Pandemic, Cyber ​​Attack, Afghanistan: the effects are global in these times

Now nothing can be taken for granted and the changes are very fast

It is now evident that the rapid change of the scenarios in which we move, along with their complexity, makes it difficult to elaborate definitive considerations, as the changes are now faster than our narrative, and surprise, or seem to surprise, even the most acute international observers and the great experts in strategic analysis, demonstrating the speed and complexity.

Global Cyberattacks, along with the dramatic events happening in Afghanistan, go beyond the interpretations and considerations expressed before. Certainly, they both make it clear how security, its models and the risk management tools are a widespread process which is transversal in communities, organizations, States, and that can no longer be declined across borders and territories: what happens in a place of war, even virtual, generates its effects on a global level.

We are now in a labyrinth where everything flows quickly, the places can be explored with the simple movement of a finger, until revealing any island and capturing the still image of those who landed there. Physical and virtual spaces intersect to the point of almost nullifying the mutual perimeters of competence, sometimes slowing down choices, decisions, interventions and management.

In the present pandemic era, with a Middle Eastern context in turbulent transformation in a digitized society, we have been witnessing for some months also the economic effects of these events. For example, the pressure on prices destined to last, provoked by the strong post-lockdown demand but also by the lack, and the consequent increase in the price, of raw materials and many components due to the delays in the supply chains, perhaps strategically induced. Emblematic is the case of semiconductors in the automotive industry, but not only. The Asian finished product is quickly available and this certainly creates certain effects globally.

The traditional approach on phenomena can’t be trusted anymore: the pandemic, the Cyber and Afghanistan, are indeed manifestations of the mutation of risk scenarios. 

We need transparent analysis, clear visions, authoritative management, political guidelines of determined public and private organizations. Risk management cannot be a component of normality, a passive acceptance of what is to come, there is no normality in the millions of deaths from the pandemic. If not controlled or managed, we will continue to have millions of cyberattacks a day and thousands of deaths between Afghans and terrorists, after 20 years of war. Risk management cannot always figure as an uncontrolled emergency. Withdrawals are not always only strategic, sometimes agreed and necessary, but the conditions of insecurity they leave are global and widespread on populations, on legal and illegal economies, on markets, on the future.