What China’s hackers get wrong about Washington: WashPo

Erza Klein wrote an interesting article for The Washington Post that covered Chinese hackers’ efforts to understand American politics.  Noting a previous WashPo article that explained Chinese cyberspies had penetrated “powerful Washington institutions,” Klein questions why the Chinese are going after law firms, newspapers, and think-tanks.  As for law firms, it was my understanding that hackers target lawyers because they (a) don’t understand cybersecurity and (b) provide an easy workaround to get to their client’s IP.

As for thinktanks, however, the previous WashPo article explained that:

Chinese intelligence services [are] eager to understand how Washington works. Hackers often are searching for the unseen forces that might explain how the administration approaches an issue, experts say, with many Chinese officials presuming that reports by think tanks or news organizations are secretly the work of government officials — much as they would be in Beijing.

In response, Klein wrote that:

The Chinese look at Washington, and they think there must be some document somewhere, some flowchart saved on a computer in the basement of some think tank, that lays it all out. Because in China, there would be. In China, someone would be in charge. There would be a plan somewhere. It would probably last for many years. It would be at least partially followed. But that’s not how it works in Washington.

. . .

I almost feel bad for the Chinese hackers. Imagine the junior analysts tasked with picking through the terabytes of e-mails from every low-rent think tank in Washington, trying to figure out what matters and what doesn’t, trying to make everything fit a pattern. Imagine all the spurious connections they’re drawing, all the fundraising bluster they’re taking as fact, all the black humor they’re reading as straight description, all the mundane organizational chatter they’re reading.

They’re missing our real strength, the real reason Washington fails day-to-day but has worked over years: It’s because we don’t stick too rigidly to plans or rely on some grand design. That way, when it all falls apart, as it always does and always will, we’re okay.

I thought this analysis was both uniquely cynical and cogent.  I’m drawn to this picture I saw on Reddit describing Soviet/Nazi thoughts on US doctrine during WW2: