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The New Nuke?
by Yusuf Sezer

 Over the past few decades, the major nations 
of the world have readily adopted and integrated 
computer technologies into their social, economic, 
political, and military sectors. Trading on the stock 
market, conducting military operations, directing 
the world’s flight traffic, and delivering electricity to 
millions of people are just a few examples of the many 
critical real-world processes that rely on computer 
systems. As events in the past few years have shown, 
these computer systems—and the real-world 
processes that depend on them—can be exploited 
with “‘illegal or legally ambiguous digital tools’ like 
website defacements, information theft, website 
parodies, DoS attacks, virtual sit-ins, and virtual 
sabotage” (Hampson 514). Thus, nations that have 
high levels of technological development—and thus 
high technological dependence—are vulnerable to 
cyber-attacks (Sanger). This fundamental weakness 
shared by major world powers has ushered in a new 
type of militaristic weapon that poses a threat to 
global peace.
 The definition of a cyber weapon varies from 
source to source, but most agree that cyber weapons 
refer to the strategic use of malware—programs 
that are designed to damage or disrupt computer 
systems—for militaristic purposes. Perhaps the most 
notable example of a cyber weapon is Stuxnet, a piece 
of malware that was designed to infiltrate computer 
systems in Iran’s Natanz uranium enrichment 
plant (Farwell and Rohozinski). Although no 
government has officially claimed responsibility 
for the development and deployment of Stuxnet, 
interviews with both former and current American, 
Israeli, and European officials strongly suggest that 
the attack was orchestrated by Israel and the United 
States (Sanger). Farwell and Rohozinski explain that 
Stuxnet’s goal was to destroy the plant’s centrifuges 
by causing them to spin much faster than normal, 
thus slowing Iran’s nuclear program—an objective 
that aligns with American and Israeli political goals. 
Stuxnet succeeded in destroying many centrifuges 

and set a new precedent for the possibilities of cyber 
weaponry. Unlike the malware that came before it, 
“Stuxnet wasn’t about industrial espionage: it didn’t 
manipulate, or erase information. Rather, Stuxnet’s 
goal was to physically destroy a military target…
literally” (Farwell and Rohozinski).  
 Although Stuxnet was successful in slowing Iran’s 
nuclear program, the scale of the damage it caused is 
relatively small when compared to the full-potential 
of cyber weapons. In The Basics of Cyber Warfare, 
Jason Andress and Steve Winterfield point out that 
cyber weapons could be employed as “Weapons 
of Mass Disruption.” The idea is to use cyber 
weapons to disrupt computer systems that control 
major infrastructure (Andress and Winterfield 21). 
In a speech at the Cybersecurity and Consumer 
Protection Summit, President Obama recognized 
that:

much of [America’s] critical infrastructure—
our financial systems, our power grid, health 
systems—run on networks connected to the 
Internet, which is hugely empowering but 
also dangerous, and creates new points of 
vulnerability that we didn’t have before. (Obama) 

Indeed, successful cyber-attacks on computer 
systems that control major infrastructure could 
cripple the nation. Patrick T. Hemmer considers 
the ramifications of a successful large-scale cyber-
attack on infrastructure: “Supervisory control and 
data acquisition systems (SCADA) that control the 
functions of power, nuclear, sewer, and air defense 
systems (among others) could either be crippled or 
engineered to create massive nuclear and biological 
emergencies” (28). Hemmer goes on to state 
that “government attempts to counter or defend 
against an attack of this nature would be limited 
and piecemeal” (28). The cyber-attack situation 
described by Hemmer could have a devastating 
toll on the military and civilian population of the 
targeted nation. This is particularly concerning 
due to the strong correlation that exists between a 



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Aisthesis      Volume 8,  201732

country’s level of technological development and its 
vulnerability to such cyber-attacks. This correlation 
implies that the world’s major countries are also the 
most vulnerable. David E. Sanger of The New York 
Times concluded that “no country’s infrastructure 
is more dependent on computer systems, and thus 
more vulnerable to [cyber-attack], than that of the 
United States” (Sanger).
 As such, the development of major cyber weapons 
by developed nations could in fact pose a similar 
situation to that of the nuclear arms race of the Cold 
War; developed nations could use cyber weapons as 
deterrents. The idea is that if one country initiates 
attack, the other will respond in kind, thus resulting in 
“mutually assured destruction”—a political doctrine 
that characterized Soviet-American relations during 
the Cold War (de Castella). At first glance, this 
theory fits perfectly; cyber weapons do indeed have 
vast destructive capabilities, and President Obama 
has already referred to the field of cyber security as 
a “cyber arms race” (Obama). However, there are 
a few critical differences between cyber weapons 
and nuclear weapons that make them particularly 
dangerous to world peace.
 Unlike nuclear weapons during the Cold War, 
cyber weapons can also be developed by groups or 
people who are not affiliated with a government, 
which creates the potential for cyber terrorism. As 
early as 1991, a report by the National Research 
Council recognized that “tomorrow’s terrorist may 
be able to do more damage with a keyboard than 
with a bomb” (7). Furthermore, cyber weapons allow 
the user to leverage “anonymity and deniability 
while conducting military campaigns in cyberspace” 
(Wilson); this makes it difficult to verify the origin of 
an attack and thus poses less risk of retaliation to the 
user. This shield of anonymity—a weapon-trait that 
is not possessed by nuclear weapons—weakens the 
political doctrine of mutually assured destruction. 
After all, how can you retaliate against an enemy that 
you can’t even identify? When combined, these two 
attributes can create a very tense climate between 
major world powers: Not only is the promise 
of mutually assured destruction a less effective 
deterrent, but there are also more potential sources 
of attack. This tension can be worsened by another 
attribute of cyber weapons that is summarized by 
Hemmer: “Specific capabilities of [cyber weapons]…

are closely guarded secrets. As such, it is very likely 
that an adversary forms a potentially uneducated 
opinion as to the effectiveness of their defenses” (20). 
This fear of inadequate defenses could theoretically 
push major nations to develop more advanced 
weapons and defenses, thus fueling a cyber arms 
race.  Together, these factors would create a more 
volatile political climate with a higher potential for 
significant destruction.
 The thought of a future cyber war is certainly 
a frightening one. Cyber weapons have enormous 
potential for destruction and, as we have seen, have 
qualities that make them especially hazardous to 
world peace when used as militaristic weapons. It 
appears, though, that world leaders are aware of the 
potential risks of such weapons, at least to a certain 
extent. For example, when questioned about why he 
has not employed cyber weapons against political 
targets like China and North Korea, President 
Obama “has repeatedly told his aides that there 
are risks to using—and particularly to overusing—
the [cyber weapon]” (Sanger). President Obama’s 
restraint regarding the use of cyber weapons shows 
that he is aware of the risks that such weapons carry. 
Namely, it shows that President Obama aims to 
avoid triggering a cyber arms race between world 
powers, an escalation that would further agitate an 
already tense political climate and could potentially 
lead to destruction on a massive scale. On the other 
hand, there is a great deal of concerning evidence 
suggesting that international affairs may indeed be 
pushing the world towards a cyber war. In “Stuxnet 
and the Future of Cyber War,” Farwell and Rohozinski 
point out that “the United States views cyberspace 
as a war-fighting domain that favours offense. Its 
policy explicitly seeks superiority in that domain” 
(Farwell and Rohozinski). This approach to cyber 
space resembles the deterrent-based diplomatic 
approaches that characterized and fueled the nuclear 
arms race of the Cold War. More worryingly, recent 
cyber-attacks have already strained the relationship 
between the United States and other major world 
powers. At the beginning of October, for example, 
the United States accused Russia of meddling with 
the upcoming presidential election by hacking the 
Democratic National Committee’s computers—a 
cyber-attack that Russia is vehemently denying 
involvement in. On the matter, Senator Ben Sasse 



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Aisthesis      Volume 8,  201733

has expressed his belief that the United States must 
respond with “a strong diplomatic, political, cyber 
and economic response” (qtd. in Nakashima). 
Equally troubling is that Iran has responded to the 
Stuxnet attack by forming a military cyber unit 
that is similar in purpose to that of the United 
States Cyber Command. On the matter, “Brig. Gen. 
Gholamreza Jalali, the head of Iran’s Passive Defense 
Organization, said that the Iranian military was 
prepared ‘to fight our enemies’ in ‘cyberspace and 
Internet warfare’” (qtd. in Sanger). 
      While computer systems and cyber space have 
allowed us to vastly improve nearly every aspect 
of human existence, they have also left us with an 
existential crisis. The more we incorporate technology 
into real-world processes, the more we put ourselves 
at risk of serious cyber-attacks. As President Obama 
put it, “it’s one of the great paradoxes of our time that 
the very technologies that empower us to do great 
good can also be used to undermine us and inflict 
great harm” (Obama). What remains clear is that the 
future role of cyber weapons in political and military 
affairs is largely uncertain and remains dynamic. 
Going forward, we can only hope that major world 
leaders consider the tremendous implications of 
cyber weapons and cyber warfare when conducting 
diplomacy. After all, the cyber weapon may very 
well be the greatest revolution in weapon technology 
since the Manhattan Project. 

Works Cited
de Castella, Tom. “How Did We Forget about 

Mutually Assured Destruction?”  BBC 
News, 15 Feb. 2012, www.bbc.com/news/
magazine-17026538. Accessed 31 Oct. 2016.

Farwell, James P., and Rohozinski, Rafal. “Stuxnet 
and the Future of Cyber War.” Survival, vol. 53, 
no. 1, 2011, pp. 23-40. 

Hampson, Noah C.N. “Hacktivism: A New Breed 
of Protest in a Networked World.” Boston College 
International and Comparative Law Review, 6th 
ser., vol. 35, no. 2, 2012, pp. 511-42.  SSRN. 
Accessed 30 Oct. 2016.

Hemmer, Patrick T. Deterrence and Cyber-weapons. 
Dissertation, Naval Postgraduate School, 2013. 
Accessed 30 Oct. 2016.

Langner, Ralph. “Stuxnet: Dissecting a Cyberwarfare 
Weapon.” IEEE Security and Privacy, vol. 9, no. 3, 
2011, pp. 49-51.

Nakashima, Ellen. “U.S. Government Officially 
Accuses Russia of Hacking Campaign to In-
terfere with Elections.”  The Washington Post, 7 
Oct. 2016, www.washingtonpost.com/world/
national-security/us-government-officially-ac-
cuses-russia-of-hacking-campaign-to-influ-
ence-elections/2016/10/07/4e0b9654-8cbf-1
1e6-875e-2c1bfe943b66_story.html?utm_ter-
m=.3bf9632c6d48. Accessed 28 Oct. 2016.

National Research Council. “Overview and 
Recommendations.” Computers at Risk: Safe 
Computing in the Information Age. The National 
Academies Press, 1991.

Obama, Barack. “Remarks by the President at the 
Cybersecurity and Consumer Protection 
Summit.” Cybersecurity and Consumer 
Protection Summit, 13 Feb. 2015, Stanford 
University, Stanford, CA. Accessed 30 Oct. 2016.

Sanger, David E. “Obama Order Sped Up Wave of 
Cyberattacks Against Iran.” The New York Times, 
1 June 2012, www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/
world/middleeast/obama-ordered-wave-of-
cyberattacks-against-iran.html. Accessed 30 
Oct. 2016.

Wilson, Clay. “Cyber Weapons: 4 Defining 
Characteristics.” GCN, 4 June 2015. Accessed 29 
Oct. 2016.

Winterfeld, Steve, and Jason Andress. The Basics of 
Cyber Warfare: Understanding the Fundamentals 
of Cyber Warfare in Theory and Practice. Syngress, 
2012. 


