Developments inside China — from its resource appetites and cyber capacity to its political and military might — will drive the actions of the other BRICs.
As Obama noted yesterday, "What we cannot do is have a situation in which suddenly this becomes the wild wild West, where countries that have significant cyber capacity start engaging in competition — unhealthy competition or conflict — through these means when, I think wisely, we've put in place some norms when it comes to other weapons".
Beijing is believed to have invested heavily in offensive cyber capabilities; the capacity to attack computer systems and networks.
The Global Centre for Cyber Security and Capacity Building will work to help countries develop comprehensive plans to deal with online threats.
Strengthen the cyber security and response capacities in public-sector agencies and critical national infrastructures.
The fact is that the United States government has already shown signs of an energetic capacity for cyber war, as in the case of Stuxnet, the software worm that the U.S., working with Israel, is believed to have used to disrupt Iran's uranium-enrichment program.
But to retain that advantage, America will need to harden its forward bases, invest in missile defence and submarines and counter China's capacity in asymmetric electronic, cyber and space warfare.
Rogers pointed out that some cyber teams operated in an offensive capacity and some defensive.
"As a deterrent against attacks on our critical resources, the United States must possess the unquestioned capacity to launch crippling cyber counterattacks.
"What we need is a better capacity to interdict weapons shipments, have a maritime capability, to have cyber defenses, to deal with these asymmetric threats from Iran," he said.
