The US military is permitted to act pre-emptively if it detects an imminent threat of cyber attack.
US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta moaned to Reuters that under investment by America's private sector and political gridlock in Washington stymied cyber security legislation.
In the meantime a presidential executive order was being considered "while we wait for Congress to act".
Panetta warned that unnamed “foreign actors” were targeting computer control systems that operate chemical, electricity and water plants and those that guide transportation. Quite why China is training actors to attack US infrastructure is unclear. Perhaps it is hoping to use the Acadamy Awards as a cover for an attack.
Panetta said that he knew of specific instances where intruders have successfully gained access to these control systems. The hackers are building advanced tools to attack these systems and cause panic, and destruction, and even the loss of life.
At the moment aggressors could derail passenger trains, contaminate the water supply or shut down the power grid in much of the country.
In the private sector too few companies have invested in even basic cyber security.
The United States is making significant investments in cyber forensics to address the problem of identifying where the attacks come from.
He said that the country was seeing returns on those investments.
The Department of Defense had a mission to defend the country and would be ready to respond to attacks. Such pre-emptive action would occur only under certain, dire scenarios, he said.
If the US military detects an imminent threat of attack that will cause significant physical destruction in the United States or kill American citizens, it needs to have the option to take action against those who would attack them, he said.
All humans being dual-natured regardless of the viewpoint [especially the viewpoints about viewpoint-viewpointing], when a human acts as if he is singular in nature, you can be 101% certain that he is of malevolence, Malevolency being of self before It could become another/others. Is it not a miracle then that those who are in positions to lord over others ALWAYS treat others as their own property - to hold in abeyance until The Stupid-Dumb are no longer required/of-use. For the simple reason of freedom from enslavement [by The Minds], ALL real humans are potentiated with a materially invisible mechanism to literally be freed of his [mental] shackles which he had acquired since the development of his thoughts, a real human being the one who is able to Evolve-Devolve whilst alive on Earth.
As such, when The Minds start its glitzy act like lying, cheating, posturing, and so forth, it is either a lesson being taught or being witnessed/learnt, the former being an addiction/repetition whilst the latter is when addition is merely a sideshow. The ability-inability to see/witness The Spiritual being The Final Judgement, not many will make the grade, a reality turned upside down by TSD through the mechansim of Fame, Fortune & Immortality by suggesting to those so mired that they will be the few who will be "saved" for riches/entitlement beyond imagination. Like it or not, the famous, the fortunate and the immortalised will be the first examples lit for The Bonfire. Mediaeval stuff suitable for The Hallelujahs indeed but nevertheless true.
One thing is certain which is that barefaced liars and crooks [some of which are actually TSD] will soon be rejected by many who did not realised the extent of the decay but when the relative truths are revealed without the realisation of the absolute ones, where will people turn to then? Not more conspiracies and the promotion of dual-natured humans as singularly natured for that is back to Square One [and is heading that way by those who proclaim "Consciousness" and other unattainable methods of taking-back/redeeming their self]. This is how subtle TSD are. So long as one is unable to perceive/see Absolutenesss other than being "told" This & That by another/some-heaty-messaging/"vision", nothing will change. This is because Reality is never about knowledge but about empowerment which is why being empowered with Absoluteness of Discrimination is the first essential/fundamental gift of Spirituality or else it is back to preaching, re-presenting, visions [a firm fav of TSD because it makes the recepient imagine that he is being chosen. To the final shock and horror of the chosen ones, God does not choose, it is we humans who choose once the real choices become available - to be or not to be. Before this moment of real choice, only apparent choices, oka gambles, are available, gambling in everything being the main activity of humans], feeling of heat, numbness, shaking, electric shocks, and other old tricks of TSD not to mention the tricks of charlatans and imposters.
In order to realise/attain absoluteness, one must become [a part] Of Absoluteness. To be able to see The Spiritual by first switching-on one's 4th dimension, Spirituality, in a sanctioned/absolute manner, for without being empowered by the 6th and higher senses of absoluteness, one is still gambling via suggestions from The Minds. The Spiritual being not material, however, there is NO way of accessing/transcending to The Spiritual via ANY material means. Especially not through thoughts for even though Thoughts are spiritual, they are not of absoluteness, being the Relativity between The Past and The Future. Scriptural scholars beware. One reason why, for example, "UFO" lacks material evidence, being within the realm of The Future [where the unrequited dead of "science" are a-roaming unhindered] and why hallucinations [from The Past dead] are deemed as imaginations/delusions by Quackery & Handler because their Tag-Alongs are mostly of The Future, their Psy This & That department of money accumulators having driven many over and beyond their Left Aura to be "captured" by those who are devolved within the Collective Subconscious.
The Unconditional Self is the ONLY reality, being the ONLY path to Reality whereas all other roads will lead to the Rome which is Of The Past or Of The Future. And just look at the barefaced liars and crooks masquerading as "Pillars of Power" even though all they spew forth are lies, cunning, connivance and Vested Interest - for attracting those moths who are addicted to the flames of Fame, Fortune & Immortality, of course. It is true to say that the latterday "The US Administrations" acquiesced to much that is wicked within the contemporary era. Others being dual natured too, it is only natural that they followed suit. The point is that the initiator has the gall and wickedness to blame others for initiating wickedness, just like that ole crook who distracts when revelation is knocking on his door. Absolutenss being Reality, Truth will be revealed one fine day. It is just that by then, TSD would have done its job very nicely - that of mesmerising almost all to either being The Stupid or The Dumb. Otherwise, the vast majority of humans who read news would not have allowed for what is happening to The Western [and therefore global] Mass Media. Armageddon it is then - not when The Mantle, The Mother withinThe Grandmother, is turning with some jokers trying to bore their way into Reality on Earth. Without conscience other than being over and under conscienced, a human is Stupid-Dumb/Dumb-Stupid and little else, depending on the moment.