US airforce shifts 30,000 troops to 'cyberwar front lines'

The US Air Force reports that it has assigned no fewer than 30,000 digital troops to "the front lines of cyber warfare". This is close to a third of the number of US troops deployed in Afghanistan. The Air Force Times reports that 27,000 enlisted airmen and women are now classified as cyber scufflers, having previously been rated as communications and electronics people. Some 3,000 officers have been shifted out of other trades to become elite "cyber officers", potentially eligible to wear the coveted cyber wings recently established by the USAF. Only a fraction of these people are actually assigned to the new cyberwar formation, the 24th Air Force, which is now forming up. Most belong, and will continue to belong, to communications sub-units in normal airforce formations with planes and stuff. But USAF cyberwar enthusiasts insist that a major change is happening.