From: iw@all.net
Subject: IW Mailing List history/951204
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Moderator's note:

The following article reprinted from Financial Times, Dec 4, 1995
may be of interest.

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US Marine chiefs trade places to experience tranche warfare.

Officers are preparing to do virtual battle in the Nymex oil pits [and
wargame FinCide]

By Laurie Morse

A dozen US Marine Corps generals and colonels will today march on to the
New York Mercantile Exchange trading floor and start matching wits with
commodity futures traders. 

The traders often describe their fraught existence in the trading rings
as virtual warfare, and the US military appears to agree. 

Keen to find ways of training officers to cope with the demands of
high-tech 21st-century warfare, a group of Marine Corps top brass will
venture into the Nymex crude oil pit in the World Trade Center after the
regular market has closed. 

Assisted by a group of handpicked veteran commodity traders, the marines
will plunge into a simulated session of futures trading that will
include several market reversals and a barrage of oil-linked "news". 

Mr Gary Lapayover, the Nymex trader co-ordinating the event, says the
trading session will allow the officers and traders to become acquainted
on friendly turf, and give the Marines a glimpse of the multiple tasks
and the speed -- that breakneck trading entails. 

Today's simulated trading will be followed tomorrow by a war games
session.  About 15 traders will follow the generals to an old officers'
club on Governor's Island, off Manhattan, and test their skills in a
computerised game designed by Gama Corp.  a Virginia-based company that
specialises in computer-generated battle scenarios. 

Later, the traders will tell the officers and their aides what they
think of the battle experience. 

What do the Marines hope to learn from the commodities pits? "Our vision
of what warfare will be in the 21st century is very different from what
we've faced in the 20th," says Colonel Tom Harkins, director of
operations at the Marines' war-fighting laboratory in Quantico,
Virginia. 

In future, the Marines expect to be drawn into smaller conflicts of the
type seen in Somalia and Bosnia.  At the same time, warfare will become
increasingly digitalised, calling for rapid decision-taking amid a
barrage of information.  "How does a commander make decisions on a
digital battlefield?" asks Col Harkins.  "Technology will increase the
tempo of battle, and the influx of digital information will require
skills in what you might call pattern analysis.  This is what futures
traders do.  In this exercise we want to see how people who face these
conditions every day deal with the stress, and get comfortable with the
risks."

During tomorrow's war games, traders will be confronted by an on-screen
battle area laid out on a grid, with as many as 50 small teams of
cyber-soldiers seeking the "enemy". 

Once "contact" is made, the teams will request firepower.  Under
pressure, "commanders" must decide how to deploy resources to the best
strategic advantage, while limiting losses. 

For Mr Eric Bolling, an independent trader who has survived nine years
in the Nymex energy pits, the Marines are being shrewd in seeking to
cross laser-swords with battle-hardened heroes of the trading pits. 

Mr Bolling, a 33-year-old former minor league baseball player, has no
military background, but sees a lot of parallels between trading, sport
and the armed services.  All three require high levels of
self-motivation and decision-making ability. 

Some of the generals and colonels may be shown to be more suited to
high-stress, high-stakes environments than others, he says.  "You have
to be able to prioritise and analyse a lot of information rapidly --
then initiate risk by making a decision; and, finally, manage that risk
by having the discipline to manage the trade," says Mr Bolling. 

"A lot of people can't do that, and wash out of these markets.  I don't
think it's something that can be learned really -- it's a personality
type."

Mr Lapayover said he selected floor veterans like Mr Bolling to
participate because he was looking for "survivors" people who have been
successful traders over a number of years.  "Military experience wasn't
a factor.  The Marines are looking for people that can help them
understand the process."

Mr Lapayover has also suggested that the top brass visit the "war rooms"
of America's largest investment banks to observe Wall Street's fixed
income and equities traders, and the strategies of high-stakes corporate
raiders. 

The war games are part of a new programme directed by General Charles
Krulak, commandant of the Marine Corps. 

"War games are not designed to give you a total solution, they are
designed to give you insight" he says.  "We're going to have our
laboratory analysts with us, and they will be looking at improving the
process."
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Date: Mon, 4 Dec 1995 17:01:24 -0500
From: JBDenson1@aol.com

I am interested in information concerning the legal implications - both
domestically and internationally - of using the internet to engage in
war. 

Has there been legislation dealing with this? If so, do you know where I
can access it?

Another specific topic I am interested in is: We claim to be able to
engage in a variety of campaigns using computer based tactics, but how
are these campaigns operationalized? Will a platoon or squadron deploy
to a war zone, set up their equipment, and commence Information Warfare?
Could it all be done from the Pentagon or some other remote location?

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From: "Hemminger, John E   Maj   SIN" 
Date: Mon, 04 Dec 95 16:30:00 PST

I consider IW to be any effort that treats Information as a strategic
asset to be attacked or protected. 
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Date: Mon, 4 Dec 1995 19:46:47 -0600 (CST)
From: David Lemmon 
Subject: Modern day example of an IW attack?

The following is pasted from CNN webb site, Oct 15, 1995:

Fake $100 bills believed coming from Syria or Lebanon

WASHINGTON (AP) -- High-quality, counterfeit $100 bills, believed made
in Syria or Lebanon, have become so common throughout the former Soviet
Union, Europe and the Far East that banks increasingly won't accept the
big U.S.  bills. 

The New Yorker reported in its Oct.  23 issue that U.S.  officials
suspect the counterfeiters may be trying to destabilize the U.S. 
economy.  U.S.  Treasury officials have played down the reports because
of fears they could shake confidence in American currency. 

The State Department believes that Syria's military is protecting the
counterfeiting ring, the magazine said.  A diplomatic solution to the
problem was stymied in 1994 because officials do not know the ring's
exact location, believed to be in Syria or the Syrian-controlled Bekaa
Valley of Lebanon. 

The bills are so good they could fool currency scanners at Federal
Reserve Banks, said Boston federal prosecutor Paul Kelly, who was
involved in an investigation by Secret Service agents. 

end story. 

What would make this a more structured IW attack would be the syrian
military's alleged involvement with the counterfeiting.  An attack on
the confidence and value of a nation's currency should certainly meet
most people's defintion of an IW attack, right?
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