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Abstract: Cyberspace becomes more and more important in modern warfare. It is almost impossible to launch a war without utilizing cyber capabilities in this era. In which way is cyber warfare different from or similar as conventional warfare? What are the unique characteristics of cyber warfare? What roles can cyber play in modern warfare? What are cyber capabilities? How can these capabilities be utilized in deterrence, defensive operations, and offensive manoeuvres? Ultimately, what is cyber dominance? How can cyber dominance be achieved? These are the questions that this paper intends to address. After conducting the literature review, this paper proposes a mechanism in revealing what cyber can do and cannot do in modern warfare. Based on this analysis, it recommends ways of fully utilizing cyber capabilities. This study can help commanders, strategists, and policy-makers to identify, allocate, and make full use of tangible and intangible cyber capabilities in decision-making.
Keywords: cyber capabilities, cyber dominance, cyber warfare, conventional warfare, decision-making
1. Introduction
The term "cyber war" is becoming more prevalent in foreign policy discussions. Increasingly, policy-makers view cyber as an elegant tool to achieve national objectives that can supplant an extensive need for land, sea, and air, and space power. This notion is misnomer because it paints an unrealistic capacity of cyber power to exclusively shape adversaries' actions. Admiral William McRaven, former Commander of the US Department of Defense's Special Operations Command, laments that "the enemy's will, that ultimate center of gravity, remains tied to the ground upon which he sits, upon which he blogs, and to the dirt under his feet" (Freedburg 2013). McRaven continued that "some of the strategists, some of the futurists, want to point to the importance of the social media and the blogosphere and the self-synchronizing organizations - for example, the Twitter-coordinated protests of the Arab Spring - but the fact is geography, terrain, matters." Russian operations in Georgia and the U.S. operations in Iraq have demonstrated that cyber capacity does not replace the need for land, sea, air, and space capabilities to achieve national objectives. However, cyber power is now an essential component of modern warfare. Success in future warfare will require unity of effort integrating cyber power with traditional power on the land, sea, air, and space...