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
Nicolas Cimarra Etchenique was the Project on Europe's Rafael del Pino-Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs Fellow in AY 2022-2023. He joined the Spanish Foreign Service in 2005. He was posted to the Embassy of Spain to Ethiopia and to the African Union (2008-2011), the Embassy of Spain to Pakistan (2011-2012) and the Mission of Spain to the United Nations (2012-2017). From 2019 to 2022 he served as the Deputy Permanent Representative for political and military affairs at the Permanent Representation of Spain to the OSCE, and he was the Coordinator of the Structured Dialogue process in 2020 and 2021.
In the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation, he has served as Desk Officer at the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation (2005-2006), as Desk Officer at the EU Directorate (2007-2008), and as Assistant Deputy Director at the Africa Directorate (2017-2019).
He graduated in Law from Universidad Complutense of Madrid.
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