Bombs and rockets – Page 34 – a sibilant intake of breath

Torture, psychology, and the law

For the darkest day of the year, a couple of torture-related items seem appropriate. Firstly, there is this New York Times piece, which argues that senior officials from the Bush administration should be charged with war crimes, for authorizing and enabling torture. The editorial argues that there is no chance that prosecutions will be sought under an Obama administration, but that he ought to clarify the obligation of the United States and its agents to uphold the Geneva Conventions, as well as reverse executive orders that “eroded civil liberties and the rule of law.”

The prospect of high-level American decision-makers being put on trial for authorizing torture is so unlikely that it is a bit difficult to even form an opinion about it. At the same time, it is likely that nobody thirty years ago would have anticipated the trials at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), or International Criminal Court (ICC). There is no clear reason for which high political office should be any impediment to being tried for war crimes, but it is very unclear how any such prosecutions would fare in the United States. It would certainly be seen as a ‘political’ act, and any connections with international law would likely be the targets for special criticism and scorn from some quarters.

The other story worth mentioning is an experiment conducted by Dr Jerry Burger, of Santa Clara University. It was a less intense re-creation of Milgram’s famous experiment on obedience to authority. Like Milgram, Burger found that a startling proportion of the population is willing to torture a fellow human being as part of a scientific experiment. This is when the only pressure placed upon the subject of the experiment is the authority of the actor pretending to conduct it. That naturally makes one nervous about what people would be willing to do when they felt an urgent and important issue justified it, as well as when far stronger sanctions could be brought against them if they did not proceed.

Energy usage and the US Department of Defence

This article on space solar power (collecting energy from sunlight using one or more satellites in geostationary orbit, then beaming it down to Earth using microwaves) contains some interesting information on American military logistics in Iraq:

The armed forces are America’s single greatest consumer of oil. The Department of Defence delivers 1.6m gallons (7.3m litres) of fuel a day—accounting for 70% by weight of all supplies delivered—to its forces in Iraq alone, at a delivered cost per gallon of $5-20. It also spends over $1 per kWh on electric power (ten times the domestic civilian price) in battle zones, because electricity must often be provided using generators that run on fossil fuels.

This helps explain why militaries have such a keen interest in new energy generation and efficiency technologies.

The information on space solar power is also quite interesting. It actually seems to be a bit less infeasible than I thought, though the launching costs remain a very significant barrier.

What Do You Care What Other People Think

This sequel to Richard Feynman’s Surely You’re Joking covers some of the same ground as the prior book, though it is focused on the inquiry conducted after the Challenger space shuttle disaster. The book includes an appendix to that report, written by Feynman exclusively. Apparently, he was going to remove his name from the findings on account of his section being censored. Eventually, they printed something largely identical to his final copy.

As he explains it, the solid rocket booster failure that destroyed Challenger was largely the result of disjointed and poor communication between layers of administration at NASA and its supplier companies. The statistical modeling of the behaviour of the O-rings in the boosters was very poorly done. Information on the vulnerabilities of the shuttle either did not reach the most senior levels or was paid insufficient heed there. In any case, it seems likely that even if cold weather and design problems hadn’t caused this specific failure, something would have eventually gone wrong anyhow. For example, Feynman describes in detail some technical and procedural issues associated with the main engines. Such problems are not really surprising, given the overall complexity of the vehicle, the ‘top-down’ manner in which it was constructed (designing whole systems before testing individual components), and its fundamentally experimental nature. That being said, Feynman’s assessment probably has continuing relevance for other projects with similar associated risks and management structures. In particular, the contrast he draws between the strong protocols used in programming the shuttle’s computer – as compared with the protocols for sensors and engines – demonstrates that it is possible to do things well, provided sufficient attention and resources are devoted to the task.

Overall, the previous book is more entertaining and shows more of Feynman’s character. Aside from a section on Feynman’s first marriage, as well as the illness and death of his first wife, this book focuses on the details of Feynman’s investigation, including his famous demonstration with the O-ring and glass of ice water. All told, I found the earlier book more diverse and interesting. This book may be more useful for those whose professional work involves dangerous machines.

Oil tanker captured off Somalia

Yesterday, Somali pirates seized a Saudi Arabian oil supertanker, carrying about two million barrels of oil. It is a tangible demonstration of just how insecure marine traffic in some parts of the world has become. According to the Associated Press, “piracy is considered the most lucrative work in Somalia.” It is estimated that pirates have taken in $30 million in ransoms this year.

As discussed here before, piracy is a growing challenge for private shipping firms and the world’s navies. In the end, maritime insecurity derives from the lack of security on land. Pirates need means to acquire arms and recruits, as well as means to collect and launder ransoms and sell stolen goods. In the end, it is just another reason for which failed and failing states are of global concern.

Celebrating soldiers, celebrating peace

The problematic nature of Remembrance Day has been covered twice here already, in 2006 and 2007. My question for today is this: would it be better to have two separate holidays, one of which is unambiguously pacifist and committed to recognizing the horrible character of war, and another in which the sacrifices of veterans are marked?

The first occasion would mostly be about civilians, since theirs is the primary experience of contemporary war. The second would still need to address difficult questions about why sacrifices on one side were more noble than those on the other, as well as what kind of conduct we should consider acceptable or laudable in war.

Spying on North American weather

Most weather systems in the Atlantic move from west to east. As a result, the Allies had a tactical advantage during the Second World War. Their weather stations in North America provided information that was useful for making plans in the Atlantic and European theatres of war.

The Germans made a creative effort to alter that balance by secretly planting a weather station in Labrador. The automated station was transported by U-boat and installed under cover of fog. Unfortunately for the Germans, the station only operated for a few days and the U-boat sent to repair it got sunk.

You can see the weather station on display at the Canadian War Museum, which is free on Thursday evenings.

Protecting the new president

Alongside general jubilation about the Obama victory, a number of my friends have expressed their concern about Obama’s personal safety. That certainly seems like a legitimate concern. Four American presidents have been assassinated while in office, and every president since Nixon has faced at least one attempt (though levels of credibility vary). During his victory speech on election night, most people probably noticed the transparent bulletproof barriers set up around the podium.

The Secret Service is certainly taking the threat seriously. According to a Stratfor briefing, Obama got a security detail earlier than any other candidate and, by the end of his campaign, it had grown to the size of a full presidential protection team – unprecedented for a candidate, and a significant strain on the manpower of the service.

Given the likelihood that Obama will be targeted by white supremacists or others – as well as the colossal impact his assassination would likely have – I certainly don’t envy the Secret Service at this point in time. While they have plenty of resources to provide physical protection, as well as identify and break up conspiracies, the risk from disciplined and capable lone wolf operators is impossible to eliminate while maintaining public appearances. Even with the assistance of the FBI, CIA, NSA, etc, there will be a measure of luck involved in ensuring that future close contact with the public does not produce disaster.

Massive anti-terror database contemplated in the UK

British Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon has been saying some worrisome things about terrorism, security, and civil liberties. He is backing a plan to create a massive database of mobile and internet communications, for purposes of fighting terrorism. One worrisome aspect is the suggestion that it would be used to deal with “terrorists or criminals.” Technologies initially justified as an extreme measure necessary to fight terrorism will always spread to more banal uses, with a greater scope for abuses.

Indeed, that is the biggest issue that needs to be weighed against the possible terror-fighting capacity of such databases. They will inevitably be abused. Furthermore, governments are far more dangerous than terrorists, both when they are acting in malicious ways and when they are trying to be benign. Modern history certainly demonstrates that, while the power of terrorists to inflict harm is considerable, the ability of states to do so is extreme.

Previously:

Martin Hellman on the risk of nuclear war

Despite the end of the Cold War, there remains some possibility of a major nuclear exchange between some combination of those world powers with more than a couple of hundred nuclear weapons. Such an outcome could arise through accident or miscalculation, unauthorized launch, or simply through the progressive stressing of the situation, in a manner akin to the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, the Yom Kippur War of 1973, of the Able Archer exercise in 1983.

Martin Hellman – one of the three civilian inventors of public key cryptography – has written a piece describing some statistical ways through which we could contemplate the risk of global nuclear war, as well as evaluate it relative to other threats. As a near-term nightmare scenario, the massive use of nuclear weapons surely exceeds the threat posed by climate change: climatic change across a decade is highly abrupt, whereas the time between the decision to use nuclear weapons and the generation of mass casualties would likely be only minutes.

Based on the frequency with which near misses have taken place, Hellman argues that the perpetuation of the current global nuclear situation carries a 1% per year risk of mass nuclear exchange. He estimates that this exceeds the risk of living beside a nuclear power plant by 1000 to 1 and has a clever rhetorical device for making that concrete:

Equivalently, imagine two nuclear power plants being built on each side of your home. That’s all we can fit next to you, so now imagine a ring of four plants built around the first two, then another larger ring around that, and another and another until there are thousands of nuclear reactors surrounding you. That is the level of risk that my preliminary analysis indicates each of us faces from a failure of nuclear deterrence.

Surely, if his estimate is anywhere near correct, all the ongoing concern about new nuclear power plants should be superseded more than one thousandfold by concern about the state of security in the face of nuclear war. After all, everybody lives with the risk associated with global thermonuclear war and nuclear winter. Only those living fairly close to nuclear power plants bear acute risks associated with meltdowns.

Hellman’s warning is akin to the one repeatedly sounded by former US Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, who himself revised the American nuclear warplan for the Kennedy administration in 1963. In both cases, the suggestions are similar: work to reduce the number of weapons, increase the time required for anybody to use them, and avoid the complacent belief that the lack of explosive accidents or attacks since the Second World War proves them to be impossible.

The Code-Breakers

For those with a serious interest in the history and practice of cryptography, David Khan’s The Code-Breakers: The Comprehensive History of Secret Communication from Ancient Times to the Internet provides an enormous mass of knowledge. The scope of the 1200 page book is vast: covering everything from the earliest ciphers to the origins of public key cryptography in detail. It is probably fair to say that the period best covered is that between the Middle Ages and the Second World War, though the sections covering the decoding of Egyptian hieroglyphics and Linear B are also detailed and skilfully written. Those interested primarily in the contemporary practice of cryptography – or those seeking a more concise text – would be well advised to consider the books by Simon Singh and Bruce Schneier on the topic.

Khan’s book excels in actually describing how various cryptographic systems work, as well as how they were broken. For the most part, his analysis is factual and dispassionate. The sole exception is in the period covering the Cold War, in which his ire against the Soviet Union and those Americans who turned into traitors for it are acute. At times, the book gets into an excessive amount of detail about the bureaucratic organization of different cipher bureaus: including lengthy sections about how various wartime bodies were reorganized. In most cases, the book does not provide much biography on the men and women involved, though exceptions exist in the case of some of the most eminent or interesting cryptographers. The book does provide an interesting discussion of the history of writing on cryptography, including the impact that major publications had on the development of the field and its comprehension within society at large. Kahn also does a good job of debunking some of the many spurious claims that have been made about ‘revolutionary’ and ‘unbreakable’ cryptosystems that people have invented: stressing how the making of cryptographic systems is a realm of abstract mathematics, while the breaking of such systems is a gritty and practical exercise.

In addition to covering the techniques of cryptography and cryptanalysis themselves, the book covers many related security issues: including physical security, invisible inks, elements of spycraft, decisions about how to use information gleaned through cryptanalysis, and the use of broken cryptographic systems to transmit fake or confusing information. The book also covers the relationships between cryptographic work and the activities it is supporting. An especially intriguing section details the efforts of the American navy to combat rum smuggling during the prohibition era. Ships with floating cryptoanalytical laboratories provided vital intelligence to interception vessels, just as other cryptanalysis had helped re-direct U-boats away from German submarines during the Second World War. The book covers an enormous variety of code systems, ranging in use and sophistication. These include diplomatic and commercial systems, high level military systems used between major installations, systems for vehicles, trench codes for those on the front lines, and more. The most abstract section of the book contemplates communication between human beings and extraterrestrials, covering questions about how we could recognize alien communication, as well as mathematical steps through which a comprehensible discourse could potentially be established.

For those interested in actually breaking codes and ciphers themselves, the book provides detailed information on techniques including frequency analysis, factorization attacks of the kind used against polyalphabetic substitution ciphers, and the index of coincidence. It also provides a lot of information on the weak ways in which cryptography is often used and the kinds of errors that have allowed for key breaks into previously unreadable cryptosystems. While it would not be especially useful for attacking modern computerized cryptographic systems, it would provide some guidance for those seeking to break into amateur or puzzle-type cryptographic challenges.

The Code-Breakers may well be the most comprehensive cryptographic history available, though it is far less detailed in its description of post-Cold War cryptosystems than some of its more concise recent contemporaries. For those wishing to gain an appreciation for how cryptography emerged, the role it played for most of human history, and the techniques that have been employed to guard and attack messages, this is an ideal place to turn.