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.”
Biography
Bethan Saunders is a Harvard Kennedy School alumni, having focused on the intersection of national security, technology, and innovation. Bethan was the Co-Chair of the HKS student organization, Women in Defense, Development, and Diplomacy, and a student coordinator for the Cambridge Project, which pairs graduate students with the Defense Innovation Unit on projects to accelerate commercial technology for national security. Bethan was also a Rosenthal Fellow on In-Q-Tel's Strategic Issues team. Before HKS, Bethan was an associate at Morgan Stanley, where she focused on business growth strategy, impact investing, and technology. She received her BSFS in International Politics and Security from Georgetown's School of Foreign Service.
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