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The long-awaited US National Cyber Strategy has just been published, and it’s five pages of content have raised considerable questions about how ambition will translate into practice.

Earlier in March, the Trump administration finally published its National Cyber Strategy after months of suspense regarding the content and tone it would convey, globally, about the US’s ambitions in cyberspace. The announcement came at a strategic time: at the start of the second year of Trump’s presidency, after a series of demonstrations of US use of cyber capabilities in the operation to extract Maduro from Venezuela, and at the outset of the unfolding war in Iran.

There is no single standard for a national cyber strategy; some can be closer to an action plan, outlining budget lines and action items; others might still be lengthy and focused on elaborate ‘pillars of action’. Unlike many ‘strategies’ so far, the US National Cyber Strategy has five pages of text and has raised both praise and critiques about its level of detail and concrete action.

There is certainly no meandering when it comes to communicating ambitions in this strategy, and we have brought together a series of experts to reflect on: (i) the continuities and ruptures the NCS presents compared to its predecessors; (ii) what it means for the US’s posture on the use of offensive cyber capabilities; (iii) the role of the private sector in enabling the aspirations set out in the NCS; (iv) how realistic are the ambitions it presents on AI; and (v) what the strategy means for UK-US transatlantic relations.

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