The fight for the future makes daily headlines. Its battles are not between the armies of leading states, nor are its weapons the large, expensive tanks, planes and fleets of regular armed forces. Rather, the combatants come from violent terrorist networks like Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda, drug cartels like those in Colombia and Mexico, and militant anarchists like the Black Bloc that fought back during the Battle of Seattle. Other protagonists - ones who often benefit U.S. interests - are networked civil-society activists fighting for democracy and human rights around the world. From the Battle of Seattle to the "attack on America," these networks are proving very hard to deal with; some are winning. What all have in common is that they operate in small, dispersed units that can deploy nimbly - anywhere, anytime. All feature network forms of organization, doctrine, strategy, and technology attuned to the information age. They know how to swarm and disperse, penetrate and disrupt, as well as elude and evade. The tactics they use range from battles of ideas to acts of sabotage - and many tactics involve the Internet. So far, across this new landscape of conflict, the edge has gone to the networks. Hierarchy-oriented states must learn to transform themselves along networked lines, or they will face the increasingly daunting prospect of struggling against a rising tide of both civil and uncivil networks enabled, and impelled forward, by the information revolution. "Punk was much more than fad or fashion; it demonstrated the fractal effect in culture, showing how small events, the acts of a few people, can cause ripples around the world."