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Timothy L. Thomas By DAVID FEITH

Fort Leavenworth, Kan.

EXCERPT FROM THIS ARTICLE:   A 1999 book by two Chinese colonels put it more aggressively (albeit in a sentence as verbose as it is apocalyptic): “If the attacking side secretly musters large amounts of capital without the enemy nations being aware of this at all and launches a sneak attack against its financial markets,” wrote Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, “then, after causing a financial crisis, buries a computer virus and hacker detachment in the opponent’s computer system in advance, while at the same time carrying out a network attack against the enemy so that the civilian electricity network, traffic dispatching network, financial transaction network, telephone communications network, and mass media network are completely paralyzed, this will cause the enemy nation to fall into social panic, street riots, and a political crisis.”

For several years, Washington has treated China as the Lord Voldemort of geopolitics—the foe who must not be named, lest all economic and diplomatic hell break loose. That policy seemed to be ending in recent weeks, and Timothy Thomas thinks it’s about time.

The clearest sign of change came in a March 11 speech by Tom Donilon, President Obama’s national security adviser, who condemned “cyber intrusions emanating from China on an unprecedented scale” and declared that “the international community cannot tolerate such activity from any country.” Chinese cyber aggression poses risks “to international trade, to the reputation of Chinese industry and to our overall relations,” Mr. Donilon said, and Beijing must stop it.

“Why did we wait so long?” wonders Mr. Thomas as we sit in the U.S. Army’s Foreign Military Studies Office, where the 64-year-old retired lieutenant colonel has studied Chinese cyber strategy for two decades. More than enough evidence accumulated long ago, he says, for the U.S. to say to Beijing and its denials of responsibility, “Folks, you don’t have a leg to stand on, sorry.”

U.S. targets of suspected Chinese cyber attacks include news organizations (this newspaper, the New York Times, Bloomberg), tech firms (Google, GOOG -0.84%Adobe, ADBE -0.33%Yahoo YHOO -1.68%), multinationals (Coca-Cola, KO -1.35%Dow Chemical DOW +0.16%), defense contractors (Lockheed Martin, LMT +0.08%Northrop Grumman NOC +1.12%), federal departments (Homeland Security, State, Energy, Commerce), senior officials (Hillary Clinton, Adm. Mike Mullen), nuclear-weapons labs (Los Alamos, Oak Ridge) and just about every other node of American commerce, infrastructure or authority. Identities of confidential sources, hide-outs of human-rights dissidents, negotiation strategies of major corporations, classified avionics of the F-35 fighter jet, the ins and outs of America’s power grid: Hackers probe for all this, extracting secrets and possibly laying groundwork for acts of sabotage.

China’s aggression has so far persisted, Mr. Thomas says, because “it makes perfect sense to them.” The U.S. has difficulty defending its cyber systems, the relatively new realm of cyber isn’t subject to international norms, and years of intrusions have provoked little American response. “I think they’re willing to take the risk right now because they believe that we can’t do anything to them,” he says. “You have to change the playing field for them, and if you don’t, they’re not going to change. They’re going to continue to rip off every bit of information they can.” (more…)

President Obama and Congress have checked out of Washington until after Election Day. But caveat, citizen. Their absence isn’t preventing harmful policy from spawning along the Potomac.

A case in point is a back door move to regulate the Internet. Any day now, the White House will issue an executive order on cybersecurity, according to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who said last week that the measure “is close to completion.”

The executive moved on its own after Congressional efforts stalled this summer amid Administration opposition. Ms. Napolitano shed crocodile tears over the Senate’s failure to adopt comprehensive cybersecurity legislation, even as the White House goes ahead with its order in the face of vociferous opposition on Capitol Hill.

What Ms. Napolitano didn’t say might help readers understand the cynical politics involved. The Administration worked to scuttle a compromise on the Hill. The Senate split over mandating IT security standards for private companies, and the Administration’s order resuscitates this contentious idea. It will also undercut efforts to fashion a bipartisan bill in a lame duck Congress. (more…)