Nuclear Policy Re(V)iew from the Periscope: SLBM and SLCM Policy Options for the 2022 Biden White House

Advances in nuclear weapon technologies from – and the corresponding evolution in the threat landscape posed by – non-allied nations over the past four years underscores the exigency of the United States (U.S) in updating its stated national security policies. Here we review and suggest options for the 2022 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) regarding the low-yield submarine-launched cruise missile (SLCM-N) and submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) programs. The 2018 NPR called for programmatic changes to counteract the evolving threat environment and allow for greater deterrence flexibility. These programs include modernization of existing technologies and creation of novel weapons systems. Of these changes, two new programs were started to develop low-yield, sea-based, non-strategic weapons. These options are designed to counter any perceived gaps in U.S. regional deterrence capabilities. We enumerate several policy options likely to be considered by the Biden White House. Our proposed solution calls for maintenance of the W76-2 program and the continuance of the low-yield SLCM-N program; we present our argument along the axes of technical and cost considerations, service system preferences, tailored response capabilities, ensured support and defense of our allies, and prevention of escalation to war.

Does Canada have anything in the way of a strategic warning intelligence culture (and does it need one)?

During the Cold War, Strategic Warning Intelligence (SWI) was a necessary and recognized function within the intelligence community given the threats posed by conventional Warsaw Pact forces in Western Europe and Soviet ballistic missiles. With the end of the Cold War, the focus of intelligence shifted to tactical or operational issues against known threats, and the SWI function and expertise atrophied as a result. With today’s expanding and more complex threat environment, this article examines whether SWI capacities should be reintroduced in order to apprise decision makers of trending threats to national security, albeit based on faint signals, so the necessary policy decisions can be made and prioritized to mitigate said threats in a timely manner.

Will Failed Insurrection Lead to Terrorism in the United States?

The following discussion outlines the attractions of a strategy of terrorism and its implications for political order. It also argues that a body of knowledge has been built up over time that provides a foundation for explaining current events. Research has shown that terrorism can be an effective substitute for the mobilization of large numbers when that mobilization is thwarted. Terrorism can sustain an illusion of power, provoke official over-reaction and community counter-mobilization, and deepen political polarization. Studies also suggest that if a broader movement dissolves, the followers who remain strengthen their commitment and become more inclined to violence. The future threat environment is most likely to be multidimensional, with multiple groups cooperating and competing along with individual actors who perceive themselves to be part of an ideological collectivity.

Engaging the Private Sector for National Security

On November 23, 2020, Robert Gordon presented on the topic of Engaging the Private Sector for National Security at the 2020 CASIS West Coast Security Conference. The presentation was followed by a moderated question and answer period. Key points of discussion included: federal level engagement with the private cybersecurity sector, the level of the cyber threat environment that the private sector is dealing with, and the requirement for a collaborative approach in the national security environment.

Financing the Grand Strategy of Great and Rising Powers

How can great and rising powers finance their grand strategy? What enables and constrains a state’s ability to finance its grand strategic needs? Under what conditions are leaders able to implement their desired financial strategy? When considering the various means available for financing grand strategy, leaders are concerned with raising revenue to implement their grand strategy as well as staying in power. Financing grand strategy, however, presents an intertemporal dilemma for leaders: a politically costly fiscal sacrifice today for benefits accrued in the future. This chapter advances an analytical framework and offers illustrative examples to understand how leaders navigate this intertemporal dilemma. First, the chapter addresses the scope of the study: military spending of great and rising powers. Second, it presents the various financing options and addresses the short- and long-term political and economic costs of each. Third, it offers three variables that condition leader willingness to incur the short-term political costs of financing grand strategy: regime type, whether a state is a rising or great power, and the degree of clarity in the threat environment.

Implementation of Threat policies and Routing process in Firepower Threat Defense

A firewall is a guard of the network which inspects the packets based on the rules adopted to be executed in the threat environment. This is used to block the flow of undesirable content, forbids unauthorized remote access, and impedes immoral contents, assures security based on protocol and IP address, insulates seamless activity in Enterprise networks, shields conversation and coordination contents and thus this cybersecurity tool secures the system when administering on the internet with humongous amount of malicious data threatening the performance and data of the network structure. Cisco’s next-generation firewalls are equipped to combat the menace and in this project, initially, it is focused on the working of the FTD and analyzes the steps carried out in the processes. FMC is the graphical user interface to control FTD which is connected through the management interface. Various policies such as file policy, Prefilter policy, malware policies, provide the firewall to work more efficiently on the firewall. Additionally, these firewalls are equipped with a routing process to uphold the efficiency of the firewall which behaves as a router to establish a connection between the network nodes. The routing process is implemented using the firewall which is an IP routing software suite that provides a robust facility to adapt the firewall for routing conditions.

Analysis of environmental problems of crop production and ways to solve them

The article deals with engineering and technological problems of improving the environmental safety of crop production as a complex biotechnical system, for the environment, consumers of crop production and machine operators who ensure production in the field. It is noted that the impact of agriculture on the environment and humans is not only promoting global warming, participation in environmental pollution by pesticides and undigested remnants of mineral and organic fertilizers, the pollution of the production of field crops with residual amounts of pesticides and food is not absorbed nitrogen, toxic threat environment in the area of the machine, but unsustainable use of non-renewable resources, the availability of which depend on agricultural technologies. The main directions of minimizing environmental pollution and reducing dependence on non-renewable resources as a result of agricultural activities are shown.

DNA Encoding for Misuse Intrusion Detection System based on UNSW-NB15 Data Set

Recent researches showed that DNA encoding and pattern matching can be used for the intrusion-detection system (IDS), with results of high rate of attack detection. The evaluation of these intrusion detection systems is based on datasets that are generated decades ago. However, numerous studies outlined that these datasets neither inclusively reflect the network traffic, nor the modern low footprint attacks, and do not cover the current network threat environment. In this paper, a new DNA encoding for misuse IDS based on UNSW-NB15 dataset is proposed. The proposed system is performed by building a DNA encoding for all values of 49 attributes. Then attack keys (based on attack signatures) are extracted and, finally, Raita algorithm is applied to classify records, either attacks or normal, based on the extracted keys. The results of the current experiment showed that the proposed system achieved good detection rates for all of attacks, which included the Analysis, Backdoor, DoS, Exploits, Fuzzers, Generic, Reconnaissance, Shellcode, and Worms, with values of 82.56%, 92.68%, 75.59%, 75.42%, 67%, 99.28%, 81.02%, 73.6%, 85%, and 90.91%, respectively. The values of false alarm rate and accuracy were equal to 24% and 89.05%, respectively. Also, the execution time for the proposed system was found to be short, where the values of the encoding time and matching time for one record were 0.45 and 0.002 second, respectively.

The Problems Facing United States Marine Corps Amphibious Assaults

There are calls by some experts to accept that an amphibious assault of coastline is simply too risky to attempt due to current threats. So, what are the challenges facing amphibious assaults? Is the amphibious assault still a viable type of military operation in the current threat environment? These questions are at the heart of the mission and role of the United States Marine Corps. This analysis delves deep into the problems facing amphibious assaults, and it serves as a primer for future discussions pertaining to improving amphibious assault capabilities.