As commander of the new U.S. Cyber Command, Keith B. Alexander leads the effort to protect the nation's computer infrastructure from cyberwar attacks.
View full sizeGeneral Keith B. Alexander (left), director of the National Security Agency, and his friend, Norman Mordue, a federal judge for the Northern District of New York, chat at the Vietnam Veteran's Leadership Program luncheon in the Empire Room at the state fairgrounds, in Geddes. Syracuse, NY -- Gen. Keith B. Alexander came to Syracuse Friday to praise Vietnam veterans at their annual luncheon, saying soldiers in that controversial war deserve the same high regard as the more celebrated vets of World War II.
But in an interview with The Post-Standard before his speech at the state fairgrounds, he spoke of a different kind of war — and a different kind of controversy.
Alexander, a Syracuse native and Westhill High School graduate, has been director of the National Security Agency, the nation’s electronic intelligence arm, since 2005. In May, he was given a fourth star on his uniform and an additional title: commander of the new U.S. Cyber Command, or Cybercom. The new organization brings together all four service units — Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines — to counter growing threats to the nation’s computer infrastructure.
To some, those threats have created a fifth potential theater of war, adding cyberspace to air, land, sea and space. They fear cyberterrorists or enemy nations could plant viruses in American computers that could cripple electricity grids, telecommunications, air traffic and other vital systems. Others believe those fears are overblown, and that by building intrusive cyberdefense systems, the new organization could threaten citizens’ privacy.
Alexander, 58, a mild-mannered man who chooses his words carefully, is clearly in
the first camp. “I don’t believe it’s overblown,” he said. “I believe there are serious threats to our infrastructure and to our government. The question is when.”
The general is busy marshaling more personnel and resources to fortify his new command. The Washington Post reported in August that Cybercom consisted of “1,000 elite military hackers and spies under one four-star general.”
“I think they left off suave and good-looking,” the general laughed when asked about that description.
A local boy
Alexander was born in Syracuse and raised in Manlius, Constantia and Onondaga Hill, where at 14 he was a paper boy for The Post-Standard. After graduating from Westhill, he went to West Point and then earned master’s degrees in business, physics and electronic warfare.
He said he visits Central New York about once a year to visit his mother, who lives along Oneida Lake in Constantia, and his father-in-law and two sisters-in-law on Onondaga Hill. His wife, Debbie, lived two doors down from him on Onondaga Hill and was a Westhill classmate. The couple has four grown daughters.
Thursday’s visit, however, was a quick up-and-back trip from NSA headquarters at Fort Meade, in Maryland. It came after U.S. District Judge Norman Mordue, who Alexander calls a mentor, urged him to address the Vietnam Veterans Leadership Program Luncheon.
View full sizeGeneral Keith B. Alexander, a Syracuse native and Westhill High School graduate, has been director of the National Security Agency, the nation's electronic intelligence arm, since 2005. He came to Syracuse Friday tp speak at the Vietnam Veteran's Leadership Program luncheon at the state fairgrounds. Mordue, a decorated Vietnam veteran, said he met Alexander a few years ago and the two have established a friendship built on mutual admiration. “He’s very important,” Mordue said. “The entire cyber warfare is in his hands.”
That concentration of power is raising concerns in some circles, according to an article in this week’s New Yorker magazine by investigative reporter Seymour M. Hersh. Hersh writes that some government officials fear that increased talk of “cyber war” could lead to the military taking a primary role in the protection of private computer systems. The article notes that William J. Lynn III, the deputy secretary of defense, has written of applying NSA’s defense capabilities “beyond the ‘.gov’ domain.”
Protecting military computers
To some, that creates the possibility that the military could intrude into the privacy of civilian computer users. Alexander downplayed such fears, saying Cybercom is responsible only for protecting military computers.
“I think you’ve seen recent statements by (Homeland Security) Secretary (Janet) Napolitano that we can leverage the National Security Agency to both provide security and ensure the civil liberties and privacy of our people,” he said. “Those are the two things that we have to bring together.”
Another area Alexander is exploring is how aggressive Cybercom can and should be in reacting to foreign threats. According to The Washington Post, Cybercom is developing technologies to go on the offensive and to shut down aggressors who might attack American systems. That raises questions not only of what is technically feasible, but of what is legal under international law.
The general questioned the use of the term “pre-emptive” to describe Cybercom’s intentions, but he clearly favors an aggressive stance against would-be cyber warriors. “There are times that you want to ensure the safety of your system, analogous to the inherent right of self-defense,” he said. “So how do you stop something from getting into your system before it gets in there? You’ve got to have that capability.”
He added: “We have been really good about developing (computer) capabilities for our nation and for our benefit,” he added. “The issue is that most of that was done without thinking that people would try to do us harm. Given that this is of tremendous value to our country, how do we defend it? ... What the government has to look at is: What is the critical infrastructure you’ve got to defend and how do you do that? And how do we explain it to the American people?”
Contact Paul Riede at priede@syracuse.com or 470-3260.