Autocracies Helping Western Societies ‘Tear Themselves Apart’: Retired US General

Men wave rainbow and Black Lives Matter flags while marching in the Pride Parade in June 2017 in San Francisco, California. Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images

Ongoing racial tensions and economic instability will leave Western democracies too weak to defend themselves against mass disinformation and cyber attacks from autocratic regimes, warns retired U.S. Army Major General John Davis.

The former major general named China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea as some of the key aggressors waging information and cyber warfare on Western governments and institutions.

“The recent impact of a deadly global pandemic accompanied by severe world economic instability, and recently inflamed racial tensions on top of an already divided society within many Western democracies, presents a historical opportunity for our adversaries to gain an advantage,” he told Australia’s National Press Club on Nov. 17.

“Selective truth and distortion to fit extreme agendas and vastly different worldviews on both sides of political and cultural divides have never been more powerful.”

Protesters throwing the statue of Edward Colston into Bristol Harbour during a Black Lives Matter protest rally in Bristol, England, on June 7, 2020. Ben Birchall/PA Media

Davis warned many countries faced major risks to their economies, public safety, and social stability.

“Our adversaries know this and they’re positioning themselves to gain an advantage with great urgency by using many of the information warfare techniques throughout the extremely fertile digital environment, including both traditional and social media,” he added.

“A growing number of adversaries are using these capabilities to what I‘ll refer to as, ’Helping Western democracies tear themselves apart.'”

One example of these efforts has been identified by cybersecurity firm Mandiant, which found Beijing-linked group, Dragonbridge, running extensive social media campaigns attempting to incite tension on issues like the midterm elections and against Western rare earth mining operations that present a threat to China’s dominance of the sector.

Screenshot of Dragonbridge-backed social media campaign targeting Australian rare earth miner Lynas (Courtesy of Mandiant).

Cyberattacks Are Now Faster and Wider-Ranging

Davis further said autocratic regimes were attacking at greater speed and scale while free from values like the separation of powers, civilian oversight, and accountability.

He outlined recent attacks including Russian activities during the 2016 U.S. presidential election and Brexit; North Korean ransomware activities; Iran’s denial of service attack on the U.S. financial sector and Las Vegas Sands Hotel; and Beijing’s theft of intellectual property and COVID-19 vaccine research.

A broad array of actions are also being used to weaken Western militaries, including establishing front companies, moonlighting military and intelligence actors, patriotic hacking, and activities targeting culturally divisive issues.

“These types of operations have become especially attractive in recent years for our adversaries that want to operate in this ‘grey zone’ because they see a tremendous advantage over the U.S. and Western democratic countries, as opposed to fighting in the traditional physical dimensions,” Davis said.

U.S. Air Force Capt. Shannon Bender, 272nd Cyber Operations Squadron, 110th Wing, Michigan Air National Guard, reviews computer information during a cyber-warfare training event, Camp Grayling Joint Maneuver Training Center, Mich., on March 8, 2022. U.S. Air National Guard/Master Sgt. David Eichaker

The retired major general said the West needed to be willing to get their hands “dirty” and engage in grey zone activities to counteract these attacks, noting autocracies did not face major repercussions when they roll out cyberattacks.

In fact, in response to Beijing’s ongoing encroachment in the South Pacific, some experts have called for governments to adopt a more flexible response to deal with grey zone activities like elite capture, misinformation, lawfare, and entropic warfare.

Cleo Paskal, a non-resident fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, has said Western governments were unlikely to out-bribe Beijing in the region.

Instead, she said the alternative was to “fight with ‘peacefare’—China and its authoritarian proxies hate when people come together and build stability from the ground up.”

Meanwhile, in recent months, a string of Australia’s largest businesses have been targeted by Russian hackers—and ransomware demands—exposing the private data of millions of individuals to the dark web and cybercriminals. Australia is one of the largest non-NATO donors to the Ukraine war effort.

Some of these companies include Medibank, the country’s largest private health insurer; Optus, the second largest telecommunications company; EnergyAustralia, one of the Big Three energy companies, as well as the Department of Defence.

The government has responded by tightening data laws and establishing a hacking task force to counteract cyber syndicates.