Russia and Cyber Warfare with Klon Kitchen
TOPICS DISCUSSED
Violence Escalates in Ukraine
Cyber Warfare with Klon Kitchen
Outside of Politics: Our Substitute Experiences
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EPISODE RESOURCES
TRANSCRIPT
Newscaster [00:00:00] Well, as Ukraine's military battles, Russian troops on the ground, there's another battle taking place, it's in the digital realm. Ukraine's Cyber Security Authority says the cyber conflict with Russia is unprecedented, describing it as the world's first hybrid war. Russia has been actively using disinformation to wage an information war against Ukraine, but now Ukraine is fighting back by using social media to rally international support against Russia.
Sarah [00:00:32] This is Sarah Stewart Holland.
Beth [00:00:34] And this is Beth Silvers.
Sarah [00:00:35] Thank you for joining us for Pantsuit Politics.
Beth [00:00:51] Hello, everyone, thank you for joining us here on Pantsuit Politics, where we try to take a different approach to the news. Today, we're going to talk about the latest in Ukraine, including bringing back friend of the show Klon Kitchen, of the American Enterprise Institute and The Dispatch, to talk with us about the role cyber attacks and cyber security are playing in this conflict. Outside of politics, we'll give you a little update on our substitute teaching experiences, really our first impressions as we've both spent some time in classrooms now. And before we get started, we want to say thank you so much to everyone who's preordered our book, Now What? Which releases May 3rd. You've made our publisher very happy by putting this preorders in. This is a really important part of getting the book into the world for reasons that we both sort of understand and sort of do not.
Sarah [00:01:36] Well, and let me just take this moment publicly to say, I want to be a New York Times bestseller. Beth but does not care, I care.
Beth [00:01:43] I care. I care for you. I want this for you.
Sarah [00:01:47] I want it. It sounds so nice. New York Times best selling author, Sarah Stewart Holland and Beth Silvers. And word on the street is you need about 5000 out the gate. You sell about 5000 books out the gate to get the attention. Is it sort of a racket? Does anybody really know how the list works? Do some books show up on the list that sell way less than that? Yes, I'm aware of this. I understand that it is not a clear and transparent process, and I do not care. I want it anyway. So let me just put that out in the universe. But that's another huge, important part to me. And while I appreciate every single preorder, now remember we're having a preorder like party in Waco, April 30th, before the book comes out on May 3rd. If you can join us, you're going to get the book a little bit sooner than it releases, which is exciting. If you're not, it's available for preorder at Amazon, Barnes and Noble anywhere you like to buy books.
[00:02:40] And if you preorder now and Amazon drops the price between now and then, you will get it at the lowest price, so no reason to wait for a better deal. Preorders are truly the best way to help us launch this book out into the world. They show retailers people want the book, that helps them note how many have available. It helps the publisher know how many to print. So if you want a book, we would appreciate if you were to go ahead and preorder it. And as a thank you, we will have a special virtual event for everyone who preorders, we'll be announcing the details of that soon. But all you have to do is hang onto your receipt with your order number or let Gmail hang onto it for you, which is what I do, and you'll be able to get that special preorder bonus.
Beth [00:03:24] We did a vibe check on Tuesday's show, Sarah, just to talk about how we're handling all of the hard news of the week. And I feel like we're going to do a similar thing today, but just narrow the scope a little bit because since we talked on Tuesday, we have seen the terror that Russia is inflicting on Ukraine increase dramatically. We have seen Zelensky, Ukraine's president, address the United States Congress. We have gotten a little bit more of a window into Putin's thinking, or at least how he's communicating within Russia about this crisis. So as you have seen all this come in this week, Sarah, what is standing out to you? What is really capturing your attention?
Sarah [00:04:05] Well, let's talk about Zelensky's address first. Do you want to talk about that first? I watched it. I thought the the video and then him speaking in English at the end was so impact. The video was really heartbreaking to me because it was something I'd already been thinking about. I read somewhere about Kharkiv, which I knew to be an important cultural city to Ukraine and its history. And the analysis was like, there's just not going to be anything left. And I thought it, oh, what would I feel if New Orleans was gone? What would I feel if Savannah was gone? These places are so important to me that just hold a position in my heart like to our history and our culture.
[00:04:48] And then that video where they show these like beautiful, sunshiny tourist videos and then contrast it with the bombs and the destruction, and it was just heartbreaking. So many images of children bleeding, suffering or dying, and it just was... it was heartbreaking and just visceral in a way that as you're just reading the reports, they're not -- I mean, the video was very specifically designed to get the emotional response and I gave that emotional response. It really, really, was heartbreaking.
Beth [00:05:24] I was in tears before the video. And then I almost just like left my body during the video because it was so impactful and it was so much. And then when he spoke, as you said, in English at the end directly to us -- you know, and he's gifted at this, he is gifted in making the message connect. I also thought about how those examples that he brought in to make this a speech for an American audience. He's doing that everywhere. He's thinking about what will really connect with the Canadians, what will really connect with the Germans.
[00:05:59] And the time and thought he is having to pour in to selling his case to the global audience made me feel kind of ashamed that he has to do that. And it also made me feel in awe of how he and his team are making everything happen. They're keeping all of these things in motion as the country is just being pummeled by Putin's forces. So I just feel a lot of things about that address. I was glad to see so many members of Congress reacting strongly and without any kind of Partisan talking points to this. I was really relieved that we brought our grown up selves, apparently to the session.
Sarah [00:06:45] I did have to check myself because, again, that video was designed to get an emotional response. Rightly so. I'm not mad at that. But then with the call for the no-fly zone I was in this space where I was like, "Do it. Just do it now." And then I thought, wait, it's not like the cities will stop being destroyed on a dime or no more children will die if we do a no-fly zone. We all know that's not the reality. It is not a simple solution that will end the suffering immediately. But that surge of like, just do whatever it takes make it stop is not a good place to make decision from, right? And I'm not even in charge of this decision, so it doesn't matter. But I did have to be like, "No, wait." When you watch the video and you see this no-fly zone call on the screen, it's just easy to link the two in your mind and say, like, "If we do this, then this stops," and that is not the reality.
Beth [00:07:40] I was really pleased also to see so many members of Congress, especially members who sit on committees where they have access to more information about all of this, praising Zelensky for asking for the no-fly zone, but then also giving them an ask that they can say yes to. Asking for the planes as a backup. And I saw a couple of people remark that they thought the planes would help Ukraine more than a no-fly zone would. I saw where Eric Swalwell was just like, "Give him the goddamn planes," and I thought, that's where I am too.
Sarah [00:08:11] Yeah. When they were talking about we're going to give them drones they can carry in their backpack, I was like, "Yes, give them all of those. Do we have more? Could we make more? How fast could we make more? Could we give them them as well?" You know, I totally agree. Like the other ask, I was like, "Give it all to him tomorrow, please." Because that can make a difference. It's not just that Russia military force is so strong, but the restocking, the rearming, that's a real weakness on their side. That's where the difference could continue to like branch out and branch out because Ukraine is going to have a flow of incoming supplies; whereas, Russia is not, and that could make a difference to me.
Beth [00:08:59] So right after I watched Zelensky's address to Congress, I watched a clip of Putin speaking in Russia that had been translated. I saw quite a few reputable news people retweeting this. So I felt pretty good that it was a legitimate video that I was watching. And in it, Putin was talking about the West counting on this fifth column within Russia. Like this idea that there are Russians who are more western in their sensibilities. And this is where you get a little bit of a peek at that sort of philosophical or even religious fervor that Putin brings to the whole thing, because he was talking about people who are just basically decadent. He talked about them with with oysters and wine.
Sarah [00:09:50] And that's pretty rich coming from the dude with the house I saw on Navalny's video.
Beth [00:09:54] I thought so too. But it's really interesting what's allowed and what's not allowed in Putin's world. But that's really the reason I wanted to bring this up, because him framing it as a struggle against liberals in the West is connecting with some Americans. And I just want to invite those folks to check out the body of information available about Putin and how he lives.
Sarah [00:10:21] Or just like the flow of companies not selling. Like, we're talking about Gucci, Apple, they're living some sort of different capitalistic experience. Like, give me a break. I mean, they're going to, they are now and it's going to continue to get worse, but they weren't before this.
Beth [00:10:38] Right. I think there are Americans who are twisting themselves once again to support an imperfect leader using imperfect tactics to advance what they think are the most important messages on Earth. And I just have to say, like, whatever your ideology is, the bombing of a theater of people who are taking refuge, hundreds of childrens dead, please do not let American politics infect the clarity that we have about how wrong this situation is under any ethical rubric.
Sarah [00:11:11] Yeah, it's disgusting. To me, it's like, "Well, then ISIS is okay." If the idea is, like, force is okay if it's to build back your theological empire, well, then what's good for Christianity must be good for other religions as well. Like it's just so transparent and intellectually bankrupt to me. Like, I can barely engage with it. I have spent a lot of time this week reading and listening to experts on Putin. I do feel my perception of him shifting. I definitely, before this, saw him as more simply personally motivated by power. I don't think I understood the level at which this sort of Russian Empire motivated him. The idea that like he has built one of the only and most recent monuments to Ivan the Terrible, it's real weird but also illuminating. So I do feel like his worldview is coming into focus as much as it can for somebody like him who remains sort of a lock box in a lot of ways.
[00:12:22] I felt like the other most illuminating thing I learned this week about him was that he's been so secluded from COVID that, like, a small circle of advisers has shrunk down to zero. And I thought, well, that's what happens when you're someone like him in his position inside your own brain. That's why solitary confinement is cruel and unusual punishment, right? Because we're not meant to be by ourselves inside our own brains and that is clearly playing out. Like, he just has no one telling him the truth. And that's how dangerous that is. Especially if you're building this theological empire-motivated worldview, right?
Beth [00:13:01] I think that's right. And focusing on his miscalculations, his strategy, the way that he looks at all of this from sort of a military perspective has been helpful to me. Reading people who have that kind of lens for the situation helps me. And that's why we wanted to bring back Klon Kitchen. Klon Kitchen is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He writes an excellent, excellent, newsletter now at The Dispatch that I can't recommend enough. I read it faithfully. And Klon is here to help us think about the cyber security aspects of this conflict in particular.
[00:13:38] But that conversation, I think, is very illuminating about all of the dynamics at work here. Klon, thank you for coming back to Pantsuit Politics. I want to start by asking you how we should put cyber attacks in context. So before Russia invaded Ukraine, the administration told us to expect cyber attacks to start as a precursor to that invasion and to remain a part of Russia's strategy. I feel like we haven't heard about it at all, which is understandable given the violence that's been inflicted on the ground. But what is going on in that realm?
Klon Kitchen [00:14:26] Maybe it would be helpful as to explain why we were saying those things, because it includes me. I was saying that as well. And then kind of how I'm interpreting what we're seeing and maybe why that is what we're seeing. The reason we thought this was going to come is, you know, maybe three aspects. One, we know that Russia has the capability. So they've demonstrated cyber capabilities for years now. So if they wanted to take an action, they certainly had the capacity to do that. Two, it makes just imminent operational sense. So if you're going to move a military force into another country, it makes sense that you would turn it off some of their, for example, their air defense systems, the type of missiles that can attack your aircraft, some of their early warning radar and other capabilities. The kind of stuff that frankly has just become a core part of our own operational doctrine.
[00:15:20] The barriers to entry are so low, the operational benefits are so high, there's just no real reason not to do it. So we knew they had the capability. There's all the justification militarily in the world for them to do it. And, frankly, we think we saw some precursors to some of that activity. I think on the intelligence side we were seeing things that indicated that that capability was kind of being spun up. So that's why we were predicting it, why we didn't see it I think. Well, there has been some kind of one off stuff, generally speaking, has not materialized the way we anticipated. And as I've been thinking about it, I suspect there are again three aspects to that. One, I think there's some strategic choice.
[00:16:02] So I think Putin, one, assumed he was going to roll in much quicker than what has actually transpired. I think he was expecting that this was going to be pretty easy. And so he was using the the kind of Pottery Barn rule like, if we're going to own this place afterwards, I don't want to break everything if we're gonna have to rebuild all this stuff. And, two, I think he was also concerned, you know, previously they've conducted cyber operations in Ukraine that have bled out of the nation. So there was something a couple of years ago called the NotPetya attack, which is this huge cyber campaign that actually escaped Ukraine and caused tens of billions of dollars of damage around the world. Massive.
[00:16:42] And I think he definitely wanted to avoid that because had that occurred, that likely would have provoked an even stronger NATO response. And so by keeping everything inside Ukraine, he's managing his risk.So I think I think that's the second aspect. The third aspect is, I think he probably tried some stuff and we were able to push it back. So in the months before all this kicked off, the United States actually made it clear that we had deployed multiple different cyber units to the region. Some were operating in Kiev initially before the invasion and then have since moved around to kind of Eastern Europe more broadly now that the invasion has occurred.
[00:17:15] And I am suspecting that some of the lower level kind of tactical cyber stuff that Putin might have been trying to do, I think we probably found it and kicked him out. So I think, yeah, those are the three reasons that I'm coming up with as to why the promised cyber armageddon hasn't materialized the way we thought it would.
Sarah [00:17:35] I'm not to take us down a rabbit hole, but how does a cyber attack spread outside where you want it to go and cause billions of dollars of damage outside the goal of the attack?
Klon Kitchen [00:17:44] So it all depends on what you're using. So I would break it down. You can break this down to a much greater degree, but break it down into two parts. When you talk about a cyber attack, the first part is breaking into the system that you're trying to either attack or kind of spy on. And that requires leveraging a vulnerability. There's something in the security architecture. There's some kind of missing code. It's the unlocked door that you push on to get in. All right, that's the first part. The second part is the delivery of malicious software that then enables you to do what you're trying to do, either attack or spy. So in the case of the Notpetya attack, once they gained access, the attack code was self-replicating and was intended to quickly spread throughout Ukrainian networks. That was the whole point of it, right?
[00:18:39] And it was what was called Wiperware. So it's kind of like ransomware. But instead of locking yourself up your stuff up, it just completely destroys. It removes it. So it's really, really, bad. Well, you can try to tailor that attack malware so that it only operates on, for example, machines that have the Ukrainian based IP address, you know, a computer that's in Ukraine. But that's not foolproof. And so in this case, it wasn't. And it actually ended up spreading even to the computers in Russia. And so some person because they're not thinking, puts it on a thumb drive because they think they're going to take it somewhere else. And, you know, some cybersecurity researcher decides you're going to put it in a sandbox and play with it, but they plug it in the wrong computer. And all of a sudden, now it's spreading on those.
Sarah [00:19:27] It's just like a virus in real life too.
Klon Kitchen [00:19:31] Well, precisely. Exactly. They're called viruses for a reason.
Sarah [00:19:34] I think I understand that better and also regret now that I know what Wiperware is.
Klon Kitchen [00:19:39] Yeah, it's pretty nasty stuff.
Beth [00:19:41] Can you talk about this cyber mission teams? Who is that? What kind of skills are there and where's the line between that kind of activity and combat?
Klon Kitchen [00:19:52] Well, so the line is a perforated line. And part of that is because, you know, if I'm on your network and I can observe, I'm one keystroke away from being able to attack. That's the nature of cyber. And so that line between what we call a computer network exploitation CNE, versus computer network attack, even between those two in computer network defense, that's a gray line. The only thing that changes is not typically the code or the people, it's the authorities that you're relying on to like, "Okay, we're transitioning now to computer network attack. So I'm invoking Title 10 authorities. Vice computer network spying I'm relying on title 50 authorities." Things like that. So more nerd stuff. But that's the basic idea.
[00:20:45] In terms of who these people are, the cyber mission teams are military units. They're not only military units, but they're predominantly military units. A couple of years ago, the U.S. military stood up a national cyber mission force each service branch. So Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and so on have their own cyber force within them and they deploy. And they have different missions. So one mission is the protection of defense networks. Another mission is cyber support to combat operations at the national level. So it's something like U.S. Cyber Command, and the NASA it's focused on protecting the US nation. So the ones that were deployed primarily consisted of those who do the support to tactical operations.
Sarah [00:21:34] What role are private companies playing?
Klon Kitchen [00:21:37] So private companies are playing a huge role in cybersecurity particularly. So as soon as this all started kicking off and a little bit before, the Cyber Security Threat Groups and Microsoft and Google and Facebook -- and by the way, these are imminently capable, very well-resourced organizations. I mean, these are companies who obviously are massive in and of themselves, but cybersecurity for these companies is about the business problem. If no one's going to use Microsoft Office, it's constantly being compromised. So they put real resources behind this and they hire the best people out there, and they're very effective, and they're very capable. And so all these companies kind of jumped into action. They proactively did what's called threat hunting and threat mitigation, looking for bad guys and kicking them out, sending information to their users in countries, saying, here's how you can protect yourself.
[00:22:30] You know, Facebook was, "Look, here's sources of information and news. Here's a way to secure your Instagram account and your WhatsApp account," and so on and so forth. So they have been an instrumental player in what's going on in Ukraine. And right now, for example, Facebook made the decision. I'm writing about this, I don't know when this will air, but in an upcoming newsletter, I write about how Facebook has actually made the decision to allow Ukrainian users in Ukraine to use the platform to resist the Russian military. And in light of those efforts, the Russian government has formally identified Facebook and Instagram as 'terrorist organizations'. And so you've got a private sector company now essentially donating their platform to resistance fighters and being called a terrorist organization by a hostile foreign government.
Sarah [00:23:25] Wow.
Beth [00:23:26] How much coordination should we understand as existing among these private companies and the U.S. government?
Klon Kitchen [00:23:34] Quite a bit, not as much as I would like. So there are some mechanisms and they've become more formalized over the last couple of years. So CISA is the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency under the Department of Homeland Security. So these are the people charged with securing US homeland networks and critical infrastructure. Jen Easterly is the director of CISA. And she's really, really, good. And she has a counterpart at the NSA named Rob Joyce, who is also very, very, good. And both Rob and Jen have put a lot of work into building and tightening the latch up between government industry because the majority of critical infrastructure networks exist in the private sector.
[00:24:23] Constitutionally, the US government can't be on those networks doing these things. And there is no scenario where the United States is able to kind of secure itself from a cyber perspective, absent a deep integration of the private sector. Then on top of that, you've got the fact that so many of these private companies are legitimate geopolitical players now, right? I mean, they have influence and they have interests on the world stage that rival a lot of other countries. And so it just makes eminent sense to be able to work with them, deconflict with them, and engage with them.
Sarah [00:24:58] So you talked about Russia. You know, they've banned Instagram. I'm trying to really think through their use of technology through the prism of censorship and through the prism of propaganda, and make sure I'm sort of delineating those two things. I've read and listened to some analysis that sort of compares Russia with China, that China is so much better at censoring and locking down their internet. Russia's learned a lot from them, but they're not quite there yet. But they are much better at sort of the misinformation propaganda aspect of it and manipulating what people think. So how do you see their use of cyber in both of those arms in this current conflict?
Klon Kitchen [00:25:42] Well, they're certainly pursuing both aims in terms of isolating their domestic population from outside news and then using online media, and social media particularly, as a vehicle for propaganda. So both of those things are happening. On the isolating of their of their population, they're doing well enough. What China has done, you know, China has deliberately taken it to 11 and they've built what's called the Great Firewall. This is the kind of internal infrastructure of their internet that where they essentially allow and disallow things to come in and to be available to their domestic population.
Sarah [00:26:26] And you can't go to China and just fire up a VPN and watch what you want.
Klon Kitchen [00:26:29] No, it's actually been made illegal. A slight nuance there. VPNs in and of themselves are not illegal. However, VPNs using standard encryption, which the government cannot crack, are illegal. So you can have a VPN, but it can only employ a level of encryption that the government is able to pierce. So that's what's going on in China. Now, with Russia, they've got a pretty good hold on what information their domestic population sees. The overwhelming majority of Russian citizens consume media from state-owned or at least state-influenced sources. So they're doing well enough there in that regard.
[00:27:14] In terms of the use of propaganda, I mean, Russia's an old hand at using propaganda. This is something they know. They've done a good job of embracing the new vehicles like social media. We actually think we've seen the first deepfake. So it looks like Russia actually created a deepfake of Vladimir Zelensky, where he's reportedly telling the Ukrainian forces to lay down their arms. People like me have been talking about this problem for four or five years. it's kind of weird seeing it happen. It didn't make as big of a splash as I would have thought it would have four years ago, but that's because we've been talking about this for long. So I'm actually quite pleased with how fast we were kind of like, no, that's not real. And we just kind of moved on.
Beth [00:27:54] I appreciated one of your recent newsletters where you broke down sort of what Anonymous is and what Anonymous is doing as part of this conflict. Can you talk a little bit about that? Both just definitionally, Anonymous has been around forever, and I still feel like I don't have a good handle on what it is. So you could talk about that and what they're doing in Russia.
Sarah [00:28:14] I always know that my emotional response to any headline citing Anonymous is unhealthy because I was like, "Oh, goody." And I'm like, this is always a sign in a historical moment that things are a little off the edge and I'm like excited to see Anonymous participating.
Klon Kitchen [00:28:28] Well, good. Yeah.
Beth [00:28:31] That's the right reaction.
Sarah [00:28:32] That's like a red flag for me. I'm like, "Wait, if I'm celebrating Anonymous presence, this is a bad sign."
Klon Kitchen [00:28:37] Yeah. A healthy distrust of oneself is always, I think, good when it comes to cyber. So the reason why we're even having this conversation, I assume, is because Anonymous does not come out and said, "Hey, in light of Ukraine, we're going after Russia." And they've hacked Russian television stations and they've, you know, supposedly put anti Putin material into Russia and so on and so forth. So anonymous is not a hacking group in the sense of a bunch of folks who are friends and like, "Yeah, you know, we're going to stick it to the man and anonymous moves." They're what's called a hacking collective. And what's interesting about it is that, the only thing that is required to become a part of Anonymous is to claim to be a part of Anonymous. So there's no orienting organizational structure. There's no kind of manifesto that everybody agrees to. There's no leadership. There's no followers.
[00:29:36] It really is just a group of hackers who sometimes work cooperatively and sometimes work independently, and there's no governing body or anything like that. Now, what that means is, is that there's a huge variation in both the skill of hackers who claim to be a part of Anonymous and their targets. So they've done some cool things like what they're doing right now. I hate same they because hackers using that moniker are going after Russia and that is, you know, in align with generally my aims. And so, okay, I get it. Now, they've also gone after some Mexican drug cartels where they've gone into their systems and doxed or released information that they've been able to pull off them.
[00:30:25] At the same time, they've also attacked the FBI. They've attacked normal citizens, political figures. They've done a lot of things that are just awful as well. And so even when Anonymous is doing actions that can be argued as good, they're often always making everything more difficult and the general situation less manageable and predictable. So I'm not a big fan. I think there are other capabilities at our disposal that could accomplish and that are accomplishing the same ends without these guys jumping in the pool and making waves.
Sarah [00:31:09] Well, and it feels like to me that a group like Anonymous operates in this foundational understanding of us having one global internet. And that does not seem to be true anymore between China's firewall and Russia's, you know, sort of increasing segregation of their population. How do you think about it when people say the internet? Do we have an internet anymore? Is that a thing?
Klon Kitchen [00:31:37] Well, we do, but it is fracturing and this is the bad news. So this is referred to sometimes as the splinter net. I'm actually, again, writing about this in this newsletter coming up. But, essentially, the bottom line is we like to think of this internet as this borderless panacea in which we all kind of trips around. There's lots of puppies and unicorns and it's wonderful and it's great.And one of the things that we're realizing is that for a long time, states, governments felt like their sovereignty was eroding, that people on the internet and companies that kind of were building the internet were somehow beginning to infringe on state sovereignty. Well, then the state remembered, oh, wait a minute, we've got guns. And they realized that the internet actually exists on servers and servers exists in real time and space. And so they have started building policies. Typically, this is referred to as data localization.
[00:32:39] And so what that looks like is China saying, "Okay, anyone who's collecting or leveraging data in China or about Chinese citizens, you've got to be inside our country so that we can manage that and not let it get stolen or abused or use anything else," which then of course puts the government in control of all of that information. And as more people look at the Chinese model, more governments look at the Chinese model where they begin putting up essentially a bubble around their internet that begins fracturing the internet. And then, you know, you don't have to be a totalitarian to want to do something like that. So the United States has real concerns about American citizens data being pilfered by Chinese companies like TikTok. We don't have to go in that again. I know everybody has strong feelings about TikTok.
Sarah [00:33:25] You're convincing me over time, Klone. I'm really coming around. I deleted it off my phone for Lent, and I don't want the Chinese government to have a content path into my brain more than anything else.
Klon Kitchen [00:33:35] Well, listen, we all make our choices. That's perfectly fine. No, I'm just going to say that we have our own interests that are driving us towards similar decisions. And so there is, I think, an inevitability that what we've understood as the internet for so long is fundamentally changing. And I do suspect that you probably will end up largely having at least two internets with their own different norms and rules. One in kind of free democratic societies, and one for increasingly totalitarian regimes. So I do think that's something that's on the horizon.
Beth [00:34:13] Well, while we are making predictions, and I want to say before I ask you this question, I recognize that it's probably kind of miserable to be an expert on anything that touches on Ukraine and Russia. So I know it's a hard question, but what do you think happens next on the cyber front with this war?
Klon Kitchen [00:34:32] I imagine that it largely stays status quo right now. The thing that I think would change that is if the war actually escalated, like, if it have expanded to include more countries. So at the point where this kind of becomes NATO versus Russia or something like that. I mean, it's all rules are off. It's full on. It's game time and cyber will be a huge part of that but it won't be our biggest concern at that point. There may be a point where Putin makes the calculation that unleashing non-state cyber groups like ransomware groups could play to his benefit.
[00:35:14] You know, in terms of like harassing Europeans or even the U.S. as a way of kind of turning the screw. But I also think that given the circumstances, he's less likely to do that than perhaps he once was because we're all kind of on a knife edge here. And if there were, say, a Colonial Pipeline attack now, we would just interpret that way different than we did previously. And so I don't think that he wants to risk turning the volume up unless something really decisively changes in the circumstances.
Sarah [00:35:50] Beth didn't ask me, but let me give my prediction. I think it's more likely that if he has to pull back militarily, if there is even some sort of negotiated withdrawal, that's when he dials up the cyber because he's like, well, I can't do this anymore, so I can at least make your lives miserable now that I've pulled back and have a little more time and energy and resources to do something else. Sort of like what we saw before. Right? Like, he goes back to what he was using before he was invading other countries.
Klon Kitchen [00:36:20] Yeah, I think you raise a good point, Sarah. I mean, on the way out, like if it's been in just a total loss for him, I could see him trying to burn the place down. But again, I think that would include things like indiscriminate shelling and all kinds of awful stuff too. And then, yeah, if we somehow convinced him to pull out of the country, we came to some type of settlement. They're taking massive military losses, Russians. And so in an effort to kind of pitch one across the plate that backs the batter up a little bit, you know, like, Hey, you may think that we've taken a hit militarily, but don't forget I've still got this capability." I'll throw it at your head if I need to.
Beth [00:37:01] Well, as we wind up here, I want to ask you just how worried you are at this point. And if you were advising the White House, is there any kind of major strategic shift that you would be pushing for?
Klon Kitchen [00:37:16] So, two things. One, look, I don't know how to say this otherwise. I'm a Christian, and I don't get too worried about this stuff just because of some of my own theological convictions in that regard. But I'll also say I've been doing this for a long time. And if I allow myself to be kind of swept away by every awful thing, man, I would never get out of bed. You know, it's just because the world is hard. There's lots of stuff going on. And, yeah, so I don't get too bent out of shape about this stuff. That being said, it is very serious. We're not talking about reindeer games here. This is real. This is very important and real lives are are being affected and that's miserable to think about. In terms of what I would recommend in the near term, I think we're largely doing what we can. I think we're largely handling this the way we should.
[00:38:07] I would appreciate if the president would stop negotiating against himself and constantly explaining what we're not going to do. I know why he's doing that. I can appreciate that, but I think it's counterproductive. You know, ultimately, I would prefer Russia be more concerned. Are we going to take the U.S? Are we going to take them off if we do this, rather than the US constantly telling them we don't want to take them off but that's well within the realm of debate. So that's fine. In terms of grand strategy, I think I would say, "Okay, Mr. President, this is the new normal. This isn't going away. No matter how this gets resolved, we are now in a Cold War with at least two major national belligerents. We need a military and a national strategy that recognizes that and then deals with it appropriate.
[00:38:49] I mean, the level of military spending that is going to be required to put us in a position to deal with the world as it currently is, is unbelievable. I mean, we're talking trillion dollar annual defense budgets. And all of those arguments that attend that conversation are welcome and they need to be heard. But I can just tell you there's no shortcut to military capability. We and Europe have been living in this world where the peace dividend of the post-Cold War allowed us to kind of dump money on other things. And one of the reasons why I think you're seeing Europe respond the way it is, and particularly Germany, is because what Vladimir Putin has done is he threw cold water on that dream. And there's no escaping that. So it's going to force some really hard choices. And I would be telling the president certainly now is the time to start preparing the American public and start laying the groundwork for kind of the inevitable future.
Sarah [00:39:53] Just a quick follow up. I mean, how much more investment do we need in cybersecurity? Every branch has their departments. How well staffed are those? Are there five people? Do we need 50? Like, where are we at?
Klon Kitchen [00:40:06] Well, one, there's always going to be more problems than there are people. All right. So we're kind of constrained by that. But, two, I would say we're still like catastrophically weak. Part of that is because we're the most digitally leveraged nation in the world. So we just have a huge what's called threat surplus. We just have a lot of attack points. And, you know, consumers are making choices and this is going to be a much bigger thing than some type of government policy. But it will include that. We're making progress. It's necessarily going to take a long time just because of how big the problem is. But if you're asking me, should we and can we do more? The answer is and categorically, yes.
Beth [00:40:47] Thank you so much. If people want to stay in touch with you, you are writing for The Dispatch now. Your excellent newsletter is there. We can follow you on Twitter. Where else can we keep up with you?
Klon Kitchen [00:40:55] Well, obviously, as a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, you can go to Aei.org and you can do a quick search for me and you'll see everything I'm doing. The Dispatch newsletter is called the current. You can subscribe to that. As you mentioned, Twitter. I mean, you know, Google me.
Sarah [00:41:10] He's around.
Klon Kitchen [00:41:10] I'm around, you know, whatever. I'm a guy.
Beth [00:41:14] Thank you so much.
Sarah [00:41:15] Thank you.
Klon Kitchen [00:41:16] My pleasure, ladies.
Beth [00:41:28] Thank you so much to Klon Kitchen for joining us today. Before we leave you for the weekend, we just thought we would reflect for a moment on our experiences as substitute teachers. If you missed it, Sarah and I knew that our school districts were really struggling to keep enough adults in every building, to keep our schools operational especially during the Omicron surge. So we applied to be substitute teachers. That is a long and drawn out process. We didn't make it in by the time the Omicron surge had left our school systems in a little bit better shape. But we are going in when we can and we've both been in classrooms now. I'll be in a second grade classroom while you're listening to this on Friday. So, Sarah, what do you think? What are your top line observations as we get into this?
Sarah [00:42:14] Well, I don't write off the deep end. I went to middle school. I went to a seventh grade science class where they were struggling with the concept. So the teacher left me a lot of work for them to do, but they didn't understand the skill needed to do the work. So I had to teach myself how to balance chemical equations. Thank God for YouTube. In about five 10 minutes. By the end of the day, I was really good at teaching. At the beginning it was a little rough, but at the end of the day I'd figured out that I got to walk in the back of the room to make sure nothing's going on in the back. The person who's creating the most disruption needs to go to the board and write the problems on the board. And I didn't have to like make any referrals or do any disciplinary action. I kept them motivated, especially at the beginning of the day by asking questions about my Tesla.
[00:43:03] They wanted to asked me a lot of questions about the Tesla. So I said, "You turn in your worksheet, you get to ask a question about the Tesla." I had candy for the end of the day. It was exhausting. I did not sit down all day long, and it's just a constant incoming of requests. And middle schoolers are really relentless in that way. But I had some really, really, great moments. I had one kid that was like, "Man, subs are the worst." But then I redirected him. We were doing a short story, he wrote like a pretty funny little rhyme about the short story, and we had a good chuckle. And then he's like, "Any paper to write that down?" And before I handed him the paper, I said, "Do you want to say something to me about earlier today?" And he said, "I'm sorry. Some people are mean to me." And I was like, "Thank you. I really appreciate that." That was like my highlight of the day when we had that moment. But it's intense. It's intense out there, that's for sure.
Beth [00:43:49] The not sitting, I think, is an important expectation to establish before you go in, if you're going to do this. Even during the planning period for the teacher that I was subbing for, I was cleaning the classroom because it just gets dirty with the little people. You know, the elementary classroom.
Sarah [00:44:04] It gets dirty with the middle schoolers too.
Beth [00:44:05] There were shreds of paper and crumbs of snacks and just tissues, and it is dirty in there. So I was busting out the Clorox wipe and the broom when they weren't in the classroom. I think that what has been striking to me because I know that I am not teaching when I'm just there for a day, especially in an elementary classroom. I'm not teaching, you know what I mean? I'm just kind of shepherding them through the day. And I was at a birthday party this weekend with my younger daughter. And a little girl who was at the birthday party had been in that class, and it's been several weeks now since I was in her classroom, but she was really excited to see me.
[00:44:47] And her mom told me that she had talked for a couple of weeks about how great I was, which I was not great. Like, listen, I was not great. I was there. Like, we were all just there. We got through the day together. But it was a reminder that you just don't know what influences kids. And I hope to say this, especially for teachers in our audience who are feeling burnt out and exhausted and counting the days to the end of this school year, like, you just don't know what difference just your presence makes with these students and what things leave leave a mark. And I know you know that, but maybe it helps to hear that from someone who's just having that experience for the first time.
Sarah [00:45:24] Yeah, church on Sunday, one of the girls that is in Griffin's class, but I was not a sub for her, she was like, "Oh my God, everybody was talking about what a great sub you are. I'm so jealous I didn't have you," and that made me feel like the queen of the world.
Beth [00:45:41] I love that.
Sarah [00:45:41] So that was pretty awesome. Yeah, I mean, the kids were great. And I didn't take the advice, honestly, that was offered to me, which was, you know, just come down like a hammer, be a jerk all day long.
Beth [00:45:52] Nobody needs that.
Sarah [00:45:53] I did not want to do that. Griffin's middle school is pretty diverse, and I felt like there are a lot of kids in that room that did not need a white lady acting like they'd done something wrong by the second they walked in the room. That's not the energy or the vibe I was looking for. So there was a couple, but I could clearly see like it was not about me, like the closest I ever got to, like pulling the kid, he just got in trouble. And so not with me, but with somebody else. And I thought, it's just not worth it. Like to double down on the fact that he's already in trouble.
[00:46:24] And so we got through, we got through. Now, I would not describe it as going smoothly. I definitely was like depleted at the end of the day and watched a lot of succession when I got home and bowed out of all my parenting duties, which I really appreciate my husband. Although he was like, "Why are you even doing this? Like, if you're going to be so depleted at the end of the day?" I was like, "Because that's the right thing to do. It's not like it's a stress management technique. I'm just trying to do the right thing here."
Beth [00:46:51] I told someone about it, that I heard him say, "My wife's moral compass takes her to some weird places." I think you're right, though. If I do one thing right with kids and not just in a sub context, but I think with my own kids, with kids in our neighborhood, with kids at church, whatever, if I do one thing right with kids, I think it's that I take them seriously. And I believe that they want to be good people doing good things in the world. And if they tell me their stomach hurts, I believe that their stomach hurts.
Sarah [00:47:24] Or their stomach might hurt because they're anxious, it doesn't mean they have a stomach virus. Like, I love Sarah Showmans. People do things for reasons. Children are people, right? Like just they're doing it for a reason.
Beth [00:47:33] Yeah. I don't need to diagnose everything for it to be a real thing for them, right? And I don't need to experience it the way they're experiencing it for it to be a real thing for them. And I think that's why just being around helps. So if you have been thinking about this, I would encourage you to do it because I don't think you need a special skill other than being willing to be a calm, caring presence for a day. I think a long term sub is a whole different gig. A whole different gig.
Sarah [00:48:00] Word.
Beth [00:48:00] But if you're thinking about just popping in when you have time, our schools need people who are willing to do that.
Sarah [00:48:05] God bless one of our local elementary schools was like, "Do you wanna be a long term sub for the special ed teacher every Tuesday?" And I was like, "I do not, thank you." I do not want to do that.
Beth [00:48:13] That's a different thing. Well, thank you all for being here. We hope you have the best weekend available. We know things are tough out there right now and always in some ways, so we're sending you lots of love. We'll be back in your ears next Tuesday.
[00:48:35] Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. Alise Napp is our managing director.
Sarah [00:48:40] Maggie Penton is our community engagement manager. Dante Lima is the composer and performer of our theme music.
Beth [00:48:46] Our show is listener-supported. Special thanks to our executive producers.
Executive Producers (Read their own names) [00:48:50] Martha Bronitsky, Linda Daniel, Ali Edwards, Janice Elliot, Sarah Greenup, Julie Haller, Helen Handley, Tiffany Hassler, Emily Holladay, Katie Johnson, Katina Zugenalis Kasling, Barry Kaufman, Molly Kohrs.
[00:49:09] The Kriebs, Lauri LaDow, Lilly McClure, Emily Neesley, The Pentons, Tawni Peterson, Tracy Puthoff, Sara Ralph, Jeremy Sequoia, Katie Stiggers, Karin True, Onica Ulveling, Nick and Alysa Valelli, Katherine Vollmer, Amy Whited.
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