paralympics. In Mexico in 1968, he recalled how the authorities just were not ready for the Games. In 1972 in Heidelberg, it was a great discovery for what the Paralympics were like. ‘The greatest thing I saw there was when the German TV came down one night to the gym and filmed an America player, Ed Owen. He was a great, great player. He was a polio so he could stand up… and when standing he was 6 ft. 8 standing. But sat down? He was head and shoulders above everyone else. He was shooting for around twenty minutes and it seemed like he never missed a shot. And I thought if he could do it, then so I can.’

Sir Philip Craven defends against Steve Owen (Image credit: Paralympics.org)

The inspiration paid off. Philip enjoyed a successful career as an athlete. He represented GB in wheelchair basketball at five Paralympic Games from 1972 to 1988. As well as competing in the Paralympics, he won several medals including the 1970 Commonwealth Paraplegic Games (Gold), the 1973 and 1975 World Championships (Gold; Bronze), the 1971, 1974, and 1993 European Championships (Gold; Gold; Silver) and the 1994 European Champions Cup (Gold).

But the Games were not without sporting tension. ‘There were plenty of bust-ups’—fights between players, in and out of teams. Nor were they without their controversies. In 1976, Philip and his teammate Gerry Kinsella were handed life bans in a letter from Sir Ludwig Gutman for playing wheelchair basketball. As explained to them in the letter, they had to learn to get on with the other players in the team. But what was causing the friction? Ultimately, Philip and Gerry were trying to reform the sport. ‘We were trying to reform the coaching which was absolutely pathetic. It was also getting the athlete’s voice into whichever sports organisation they were involved in.’ Although they played in the Toronto Games in 1976, they were isolated from the team, perhaps out of the coaches’ fear that they were fomenting revolution. This was a huge ban, as Philip and his teammate, Gerry, were the two of the most talented players on the team, taking GB to European Championships in 1971 and 1974 and the World Championships in 1973. The result of the disagreement and their exclusion led to the gutting of GB wheelchair basketball, which finished seventh at the 1977 European Championships. It was no surprise they were invited back to the team. But what led Philip back to the team? ‘I spoke with my wife, and the two of us agreed that the only way you can reform anything is from the inside. You can keep on firing shots from the outside, but they will never listen. But if you are on the inside, you can sort things out.’ Philip returned to international wheelchair basketball but his teammate Gerry, refusing to return unless he received an apology from Sir Lutwig Gutmann, never played again for GB.

The sport needed reform. And at this critical junction, if Philip hadn’t decided to return to try to reform from the inside, he believes ‘the athletes would have remained as patients in the minds of the medical doctors who basically ran the international and national sports movements.’

His memorable games produce all types of controversy from sport to international affairs.

‘1976 was a revolutionary time as we spoke about. But even when we got out to Toronto the coaching was so incompetent. Training sessions weren’t organised, you had to arrange it yourself. 1980 was a disaster from all points of view. The Paralympics were due to be in Russia, but the Russians sent a famous notification that the games can’t take place because they don’t have any disabled people, so how could they arrange them? I referred to that in the closing ceremony at the 2014 Winter Games in front of Putin. Instead, the Dutch stepped in and the Games took place in Arnhem. But the biggest problem in 1980 was that Dutch organisers got hold of this special soft surface that was being experimented with on basketball at the time. If you were 7 ft. and going for a dunk you would have a cushioned landing. But you couldn’t bloody well push your chairs on the surface! It absolutely killed you. In 1984 the games were at Stoke Mandeville. We beat the eventual gold medallists, France, but we lost to Japan. The biggest thrill to me was beating France.’ But who does his wife cheer on? ‘Well that’s an interesting story, but certainly for out of this interview.’

For every sports player competing on the international stage, it produces a number of rivalries, especially coupled with national pride. For Philip, “The team I always wanted to beat but only achieved it once was the USA. In the International Stoke Mandeville Games in ‘86. We beat the States in the semi-final and then lost the final to the Aussies. From the point of view of playing it was the States, but from the point of view of English and British pride, it would be Australia. I can’t stand losing to the Aussies”.

‘Teams start with two’: elected to the IPC

Philip was no stranger to sports administration. By the time he was standing for President at the IPC in 2001, he was the Performance Director for the GB’s Men’s wheelchair basketball team. But what called him to stand for president?

‘In May 2001 the International Paralympic Committee, now 12 years old, staged its first strategic planning conference in Kuala Lumpur. It was a very good conference, but the mission and the vision that was produced after the conference showed it had been written long before the conference had started. It didn’t include anything that had gone on; despite being the length of a chapter of a bloody book! So of course, I expressed my opinion to the Committee at the end of the conference. [I] had decided things needed to change.’

Returning from Kuala Lumpur, Philip immediately planned with his wife what they were going to do about it. Fortunately, their daughter had just finished university and his son was nearly finished. And this was vital for his decision to put his name down for the nominee as at the time there was no salary for President of the IPC. But as he and his wife said ‘we have to go for it to change things around.’ This was a position that required soul to be poured into it, and one that Philip felt he had to do.

But Philip was not the only potential candidate from Britain. He faced a challenge from another Brit, who not only worked for the Cabinet Office at 10 Downing St, he also had the backing of the Foreign Office. Quite the domestic support for an international position. Like all good British negotiations, Philip set up a discussion with the potential challenger in a pub. ‘He lived near Lincoln and I lived in Crewe, and we met in a pub in Lichfield and talked this through.’ After a couple of pints and deliberating on the future of the Paralympics, the challenger stood aside for Philip to go forward as the nominee by the British Paralympic Association.

Philip’s vision was vital for election to the IPC. He had written communications in several languages, ultimately about bringing far more national Paralympic committees into the Paralympics. Moreover, Philip stated, ‘as well as getting a fantastic wife when playing in France, I also learnt to speak French fluently, which was very important during my election to the IPC. I remember most, if not all, French-speaking African nations voted for me, which really tipped the balance.’ He added further that, ‘the one thing this election taught me was you can have all your information written down, translated into many languages, but don’t think people understand it the first time around. We must have sent it six, seven times to each national Paralympic committee, and it definitely had an effect.’ Philip defeated the other challengers, including one placed to stand to take the votes away from Philip.

Just to show how well received Philip’s election to the IPC was by certain members of the IPC board, he recounted a story starting 24 hours before the result: ‘Each of the four candidates for the position of president was given a single A4 sheet of paper itemising what would happen when the successful candidate had been elected. This was that the new president would be invited onto the stage by the outgoing president, would say a few positive words of endearment for the outgoing president’s previous twelve years of work, would be invited to sign the certificate awarding the outgoing president the Paralympic Order, and to remain on the stage until the outgoing president concluded the general assembly.’ Philip was never invited onto the stage.

Immediately into his first term as President, challenges had to be met. The Board had to build an international brand, and they had to start from the bottom. As in so many aspects of life, money was the biggest issue. ‘We needed cash. We needed to professionalise the organisation without losing the grassroots feel. I met the President of the International Olympics Committee (IOC) Jacques Rogge, who invited me to the Winter Olympics at Salt Lake City, Utah. I met Mitt Romney, who was the President of the Organising Committee, and we had a successful Games. But we never made any money from Salt Lake City. One key change to the IPC management line up happened after Salt Lake City. This was when, with IOC support, Xavier Gonzalez came to work for the IPC in June 2002 as Director of Paralympic Games straight from a similar position at the Salt Lake City Organising Committee. We had so much success going forward as teams start with two, and the president and the CEO formed a crucial team at the top. The way we were going to achieve this was from the Games, and hope sponsorship came after. Unfortunately, at Athens in 2004 where an income of one million dollars should have come into IPC coffers, this had to be spent on enhanced television coverage. Fortunately, Jacques Rogge of the IOC, came to our aid and offered the IPC a loan of one million dollars at zero interest, which permitted us to expand our organisation.’

From 2000-2003 the IOC signed with the IPC a three-part agreement, which ensured that the Paralympic Games would be organised by the same organising committee as that which staged the Olympic Games. The first Paralympic Games to benefit from this new agreement ‘one event, two games’ was Beijing in 2008. ‘This brought in the money we needed for the International Paralympic Committee to cover for the 4-year period. It was Beijing that allowed us to build our international brand.’

This breakthrough at Beijing had actually happened three years earlier, in November 2005 after Philip had been re-elected as President for the first time. Philip met with the Premier of China, Wen Jiabao, in the Great Hall of the People for a meeting scheduled to last only 15 minutes. However, ‘it lasted three times that length with me and him speaking all the time. We talked about what parasport could do for society’ in China. Philip’s diplomacy paid off. After that meeting in February 2006, Hu Jintao, the President of China, declared that the Paralympics would be of equal splendour to the Olympics. Philip recalled: ‘we took off like a space rocket after that.’

For Philip, it was all about developing relationships and getting on with people. ‘During the Beijing games, I couldn’t speak a word to the President’s wife [Liu Yongqing], but we got on like a house on fire. We didn’t understand why, but it was just like that.’

The Road to London 2012

In 2005, London went to the finals in their bid to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games, in competition against Paris, New York, Madrid, and Moscow. What took London to success in their bid against the other sporting city giants?

‘The election of the host city for 2012 took place in Singapore. And first of all, Tony Blair and his wife did an amazing job. They were out there for the majority of the time. They saw so many IOC members. What I think sealed it for London, and I said this to my wife who was rooting for Paris, was Seb Coe’s speech, and additional to that was a film produced by a small London company on how sport can inspire young people, and this compared favourably with the touristy videos produced by New York and Paris. Even after the dress rehearsal, I knew we had it.’[2] But this was not necessarily a done deal. True to the stereotype, the British bid stood firm underdogs against the titans. As the BBC reported in 2005, the two London “unknown film makers”, Daryl Goodrich and Caroline Rowland, will battle against Steven Spielberg and Luc Besson in a bid to win the London Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Nor was the bid given the easiest ride. London was given the ‘death slot,’ the presentation of their bid right after lunch. Philip recalls how New York and Moscow went before Lunch, with Paris and Madrid following London later in the afternoon. But true to Philip’s prediction, following the London bid ‘everyone was buzzing.’ He could safely declare to his wife ‘that we won it.’

One of Philip’s lasting memories from this time was the efforts of Lord Sebastian Coe. ‘He did a handwritten note to each IOC member written on House of Lords notepaper. He made the effort and took the trouble to do things in a very personable way. You only need to swing a few voters to get the outcome that we got.’

Channel 4 advert for the Paralympics Games (Image credit: Channel 4)

Fast forward to 2012. It is the opening night of the Paralympics and the atmosphere in London was electric. Channel 4 released an incredibly successful marketing campaign including TV adverts ‘Meet the Superhumans’. The Channel 4 marketing team had a great strategy that delivered a powerful message: Billboards appeared across London saying, ‘Thanks for the warm-up.’ It created a buzz in London, that in turn generated global attention.

Here I asked Philip to delve into the word ‘superhumans.’ It is a word we hear a lot in the UK. Did it demonstrate a breakthrough?

‘When Channel 4 came up with this. I wasn’t happy with the two words when they were brought into one. Because we’re not superhuman, we’re not greater than being human. We’re super, and we are human. We’re good people. And we happen to be athletes, or coaches. But Channel 4 stuck to superhumans as one word, and it was a fantastic success. It was an advert, an introduction to the Paralympics that was not just showed by Channel 4, but the BBC, ITV, SKY. It was a fantastic way of getting the British public to follow the Paralympics. It paid off.’

When asked about the London Games’ impact on the international stage, for Philip so many teams recalled back on London fondly. The Hungarians said to me ‘they competed with their national team, but they felt that they were back at home’. And this wasn’t with just the Paralympics, but also the Olympics too. The spectators weren’t completely partisan, they supported everybody. And that’s what we find at the Paralympics anyway. I was sat next to the Head of the Paralympic movement in China for the swimming, the same night Ellie Simmonds won one of her medals. He said to me, “there is something extra special here.” I have been to China around 18 times before the games, and for a Chinese man to say that, it takes a lot, especially as the Beijing Games were excellent’.

During the opening ceremony of the Games, Philip sat next to the Queen. Try as I might to discover the private conversations that occurred between the two, he joked: ‘I’ll find myself in the Tower if I share them with you!’

Sir Philip Craven MBE, Queen Elizabeth II, and Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex look on during the Opening Ceremony of the London 2012 Paralympics (Image credit: Chris Jackson/Getty Images Europe)

Part II of this blog will be published on Wednesday 14 October

[1] McLaren Independent Investigation Report – Part 1https://www.wada-ama.org/en/resources/doping-control-process/mclaren-independent-investigation-report-part-i

[2] The Official London 2012 Olympic Games Bid Film “Inspiration”. https://vimeo.com/130599690

Timothy Moots is a Senior Editor at Strife and a PhD Candidate at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London.

COVID-19 and China-US Relations: An Interview with Jia Qingguo

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by Lin Li

Professor Jia Qingguo, former Dean of the School of International Studies at Peking University and member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference’s National Committee (Image credit: SCMP)

The global economy, politics, as well as daily life, ground to a halt after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Worldwide, infection rates rose to staggering heights; leaving a striking amount of casualties in its wake. Despite this situation, the chronic rivalry between the US and China continued, with further pessimism on the rise and little hope of cooperation anytime soon. As is now usual, Lin Li virtually met with Professor Jia Qingguo for an interview on US-China relations during and after the pandemic. Originally conducted in Chinese, the interview, and its subsequent translation are made by the interviewer.

The failure to cooperate against COVID-19

At the outbreak of the pandemic, the world expected China and the United States to work together in stemming its spread. However, the opposite is true. Instead, the mutual suspicion between the two countries escalated further from an initial trade war to become a war on all but the kinetic front; with little hope of such rivalry diminishing in the near future. The reasons for this situation, Jia Qingguo believes, is because the political environment in the United States sustains a highly emotional consensus on the government’s tough stance towards China. Such sentiment led to the ideological and political differences between these nations to become more pronounced. As a result, the population of each country tends to see the one as the polar opposite of the other.

‘After the outbreak of COVID-19, the US government poorly implemented measures against its spread. Out of domestic political considerations, it tried to pass the buck to China, which led to more negative interactions between the two countries. Moreover, in the heat of the U.S. presidential election, both sides of the campaign intend to play tough on all matters related to China. This situation is not beneficial for the bilateral relationship. Of course, that does not mean there is no room for improvement. Domestically, consensus on China is based on very particular perceptions of the country,’ Professor Jia argued. ‘These perceptions may not be entirely in line with reality. If China does a good job in explaining itself and adjusts some policies, I think it is still possible to change the American public’s position on China.’

Jia Qingguo believes that, globally, the response to the pandemic has been lacking in leadership. With the US finding itself bogged down in the fight against the pandemic, the virus further exacerbated previously existing suspicions against China. In such a situation, it is difficult to find any grounds for effective cooperation. ‘The Chinese government has been expressing its willingness to cooperate and has made great efforts, actively helping other countries to fight the virus. As President Xi Jinping said recently at the Extraordinary G20 Leaders’ Summit, China believes that the best way to fight the global pandemic is through international cooperation.’

China and the US: more alike than one would think

‘I do not think that China and the United States are that different in nature,’ Professor Jia argued. ‘Although the two countries have different ideologies and political systems; both do advocate democracy and freedom, the rule of law, and the market economy. In fact, these three elements are all listed as China’s official core values, although there is still a big difference in how these values are put in practice. Both China and the United States are also beneficiaries of the existing international order. Both countries hope for stability, peace, and international prosperity. They also advocate free trade and the need to jointly address global challenges such as climate change, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, international terrorism, and international crime. In fact, one could argue that the two countries are more similar than many may believe. If we can emphasise these common values and interests, without focusing on the ideological and institutional differences, the bilateral relationship could well be stabilised again.’

Professor Jia contends that the United States and many Americans remain doubtful about Chinese intentions, indeed in part because of their perceptions about the country. For example, realists assume that when a great power rises, it will expand and challenge the existing power. This so-called Thucydides Trap assumes that, as China rises, the country will challenge the US; thereby provoking a confrontation. Others believe that the United States is able to change China to its liking. This latter group is very disappointed that China has not made the changes they expected it to make.

The effects of COVID-19 on China-US relations

According to Jia Qingguo, the pandemic has both positive and negative effects on China-US relations. Its negative impact is taken by extremists on both sides as an opportunity to vent their discontent and to speculate on the other side’s culpability. Riddled with undertones of a conspiracy, such assessments feature accusations of intentionally creating or spreading the virus, thereby even advocating war.

At the same time, the virus has become the common enemy of the two countries, the fundamental interests of which require cooperation to fight against this enemy together. This mutual fight requires both China and the US to strengthen their information-sharing processes, to enhance bilateral cooperation in the development of medication, to provide anti-epidemic supplies to each other through donation and trade, and finally, to coordinate international cooperation.

Nevertheless, Jia Qingguo believes that the chance for cooperation has been diminishing as a result of negative interactions between the two sides. In the post-pandemic era, both countries should reflect on what the main reasons and factors are for the deterioration of the relations, as a basis upon which to formulate more reasonable policies.

Obstacles for China-US cooperation in fighting the pandemic

‘The two biggest obstacles in China-US Cooperation in fighting the pandemic are psychological and political. Psychologically speaking, both countries are faced with the problem of how to perceive the other properly. In recent years, the mainstream of American foreign policy has taken an increasingly extreme view of China, always interpreting China’s words and deeds from the worst possible angle. China also has some speculations about the intentions of the United States from the perspective of the ideologues and offensive realists. Such mindsets make it difficult for cooperation to be sustained. Politically, and based on the different interests and value orientations, there are people on both sides who deliberately exaggerate the other side’s negative rhetoric and actions; even inciting confrontation as inevitable. In so doing, the level of distrust between the two countries is growing. It is likely that Chinese people have similar views on the United States.’

Under such circumstances, Jia Qingguo continues, people on both sides should objectively and pragmatically assess the China-US relationship and take positive measures to stabilise and promote cooperation. Both countries are stakeholders in the international order and hope for world stability and prosperity. Peaceful coexistence and cooperation are in their best interests and feature as the foundation of this bilateral relationship. China and the US could strengthen their cooperation, for example, by exchanging anti-pandemic experience, collaborate in developing medication, and coordinate economic policies in order to stabilise the global economy. Only through cooperation can the two sides effectively overcome the pandemic and improve the relationship.

The lowest point in the past four decades?

‘Whether it is the lowest point since the establishment of diplomatic ties forty years ago depends on how you measure it.’ Jia Qingguo argues, ‘I think politically and security-wise it certainly is. But when it comes to the economy and other aspects, I think we still made much progress. Nevertheless, a further deterioration of the relationship is in the books. The Trump administration seems determined to stir up some kind of crisis in the relationship in order to improve the President’s chances for a second term. China also has domestic public opinions, so when the United States closed the Houston Consulate, China felt that it had to close the Chengdu Consulate in response. Indeed, if the United States decides to take certain measures, the Chinese government may find it necessary to respond in kind. As a result, the relationship may end up in a disastrous spiral of escalation. I hope that both sides can calm down and handle bilateral relations in a more pragmatic way. It is complicated, but I think both sides should at least make some efforts.’

‘Recently, many people are talking about the possibility of war between China and the US. I think that is still very unlikely. First, the cost of war between China and the US is too high for both countries to bear. It has become an unwritten law that nuclear powers do not fight wars, since there is no winner in such a conflict. As long as leaders of the two countries are rational, they will try their best to avoid war. It is also very hard to persuade their people to fight such a kind of war. The American political system with its checks and balances means that only when most people say yes, could the government go to war with foreign countries, especially with nuclear states.’

If not nuclear, what kind of war?

‘The war on the scientific and technological fronts has begun and will continue. However, there will also be limits. The blocking of Huawei or other Chinese high-tech companies hurts not only China but also the US, because these Chinese companies are important customers of American companies in the high-tech industry as well. If uncontrolled, the war in science and technology will break the existing ecology of the research and development as well as production chains, with a devastating impact on all countries in the world.’

China and the United States are facing a crisis of trust. America’s distrust of China is particularly prominent in its approach to China’s development of high technology like 5G. Because of the high degree of penetration of technology into people’s life and work, trust is needed more than ever. With this in mind, Huawei has offered to release the source code of some of its software, in an attempt to soften concerns on the safety of personal information and its storage. Jia Qingguo argues: ‘In terms of technology, we should have more communication and take necessary measures to reassure each other. The Americans also have a responsibility to reassure China that Microsoft and Google will not harm China’s national security. Both sides must make a lot of effort to rebuild some trust for the future of our relationship. However, I do not believe the Trump Administration will do so. I hope the next government can.’

‘The possibility of a financial war cannot be ruled out either. But this will bring even more harm to the US. Unless the two countries become extremely confrontational, it will be difficult for the United States to make such a decision.’ Trump’s views on the international economy remain those of the 19th century. For example, the American President thinks that the United States has suffered a great loss in trade with China because it runs a large deficit with the country. In fact, many products exported from China to the United States include parts, services, or patented technologies from other countries, including the US. Trump assumes the goods exported from one country to another are 100 per cent made in this country. It is simply not true.

‘Some people are wondering what happens if the United States refuses to honor the U.S. Treasury bonds purchased by China. I think the chance for that to happen is very low, because such action may trash the credibility of the US. Some people say that the United States will forcibly terminate its financial exchanges with China, which is even less likely, for the same reason that this will cause great harm to the US, and other countries will not agree either.’

Therefore, whether it is to fight a war of science or technology or finance or trade, the costs are likely to be prohibitive. The Trump administration may not rational but in the end, people in the United States may stop it.

In conclusion, Jia Qingguo argues that in the long run, China and the US have to find a way to coexist peacefully and cooperate when needed because their interests and survival demand it. ‘As stakeholders in peace and prosperity, China and the US have many things in common, and that hasn’t changed despite the recent round of conflicts.’

Lin Li is a doctoral researcher at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London and a Senior Editor at Strife. Lin completed her BA in Law at the School of International Studies, Peking University in Beijing; her MA in Geopolitics, Territory and Security at Department of Geography, KCL; and her MA in History of War, War Studies, also KCL. Lin previously worked as Teaching Assistant for the School of International Studies and a Research Assistant for the Institute of International and Strategic Studies of Peking University, as well as Program Manager for Peking University’s Office of International Affairs. Lin is an Observer of the PKU Youth Think Tank since 2018. A Chinese Zheng musician, Lin has published concerto CDs with the Chinese Film Symphony Orchestra and held a series of concerts internationally.

 

 

 

 

Future Warfighting in the 2030s: An Interview with Franz-Stefan Gady

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by Ed Stacey

British Royal Marines 45 Commando testing the Black Hornet 2 Unmanned Air System at the Army Warfighting Experiment 2017 (Image credit: Crown Copyright)

On 15 July 2020, Ed Stacey sat down with Franz-Stefan Gady to discuss the International Institute for Strategic Studies’ (IISS) upcoming future warfighting project. After introducing this new piece of work, Franz-Stefan offers some thoughts on the changing nature of warfare, the roles that emerging technologies and the nascent domains of space and cyber might play in future conflicts, and the need to move away from purely technological discussions about future warfighting.

For more information on the IISS and the latest analysis of international security, strategy, and defence issues, visit them here or follow them on Facebook, Twitter (@IISS_org), and Instagram (@iissorg).

 

ES: What is the IISS future warfighting project?

FG: The future warfighting project has just recently kicked off and looks at how great and medium-sized powers would fight high-intensity wars amongst peer and near-peer adversaries in the 2030s. So, what sort of capabilities will militaries need to develop over the next couple of decades in order to deal with specific operational problems in future warfighting scenarios? And how will these powers integrate emerging cyber and space strategies into existing, more classically conceived, options for kinetic and cognitive warfare?

The project explores future warfighting through three dimensions: space and cyber, kinetic and cognitive. Space and cyber refer to the application of primarily offensive cyber capabilities, supported by space assets, in cyberspace (including electronic warfare operations). Kinetic pertains to the use of conventional and nuclear weapons systems and the ‘traditional’ domains of air, land and sea. While the cognitive dimension includes an examination, not only of the use of information warfare but also the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning into military hardware to gain information dominance at the strategic level and to influence decision-making at both the civilian and military level.

It is a fairly broad topic, and notably, we take technology as a starting point. By this, I am referring to the fact that a lot of future warfare discussions focus mostly on technological capabilities and their impact on warfighting. Yet I believe that such capabilities in themselves are fairly agnostic when it comes to triggering change. You can only really trigger change when you merge technological capabilities with new tactics, the right operational concepts and the right organisational structure.

So, the project takes technology as the starting point of a much deeper analysis of these new ideas. In doing so, we are trying to fill a gap that not many other institutions talking about future warfighting are looking at.

ES: What is your methodology for the project?

FG: As I mentioned, we are principally looking at future warfighting through three dimensions: space and cyber, kinetic and cognitive. We use these three dimensions to conduct comparative case studies on how various countries are thinking about future warfighting; and to divide up the literature, all the documents and interviews, and the military capabilities.

The first part of the project looks mostly at how China, Russia and the US would fight a high-intensity war after a breakdown of conventional deterrence. So not really grey-zone scenarios or hybrid warfare (though these are relevant) but rather high-intensity combat between great powers, which we have not really seen for many decades.

ES: What are your main findings so far?

FG: It is very early on, and I am hesitant to draw firm conclusions. But one of my hypotheses is that these three dimensions will increasingly merge into one over the next decade, and simultaneously, we will see a rebalance of conventional kinetic operations vis-à-vis cyber, space and information operations in any high-intensity great power war scenario. At the operational level, this is a result of the presumptive Chinese emphasis on system destruction warfare, the US attempt to move towards decision-centric manoeuvre warfare and the Russian push towards new-generation warfare.

All three forms of warfare attempt to move away from an attrition-centric approach, that emphasises the kinetic annihilation of an adversary’s forces, in favour of an evolving model of dislocation and disruption, that entails undermining an adversary’s battle network in all three dimensions. In this new form of network-centric warfare, you do not try to destroy your enemy and its main force; instead, you try to disable its networks and compromise its ability to fight.

A second hypothesis is that all three great powers will be increasingly capable of fielding precision-strike capabilities in all three dimensions in the 2030s. This will culminate in the establishment of a multi-dimension precision-strike regime, defined by the ability of a great power to conduct precision-strikes in the kinetic, cyber, space and cognitive dimensions against platforms, networks and humans at all ranges and in all warfighting domains.

And these two hypotheses draw attention to a third, which is that armed forces have a cultural problem in being overly focused on kinetic capabilities. My question would be, is this going to be a disadvantage for militaries in the future, as we move from a platform-centric approach to a more network-centric approach? (By platforms I mean tanks, ships, missiles and so on, or how we usually assess the military capabilities of a country – and I think these sorts of assessments are going to become less relevant in the future.)

There is a lot of resistance to this shift. For example, I have just spent some time looking at what is happening in the US, and the US Congress, interest groups and people within the Department of Defense are hesitant to give up certain capabilities that might no longer work in future warfighting scenarios, so-called legacy platforms. It is a huge problem. How exactly can you phase out legacy platforms and what are you going to replace those platforms with?

For instance, are we really going to have manned aircraft in 20 to 30 years from now? The answer is yes, but maybe we need to have a new role for manned aircraft. And maybe we are going to have more autonomous systems operating in the battlespace. What is the role of these new armed platforms? Are they going to be flying command and control centres, controlling autonomous swarms in the air or on the ground or in the oceans?

This question of integration is going to be crucial. You are still going to have legacy platforms 20 years down the road: you are still going to have the F-35 and maybe the F-15; you are still going to have most of the ships that you see in navies today – the aircraft carriers, the destroyers and manned submarines. But how do you integrate these capabilities with new platforms that are being developed? And by integrating, I mean how do you come up with a good operational concept to conduct a successful campaign in the future against a potential peer or near-peer adversary?

You cannot really talk about future warfighting unless you start off with a problem statement. Essentially, what is the operational environment you are envisioning in the future? And from there you try to come up with the kind of force structure you need, the kind of operational concepts you need and then also doctrine (how you train your force to fight in these future conflicts). And, of course, you need the resources and the strategy that comes along with all of this. So, it is a long, long process – and that is what we are trying to shed some light on.

It is a huge problem. How exactly can you phase out legacy platforms and what are you going to replace those platforms with?

ES: Which domain, if any, will be the most important in future warfighting? And does any domain have revolutionary potential?

FG: As I said, I think a key question behind modernisation efforts in China, the US and Russia (and we will also look at medium-sized powers, such as the UK, Germany and Japan – states that have strong military capabilities and relatively high defence budgets) is how they integrate these different capabilities. Ultimately, there are going to be trade-offs. And countries like China, Russia and the US – mostly China and the US, but its partially true for Russia – can handle these trade-offs better than smaller powers because they have the resources to invest in both legacy platforms and new capabilities and create a better force structure. Most other militaries will not have the money to do both, so they have to be very careful about where and what they spend their money on.

This makes your question a pertinent one, in the sense that states do need to prioritise funding when it comes to these capabilities. You can have all the operational concepts in the world and the doctrine, but if you do not have the capability then it just does not work – it is impossible to become an effective warfighting force.

So, when we talk about a new age of network-centric warfare, we are really talking about the creation of what you would call a military Internet of Things (IoT). That is a virtual and kinetic kill chain that creates networks that link the sensor to the shooter in a triangular relationship, or a ‘system of systems’. The sensor identifies the target and then through a network relays that information to the shooter, whether a manned aircraft, a missile or an offensive cyber capability. And the idea behind this is that a military commander would much faster be able to identify a target on a sensor and then through the military IoT direct fire, whether virtual or kinetic strikes, to degrade the target or destroy it.

Obviously, this opens up new attack vectors in cyberspace. And so, you cannot really implement any of these concepts properly unless you have extremely strong cyber defences, and cyber defence almost always entails offensive cyber capabilities.

I think an important technological capability to develop and hone in the future will be AI-enabled cyber defensive and offensive capabilities. When we think about the first officially AI-enabled weapons platform, it is probably going to be an offensive cyber weapon because they are easier to deploy than, let us say, a lethal autonomous weapon system like an autonomous tank or missile. This is because of all the risks that are still involved and the fundamental lack of trust in these platforms unless you test them at great length.

So, to a certain degree, the foundational element of network-centric warfare will be strong cyber defences and, ultimately, AI-enabled cyber defence capabilities. This will entail advances in AI and cyber defence. But if you do not have these, your network is going to be immensely vulnerable and attacks from the electromagnetic spectrum could turn the lights off, so to speak, of any of your networks. At the same time, however, you cannot of course neglect any other capabilities or domains.

In terms of revolutionary new capabilities that are going to fundamentally change the future of warfare, I do not think you will find these in hypersonics, for instance, because they just improve existing capabilities – they will be evolutionary. But when it comes to AI-enabled cyber capabilities, I think these have revolutionary potential.

I have to caveat this, though, by noting that it is very difficult to assess these capabilities because we have not seen high-intensity combat between great powers in which they have been deployed. And this is true of even strategic offensive cyber weapons, let alone AI-enabled cyber weapons. One scholar once called it the ‘fog of peace’, and we really do operate in a fog of peace when it comes to deliberations about future warfighting.

In terms of historical context, we are very much like where we were in the 1920s and 30s when it came to airpower. Because in the First World War you had airpower capabilities but by no means did airpower reach its full potential. It took the Second World War and the aerial campaigns of the Allies and the Axis powers to see whether some of those propositions in the 1920s and 30s turned out to be true.

A lot people said that airpower was going to be the only necessary military capability in future wars; that you could essentially win any future conflict with bombers and fighter aircraft, and that you would not need land forces or sea forces anymore – that airpower makes everything obsolete. That turned out to be untrue. And then there were the others who said: ‘Oh, well, airpower is completely useless; you do not really need strategic bombing capabilities; we only use aircraft for tactical purposes, like reconnaissance and tactical strikes’. And that also turned out to be untrue. At the end of the day, airpower had a big impact but it was, I think, by no means the decisive factor in the Allies’ victory.

So, we are in a similar situation in the sense that there will be extreme positions when it comes to network-centric warfare and all of these new capabilities, particularly cyber capabilities. At the end of the day, the truth will also probably be somewhere in-between the two extremes: one side saying that cyber is not going to be that important, that it is really just an auxiliary to other capabilities, and then the other, saying that cyber is going to be a revolutionary capability.

The difference, though – and I think why cyber has the potential to be more important than airpower, for example, or even nuclear weapons – is that cyber permeates all other dimensions and warfighting domains. It really is a foundational element of warfighting. Without strong cyber capabilities today, you cannot conduct conventional military operations because every system that is in a tank or an aircraft or a ship – all command and control systems – are immensely vulnerable to cyber-attacks. Any idea of new warfighting has to take that into account.

So, I would say cyber and AI-enabled cyber capabilities probably have the biggest potential to revolutionise future warfighting. Of course, there are other capabilities of note as well. But cyber is slightly underestimated by a lot of military planners and defence departments, despite probably having the biggest potential.

ES: You note the revolutionary potential of AI-enabled cyber capabilities. More generally, do you think AI as a technology is a game-changer or is it overhyped? And is an AI arms race inevitable or perhaps already even happening?

FG: I generally do not like the idea that there is an arms race in AI happening. Firstly, AI is not a weapon system or a military capability per se: it is a general-purpose technology, as some scholars have pointed out. And so, we should not consider AI in isolation but instead how this technology might be combined with weapon systems.

In the short term, I do not foresee revolutionary changes when it comes to AI-enabled capabilities. But in the long-term, it is definitely possible.

In the short-term, what we are going to see is an accelerated pace of military operations from AI first arriving in non-lethal roles. And this is already underway when it comes to intelligence collection and analysis, support elements for command and control, decision-making support, and Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities – where I see huge potential for AI, such as in AI-enabled satellites.

It is a hugely important field, and AI does have the potential – just like the combustion engine 100 years ago – to revolutionise warfare. But I would not look at it in isolation, and that is an important point to note about discussions around future military technological capabilities in general. What people usually get wrong is not so much predicting a particular technology but rather how that technology will combine with the wider defence architecture to field an effective weapon system.

If you think about the Second World War, for example, you had radio communications, the combustion engine, advances in armour protection, as well as in the ballistics and mechanics of high-velocity guns. But it was only through merging all of these new capabilities that we created the tank – in other words, only in combination did they create a ‘revolutionary’ weapons platform. Yet even that alone did not do that much. All of the Western militaries had tanks and fairly advanced tanks that were relatively equal in terms of technical capabilities. The true change came when the Germans devised a revolutionary operational concept that later on was adapted to doctrine (operational concepts being the precursors to doctrine). By combing all of these technological developments with a revolutionary approach to warfighting, the Germans enabled not a revolution in military affairs but a decisive victory in the battlespace.

In the short-term, what we are going to see is an accelerated pace of military operations from AI first arriving in non-lethal roles.

So, I guess the major point here is that technology alone is not going to determine the character of future wars. It is really as much, and if not more, about how you change your organisational structures, adopt doctrine and so on. And within this, there is the key question of how you integrate all of these new platforms and approaches into an overall force structure that gives you the most capabilities to meet future operational problems.

To return to your question, I guess we have to ask: firstly, what are the most important technologies that AI could be combined with? Secondly, what would be the best operational concepts and doctrine to exploit the full potential of these newly combined technological capabilities? And thirdly, what sort of organisational structure and force posture does your military need to execute missions that exploit the full potential of these new capabilities?

ES: Thinking about other technologies, how significant is it that China is overtaking, or perceived to be overtaking, the US in various areas of research on quantum technology? In the context of the tech war too, is it significant that China is making ground in this space?

FG: Yes, I think so. Quantum technology is an interesting one because we are still probably many years away from fielding military capabilities when it comes to quantum radars or quantum sonar. There is also a debate over whether it will have any impact at all in the military domain. And so, I am hesitant to make any predictions about quantum technological capabilities and their impact.

To answer your point about competition between the US and China, as I mentioned earlier with regards to AI, I just do not see all of these tech races as really being tech races. Firstly, there is a lot of cooperation between the US and China in many fields, and there is more collaboration than you would think in developing these emerging technologies. Secondly, you have to question whether these technologies will actually have a significant impact on the modern battlespace and to what degree they will revolutionise future warfighting.

Just to illustrate why I always try to move away from strictly technological discussions when we talk about future conflict. My approach to military power is based on what the defence analyst Stephen Biddle called the ‘modern system’ of force employment. That is, military power is based, on the one hand, on combined arms operations that increase the effects of precision-guided munitions (what I call the multi-dimension precision-strike regime), whilst on the other, cover and concealment and the dispersion of your forces, for example through stealth technology or the suppression of ISR capabilities, simultaneously offer protection from an adversary’s precision-strike capability.

The aim of combined arms operations is to integrate different services, capabilities and platforms to achieve a decisive effect in the battlespace. In the modern battlespace, the emergence of precision-guided munitions requires militaries to conceal their forces because, in order to conduct these operations successfully, usually you need to be able to mass your forces to achieve a breakthrough on the frontline.

And combined arms operations are really difficult to pull off. Combining and coordinating capabilities and strikes from land forces, naval forces and air forces to achieve some sort of effect and a breakthrough in the battlespace is immensely difficult – and something only a few militaries have been capable of achieving.

To take the example of the first Gulf War, there was a decisive victory by the US and her allies, but this was not just down to superior technologies: it was technology integrated with combined arms operations, and the ability to hide forces and conceal movements, that achieved this one-sided victory. The other side, Saddam Hussain, also had a powerful military and fairly advanced technological capabilities (although not as powerful or advanced as the US). But it was impossible for him to achieve meaningful effects in the battlespace because, on the one hand, he failed to hide his forces from precision strikes, and on the other, to conduct combined arms operations to counter the US and her allies.

Saddam probably could have conducted some form of combined arms operations against elements of US ground forces, by using artillery strikes in combination with tanks, infantry and air strikes. But he failed to coordinate his attacks and successfully manoeuvre his forces. These are the key tenants of any military these days, and the ability of a military to execute these operations is currently the decisive factor in warfighting.

Revolutionary change in the future battlespace is most likely to happen if these warfighting methods are made ineffective by new technological capabilities. Ones that make cover, concealment and dispersion through camouflage or stealth technology, as well as combined arms operations in general, obsolete. That, in essence, are capable of detecting every move on the battlefield and provide complete situational awareness. To date, no such technological capability exists – but I accept that may change in the coming decades.

When it comes to stuff like AI-enabled ISR capabilities or quantum radar and quantum sonar, if these capabilities can facilitate that sort of situational awareness then you might have a revolutionary technology on your hands. Until such a technology exists, however, combined arms operations, or multi-domain operations, will remain the most important factor when it comes to military power.

ES: And finally, how important is space going to be as a future warfighting domain?

FG: New space-based capabilities are crucial to how all major military powers exercise command and control over their forces. They also directly link to the ability to conduct offensive cyber operations and campaigns, which will be a – and if not the – crucial component in any future military campaign. For one thing, space and cyber permeate all other war-fighting domains and so are the new centre of gravity for high-intensity military operations.

Whoever dominates space will have massive advantages in the cyber domain, and without space capabilities, you are essentially not capable of conducting modern military operations. So, all major military powers have been working to deny potential adversaries the use of these capabilities, which until recently basically meant GPS type satellites.

China and Russia have recognised the US is particularly vulnerable when it comes to space.

No longer in the future, however, are you going to have just a handful of GPS satellites you depend on for ISR capabilities, targeting, early warning detection systems and so on. A lot of current discussions in the US are about making ISR architecture less reliant on space capabilities and a desire to diversify and build more resilient space architecture. As a result, we will see a proliferation of smaller, cheaper, low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites in order to create more redundancy in capabilities and to increase the resilience of space architecture and battle networks.

Networks of hundreds to thousands of smaller, more expendable LEO satellites are much harder to disrupt than larger GPS-type satellites. LEO satellites, such as the ones to be developed by OneWeb in the UK, can increase situational awareness in the battlespace, for example by transmitting high-resolution, real-time video directly into the cockpit of military aircraft, such as the F-35, and decrease the reliance on GPS for these tasks. They could also be used to monitor the activities of adversaries and in developments in areas such as optical clocks, which are necessary for accurate positioning and enable high-precision, reliable navigation (and as a result precision-strikes) without the limitations of GPS systems.

China and Russia have recognised the US is particularly vulnerable when it comes to space. They have tested anti-satellite weapons and have been developing cyber capabilities to degrade and disrupt and manipulate satellites. Having said that, the US will continue to dominate the space domain for the foreseeable future.

So, it is going to be a hugely important warfighting domain because it links to other key capabilities: it is very difficult to pull off precision-strikes without space assets, and it is very difficult to conduct offensive cyber operations without space-based capabilities. And it is already a very important domain, which is why countries are working to build more resilient space architectures and, at the same time, looking at alternatives to existing platforms.

It is extremely difficult, though, to achieve uncontested superiority in space because of the nature of the domain – which makes assets immensely vulnerable to all sorts military operations, whether kinetic strikes, such as anti-satellite weapons, cyber-attacks or electronic warfare. And there is a ‘nuclear’ option in space too: a series of kinetic strikes against satellites causing massive debris, which would knock out a large percentage of existing space-satellite architecture.

Ed Stacey is an MA Intelligence and International Security student at King’s College London and a Student Ambassador for the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). The #IISStudent Ambassador programme connects students interested in global security, political risk and military conflict with the Institute’s work and researchers.

Franz-Stefan Gady is a Research Fellow at the IISS focused on future conflict and the future of war. Prior to joining the IISS, he held various positions at the EastWest Institute, the Project on National Security Reform and the National Defense University, conducting field research in Afghanistan and Iraq, and also reported from a wide range of countries and conflict zones as a journalist.

Cyber Security in the Age of COVID-19: An Interview with Marcus Willett

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by Ed Stacey

The World Health Organisation has reported a fivefold increase in cyber attacks during COVID-19 (Image credit: Getty Images)

On 22 April 2020, Ed Stacey sat down with Marcus Willett to discuss his recent article for the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). Marcus’ analysis draws parallels between the current coronavirus crisis and global cybersecurity challenges and warns against the Balkanisation of either response. In this exclusive interview, he expands on his thinking.

For more information on the IISS and the latest analysis of international security, strategy, and defence issues, visit them here or follow them on Facebook, Twitter (@IISS_org), and Instagram (@iissorg).

ES: In your article, you explore the idea of a global cyber ‘pandemic’ – what do you mean by this?

Marcus Willett: What the article tries to show is that we like to take a lot of language in the world of cybersecurity from the world of dealing with medical crises – like the horrible one we are currently facing. For example, terms like virus and infection. However, what we have not started doing is using words like endemic and pandemic. The article was merely trying to go that extra step and consider the applicability of these words to what is happening in cyberspace. If you just look at cyber-criminality, for instance, techniques that were developed by people in the most advanced and connected nations have now spread, and are being used, all over the globe, by individuals, hacktivist groups, criminals and, of course, states.

Sitting here at the moment, if a cybercriminal was to try and defraud us, that criminal is as likely to be in Eastern Europe, or Nigeria, or Vietnam, as anywhere else. So what I was trying to show is that the use of cyber has spread globally and that you can get infected – through your network or your device – from anywhere around the globe. ‘Pandemic’ feels like quite a good word to describe that phenomenon, particularly since we are all using it at the moment.

ES: Is there a cure for the cyber pandemic?

Marcus Willett: I do not think there is a silver bullet-like vaccine; a cure is more about how nations might approach the problem. The trouble with people who have worked in my sort of background is the thinking that there is always, waiting for you, some technical silver-bullet – a wonderful technical solution that will solve the world’s problems when it comes to cyber. I do not think that is right.

If you think about offensive cyber, for example, the incentives are not great for states to talk about their most sensitive capabilities. This is because the most advanced states still think they have got such an advantage in terms of cyber that it does not make sense to reveal what they have developed to the world. But I believe states need to start a dialogue about the risks involved in some of these cyber capabilities, building on stuff that is already being done around developing norms of behaviour, to think about how we might better manage them.

So, I think a cure is more in the territory of better understanding the risks and better managing those risks than pursuing technical solutions. And the only way we are going to get to that is to recreate the sort of cooperation we see with the response to the current health pandemic. Additionally, I think that the best way of having those sorts of conversations is not to start at the most difficult end, which is, say, to try and work out some big deterrence theory and proliferation control treaty around offensive cyber capabilities. Because that is going to get silence from some of the big actors from the very beginning.

Instead, it is better to pick an area like cybercrime, where all states have a vested interest in trying to combat the defrauding of their economies and use that as a way to start the dialogue between states about how we can better manage these risks. Always, however, with the goal of an internationally agreed regime over what is a responsible use of cyber capabilities. The same way we have ended up with the understanding that it is generally unacceptable that people use barrel bombs and cluster bombs – that a guided missile is more acceptable.

ES: Is the United Nations (UN) the best space for this dialogue to take place?

Marcus Willett: Whilst it needs to be under the auspices of the UN, I cannot help but feel there is a certain group of nations that need to start the conversation. I would love to see, particularly, the Americans and the Chinese talking about cybercrime. That would start a dialogue that might help bring some of the conversations they are having around technologies – take Huawei, for example – into a better place – and where they need to be. If we carry on with this sort of competitive conversation around the future of cyberspace, I think we will end up with results that are not very good for likeminded nations like ourselves and our allies.

ES: Russia has been quite active at the UN on cybercrime. Do you see their recent proposal as a viable alternative to the Budapest Convention?

Marcus Willett: One of the reasons I suggested the US and the Chinese are to draw that distinction with the Russians, who are quite fond of coming to the UN with grand proposals that are, frankly, a little bit transparent. I did a conference in Berlin last year on a panel around cyber and question number one from the audience came from the Russian cyber representative to the UN Group of Governmental Experts (GGE). She laid out, not a question, but a statement about how the Russians were the good guys around cyber, claiming that they had been arguing for all sorts of things – like the cybercrime treaty you just mentioned – and for the outlawing of any military use of cyber capabilities. This was just after the Skripal incident and when that GRU unit was exposed at the Hague. So you can imagine how the Dutchman to my right reacted; it was an ‘actions speak louder than words’ situation.

A more realistic conversation with the Russians, since a lot of cyber-criminality emanates from bits of their territory, would be around legal jurisdictions and Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters (MLAC) arrangements – to try and get their assistance in pursuing some of this criminal activity. As you know, they are very unlikely to agree to that. And these are difficult conversations because they are likely to end up in accusation and counter-accusation.

I like the idea of the Americans and the Chinese talking about it; both with a vested interest, both without the past of being connected to cybercriminal gangs. That has got a higher chance of success. Yes, the Russians need to be brought into those sorts of conversations, but I would not start there because, again, it feels like too difficult territory. Cybercrime between the US and China: easier territory. Cybercrime with Russia: very difficult territory. Offensive cyber and military capabilities: very difficult with everybody. It is about trying to find those baby steps.

ES: Is cooperation between the US and China on cybercrime possible in the current context of the ‘tech war’?

Marcus Willett: What I am trying to argue is that there is more potential for a conversation around cybercrime than there is for a conversation on anything else, given the context of the tech war. It would be the best way of starting a dialogue because it is a rare area of mutual interest. Of course, you would have to start the conversation with a very clear definition of what you meant by a ‘cybercriminal’. But there are millions being defrauded from the Chinese economy by cybercrime, just as there is from the US economy; they are both targets of cybercriminals. So, you have got a better chance of starting a conversation there than anywhere else.

Does that feel overly idealistic given what is going on? I would have thought there was a chance if you just had the tech war or even just the trade war. However, if this escalates into finger-pointing around COVID-19 and an inquiry turns into making China some sort of a pariah state, it would be less likely. And you can see already how some of the stuff coming out of the White House is only going to antagonise the US’ relationship with China even more. So, no – perhaps the prospects are not as good as they were a few months back, but it is about more than just the tech war.

ES: Why do states such as Russia and North Korea use cyber organised criminal groups (OCGs) – either by shielding or cooperating with, and perhaps even masquerading as, them – to augment their cyber capability?

Marcus Willett: Something you said earlier resonated with me. When you alluded to the issue of defining cyber-criminality and the Russians perhaps having a slightly different idea. I remember the same sort of trouble around early attempts to talk with the Chinese about counterterrorism. You had to be very careful to define what you meant by terrorism for them not to think that that was an excuse to go after Uighurs in their own country. For the Russians, unless you are very careful about defining cyber-criminality, for them, people that we might call cybercriminals are patriotic hackers – an extension of the Russian state. That definitional point is a problem.

Another thing to note is the sophistication of some of the capabilities that have been developed by the organised criminal fraternity. In a good, realpolitik way, a state like Russia can see an advantage in these sorts of capabilities being developed by people sitting on its own soil. As you know, beyond cyber, plenty of corruption goes on between criminal gangs and the Russian state – and has done for centuries.

I lived in Moscow in 1983-84 as a student, during the height of the Cold War. And even though you could not read about it in the press, every Russian you spoke to knew that all sorts of arrangements were going on between the Soviet government and people they called mafia bosses – the mafia boss in Leningrad, as it was then, or the mafia boss in Moscow. There was the official world and then there was what really happened. So, I cannot help feeling – as so often in cyber – what you see being played out in cyberspace is actually a reflection of what has been going on for a long time in the real world. Sorry to use this phrase and be the first one to use it, but cyber is just a new domain for old age stuff. It is an accident of history and culture, going back through Tsarist times, that some slightly shady stuff goes on between the Russian state and parts of its population. Why should we be surprised to see that being playing out in cyberspace?

In terms of the other point you are making, which is that some states pick up a modus operandi that makes them look like cyber OCGs – and I think you are mainly referring to North Korea there. Well, I wonder if that is out of choice or whether it is simply the case that the level of sophistication that they are able to attain is that of a cybercriminal group.

North Korea is a very interesting example. Everybody knows that they were behind WannaCry and the hack on Sony Pictures, and that they have been trying to defraud the global banking system – Swift and so on. I put it to you that North Korea is not able to do much more than that given its own massive vulnerabilities. For example, the number of connections that come out of North Korea to the global internet is extremely few, and so, for that reason, it often deploys its operatives overseas. It would certainly need to do that if it got involved in any sort of conflict, as it would have no chance of running offensive cyber operations from within its own territory if it was up against a capable cyber actor.

In other words, North Korea has had to develop these more distributed, low-level capabilities. I do not think they are deliberately trying to make themselves look like cybercriminals, it is just that is the sort of capability they know they can use and have access to.

Countries like North Korea and Iran have learnt from what other countries have done in cyberspace, which is perhaps not the lesson that was intended; it certainly was not the lesson intended for Iran around Stuxnet. They saw this activity and thought: ‘Oh, that is interesting. What could we do in cyberspace? And would that give us a reach beyond our own region that we have no chance of achieving with any of our other capabilities? Does it give us a reach even into the great Satan – the US?’. And low and behold, it does. Their attacks are not going to be of the level of sophistication that can bring down the US’ Critical National Infrastructure (CNI), but they can have strategic effect. Whether that is propaganda effect or just being an annoyance, it nevertheless can be used to say to their citizens: ‘Look, we can do harm to the US’.

It is the famous point about cyber, that what can look like unsophisticated capabilities can proliferate and be picked up easily by states, from groups like cybercriminals, and then utilised to have a strategic effect in the mainland of a superpower, in a way that they previously could not. So, North Korea, and I would add Iran, are very interesting studies in some of the risks associated with the proliferation of cyber capabilities.

Sitting in the back of our minds, always – and this is the other thing big, cyber-capable states need to talk about – is the proliferation of some of those more destructive capabilities to terrorist organisations, and what that could mean. Everybody always assesses international terrorist groups when they look at threat actors in cyberspace. And the answer for years has been: ‘They know about the potential; they are interested and looking for it, but they do not have it’. And so, every assessment ends with: ‘So there is no need to worry about them at the moment’. Well, that picture could change. If ever terrorists work out a means of delivering the same sorts of physical destruction that they can through the use of a bomb, with cyber means, that is a bad day for everybody.

ES: How real is the threat of a catastrophic cyber event?

Marcus Willett: Having talked about cyber-criminality, terrorism, and states realising the asymmetric advantages they can gain through cyber capabilities, nevertheless, these are not where I see the greatest risk of a cyber catastrophe. The greatest risk of a cyber catastrophe, in my mind, is what is happening every second of every day, with the reconnaissance and prepositioning by states against their potential adversaries’ CNI – infrastructure like power, transport, communications – the bringing down of which would have catastrophic humanitarian consequences, as well as technical dimensions. And, while I am sure no state short of a conflict situation would intend to do that, my worry is that – as has already been proven in WannaCry and NotPetya – states, in trying to either reconnoitre a network or preposition for a conflict scenario, may accidentally make a mistake.

Prepositioning is necessary because, to have an effect in a conflict situation, you cannot go from a standing start: you either have that presence in the network or you have not. In other words, you need to establish a presence in the network in peacetime to be able to have that capability should a conflict occur. So, states are not only doing reconnaissance, they are doing pre-positioning. And the chances of something going horribly wrong, I would say, are fairly high.

What worries me most about that is, even just the detection of that sort of activity – what some may define as a cyber attack – could cause escalation. And how states try and deescalate in a cyber catastrophe is still something we have not properly thought through. How a prime minister or a president would be brought into the discussions around such a technical subject, that had spilled out into real-world loss of life and escalation, in a way that could deescalate the situation, is an issue at the heart of where we need to get to around international conversations, under the auspices of the UN, for cyber.

My argument is that, although this is the biggest risk, you cannot start with this conversation amongst states. But you have to start the conversation somewhere, so have it about cyber-criminality. Do not be deceived, however, in forgetting that the biggest risk is the one I have just been through: a mistake by a state in cyberspace that is interpreted as a potential act of war. That is the biggest risk in cyberspace.

How likely is that sort of catastrophe? The sad thing is that we do not really know, except to say that it is probably more likely than we should be comfortable with. The problem is we still do not properly understand what is happening in cyberspace. But there is lots of reconnaissance and prepositioning going on, all the time, by states, against each other’s CNI. Do not be deceived as to what is reported in the press about there having been 200 cyber attacks in the last ten years, or whatever the figure is. It all depends on what you mean by a cyber attack.

ES: Your comment on translating technical information to world leaders really resonates with President Trump in the White House. With a lack of precedent for escalation in cyberspace, there is no knowing if and how he might act.

Marcus Willett: Unfortunately, if you are an official in the US administration at the moment, you know you dare not mention the word cyber to President Trump. Because – and this is a massive generalisation – to him, all he can equate cyber with is: ‘The hacking into of our electoral processes and people saying that cyber is the reason I got elected’. Whilst he has made statements about the use of cyber in the past, I know from private conversations with ex-colleagues who are in those positions, that cyber is a subject you have to handle very carefully. Otherwise, you press the wrong button with the President, and it ends up not being a conversation, but the receipt of an earful. So, it is a huge challenge.

ES: And finally, in the context of the coronavirus crisis – and discussions around sovereign capability, national tech companies, supply chains, and so on – is the Balkanisation of the internet preventable?

Marcus Willett: This is a very interesting question. Balkanisation, or even bifurcation of the internet, which is the other phrase that is thrown around, is the concept of two internets. One model is what we have at the moment: multi-stakeholder governance, free, with a balance between states, NGOs, the private sector and techy-coders; and then how that internet is developed and run, with a balance between the rights of individual citizens, the private sector and governments. And the second model, which is being pushed by the Chinese and the Russians, which entails greater state control over sovereign cyberspace. This can sound like just a technical issue, but the implications for how the global economy works, for example, are massive.

Why would states not want more control over the threats to them and their own sovereign bit of cyberspace? Well, the net result may be, instead of having a conversation about how you can achieve control with a single internet and a single global economy, you end up with two separate versions, then three, or four, and so on. And do not forget what the word Balkanisation means: it is the disintegration into individual components that compete, or even conflict. And if there were two separate internets, one Chinese and one US, broadly speaking (although there is talk of a RU.net and the Iranians have invested quite a lot of money into trying to develop their own intranet) the current risks around cyber that I described earlier, between states, become even greater.

Imagine if you had no vested interest in that other internet: it is not connected to your economy; none of your CNI is dependent upon it. What would the incentive then be for states to restrain themselves around their use of cyber capabilities?

That is my worry about Balkanisation and why I fear a tech war, to which the only solution is to ban bits of tech from your own networks, ends up being self-defeating. Not only immediately, as you can see with all the US tech providers, for example, going to the White House saying: ‘Do you not realise what that does to our own economy and our ability to export into those markets?’. That is almost putting an Iron Curtain down that virtual world of the internet. And if you think about how dependent we are all becoming – with the Internet of Things, smart cities, and smart homes, and so on – that virtual curtain could only be followed by a real-world equivalent. I think it is incredibly short-cited, and it can only lead to increased risk geostrategically.

Having said all that, if you are sitting here in a place like the UK you speak with two different voices. You certainly support the idea of a single, multi-stakeholder, free internet. But Ministers also worry about the UK’s ability to deal with terrorists and cybercriminals in its own bit of cyberspace because of issues such as the spread of ubiquitous encryption by big US tech companies. So, the UK also has a sovereign problem around understanding some of the biggest threats in cyberspace. It is a difficult question to answer, which becomes especially challenging for a middle-ranking country like the UK: one that instinctively does not want to see Balkanisation and cyber sovereignty, but also wants a bit more sovereign ability for national security reasons, over its little bit of cyberspace. It is a fascinating subject that is, I think, just going to roll. But I do not like the idea of banning tech from your own network; it is unrealistic and just not the way to go.

In some ways, the US has hit the strategic thing that is going on: a global competition about how the internet in the future will be developed, between itself and China – its main rival in this space. That is the big strategic point. And though the UK may not have woken up to that issue, the US tactic feels wrong. The UK tactic, ironically, perhaps not having recognised the strategic issue, feels better. And for those who love their deterrence theory, this is the idea of deterrence through entanglement – which everybody debates whether it really works or not. The notion that a potential adversary entangled with the global economy and in global cyberspace, is far easier to deter from bringing down that economy and that cyberspace than it would otherwise be.

And one more thing: look at this from China’s perspective. China is desperately dependent on eight US companies for how it runs its own networks. You could list them: Microsoft, Qualcomm, IBM, Intel, Cisco, and so on. They call them the eight guardian warriors. Yes, China does talk about having its own internet and ‘the Great Firewall’, and all that sort of stuff. But interestingly, two of those eight companies – Microsoft and Cisco, I believe – sit on China’s cybersecurity internal standards-setting body. IBM and the Bank of China develop technology supporting trillions of dollars of financial transactions around the globe. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) uses Microsoft. I mean, that is just how it is – they are thoroughly entwined. Why would you try and persuade the Chinese that the better solution is for them to start developing everything indigenously; to not use anything American and wipe out half of the world’s population from your markets? I mean, why would you do that?

Ed Stacey is a BA International Relations student at King’s College London and a Student Ambassador for the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). The #IISStudent Ambassador programme connects students interested in global security, political risk and military conflict with the Institute’s work and researchers.

Marcus Willett CB OBE is a Senior Adviser at the IISS. He helps to develop and deliver a programme at the IISS that researches the use of cyber and related technologies as levers of national power, including their role in future conflict. His initial focus is on developing a methodology for measuring cyber power to assist national-level decision-making.