After the suspect Iranian elections in 2009, local activists appeared and asked how to organise online without being caught by the government’s surveillance techniques. Housh and his colleagues coached them with the best research they could find. At one point he was speaking to five activists inside Iran. Then came days of silence before one got back in touch using the code word. The other four were dead, he said, and he wouldn’t be in contact again.

They’re watching. And they can bring you down. [Not paywalled]

Some of the language stood out. The description of future, smaller scale terrorist attacks as ‘entrepreneurial terrorism’ is apt and a particularly useful way of conceiving of more fragmented or ‘start-up’ groups, out to prove their new method. Likewise the reference to an al-Qaeda 2.0, which was perhaps a nod to the big issue: cyber attacks.

Cyber, Chertoff stressed, was the exception to the idea of future attacks being smaller scale (along with biological attacks). His concern over the lack of attribution/high deniability, and his questions of what would constitute an act of war, what evidence you would need, and to whom you would present it, are most relevant given the DigiNotar incident and the response to it over the past few days. During the Dutch government’s press conference yesterday, it was alleged that the attack came from inside Iran (which now seems certain), which fits with recent changes to Iran’s domain name servers.

This brings us back to an important general question raised by Chertoff: to what extent is a state responsible for the servers within it, and at what point would a foreign power go in to take out those servers? At present, the DigiNotar attack seems to be concerned with snooping on opponents of the regime. However, in doing so some collateral damage has been done to foreign powers (the Dutch governmental websites and, potentially, MI6 and the C.I.A.). While retaliation is extremely unlikely, it is clear that Chertoff’s question will soon need to be answered.

Source

• Michael Chertoff, US Department of Homeland Security (2005-09), Current and Future Security Threats Ten Years After 9/11. Speech and Q&A heard live at Chatham House 5.09.2011, transcript and video of the speech, and audio of the Q&A, available here.

Alongside some statistics on the growth of China, which were doubtless chosen as much for their shock as illustrative value (for example, that China currently has 8,000km of high speed rail track, more than the rest of the world combined, yet will have 13,000km by the end of next year), he was keen to emphasise that today’s generation in China live fundamentally different lives from those of their grandparents. This brought to mind the importance of the ‘magic washing machine‘ that Hans Rosling focussed on in one of his many excellent TED Talks. Brown argued that one key UK export, one of our continuing strengths in the changing world, is our values. In the Q&A session following the speech, unsurprisingly, this led to concerns over whether the UK would be able to influence China’s position in certain areas through trade. By way of reply, Brown referred to a debate he had been having, over whether economic liberalisation always leads to social liberalisation. Historically, it always has, but will this continue in the future, particularly in the case of China? His view was that it would, but, like many others, with reservations.

The other point made that caught my interest was that in a more globalised world, we Britons need a more globalised outlook. Our general knowledge of key political figures in the emerging powers is poor, and our interest in engaging with these nations is less than it should be. In this, as Brown put it, ‘Britain needs a big wake-up call’.

The just-released Chatham House-YouGov Survey 2011 ‘British Attitudes Towards the UK’s International Priorities’ suggests this lack of knowledge and interest. Many members of the public, when asked whether Britain should have stronger or weaker ties with various countries (including the US, Brazil, India, Turkey and Indonesia) overwhelmingly said the involvement should stay the same. With the exception of China (with whom respondents wanted stronger ties), ‘stay the same’ far outstripped ‘stronger’, ‘weaker’ and ‘dont’ know’. But this should not be interpreted as an endorsement of current strategies; ‘stay the same’ would be the answer to give in a survey if you don’t know what the current involvement is, but don’t want to admit to it.

So, while the public accept that we must engage with emerging powers in terms of business, their interest in them on a personal level is more limited. This is something we will have to confront in order to make full use of our best advantage, Soft Power. While acknowledged by Brown, it was somewhat downplayed in favour of commercial competitiveness (which is perhaps to be expected from a government that has taken an axe to the funding of our greatest soft power institution, the BBC World Service). To overlook soft power is to overlook what we can and should do best.

Sources

• Jeremy Brown MP, Navigating the new world order: The UK and the emerging powers. Speech with Q&A heard live at Chatham House 20.07.2011, transcript of the speech available here.
• The Chatham House-YouGov Survey 2011: British Attitudes Towards the UK’s International Priorities (Survey Analysis by Robin Niblett). Printed edition used. Survey available here, the specific data referred to here.

I’ll be with you shortly.