Article

2019-07-08 Terror Networks

Attacking Command and Control Nodes: Two Examples Reveal a Change in the Face of War

"Attacking C3 Nodes"... not exactly a new concept, but an interesting article nonetheless.
[Free Range International] In my last post I speculated that the drone, shot down by the Iranians, was an intentional baited ambush by the United States Navy. My theory is based on the pattern of events and the reported outcomes in current Iranian situation and, as I said in the last post, we may have have arrived here by accident, but we are here.

"Here" is the destruction of the Iranian missile control systems by a cyber attack launched during an aborted air raid. Missile control systems are closed kimono, they are never connected to the internet, all inputs into the system come from filtered targeted data or humans. The system went down one of two ways; through the return from a targeted platform, or through the actions of a human asset.

Given the historical record of the Central Intelligence Agency with human intelligence assets the chances they had an agent anywhere near Iran’s missile defense systems are remote. But it is possible and will cause the Iranians to launch a long, bloody, mole hunt. Mole hunts are an awesome tool to use against adversaries because a mole hunt will always turn up guilty people to be disappeared even when there are not guilty.

The United States had a gigantic Mole hunt in 2001 when weaponized anthrax spores showed up in the congressional mail room. Robert Muller and James Comey oversaw the ensuing investigation hounding one man to suicide while bankrupting another. Neither of the suspects had anything to do with the Anthrax attacks and the one who survived won a 5.82 million dollar settlement after he was exonerated. That’s how mole hunts work; they find "guilty" people regardless of actual guilt, and right now Iran is in the middle of a big one. What could be better than that?
Followed sometime later by a two year Russian collusion investigation or as the author refers to it, "Mole hunt."
The simplest explanation for why a demonstrator drone, past its service life and headed for a junk heap, was sent over to the gulf and promptly shot down is the drone was serving a specific purpose that no other platform could serve. That service was (possibly) introducing a virus into the targeting systems. When we sent in a feint raid (pulling the planes back at the last minute) the virus the drone introduced was activated. The resulting damage was catastrophic for Iranian defense forces.

This morning in Kabul, Afghanistan there was yet another horrific bombing. This one targeted the Ministry of Defense offices responsible for administration and logistics. A truck bomb started the attack which was followed up by multiple gunmen who had no intention of surviving the assault. It is a typical Taliban attack in an area with no less than five schools as well as the Ministry of Public Works (across the Kabul River).
Emphasis added.

Posted by Besoeker 2019-07-08 07:05|| || Front Page|| [11 views ] Top

#1 (pulling the planes back at the last minute) the virus the drone introduced was activated. The resulting damage was catastrophic for Iranian defense forces.

Forcing air defense systems to be manned and radars to be switched to the on positions revealing locations.

Posted by Besoeker 2019-07-08 07:15|| 2019-07-08 07:15|| Front Page Top

#2 Air defense systems are disconnected from the internet, yet accept data feeds from targets they're tracking? Or from random external sources? And the data is treated as executable instructions?

Posted by Rob Crawford 2019-07-08 07:26|| 2019-07-08 07:26|| Front Page Top

#3 Military mobilization alerts have a handy way of finding themselves being transmitted by cellie. These lads have other cellie... bad habits as well.

Posted by Besoeker 2019-07-08 07:30|| 2019-07-08 07:30|| Front Page Top

#4 introducing a virus into the targeting systems.

But B, aren't the Iranian MDS targeting and launch controls running on their own intranet ? Can a Wi-fi link within a window of a few seconds be used to transfer and execute a virus like that ?

Is it possible that it was a self-goal by... interested parties within the five-sided box to push Trump further into an unavoidable conflict ?

Posted by Dron66046 2019-07-08 07:48|| 2019-07-08 07:48|| Front Page Top

#5 Is it possible that it was a self-goal by... interested parties within the five-sided box to push Trump further into an unavoidable conflict ?

Yes possible, but in my view unlikely. I'm sticking with the fear of a commercial aircraft being shot down and POTUS being blamed. You may recall how quickly cml airline flight restrictions were put in place following the cancellation of the attack. A key added benefit would be the uptick and tracking of signals devices at all levels.

For obvious reasons, we attempt to avoid detailed discussions on signals intelligence capabilities here on the 'low side.'

Posted by Besoeker 2019-07-08 07:53|| 2019-07-08 07:53|| Front Page Top

#6 this maybe about the WoT but it is opinion

or speculation

and the title is false since using decoys is an old, old practice (used at least as far back as the 5th century BC by the Athenians vs Sparta at Ephesus)

Posted by lord garth 2019-07-08 08:05|| 2019-07-08 08:05|| Front Page Top

#7 Spot on observations your Lordship. Corrections have been made. Thank you !

Posted by Besoeker 2019-07-08 08:10|| 2019-07-08 08:10|| Front Page Top

#8 I believe 'virus' is used as a metaphor, poorly selected by the author, to suggest the Iran's drone response would trigger an infectious internal inspection and search for the guilty parties in the command chain that used unsecure communications in response to the event (i.e. mole hunt).

Monitoring command and control channels with ensuing affiliated ancillary communications is an 'old' strategy of tedious linkage analysis. Modern AI machine learning techniques can expose the communication nets, almost realtime. A delight for Mission Planning.

Posted by Skidmark 2019-07-08 08:11|| 2019-07-08 08:11|| Front Page Top

#9 Air defense systems are disconnected from the internet, yet accept data feeds from targets they're tracking?

They need to: IFF

Posted by Frozen Al 2019-07-08 11:20|| 2019-07-08 11:20|| Front Page Top

#10 "...a demonstrator drone, past its service life and headed for a junk heap, was sent over to the gulf and promptly shot down..."

Where did this information come from? This is new to me and kind of changed my opinion of this incident. OTOH, it does explain Trump's reaction.

Posted by Seeking Cure For Ignorance 2019-07-08 11:39|| 2019-07-08 11:39|| Front Page Top

#11 RE #10: I recall seeing something along the same lines that it was not a front line asset, and that sort of makes sense; going to scrap it anyway; get some good out of it.

Posted by USN, Ret. 2019-07-08 14:32|| 2019-07-08 14:32|| Front Page Top

#12 I found this earlier article showing the flight path of the doomed drone.

And here on the aircraft spots twitter feed. Interesting, eh?

Posted by Bobby 2019-07-08 15:14|| 2019-07-08 15:14|| Front Page Top

#13 Thanks for the lead Bobby.
According to TheDrive the drone Iran hit was the 2nd flight. The 1st was sent in low, and targeted but missed. The 2nd was sent in at a higher outside of the NOE.

Reminds me of KAL007 probing the Soviets.

Posted by Skidmark 2019-07-08 18:17|| 2019-07-08 18:17|| Front Page Top

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