The overarching question imparting urgency to this exploration is: Can U.S.-Russian contention in cyberspace cause the two nuclear superpowers to stumble into war? In considering this question we were constantly reminded of recent comments by a prominent U.S. arms control expert: At least as dangerous as the risk of an actual cyberattack, he observed, is cyber operations’ “blurring of the line between peace and war.” Or, as Nye wrote, “in the cyber realm, the difference between a weapon and a non-weapon may come down to a single line of code, or simply the intent of a computer program’s user.”
A Panel Discussion with:
BG Kevin Ryan (US Army retired)
Director, Defense & Intelligence Projects, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School
Simon Saradzhyan
Fellow and Assistant Director, Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School
Dr. Alexandra Vacroux
Executive Director, Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Harvard University
Jill Dougherty (moderator)
Spring 2014 Fellow, Shorenstein Center, Harvard Kennedy School
Former Foreign Affairs Correspondent, CNN