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The Cyber Defense Review

Forward Persistence in Great Power Cyber Competition: Military Assets in a Relative Power Erosion Framework

By Dr. Thomas F. Lynch, III | December 19, 2024

The United States, the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and Russia are engaged in strategic competition below the threshold of armed conflict. Cyberspace is its principal medium. America’s relative power stature is under non-stop cyber duress from these rivals. Protecting America’s three main peacetime power sinews – its economic edge; domestic political cohesion and electoral system confidence; and public trust in protection of personal privacy and security – from the subversive and corrosive cyber activities by Great Power rivals requires an array of U.S. government agencies, especially the U.S. military. The new era of Great Power strategic competition has fragmented the internet and rendered inadequate America’s historical preference
for an orderly, law-based framework that manages cyber-competition. The U.S. needs to focus on a Relative Power Erosion Framework featuring persistent engagement and a hunt forward posture. USCYBERCOM-led cyber campaigns are necessary in the short-term for effective American strategic cyber competition. In the longer-term, unique American military capabilities for persistent cyber engagement should be replaced with those in selected civilian governmental agencies more befitting of a ‘new normal’ for endemic cyber-competitive interactions among the Great Powers.


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