STUFF: News, Technology, the cool and the plain weird

[MIKA27]

FRANK MCCARTHY THUNDERBALL ORIGINAL ARTWORK

American-born artist Frank McCarthy was responsible for posters from some very well-known films, including The Ten Commandments, The Dirty Dozen, and Once Upon a Time in the West, but his most famous works are those done for Bond films.

This Frank McCarthy Thunderball Original Artwork gives you a chance to own a bit of that history. Both of the paintings, done in casein on 35.8 x 23.6 inch boards, were used in posters for the film, with the iconic jetpack featured in the "Look Up!" poster, and the underwater battle scene captioned with "Look Down!". Each comes with a letter of provenance and is expected to fetch a minimum of $40,000.

[MIKA27]

PARCE COLOMBIAN RUM

Founded by three brothers — one of whom lives on a property once owned by Pablo Escobar — Parce Colombian Rum is inspired by the beauty and hospitality of the Colombian people. Aged for 12 years and crafted by hands with over 50 years of experience, this rum is aged in whiskey barrels, making it perfect for lovers of bourbons or scotch. It even took home the honor of Best Rum and Best in Show at this years San Francisco Worldwide Spirits Competition.

[MIKA27]

SHINOLA MUHAMMAD ALI WATCH

It won't make you float like a butterfly or sting like a bee, but the Shinola Muhammad Ali Watch will help you look your best. Created in collaboration with Louisville's Muhammad Ali Center, it has a 41 or 36mm stainless steel cushion case, with a matte black dial, gold-colored numbers and hands, and a date window above the 6. It's powered by a Detroit-built Argonite 705 movement, finished with a brown alligator strap with distinctive red backing, and arrives in a custom hickory box, alongside three limited edition, 8.5"x11" prints captured and signed by Magnum photographer Thomas Hoepker. Limited to just 400 examples.

[MIKA27]

Vin Diesel Is Bringing Riddick Back With A New Movie And TV Show

This is pretty exciting news: Vin Diesel has announced that he’s intending on developing two Riddick sequels: a fourth film titled Furia, and a television show titled Merc City.

Diesel made the announcement via Instagram, stating that his company, One Race Films will be handling the film, with Director David Twohy starting work on the first script for Furia next month.

Just by going by the title, Furia will open up some long-unanswered questions about Riddick’s past, something that’s been hinted at throughout the last couple of movies. Furyans had been a race of humanity with some unique characteristics, and which had been largely exterminated by the Necromongers - Riddick is one of the last surviving members of his race.

On the other side, a TV show about the Mercs of this universe would be utterly delightful. The Riddick franchise has always had the markings of a really cool, well-built science fiction universe, and the general lawlessness is something that could be really exciting to see week to week.

Hopefully, Furia will be a bit better than 2013’s Riddick. Could this be a giant trainwreck? Potentially. Could it also be awesome? We hope so.

[MIKA27]

IWC PILOT CHRONOGRAPH TOP GUN MIRAMAR

Great watches are getting harder and harder to find nowadays, mostly due to smart watches and smartphones replacing the need to own one. Occasionally, we come across a brilliantly designed wrist watch that doesn’t care about how technologically advanced everything else is, but, instead, focuses on having a great look.

That’s the case with the International Watch Company’s Top Gun-inspired Miramar Chronograph, which is a tribute to the birthplace of the movie’s U.S. Navy pilot’s school in Miramar, California. It has a military-style color scheme, external chapter ring, and an inner hour circle. The watch uses a unique flyback function to protect itself against magnetic fields, and it also has a soft-iron inner case. It also has a 68 hour power reserve when fully wound, and displays the date on its face. [Purchase]

[MIKA27]

The Best Whisky In the World Costs $30

Jim Murray and the people of Scotland are going to have words soon.

Last year, Murray named the Yamazaki Sherry Cask 2013 as the best whisky of the year. Now, for his 2016 edition of the Whisky Bible, here’s a bottle from Canada. Crown Royal Northern Rye is Jim Murray’s pick for the World Whisky of the Year. The Canadian rye has classic rye spicy notes and a smooth finish. Oh, and it costs $30. Yes, the best whisky in the world costs just a little bit more than a bottle of Jack.

You can view some of the other winners here.

[polarbear]

The Best Whisky In the World Costs $30

Jim Murray and the people of Scotland are going to have words soon.

Last year, Murray named the Yamazaki Sherry Cask 2013 as the best whisky of the year. Now, for his 2016 edition of the Whisky Bible, here’s a bottle from Canada. Crown Royal Northern Rye is Jim Murray’s pick for the World Whisky of the Year. The Canadian rye has classic rye spicy notes and a smooth finish. Oh, and it costs $30. Yes, the best whisky in the world costs just a little bit more than a bottle of Jack.

You can view some of the other winners here.

Where are you finding bottles of Jack for $30? ;-)

[MIKA27]

Where are you finding bottles of Jack for $30? ;-)

I can be technical and state you can get a bottle of Jack for $29.00 but I never said how much volume

[polarbear]

I can be technical and state you can get a bottle of Jack for $29.00 but I never said how much volume

Touché

[MIKA27]

All The Military Gear The UK's Buying On Its Defence Spending Spree

David Cameron’s Conservative government is to announce the formation of two new 5000 troop-strong strike brigades, as the UK’s first defence review since 2010 was revealed yesterday. It’s just one element of a major new defence push by the UK’s top brass.

Adding £12bn to the UK’s military equipment budget (bringing total defence equipment spending up to £178 billion over the next decade), the strike brigades will be ready by 2025, and have the capability to deploy thousands of kilometres away from central operations. The brigades will have access to the new Scout fleet of vehicles, as well as 600 armoured tanks, jeeps and troop carriers.

In addition, new aircraft will be commissioned to fly from two new Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers, currently being built by a consortium of contractors including BAE.

HMS Queen Elizabeth

“At [the strategy’s] heart is an understanding that we cannot choose between conventional defences against state-based threats and the need to counter threats that do not recognise national borders,” reads Cameron’s words in the foreward to the budget review.

“Today we face both and we must respond to both.”

The budget raise comes in part in response to the growing presence of terrorist threats — the government has already pledged a 30 per cent increase to the counter terrorism budget, as it looks to improve MI5’s reaction times.

To aid surveillance, nine new Boeing P8 maritime patrol aircraft will be deployed, capable of anti-submarine and anti-surface ship warfare. These will be intended to protect Trident and the new BAE-build aircraft carriers, replacing the decommissioned, torpedo-carrying Nimrod aircraft that left a significant hole in the UK military’s ability to spot submarines.

Boeing P8 Poseidon

Two new Typhoon aircraft squadrons will be established, bringing the total squadron count up to seven, each containing around 12 aircraft each. The Typhoon jet fleet will have its life extended by 10 years, keeping them in service until 2040, and will be upgraded with new equipment. This includes new active electronically scanned array radars.

RAF Typhoon FGR4

Finally, both increases to Britain’s special forces troop numbers and the Navy’s sailor count are expected, while the Reaper drone fleet will double by 2020.

MQ-9 Reaper

If all this sounds like overkill, the Prime Minister has pointed out that it in fact counts for only 2 per cent of the UK’s GDP — the bare minimum that Nato countries are supposed to pledge to defence (though few ever meet that number).

“This is vital at a time when the threats to our country are growing,” Cameron says in a foreword to the review.

“From the rise of Isil [islamic State] and greater instability in the Middle East, to the crisis in Ukraine, the threat of cyber attacks and the risk of pandemics, the world is more dangerous and uncertain today than five years ago.

“So while every government must choose how to spend the money it has available, every penny of which is hard-earned by taxpayers, this government has taken a clear decision to invest in our security and safeguard our prosperity.”

[MIKA27]

Captain America: Civil War Gets A Surprise First Trailer

For a movie that isn’t coming out until June next year, you think we’d have to wait longer to see the first full-length trailer. But that’s not Marvel’s style with Captain America: Civil War. The first trailer just debuted on Jimmy Kimmel Live in the US, and it’s awesome.

[MIKA27]

How The SpaceX Crew Dragon Spacecraft Will Bring Us Back To Space

SpaceX just got its first crewed spaceship contract from NASA for the Crew Dragon spacecraft and it’s set to bring us back to space on American spaceships after so many years without. Along with the Boeing Starliner, the Crew Dragon will start making crewed space flights in 2017. For reference, the last flight of the Atlantis was in 2011. So it’s been a while!

The SpaceX Crew Dragon (and the Boeing Starliner) will let NASA make its own flights to the ISS and end America’s reliance on Russia’s Soyuz.

[MIKA27]

An Aircraft Carrier Commander's Last Day In The 'Office'

This photo of Captain Christopher Bolt preparing for his last flight looks like a painting, bringing together Bolt’s monochrome profile and the ragged reflection of the carrier’s megastructure on the coating of plane window.

It’s almost poetic. According to the Navy, Bolt is part of its “only forward-deployed aircraft carrier,” the USS Ronald Reagan. In the photo, he’s performing one last preflight check before taking to the sky — his “last as the ship’s commanding officer.”

[MIKA27]

What The Hell Caused This California Road To Suddenly Rise Up And Crumble?

A stretch of Vasquez Canyon Road in Santa Clarita has inexplicably lifted upwards over the course of just a few hours. Geologists are stumped.

As CBS Los Angeles reports, it all started last Thursday, November 19, when motorists starting calling the California Highway Patrol about the road lifting and warping. Over the course of the next three days, the road kept rising along a 60m stretch. In some places the road lifted as much as 4.6m, and some sections were practically vertical.

As noted in the Santa Clarita Valley News, some people thought it was triggered by an earthquake, while others joked that it was caused by the worm-like creatures featured in the Tremors movies.

But what’s particularly strange about this event is that it wasn’t precipitated by any obvious geological phenomenon (or mythical subterranean creature, for that matter), be it an earthquake or rainstorm. Even weirder is the fact that it happened over the span of a few hours.

UCLA professor Jeremy Boyce recently visited the site with his students. Here’s what he told CBS News:

When we think about geology, we think about processes that happen over millions and billions of years, so the opportunity to bring students out and see something happening over a scale of hours gives them the idea that not only does geology take forever, it can also happen almost instantaneously.

Over at the AGU Landslide Blog, geologist Dave Petley makes the case that it was caused by a progressive landslide, though one without an obvious trigger. This photo, taken from the Santa Clarita Valley Signal, offers a revealing perspective:

Petley admits that media reports of the road rising up appear to be accurate.

A spokesperson for the LA County Department of Public Works described it as some “really extraordinary soil movement” that turned the road into “essentially catastrophic failure.” Indeed, it appears as though the soil moved underneath the road, and then lifted it up. Which is quite odd. Normally, a landslide would just wipe the road away.

Before-and-after pics of the site show that the road is situated on a box cut, and that the unloading of material from the slope likely contributed to the landslide.

Footage of the road from a few years back show signs of extensive cracking, though nothing quite on the current scale.

A geology professor at College of the Canyons referred to it as a “massive wasting event,” adding that “some sort of water event saturated the rock” causing it to act as a lubricant, thus facilitating the layers above it to move along a curved surface.

Here’s some drone footage of the site:

The stretch of Vasquez Canyon Road between Lost Creek Road and Vasquez Way is closed until further notice. Geologists will continue to investigate.

[MIKA27]

Awesome Photo Of A F-15 Being Refueled From The Air Fuel Tankers Perspective

What a view. Here’s a KC-135 Stratotanker refuelling a F-15 in the air from the perspective of the air tanker. Actually, it’s almost like seeing the whole process from the perspective of the boom, as we see the probe arm reach into the receptacle. It’s such an awesome angle.

The US Air Force says:

A KC-135 Stratotanker from the 100th Air Refuelling Wing refuels an F-15E Strike Eagle from the 48th Fighter Wing Nov. 12, 2015, over the northern Mediterranean. While deployed to Incirlik Air Base, Turkey, both wings will work together in support of Operation Inherent Resolve and counter-Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant operations in Iraq and Syria. (U.S. Air Force photo/Senior Airman Kate Thornton)

[MIKA27]

Check Out The Glorious Capes On These Batman V Superman Action Figures

Although some may disagree, nothing beats a good cape on a superhero suit — and the same stands for superhero action figures. So it’s a good jobe Medicom’s new toys based on Batman v Superman have some fantastic, poseable capes to make the figures really shine.

Medicom revealed the roughly 15cm tall toys earlier today, and while there’s things about them that don’t quite work — it might be the posing but Batman seems like he might have some neck problems in his advancing age, and Superman has some of the strangest coloured lips I’ve ever seen on a figure — they’re overall fantastic. The hyperarticulation helps with that, but really, it’s the capes. Glorious, swooshy capes — with wire frames to pose them fluttering in the wind, like any good cape should!

See what I mean about Batman’s neck problem though? I mean jeez Bruce, I know you love to brood but think of the spine pain! That does not look comfortable.

Aside from their capes, Batman and Superman come packed with a few extra accessories. Both have alternate hands for posing and gripping some extra bits and bobs, but Batman has a trusty Batarang, a grappling hook gun, and some kind of machine-gun-looking device (that, knowing Batman, probably isn’t an actual gun). Superman, on the other hand, doesn’t need many wonderful toys — instead, he comes with an alternate head to show him ready to blast his heat vision .

Man, combined with those eyes, Superman’s lips look even weirder.

Medicom’s MAFEX Batman and Superman will be out in July 2016, and set you back 5500 yen each (about $62).

[MIKA27]

New Chinese Plant Will Clone 1 Million Cows Annually

Imagine one million identical cows marching shoulder to shoulder and rib to rib down a path to the slaughterhouse. Imagine one million identical cows getting the same idea simultaneously to turn around and storm the cloning plant that created them. Somewhere in between is what probably will happen when the world’s largest cloning plant, currently under construction in China, goes into full operation in early 2016.

Plant where 1 million cows will be cloned annually

The $31 million plant is being built in Tianjin (160 km (100 miles) from Beijing) by BoyaLife, a three-year-old biotech firm specializing in stem cell and regenerative medicine, biological products, drug innovation and hereditary diseases research. The plan for the 14,000 square meter (150,000 sq. ft.) plant is to produce 100,000 cloned cattle embryos the first year and ramp quickly up to a million annually to satisfy China’s rapidly-growing demand for beef.

In addition to cattle, the company will clone pet dogs, police dogs, racehorses and “non-human primates,” with the somewhat altruistic goal of being the first to someday clone endangered pandas.

Cloned pigs

What could possibly go wrong? Here’s what Xu Xiaochun, CEO of BoyaLife, has to say:

We are going [down] a path that no one has ever traveled. We are building something that has not existed in the past.

That’s not promising. Neither is the fact that BoyaLife is partnered with Sooam Biotech, a South Korean company run by Hwang Woo-suk – the former “king of cloning” who was found guilty in 2006 of research fraud and gross ethical lapses in his attempts to derived stem-cell lines from cloned human embryos.

What else? The plant is near the site of chemical explosions that killed at least 165 people in August. China has recently had many major food safety scandals. Many are concerned the cloned beef will be rushed to market without thorough testing and some suggest that the testing be done on corporate and national leaders – not a bad idea.

While China’s experts say cloned beef is safe to eat, the European parliament in September proposed a ban on cloned animals for food and a halt to importing products derived from them. In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration approvedthe sale of cloned beef for food in 2008 but doesn’t require the products to be labeled as such and many believe it is being sold anonymously.

Is the world or China ready for massive amounts of cloned beef from BoyaLife? How will we know if it’s safe? Would you eat cloned beef? Do you think you’re already eating it?

What could possibly go wrong?

[MIKA27]

How a Russian Tsar’s Relative Died Alone in Australia

Leonid Kulikovsky lived in a trailer park and was devoted to his dog. Although no-one knew it, he was the great-grandson of Alexander III, the penultimate Tsar.

His grandmother was the last Grand Duchess of Imperial Russia, and he was the great-grandson of Alexander III, the penultimate Tsar, but when Leonid Kulikovsky, 72, died alone and unknown in a small Australian town this year, the extravagances of a White Russian funeral were not observed.

In fact, quite the opposite—it took two months for the authorities to establish the identity of the quiet, retired water engineer who lived on a trailer park and whose greatest passion appears to have been walking his dog.

Leonid may have been a ‘White Russian’, as the Russian nobility and descendants of the royal family are known in Europe, but he did not advertise the fact, although there was a clue to his true identity in his nickname, “Old Nick”—a reference to his relative Nicholas II, the last Tsar of Russia, who was executed along with his family, doctor, cook, and maids by the Bolsheviks in July 1918.

Peter Byers, the owner of the caravan park in the dusty town of Katherine in the Northern Territory, said, “Old Nick decided it was all a bit much for him and traded his Winnebago for a car. He rented a small unit from us and stayed put.”

Mr Byers told The Northern Territory News, “He said he’d made a few friends in Katherine and was happy here … He got on with everybody. He loved his dog and took great care of him. He was a great reader and had a huge number of books on Vikings.”

Leonid’s grandmother, Grand Duchess Olga, was a sister of Tsar Nicholas, who was shot by revolutionary forces in 1917 when the Romanovs were deposed.

Olga fled to the Crimea and then to Denmark, and purchased a dairy farm inBallerup, near Copenhagen.

According to a report in The Daily Telegraph, she led a simple life, raising her two sons—one of whom, Guriy, was Leonid’s father—while also working on the farm and painting.

In 1948, apparently feeling threatened by Josef Stalin’s regime, Olga emigrated with her immediate family to a farm in Ontario, Canada, and died, aged 78, in Toronto.

Mr Kulikovsky reportedly moved from Denmark to Sydney in 1967. He has a sister who still lives in Denmark.

According to the Telegraph, his identity was only discovered after the head of Russia’s Orthodox Church in Australia visited Moscow and was told a member of the Romanov family had died in the Northern Territory.

[MIKA27]

CORRIDOR BAR:

The Corridor Bar from BDI is a highly contemporary and functional home bar, the perfect combination of style and function. The beautiful cabinet offers racking space for wine bottles and storage for a host of liquor bottles, glassware and all other kinds of bar implements are beautifully organized in the numerous open shelves and single closed drawer within. A black micro-etched glass top is the perfect work space to create your cocktails. An elegant solution that is as much a pleasure to look at as it is to use.

[MIKA27]

Students Have Brought An Extinct Vegetable Back To The Kitchen Table

In 2008, an archaeological team uncovered a clay jar buried on a Menominee reservation near Green Bay, Wisconsin. Inside, they found that it contained seeds. Now, a group of students have brought the plants back to life.

The seeds were carbon dated and found to be 850 years old, and were for a type of squash that had been presumed lost. The seeds, named Gete-okosomin (Anishinaabe for ‘really cool old squash’), were taken and distributed to several growers on the Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe reservation. In 2014, they planted several of the seeds, and found that they grew to enormous porportions:

“(Last year) I planted four seeds,” [sue Menzel] said. “By July the vines were more than 8m long. … By the time we were done we had two dozen (squash). The largest was 1m long, 8kg.”

Seeds from that crop (now in its fifth generation) have been provided to the American Indian Center, which yielded new vegetables for their annual Giving Thanks Feast and Powwow last week in Chicago, Illinois. Another group of students in Winnipeg also received a batch of seeds, which they incorporated their course curriculum.

Off The Grid News asserts that the plant was lost in part due to more recent history: the forced migration of Native Americans during the 1800s meant that crops and traditionally-held lands were abandoned:

Food independence and local food are important issues to Native Americans because of their history. During the 19th century the United States government was able to end Native American resistance on the frontier by destroying their food supplies. This forced the tribes onto reservations, where many of them were dependent on government handouts for food.

Now, with the rediscovery of the seeds, this crop is one that’s beginning to return to kitchen tables.

[MIKA27]

We Still Don't Know Why The Heck There Are So Many Blue Tarantulas

A very particular shade of blue hair has evolved independently on eight separate occasions and in at least three different ways in tarantulas, a new study finds. And scientists are having a hell of a time figuring out why.

Like most animals with a blue hue, tarantulas don’t get their colour from pigments. Rather, the striking cobalt we perceive is caused by nanoscale lattices that bend and scatter light in specific ways. So called “structural colours” are used for everything from attracting mates to warding off predators. Usually, the function of these dazzling displays is obvious; in tarantulas, it’s an ever-deepening mystery.

As reported this week in Science Advances, a team of researchers has completed a detailed optical, morphological, and evolutionary analysis of blue hair colour in tarantulas. At least forty species in eight distinct lineages come in blue — and not just any ol’ shade. Across those eight groups, hair colour converges within an extraordinarily narrow band of wavelengths, centered around 450 nanometres. That finding suggests natural selection is playing a big role. But what’s driving it?

Colour (LM), morphology (SEM), and nanostructure (TEM) of blue hairs in eight different tarantulas (A-H). Image via Hsiung et al. 2015

The most obvious hypothesis is that tarantula blue is a side-effect of some other hair property, for instance, the ability to repel water. But if that were the case, we’d expect each type of tarantula hair to have a similar molecular architecture. Instead, the researchers found at least three distinct nanoscale configurations, including multi-layered sheets of cells, and semi-ordered spongy structures.

Mate attraction also seems to be off the table, seeing as tarantulas have very poor colour vision and don’t perform any conspicuous courtship displays. The most likely explanation seems to be that tarantulas are signalling another species — perhaps a predator — but at present “the receiver of that signal remains unclear.”

In any case, it’s a fascinating illustration of how natural selection can produce similar outcomes from very different starting points. The ways of evolution are oft mysterious, but there is a method to the madness

[MIKA27]

The Next Alien Film, Covenant, Will Be Shot In Sydney (With Two More To Follow)

Well, hopefully two more. But definitely one, with director Ridley Scott confirming last week that Sydney would play host to Prometheus follow-up Alien: Covenant.

The wheels were set in motion a few months back when Ridley met with Julie Bishop, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, to persuade Australia to “change [its] filmmaking incentives” and make the country more appealing to overseas productions, according to Fairfax’s Garry Maddox.

Turns out that was all the convincing the government needed and now we’re going to have xenomorphs in our own backyard.

Filming won’t start until March next year once Michael Fassbender, who played the android David in Prometheus, comes on-board, but they do plan to stick around for a four-month shoot.

The article mentions that Ridley wants to pump out two additional Alien films, also in Sydney, though it all depends on if the government makes the “location offset” an ongoing thing.

Oh, and if Covenant is a success. That’s pretty important.

[MIKA27]

An Up-Close Look At The Exclusive Engine For The Next Airbus

Rolls-Royce Holdings has just released this cool factory photograph of their newest large turbofan aircraft engine, the Trent 7000. It’s the seventh generation of their Trent family, and built exclusively for the upcoming Airbus airliner, the A330neo.

The Airbus A330neo, successor to the Airbus A330, will be a wide-body twin-engine jet airliner, and its Trent 7000 engines are expected to consume less fuel, and to be less noisy. You can admire the exposed 284cm diameter 20-blade fan of the engine in the uncropped full image below:

[MIKA27]

Scientists Can Now Establish Your Gender From A Fingerprint

Fingerprints may be unique, but without an existing record they can’t help identify a person. Now, though, researchers can use chemical analysis of the prints to identify the gender of whoever left them behind.

A team of researchers from the University at Albany has developed a technique which uses the chemical composition of a fingerprint to ascertain gender. It’s made possible because of the subtle differences in amino acid concentrations that leech out of human skin: women tend to release twice the levels of amino acids, and in a slightly different distribution to men, too.

A team of researchers led by Jan Halámek decided to see if they could identify those differences even in something as scant as a fingerprint. First, they extracted the amino acids from a fingerprint by transferring it onto a piece of plastic wrap. Then, they washed the print with hydrochloric acid while heating it, encouraging the amino acids to be released. From there, the team analysed the presence of amino acids within the hydrochloric acid.

And boy did it work. The team performed a series of experiments, lifting fingerprints from door knobs, computer screens and other surfaces. Across their tests, they found that they could use the technique to accurately identify the gender of the print’s owner 99 per cent of the time. The results are published in Analytical Chemistry.

Obviously actually matching a fingerprint — or, better, a DNA sample — is more useful for law enforcement, but the technique could still prove useful. Indeed, Halámek points out that its results could provide vital evidence when fingerprints are smudged or distorted. However it’s used, though, expect to see it referenced in a TV detective show soon.

[MIKA27]

The Next Big War Will Be Digital -- And We're Not Ready For It

In the 21st century the familiar form of warfare in which physical damage is meted out against the opponent’s military forces and infrastructure has become only one form of attack. Instead, states are increasingly launching non-lethal attacks against an enemy’s information systems — this is the rise of information warfare.

Dan Kuehl of the National Defence University defined information warfare as the “conflict or struggle between two or more groups in the information environment”. You might say that just sounds like a fancier way of describing hacking. In fact it’s a lot more sinister and a lot more dangerous than its somewhat tame name implies.

Western leaders are investing billions to develop capabilities matching those of China and Russia, establishing military commands for attacking, defending and exploiting the vulnerabilities of electronic communications networks. Information warfare combines electronic warfare, cyberwarfare and psy-ops (psychological operations) into a single fighting organisation, and this will be central to all warfare in the future.

The anatomy of information warfare

The free flow of information within and between nation states is essential to business, international relations and social cohesion, as much as information is essential to a military force’s ability to fight. Communications today lean heavily on the internet, or via communications using various parts of the electromagnetic spectrum (such as radio or microwaves) through terrestrial communications networks or satellite networks in space. We live in a highly connected world, but it doesn’t take much to tip over into instability or even chaos.

Electronic warfare is used to disrupt or neutralise these electromagnetic transmissions. These might be electronic counter measures and jamming used to cripple military communications or weapons guidance systems. Or it can include civil uses, for example the ADS-B air traffic control system used by aircraft to avoid in-flight collisions, or the recently adopted European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS) that replaces railway trackside signalling and provides full control of trains. Jamming or degrading either of these would cause chaos.

We have become familiar with cyber-attacks launched through the internet against digital networks, which can make it impossible for businesses to operate. Enormous damage can follow, in cost and reputation, as seen from attacks on Sony Pictures and TalkTalk. Bringing down a stock exchange could cause massive financial losses. Cyber-attacks can also be directed at industrial control systems used in manufacturing plants or in power, water and gas utilities. With the capacity to affect such a wide range of national infrastructure lives would be put at risk.

Psy-ops are aimed more at degrading the morale and well-being of a nation’s citizens. This might include spreading false information, rumour and fear through social media and news outlets. The great level of connectedness that populations have today is a strength, but being instantly connected means that misinformation and fear can also spread rapidly, resulting in panic.

Information warfare, then, is the integration of electronic warfare, cyberwarfare and psychological operations, for both attack and defence.

Information war has already broken out

It’s suspected that Russia has launched increasingly sophisticated non-lethal attacks on its neighbours, for example against Estonia, Georgia and Ukraine, which experienced an integrated onslaught of electronic, cyber-attacks and psychological operations.

There is convincing circumstantial evidence that the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan gas pipeline in Georgia was targeted using a sophisticated computer virus which caused an uncontrolled pressure build-up that led to an explosion. Even the so-called Islamic State has shown it has a good understanding of how to use and manipulate social media for use in psychological warfare. IS is reportedly building greater cyberwar and electronic warfare capabilities, as it recognises that winning the information war is key.

A response to unconventional warfare

In response to the threat of information war the British Army has established two new formations: the77th Brigade for dealing with psychological operations, and the 1st Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Brigade which combines electronic warfare and intelligence. Hundreds of computer experts will be recruited as reservists, trained with the help of GCHQ’s Joint Cyber Unit.

These are moves in the right direction, but the approach is too piecemeal. A recent RAND Corporation report argued for a highly integrated approach to all aspects of information warfare in order to present an effective defence force. In the US, Admiral Michael S. Rogers released a Cyber Command vision statement, describing how it would defend Department of Defence networks, systems and information against cyber attacks and provide support to military and contingency operations. The US approach is more integrated but this is only the case within the military — from a national perspective both countries lack an overall integrated approach with a common command structure that includes threats to civilian infrastructure.

So while the concept of information war appears to be well understood the aspects of it are not being addressed together, and such siloed thinking could lead to gaps in our security. Western governments have failed to fully grasp the vulnerability of electronic communications and the enormous risks this poses to critical infrastructure, transport, and the safety of civilians.

The US director of intelligence has emphasised the enormity of the cyber-threat facing the US, while British General Sir Nicholas Houghton in a speech at Chatham House observed that most acts of physical war today incorporate an online aspect, where social networks are exploited to manipulate opinion and perception. He also acknowledged that the tactics employed by Russia combine aspects of information war and also counter-intelligence, espionage, economic warfare and the sponsoring of proxies.

We need to better understand the full scope of information warfare as it evolves, identify where we are most vulnerable, and then establish a single point of responsibility to implement defence mechanisms. Because those adversaries that are unconstrained by western policies, or by ethical or legal codes, can and will exploit our vulnerabilities.