Obama authorised wave of cyberattacks on Iranian nuclear facilities

There is a long article here on Obama's cyberattacks on Iran sometimes in cooperation with Israel. Given the U.S. doctrine of pre-emptive war as justified self defense Iran would be justified in attacking the U.S. (or Israel) since it has already ample evidence of actual and no doubt planned attacks against the country. U.S. actions make it clear that the only way of protecting oneself against the U.S. and its allies is by having a retaliatory force that would endanger U.S. security. No doubt China has taken this lesson to heart. China is also expanding its own cyber weaponry.

The attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities were named Olympic Games. They were started under Bush but as with many Bush policies were carried on and even expanded under Obama..

The program was carried on even after a disastrous accident in which the maliicious program Stuxnet escaped outside of its intendend target area worldwide. Stuxnet could then be analysed by experts around the world and the secret was in fact out.

Iranians had been mystified by their malfunctioning centrifuges. The program made them spin too fast and self destruct. Iranians thought they were defective. Stuxnet a worm was produced jointly by Israel and the U.S.A. While the worm may have set back the Iranian progress in enriching uranium for over a year it sets a terrible precedent. Yet there seems no action by the UN or any US. allies to criticize or prevent further development of such activities.

The most that Iran is doing so far is perhaps trying to develop weapons production ability. It is not at all clear that they have decided as yet to actually try to produce weapons. However, given the action of the U.S. and Israel it would seem tempting for them to do so. What else could protect it from U.S and Israeli attack?

A more recent development is an attack on Iranian officials' computers by Flame which rather than damaging equipment simply collects information. It is a spy cyber weapon and really involves nothing new. Although the code seems old U.S. officials say it was not part of Olympic Games. However the original target of the Flame was Iran though again it seems to have escaped and spread to many other places. For more see this article.