Brave New War: The Next Stage of Terrorism and the End of Globalization
By John Robb, 2007

I’ve been interested in the problems of securing essential utilities and improving national security for a few years. This book gives a modern view of terrorism and suggests new strategies for security. I found some of the insights very interesting. Terrorists in the twenty-first century have entered a new era and attacks have some attributes that were not seen previously. First, with the interconnectedness of society, attacks on infrastructure (electricity, oil, etc.) have huge multiplier effects, which allow terrorists to cause thousands or millions of dollars in damage for every dollar they spend on the attack. Second, terror cells are quickly evolving their tactics by watching other cells. Effective techniques are quickly duplicated and improved. Third, the enemy in the war on terrorism is rarely a nation-state. Small groups have the ability to wage war, and they are able to use our country’s size against us in battle. Many small groups tend to cluster together under one umbrella cause (hatred of the US/infidels or defense of homeland from western crusaders) and fight, though there are individual differences in motivation or technique between groups. Using the established practice of targeting leaders of these groups won’t work because they are so easily replaced and because no one leader controls a significant portion of the various terror cells/groups.

The book explains why the US had such trouble with guerrilla insurrection and infrastructure instability in Iraq post-Saddam. New techniques of attack and defense are necessary in the new world of terrorism. On the defense side, we need to build open platforms upon which different groups can innovate and layer security. If the electric grid were better understood by the average innovator, it would be open to improvements in security and redundancy. Putting all of our faith in one organization, such as the Dept of Homeland Security, to protect us from attack will result in disaster every time. Personally, I’m most worried about the electrical grid going down in an attack. Think about how dependent EVERYTHING is on electricity. If a significant portion of the country went dark for a month, chaos would ensue. I hope we don’t see anything like that in the future, but I expect it to happen eventually.