At sixteen stories high, the doctor’s office looms over the neon-colored metropolis. Within the high-rise, consultation offices, operating rooms, and recovery suites occupy most floors. Additional floors house a dental clinic, a rooftop lounge, and apartments for long-term stays. This is 

, a one-stop, full-service plastic surgery facility in the heart of Seoul, South Korea.

South Korea has an obsession with plastic surgery. 

 has undergone some type of cosmetic procedure, compared with 

 in the United States. With plastic surgery’s staggering rise in popularity, an attractive physical appearance is now the 

 for a successful career. Undergoing surgery to achieve an employable face in South Korea is just as commonplace as going to the gym in America.

The most popular surgery is Asian blepharoplasty, the process of changing the Asian eyelid, commonly referred to as the “monolid,” into a double eyelid. The second is rhinoplasty, or a nose job. The prevalence of these two procedures, especially the “double-eyelid” operation, has led to a delicate question: Are South Koreans are seeking to westernize their appearance? Cosmetic surgeons and scholars tread lightly around the issue. Some argue that Western culture — a broad and imperfect term — cannot claim “big eyes” as unique to its definition of beauty. Others note that 

 of the Asian population is born with monolids. Some practitioners, including Dr. 

 of OZ Cosmetic Clinic and Beverly Hills plastic surgeon 

, deny altogether that double-eyelid surgery is intended to make its recipient appear more Western.

The story of an American surgeon in the postwar Korea of the 1950s, however, suggests otherwise.

The late David Ralph Millard was a titan in the field of plastic surgery. Obituaries in various medical journals praised him as the “

 all over the world who were born with facial clefts” and “

 plastic surgeon we have alive.” The American Society of Plastic Surgeons named Millard among 

 “Plastic Surgeons of the Millennium.”

A graduate of Yale College and Harvard Medical School, Millard apprenticed Sir Harold Gillies, widely regarded as the 

. Gillies had been a surgeon during World War I, when new weaponry injured soldiers in ways previously unimaginable. He reconstructed the disfigured faces of wounded soldiers, and in the process became the first physician to successfully graft a new nose onto a patient — a soldier who had been injured at the Battle of Ypres. Years later, Millard trained under Gillies for two years in England, becoming a close friend and colleague.

In 1954, Millard was stationed in South Korea as the U.S. Marine Corps’ chief plastic surgeon. He considered it an opportunity to leave a legacy similar to Gillies, who by then was a celebrated innovator in the field. Postwar South Korea offered no shortage of patients for Millard, who deemed the country “

.” He was tasked with providing reconstructive surgery for wounded soldiers and children with congenital diseases.

A common case Millard encountered was the cleft palate. He saw the defect as a normal lip twisted into an abnormal shape, and reasoned that he could rotate the lip into its correct position, filling the remaining cavity with facial tissue. His solution proved ground-breaking: now 

, Millard’s techniques achieved a more natural appearance in patients than early corrective surgeries were able to achieve. 

 offers a myth-like account of Millard’s discovery: supposedly, the surgical procedure came to him in a mid-day reverie. Upon waking, he exited his tent and literally lassoed a passing Korean boy, who soon became the first recipient of the revolutionary cleft palate treatment.

’s fanciful account and in other articles written about the U.S. Marine surgeon, Millard became famous for this innovation. Absent from such articles, however, is Millard’s other groundbreaking work in Korea: the advancement and popularization of the double-eyelid surgery.

Millard first considered altering the human eye while reconstructing eyebrows for burn victims. He began to keenly study the eye, socket, and folds, musing how to change it from “Oriental to Occidental.” He initially thought that he would never find a consenting patient to operate on, until a Korean translator approached him and, according to accounts from the era, asked to be “made into a round-eye.” “He felt that because of the squint in his slant eyes, Americans could not tell what he was thinking and consequently did not trust him,” 

 “As this was partly true, I consented to do what I could.”

Upon researching the operation, Millard found that surgeons in Japan, Hong Kong, and even Korea were already performing double-eyelid procedures for both medical and cosmetic reasons. Unable to find any publications about the surgery that were written in English, Millard devised his own operation. He decided to raise the nasal bridge and widen the eyes to reduce the “Asian-ness” of his patient’s visage. Millard first transplanted cartilage to the nose. He then tore the inner fold of the eyelid, removed fat resting above the eye, and sutured folds of skin together, creating a double eyelid. The interpreter was 

, and reported that after the operation, his ethnicity was often mistaken for Italian or Mexican.

Millard went on to cosmetically alter the faces of numerous Koreans during his yearlong tour. Many of his patients were women in the sex trade, electing to go under the knife in order 

 to American GIs. Millard trained local doctors to continue his work after his departure. Once stateside, he published two papers on his Asian eye operation: “

The Oriental Eyelid and Its Surgical Revision

Both works display an insensitive and at times racist tone. Millard writes that the Asian monolid “gives the effect of an expressionless eye sneaking a peep through a slit, a characteristic which through fact and fiction has become associated with mystery and intrigue.” He later concludes, “the plastic surgeon may be called upon to help [Asians living abroad] blend in with their surroundings.”

Multiple historians have cited Millard and his publications as clear evidence for Western influence on modern beauty ideals in South Korea. In 

, Nadia Y. Kim wrote that “the U.S. military and [Millard] were crystallizing Koreans’ sense of inferiority to their White racial bodies.” In 

, David Palumbo-Liu argued that Millard’s work implied “a defect inherent in the Asian face … [which] must inevitably be modified if the East is to have any authentic contact with the West.”

And yet, despite the story of David Ralph Millard, some cosmetic surgeons and scholars still maintain that double-eyelid surgery is not a procedure aimed at mimicking Western features. In a 1989 medical journal, 

surgeons from Korea, Japan, and Los Angeles

 declared that the procedure was not for “Caucasianization of the Oriental eye,” but simply to help patients “look more attractive within the current aesthetic norms of [the patient’s] own culture.” Scholars point out that Millard was not the first to perform double-eyelid procedures — accounts exist as early as an 

 article that describes similar operations occurring in Japan — but he simply became the one to revolutionize and popularize the operation.

The historical context of Millard’s visit to Korea perhaps best elucidates the Western connotations that the double-eyelid surgery carries. The Korean War had just exposed the entire country to the Western world via the U.S. military’s presence. After the fighting stopped, Koreans sought to emulate the people they now associated with influence, money, and power. “More critical than the surgery itself,” writes John DiMoia in 

, “was the postwar context in which it took place, with medical relief frequently mobilized as evidence of benevolent intentions, conveniently ignoring the power differences embedded within the U.S.-ROK [Republic of Korea] relationship.”

In Korea, Millard left a legacy that neither he nor the U.S. military had planned, laying the foundation for Seoul to become the worldwide mecca of plastic surgery. Clinics offering the double-eyelid procedure 

 throughout Korea during the 1960s. By the 1990s, the industry’s growth caught the attention of Western media outlets. The 

 ran stories about Koreans’ decisions to 

 — the common slang at the time. Today, the number of Koreans undergoing surgery has reached a critical mass, and the menu of services has expanded far beyond Western eyes: hip augmentation, facial implants, skin whitening, even calf reduction (which uses Botox injections to reduce leg muscle size).

This trend is not without risk. The huge demand for cosmetic procedures has put uncertified doctors in business — a number that some estimate to be 

 of all cosmetic surgeons in South Korea — resulting in botched and, at times, lethal procedures. 

 is one of the newest and most dangerous procedures to reach the operating room. Aimed at reshaping and slimming the jawline, the surgery involves shaving — and occasionally breaking — the jawbone to achieve a delicate, V-shaped chin. As its popularity has continued to grow, many Korean women are beginning to have 

Recent patients can be seen strolling around Seoul wearing their bandages and talking excitedly about the procedures they have planned next. Only a few years ago, plastic surgery recipients took vacations to hide their post-operation recovery. Now, the bandages — and the augmented features beneath — have become something of a status symbol.

, Millard compiled a list of principles he thought every cosmetic surgeon should know. The eighth principle reads: “Know the Ideal Beautiful Normal.” A colleague later 

 that Principle Eight had been Millard’s favorite: “He, more than anyone of his era, was able to achieve it.”

As the double eyelid and the V-line jaw explode in popularity, Korean women and men are adhering to Principle Eight just as Millard advised. They seek ideal beauty, now synonymous with ideal normalcy in their society, at great cost — creating a surreal, self-perpetuating cycle.

Or perhaps, Principle Eight captures the central problems with the cosmetic surgery obsession, both in South Korea and elsewhere: Is there an “Ideal Beautiful Normal”? Who or what has defined it? And what are the consequences of pursuing it?

 has taught English in Poland, worked the counter at a Chipotle Mexican Grill, and is currently pursuing a degree at Georgetown University, where she chairs the editorial board of the

; modified with elements from Shutterstock

faceoff-1 2.jpg

South Korea's obsession with cosmetic surgery can be traced back to an American doctor, raising uneasy questions about beauty standards.

Eyes wide cut: the American origins of Korea’s plastic surgery craze

In 1948, MIT mathematician Norbert Wiener published 

, a book that heralded the coming information age. Cybernetics, according to Wiener, is “the science of control and communication in the animal and the machine.” Just as the human body sweats or shakes to regulate its temperature, the “Roomba” vacuum-cleaning robot rotates and continues in a different direction after hitting a wall. In either case, both the animal and the machine use information, feedback, and control to interact with their environments and achieve goals.

By considering animals’ methods of control and communication similar to that of machines, Wiener and other scientists were able to design bigger and more powerful machines. A few years before Wiener’s book, British mathematician 

 used cybernetic principles to create his Turing machine, which pioneered the design of the modern computer and deciphered Enigma, the ‘unbreakable’ World War Two-era cypher used by the German military.

In the wake of Turing’s invention and Wiener’s research, a tremendous enthusiasm for cybernetics swept world of American academia. The possibilities of cybernetics, it seemed, were endless. By simply posing the problem or asking the question in a way comprehensible to a logic machine, the machine could churn its gears and produce the correct, logical answer.

In current times, the term cybernetics has become outdated, replaced by more specific terminology in the ever-growing field of information technology. But even in the 1950s, its limitations were evident.

The emerging field of cybernetics was low-hanging fruit for Soviet propagandists looking for new material to demonize America. A 1949 directive “Plan for the Intensification of Anti-American Propaganda in the Near Future” ordered journalists to ramp up the rhetoric. Newspaper headlines soon declared “The Degeneration of Culture in the USA” and “Science in the Service of American Monopolies.”

In 1951, Boris Agapov, the science editor of influential Russian magazine 

 stumbled upon Wiener’s theory on the cover of 

 asked the headline. Agapov knew very little about Wiener and even less about cybernetics. But for Agapov, the article was a goldmine of anti-American propaganda. Rather than reading Wiener’s book, Agapov paraphrased from 

. The result was an inflammatory article that denounced cybernetics as the “sweet dream” of American capitalists, who aimed to use automation to neuter class-conscious workers.

In the paranoia of Soviet society, both Communist apparatchiks and street merchants heeded the words of the state-run media. Soon after Agapov’s article was published, Lenin State Library, a hulking institution that overlooks the Kremlin, pulled Wiener’s 

 from circulation. Others followed suit. The Institute of Philosophy labeled Wiener as a “philosophizing ignoramus” who belittled human thought as mere math equations. In 1952

, depicting a dystopic New York in which big business and the military have created robot soldiers, robot gangsters, robot Klansmen – all part of America’s nefarious cybernetic master plan.

As the media and other government agencies censored and ridiculed cybernetics, others grew frustrated. For scientists Ekaterina Shkabara and Lev Dashevskii, the daily papers were quickly turning their life’s work into a taboo subject. The pair was constructing what became the Small Electronic Calculating Machine (MESM), the first Soviet computer. Like other Soviet scientists, Shkabara and Dashevskii faced a catch-22 with their research: the government demanded that they “criticize and destroy” Western science while simultaneously ordering them to “overtake and surpass” it.

, Slava Gerovitch writes, “In the murky waters of Cold War politics, Soviet scientists and engineers were caught between the Scylla of the national defense and the Charybdis of ideological purity” (in Greek mythology, Scylla was a six-headed monster and Charybdis was an inescapable whirlpool). Faced with this contradiction, Shkabara, Dashevskii and other leading Russian scientists tried to appease both sides, publishing articles that denounced Wiener’s cybernetics while praising their own research, which undeniably employed cybernetic principles.

Soviet military officials read Agapov’s mockery of cybernetics with trepidation. Research into high-speed digital computers had already begun in the Soviet Union, and suddenly it was a treasonous endeavor. Researchers realized they needed to change the language of their work in order to continue it. Instead of “computer memory”, they began using the term “storage.” “Memory” sounded too human — too much like cybernetics’ claim of animal and machine similarity. Likewise, “information” was replaced with “data” and “informational theory” with “the statistical theory of electrical signal transmission with noise.” Under this new, ideologically pure nomenclature, cybernetics remained indispensable. Soviet military researchers, quietly and tactfully, kept adapting cybernetic principles for their atomic, ballistic missile, and anti-missile programs.

With the death of Stalin in 1953, the Soviet Union entered the “Khrushchev Thaw.” General Secretary Nikita Khrushchev relaxed the strict ideology of Stalin, creating some limited space for dialogue and dissent. Scientists could now study abroad and invite foreign colleagues to Moscow. No longer having to “Criticize and Destroy” Western science, scientists celebrated cybernetics, erasing its taboo status. The Academy of Sciences began publishing a periodical, 

. By 1961, the government was directing the construction of computer factories.

The Party Central Committee now envisioned a use for cybernetics beyond guiding missiles: optimizing the economy. A national computer network was formed to amass and share economic data in real time. The plan was so grandiose that the CIA created a panel to investigate it. In a 1962 memo, Arthur Schlesinger, a senior aide to President Kennedy, fretted that “by 1970, the USSR may have a radically new production technology, involving total enterprises or complexes of industries, managed by closed-loop, feedback control employing self-teaching computers.”

But like many things in the Soviet Union, the whole endeavor was frustrated by the glacial pace and reticent attitudes of bureaucracy. Instead of using computers to increase communication and efficiency, each economic ministry individualized its computer systems, estranging itself to protect power and relevance. The result of the economy’s computerization? More data than anyone knew what to do with.

By 1985, Soviet economic agencies produced 800 billion documents per year – 3,000 documents for each Soviet citizen. More and more paperwork had to pass through the same number of officials, creating delays and stagnation. Gerovitch notes that in order to produce something as simple as a flat iron, a factory manager needed the signatures of 60 different bureaucrats. The bureaucrats themselves submitted, forged, or exaggerated data to keep their superiors happy. Of the billions of documents produced, few were of any value.

Many in the Soviet Union believed computers would secure their position at the top of the world order. Instead, the paper morass created by computers both revealed and exacerbated the economy’s shortcomings. Information technology, once “called in to prove the superiority of socialism,” concludes Gerovtich, “eventually proved the ineffectiveness of the Soviet regime.”

From Newspeak to Cyberspeak: A History of Soviet Cybernetics

How the computer got its revenge on the Soviet Union

Untitled-1.png

The story of why the Soviet Union first labeled the computer as a taboo invention, and later believed it would prove the superiority of the communist system. 

The peculiar history of computers in the Soviet Union

Americans are notoriously bad with geography, and our own borders are no exception. Oft forgotten is the fact that the United States is an arctic power, with the entirety of Alaska’s northern coastline comprised of frozen tundra and frigid seas. The numbing cold has not precluded certain countries, the U.S. included, from venturing into the alabaster abyss, which is fast becoming a geopolitical hotspot. Here are six reasons why you should be paying more attention to the polar region.

1. Climate change is creating both disaster and opportunity

The melting of polar ice is quickly destroying the Arctic ecosystem and slowly making 

 as rising sea levels submerge coastal areas. Since 1970, 17 percent of the Arctic’s sea ice 

, and by 2040, the portion of the Arctic that remains frozen year round will be contained to the 

 — a few remaining ice blocks near Canada and Greenland. As the ice disappears, economic opportunity emerges. In the coming decade, energy companies will invest a projected 

 in the Arctic. Investors from all over the world will flock north to harvest a quarter of the world’s undiscovered oil and gas, as well as the zinc, copper, gold, and diamonds that lie below the Arctic’s surface. Commercial investment in the Arctic will be accident-prone, as ships and equipment operate in unfamiliar conditions. It’s a bitter irony, 

 “Ice that’s been cleared by climate change [is] allowing companies to dig for more fossil fuels.”

2. Territorial disputes remain unresolved, and the U.S. has not ratified a treaty that could help

The U.S., Canada, Russia, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Iceland, and Finland have all claimed territory in the Arctic. Give each of these nations a map, and they would draw 

. Disputes remain over whether the Arctic Ocean should be entirely international waters, precisely where cargo ships can sail, and who owns 

As climate change melts polar ice, countries have placed additional claims on waters adjacent to their coastlines. Of the five nations that directly border the Arctic, four of them — Canada, Denmark, Norway, and Russia — have ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). The treaty gives ratifying nations exclusive economic zones 200 nautical miles out from their terrestrial boundaries. UNCLOS also allows countries to submit claims to continental shelves, extending the area in which a country can mine resources. The U.S. has signed but not ratified the treaty. Since the treaty went into effect in 1994, 

 have stood arms-crossed and obstinate, maintaining that UNCLOS forces the U.S. to cede too much authority to an international institution. The U.S. Navy, the Bush, Clinton, and Obama administrations, commercial interests, and most everyone else 

 that UNCLOS would benefit the U.S., and that refusing to ratify the treaty only weakens U.S. stature in Arctic negotiations.

Scattered along Russia’s northern coastline is the country’s Northern Fleet — an assortment of battleships, ballistic missile submarines, nuclear attack submarines, and, for good measure, 

. Founded during the Cold War, the Northern Fleet has proliferated in recent years thanks to President Putin’s 

 and restructuring of military command. The Northern Joint Strategic Command now controls both the surface and a submarine fleets — together an 80-vessel enterprise. While 40 to 70 percent of the fleet is not currently operational, 

says Russian navy expert Dmitry Gorenburg

, five naval deployments are conducted in the Arctic each year. And although economic sanctions have stagnated ship construction — as contractors are unable to procure precision tools from Germany or gas turbines from Ukraine — Russia has continued to expand its arsenal of submarines. Russia’s new nuclear attack submarine model 

Analysts have called this Putin’s “Arctic Pivot”

 — a long-term venture to bolster military presence in the Arctic as melting ice exposes more waters to patrol and more resources to extract. Most recently, the Northern Fleet has flaunted Russian military capability in the ongoing Ukrainian conflict: 5,000 NATO troops underwent 

 near the Russian border this March — an exercise reportedly planned before the Ukraine crisis began. Russia responded with an exercise of its own — 

38,000 troops, 41 ships, and 110 aircraft

4. The U.S. has one operational icebreaker

Compared to the other Arctic nations, the U.S. lags far behind in infrastructure and investment. The U.S. has yet to build a single port in the Arctic, and 

the Coast Guard possesses only two diesel icebreakers, with one in operation

. Russia’s coast guard, by contrast, boasts 

a reported 14 icebreakers under construction

While the U.S. Navy’s submarines are experienced in ice-encrusted waters, its surface and air forces are less so. In a 

, the Navy concluded that in its current state, it could realistically maintain a presence in the Arctic only in summer months. Moreover, the U.S. Senate’s continued failure to ratify UNCLOS forces the Navy to navigate waters in which they are not always welcome.

The Navy seems to be aware of the asymmetry of its Arctic capability 

as it prepares to train in “war games” in the Gulf of Alaska this summer

, which will be the Navy’s largest exercise in the Gulf to date. Environmentalists warn that the Gulf’s water and wildlife face a great risk as tens of thousands of pounds of ammunition are about to come raining down. The war games will continue regardless, in what appears to be a warm-up for the “Arctic Race.”

. Among the unmapped territory is Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater mountain believed to contain the lion’s share of Arctic oil and gas deposits. To conduct research and extract resources at Lomonosov, Arctic nations must submit a claim to the United Nations to prove that their continental shelf extends into the mountain. As such a bureaucratic endeavor is slow-moving, countries are playing spy games while they wait. Stealth submarines, drones, satellites, and eavesdropping bases have proliferated in the area. “The Arctic,” 

’s James Bamford, “has become the crossroads of technical espionage today.”

In the midst of the spying, countries have formed alliances that are convoluted and vary by issue. Canada had a tiff with Russia in 2007 after 

 was placed on contested seabed, but both states agree that certain portions of the Arctic are 

 out of which foreign vessels cannot pass without permission. The U.S. disagrees with Canada on this, but at the same time the countries share their Arctic intelligence. Much of the U.S. intel is collected at one of the most remote and classified buildings in the world: the

, which operates satellites that fly over Russia’s portion of the Arctic every 90 minutes. The increasing pervasiveness of espionage in the Arctic has the trappings of a new Cold War — but this time, the name isn’t only metaphorical.

6. The U.S. recently became Chair of the Arctic Council

If the previous points sound ominous, or at least worrisome, don’t lose hope yet. In April, the U.S. 

began its two-year stint as Chair of the Arctic Council

 comprised of the eight Arctic nations. The U.S. has drawn criticism in past years for 

 among its agencies. With its current chairmanship, however, the U.S. finds itself in a position to refine its policy, navigate the Council through the issues of an increasingly accessible Arctic, and perhaps rally the Senate to finally ratify UNCLOS.

In May, the U.S., Russia, and three other Arctic nations signed a fishing agreement, despite the events in Ukraine having delayed the process. With this development, the current trend of cooperation in the Arctic was reinforced. “Some people call this Arctic exceptionalism,” explained 

World Wildlife Fund spokesman Clive Tesar. 

“We can have our disagreements elsewhere, but in the Arctic, we have to cooperate.”

And yet, considering the march of climate change and circling commercial and military interests, the future of “Arctic exceptionalism” is far from certain. The Arctic race may yet have a winner.

1769249.jpg

Six things you should know about the world’s fastest-expanding frontier.

The race for the Arctic

On February 19, Russian cybersecurity firm 

 had a break-in. There were no signs of forced entry or incriminating security footage. The only noise was the droning electric hum of computer servers as one approved an incoming software program. The interloper had the right identification – a digital certificate, required by the server to allow installment of the new program. Once in the system, the malware effectively constructed a panopticon within Kaspersky. Gaining access to internal files and communiques, it could see the company’s inner workings. And no one would see it until June — four months later.

When Kaspersky did discover the hackers’ work, 

the firm put its best analysts on the case

 to understand how the rogue code was so successful, and who wrote it. The findings are troubling. The malware, dubbed Duqu 2.0, seems to be the most complex of its kind. Israel appears to have conducted the attacks. And Kaspersky Lab was not the only target.

The malware’s first task was to gain entry into Kaspersky’s computer network. To trick the servers into thinking the incoming software was from a legitimate company, the creators of Duqu 2.0 used 

a digital security certificate stolen from Hon Hai Precision Industry Co.

 This would be unremarkable were it not for the fact that Hon Hai is better known as Foxconn, the tech manufacturing colossus with a client list that includes Google and Apple, 

a history of miserable working conditions

, Kim Zetter suggests an answer: to mislead investigators into thinking China orchestrated the cyberattack. Beyond giving investigators false leads, the malware’s use of digital certificates poses a serious challenge to the cybersecurity community. Hackers are subverting the very measures intended to defend against them — measures that discern a malicious program from a legitimate one.

The digital certificate disguise isn’t going out of style anytime soon. Considered to be the forerunners of Duqu 2.0, the 

 in 2010 also exploited digital certificates to gain entry. In all three attacks, each certificate originated from a different Taiwanese tech giant, suggesting the perpetrators possess an arsenal of stolen certifications. 

Kaspersky Lab’s Global Research and Analysis Team consider

 the hackers’ stash “extremely alarming, because it effectively undermines trust in digital certificates.”

.” For one, Duqu 2.0 is incredibly hard to detect. Increased network traffic is a typical “tell” of hacker activity; traffic spikes when malware-infected machines communicate with the hackers’ external computers. But Duqu 2.0 masks its presence by infiltrating not just computers, but also firewalls, gateways, and servers. The result is a secure communication channel that allowed hackers to access, spy, and sabotage the Kaspersky network unnoticed.

Once in, it’s very hard to wipe from a computer. With less-advanced malware, rebooting an infected machine should erase the bad code, and the hackers would have to start over. Duqu 2.0 eliminates this risk by storing a master copy of itself within the shadow communication network it creates. In the event of a machine reboot, Duqu 2.0 sends a copy soon thereafter to re-infect the recently “cured” machine.

Attributing the cyberattack with full certainty is almost impossible, as the hackers used proxy servers to obscure their trail. But there are other ways to determine the author of malware, and 

 are now pointing fingers at Israel. Duqu 2.0 appears to be a descendent of Stuxnet, a cyberattack on an Iranian nuclear plant 

widely reported to be a covert collaborative effort

 between the United States and Israel. The resources needed to create and execute attacks of this magnitude and precision suggest the involvement of a nation-state or other large organization able to provide adequate funding and direction.

By observing patterns in the malware’s activity, Kaspersky Labs found another clue implying Israel’s involvement: as with the Duqu 1.0 attacks, Duqu 2.0 hackers appear to have spied on the Russian firm every day of the week except Saturday, suggesting that they were observing the Sabbath. But perhaps the most convincing evidence for Israel’s involvement is the identity of Duqu 2.0’s other victims. According to Kaspersky’s report, the malware infected other IT security companies in order improve its espionage capabilities. What’s more, Duqu 2.0 targeted three luxury European hotels. Analysts were at first befuddled by the lack of any apparent connection between the hotels — until it turned out that all three hosted negotiations between Tehran and the P5+1 over Iran’s nuclear capabilities. Upon further investigation, Duqu 2.0 was found to have targeted other events connected with the Iranian nuclear deal.

The original June 30 deadline for the nuclear negotiations has come and gone, 

 appears to be the modus operandi. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu had consistently 

 that Iran is “not a country that you can place your trust in. And it's not a country that you're going to resolve its congenital cheating.” Considering Kaspersky’s discovery of Duqu 2.0 slinking around its computer network, it would appear that Israel isn’t playing it too straight either.

Attackers stole certificates from Foxconn to hack Kaspersky with Duqu 2.0

lauracyber.png

An investigation into a hacked Russian security firm suggests Israel is waging a fierce cyber-espionage crusade.

Advanced malware is spying on the Iranian nuclear talks. It's probably Israel.

The Dead Sea is fighting oblivion. Renowned for its cobalt waters, high salinity, and religious significance, the biblical lake faces a slow death as its tributary, the Jordan River, is continually overdrawn to satiate the demands of Jordan, Israel, Lebanon, and Syria. Each year, 

the Dead Sea’s water levels drop by approximately 3.3 feet

The desiccation of the Dead Sea is a part of a greater water crisis unfolding in the region. Israel, Jordan, and Syria syphon water from the Jordan River to grow crops and provide potable water for their people — demand that spiked with the arrival of Syrian refugees. As a result, 90 percent of the Jordan River no longer flows into the Dead Sea. Some 

 that, without intervention, the sea will be 

. Beyond the question of survival, tourism and mineral industries evaporate as the sea recedes. 

More troubling still are the massive sinkholes

: fresh water from underground aquifers can seep into salt deposits in the dried seabed, dissolving the salt and creating cavities that ensnarl buildings, roads, and humans.

For decades, scientists have warned of the Dead Sea’s demise, spurring action that has heretofore been inadequate. Serious discussions on how to save the Dead Sea began in the 1990s. In an early proposal, a pipeline connecting the Red Sea to the Dead Sea would have provided 900 million cubic meters (cbm) of water annually to be desalinated for civilian use. Another 900 million cbm would be added to the Dead Sea each year, allowing it to maintain its volume. Scientists voiced their concerns. Red algae from the Red Sea might float on the buoyant Dead Sea’s surface and, with relentless sunlight, the invasive species could multiply and stain the Dead Sea crimson. For a region so intertwined with Abrahamic faiths, the irony would not be missed. (Think Moses turning the Nile River into blood). Gypsum could form due to the incompatibility of the Red Sea and Dead Sea’s respective mineral contents, coloring the Dead Sea a chalky white. Other scientists took issue with the pipeline itself, which transverses an earthquake zone; if the pipeline should leak, underground freshwater aquifers could be contaminated by salt, compromising water stores for local farming and consumption.

With such dismal scenarios predicted, Jordan, Israel, and the Palestinian Authority asked 

the World Bank to conduct a $16.5 million study

 to investigate the risks. The World Bank’s verdict conceded that 900 million cbm a year of Red Sea water would potentially dye the Dead Sea milk white or blood red, and would definitely spoil underground freshwater. The three party states scaled back their ambitions and 

 to build the Red Sea Dead Sea water conveyor (RSDSWC), a 112-mile pipeline that will transport a reduced 200 million cbm of water annually.

The RSDSWC will refill the Dead Sea while providing potable water to the region, courtesy of a desalination plant at the Gulf of Aqaba. The drinkable product — 80 million cbm per year — will be divvied between the Israelis and Jordanians. The Israelis, in turn, will sell freshwater from the Sea of Galilee to Palestinians and Jordanians. This exchange is intended to ameliorate both regional water scarcity and fraught diplomatic relations: “Building the pipeline will enhance political stability and have an overall positive effect on the peace process as these countries work together,” said World Bank water specialist Alexander McPhail. The briny water from the desalination process will be slowly introduced into the Dead Sea to counteract its retreating shoreline. At a rate of 80 million cbm annually, the Red Sea water should not cause severe changes in coloration as the earlier, larger-scale proposal would have.

A microscopic frontier lies at the bottom of the Dead Sea

It sounds like an innovative idea to remedy an environmental concern and bridge a political chasm, right? Unfortunately, there’s a catch.

The Dead Sea’s namesake comes from its high salinity, long thought to preclude life from forming. In 2009, 

German marine scientist Danny Ionescu found otherwise

. Exploring freshwater springs that dot the seabed, Ionescu discovered species never before seen: “Life [was] screaming at us — an entirely new microbial ecosystem in the Dead Sea.” The Dead Sea, in fact, is living.

Ionescu’s discovery of these primitive lifeforms — species with fantastic abilities, including their survival through severe oscillations in salinity — could further our understanding of life’s origins. The presence of these creatures, however, complicates the RSDSWC project. Ionescu predicts that Red Sea water would enable these organisms to thrive at the sea’s surface – changing its color, a problem thought to be solved by the RSDSWC’s slower flow design. Ionescu and other scientists hypothesize that Red Sea water, no matter how quickly or slowly added to the Dead Sea, will dissolve salt deposits, create more sinkholes, and contaminate local freshwater. A new species of green sulfur bacteria discovered by Ionescu could accelerate the process.

A microscopic frontier lies at the bottom of the Dead Sea, but its discovery came too late to be considered in the World Bank’s report. The RSDSWC project has been greenlighted and is scheduled to be operational by 2018. How this miniature ecosystem will react to Red Sea water remains unknown. Ionescu and other scientists, meanwhile, urge consideration of alternate solutions, such as charging factories fees for diverting Jordan River water that would otherwise feed the Dead Sea.

In reality, protecting an ecosystem is not as seductive as the potential of regional peacebuilding. The diplomatic and environmental outcomes of the RSDSWC remain to be seen, as does the ability of scientists to convince policy-makers to proceed with caution. In the brawls between science and politics, though, history has favored the politicians.

“The Dead Sea Lives! Why scientists question the longstanding plan to merge the Dead Sea and the Red Sea,”

Jordan, Israel agree $900 million Red Sea-Dead Sea project

“Jordan hopes controversial Red Sea Dead Sea project will stem water crisis

7051056073_76db6025a3_o.jpg

A water crisis could dry out the biblical salty lake, and the proposed solution is rife with problems.

The Dead Sea isn't dead… yet

One hundred forty-six spent cartridges litter the ground. Thirteen people lie dead. Nurses reported that the excess of spilt blood make it difficult to attend to victims. This was Fort Hood, Texas, on November 5, 2009, when U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan murdered 13 and injured 33 more with 

 that he purchased and trained with specifically for the occasion.

Two-and-a-half years earlier, Seung-Hui Cho held a Walther P22 and a 9mm Glock pistol. 

His rampage left 32 faculty and students dead

 in the science and mechanics building on the campus of Virginia Tech University. At the time, David Maraniss of the 

 wrote that April 16, 2007, was “another date of death for people to absorb, if not fully comprehend.”

At each of those dates of death, tragedy was met with shock, grief, and bafflement: Why did this happen? What were the motives? For Hasan, a self-described 

 his distorted faith in Islam played a role. For Cho, the cause was less ideological than medical, an end result of 

inadequately treated anxiety disorders and mental illness

. In the end, regardless of their motives, both Hasan and Cho picked up guns and both murdered innocent people. In that way, they are similar, but did their motives affect 

Laura Kurek