The Diplomat
The Ministry of Defence announced the creation of the Military School of Cyber Operations, a military educational center under the Defence General Staff through the Joint Cyberspace Command, which aims to improve personnel training and ensure an “operational capability of excellence” in the field of cybersecurity.
According to the Ministerial Order, signed last February 2 by the Minister of Defence, Margarita Robles, and which came into force this past Wednesday after its publication by the Official State Gazette (BOE), the 2019 National Cybersecurity Strategy establishes that “security in cyberspace is a priority objective to guarantee National Security and a competence of the State to create a digital society based on trust”.
Apart from that, the Defence Policy Directive of August 2020 lists cyber-attacks as “one of the cross-cutting phenomena that can have a huge impact on the well-being of citizens, on social stability and international security”. In this context, “the disposition of the Armed Forces and Defence authorities must be oriented to generate greater national and international resilience in the face of the cross-cutting challenges generated in cyberspace,” the Order continues.
Likewise, the recognition and definition of cyberspace as an area of military operations by NATO, by the European Union and by Spain has meant the recognition of “a transcendental change in the nature of military operations, derived from the technological revolution of the new digital society”. This recognition not only implies the need to operate in cyberspace, but also reflects the need to develop a specific operational capability different from the forces operating in the physical domains.
Given the complexity of the cyberspace domain and the activities that take place in it, in order to face this threat “the Armed Forces must preserve at all times an operational capability of excellence, also guaranteeing its availability”. This excellence “requires an effort in training and personnel selection that allows to fill each position with the most suitable and best prepared personnel”.
For all these reasons, “it is necessary to create, jointly, a new military training center specialized in cyber operations, capable of providing the Ministry of Defence personnel with the necessary skills to plan, direct, coordinate, control and execute the military operations established in the doctrine in force and leading to ensure freedom of action in the cyberspace of interest”, continues the text. The new center, according to Defense, has a “null budgetary impact”, since it does not imply “unnecessary or accessory administrative burdens” or “the modification of any budgetary item”.
The educational structure of the Ministry of Defence, which includes all the military educational centers that develop teaching in the Armed Forces, is managed by the Chief of Defence Staff, the Undersecretary of Defence and the Chiefs of Staff of the Army, the Navy and the Air Force, within the scope of their respective competences. In addition, within the Defence Staff, the Joint Cyberspace Command (MCCE) is the body responsible for the planning, direction, coordination, control and execution of actions to ensure the freedom of action of the Armed Forces in the cyberspace field and, therefore, it is also responsible for defining, directing and coordinating awareness, training and joint training in this area.
