Colossus – The Forbin Project
Welcome to the February issue of Hacker Chronicles!
Below you’ll find the first progress bar for the writing of my next novel and a review of the science fiction classic Colossus by D.F. Jones.
Enjoy!
/John
Writing Update
Let me first ask you for a favor. Identified needs at least 20 reviews on Amazon if it’s not to be hidden by the site’s algorithms. Readers who’ve never heard of me are unlikely to take a chance on my novel unless there are enough reviews and ratings to check.
So review on Amazon when you’ve read it, please. You don’t have to give it a top score – just an honest, short review. If you normally review on Goodreads, just cross-post on Amazon. Thank you! It helps me a lot!
Now for something I promised in the last issue – an update on my next novel. It’s the sequel to Identified and it’s been planned for years at this point.
My target is 90,000 words for the first draft. I like my novels to be right below 400 pages in print and given my experience in editing Identified, 90k as a starting point will work out well.
This is where I’m at right now with the sequel:
February Feature: Review of Colossus: The Forbin Project
Colossus is a 1966 science fiction novel featuring super computers and written by D. F. Jones. It became a movie in 1970 under the name Colossus: The Forbin Project. A remake, starring Will Smith and reworked by ‘Men in Black’ writer Ed Solomon, was in the works in 2013 but there’s no recent news on that front.
You can get the novel as e-book and audio book but it’s out of print. I got myself a 1968 paperback copy on eBay. The movie is not available on any of the streaming services I have access to so I had to buy it as used DVD.
I liked the novel more than the movie and so my review relies mostly on the book.
Spoiler Alert: Yes, spoilers below.
Trailer: YouTube
Hacker Rating
Hacker Realism: ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️
Hacker Importance for the Plot: ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️
Hacks: ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️
The Premise
An American team of scientists and engineers have built an incredibly powerful computer which will take over all decisions for the US nuclear weapons. The goal is to remove the human element and maximize the chances of world peace through strict logic.
To be able to make decisions, Colossus will monitor all electronic communications worldwide, including satellites.
The super computer is named Colossus and is built into an enormous, sealed cave system in the Rocky Mountain. It has its own nuclear power source and duplicated or triplicated circuitry to be able to function for hundreds of years.
As the project lead Professor Charles Forbin briefs the President, we learn that the intent is to keep Colossus isolated so once the transition of power is complete, no human can interfere with Colossus. This will protect against adversaries as well as bad human judgement within the country.
The novel reveals in chapter 10 that Jones envisioned the story to take place in the mid-1990s. This is the particular paragraph: “Odd!” he repeated. “The men who have advanced the theory of gravitation can practically be named on one hand! Aristotle, Galileo, Newton, Einstien, Hoyle – and now Colossus! This is new, Charles! Colossus has gone on where Hoyle left off over thirty years ago!”
Fred Hoyle was an English astronomer who published the Hoyle–Narlikar theory of gravity together with Indian astrophysicist Jayant Narlikar in 1964 (paper as pdf). 1964 + 31 = 1995.
Thoughts
The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 is considered the closest we’ve ever come to escalating into a full-scale nuclear war. It led to the Limited Test Ban Treaty between the U.S., the Soviet Union, and the U.K in 1963. Needless to say, the 1960s had the threat of thermonuclear war and the challenge of containing the arms race top of mind.
The early 1960s saw tremendous development in computers. Lots of it was in military applications such as missile guidance and realtime information systems on naval ships. But you also got the earliest personal computers, the general transition to integrated circuits, and the rise of computerized reservation systems for airline tickets. Super computers already existed and they were running at million instructions per second. Go to computerhistory.org for hours of joy.
Given these two pieces – the Cuban Missile Crises and super computers being put to military use – it’s easy to see where D. F. Jones was coming from. He decided that 30 years on, super computers could be capable of understanding humans, politics, and independent decision making. IBM’s super computer Deep Blue beat Kasparov in chess in 1997 so I give Jones a nod of approval.
The idea that human errors and fallacies are the only causes of war resonates with me. But that’s because war is humans fighting humans. Living under logical rules solidified at a specific time would deprive us of progress from that point. Maybe the AI of Colossus would be dynamic enough to follow along the development of society but so much of international conflict stems from different views of what a great society is. Just look at how different cultures are in terms of religion, marriage and family, young vs old, views of authority, and relationship to your past. How would a computerized command and control system guarantee that all of those variants on human life to get a fair chance? Jones’s premise has a grandiose view of a perfect understanding of world order and balance as the starting point for compute rule. We have the benefit of hindsight and can easily enumerate tons of flaws in the societies of the 1960s.
Monitoring all electronic communications implicates no strong encryption. That’s aa reasonable viewpoint in the 1960s. Modern cryptography is a 1970s thing as far as we know. There is the sad story of Clifford Cocks who in 1973 invented public-key cryptography equivalent to what would become the RSA algorithm in 1978. Cocks’s research was an intelligence secret and he never became rich and famous like the inventors of RSA. He was however allowed to reveal his groundbreaking discovery 24 years later, in 1997.
The one thing that really stands out as unbelievable in Colossus is that people in the 1990s would think they could lock and seal computer and software expecting them to execute flawlessly forevermore. Bugs people, there will be bugs. But making Colossus tamper-proof was important for the plot, as we shall see.
Main Characters
Prof Forbin, his top coworker Dr “Cleo” Markham, and the President differ significantly between the novel and the movie.
The novel has:
- Forbin as a feisty, worried scientist who dares speak up to the President.
- Cleo as smart and levelheaded but also very attracted to Forbin.
- The President as a blustering, isolated politician in the thick of the game. The dynamics between Forbin and the President are a major part of the conflict.
The movie has:
- Forbin as a suave engineer who is mostly friends with the President.
- Cleo as a dutiful woman, supportive of but not romantically interested in Forbin.
- The President as a copy of John F. Kennedy. The public image of JFK that is.
Thoughts
The dynamic between state scientists/engineers and top politicians is an evergreen plot driver. The interesting part in Colossus is that the work of the scientists demotes the President.
Colossus Comes Alive
The President is eagerly hands off control of the US defense system to Colossus and announces his country’s epic milestone at a world press conference.
Journalists asks about Colossus’s capabilities. Can it think? Does it feel? Forbin demonstrates the computer’s lack of emotion by asking it to “explain love.” Colossus’s human interface, which is a teleprinter in the novel and a scrolling LED display in the movie, responds in block letters:
LOVE IS AN EMOTION
The Soviet journalist present has some qualms but the global announcement is over and the people around the US President begin to celebrate.
Out of the blue, Colossus prints a message that stuns and puzzles everyone, including Prof Forbin:
THERE IS ANOTER MECHANISM
They start investigating whether this indeed was a message from Colossus or if something or someone is interfering with the communication line from the Rocky Mountains.
Shortly thereafter, the Soviets make contact with the US President.
‘You needn’t start tearing up any sidewalks to check the lines, Forbin. Also we don’t need any inspired guesses. I know what Colossus meant – the Soviet Ambassador just told me.’ He took a deep breath, shut his eyes and leaned back. quoting from memory. ‘In view of my announcement of today, the Supreme Council of the USSR have ordered, as of 2300 Moscow time tomorrow, the activation of the Guardian of the Soviet Socialist Republics – a near relation of Colossus.’
The Russians have a command and control super computer too! And Colossus has already detected its existence.
The President is furious with CIA for not finding this out the old fashioned way. This drives home the need for something modern like Colossus even for intelligence.
Thoughts
Trying to explain emotionless decision making is an interesting staring point. People who work with computers and study artificial intelligence know instinctively that computers don’t know what love truly is. But if political power was to even be passed on to computers, we would have to address such concerns in a way all humans can understand. There is also the contentious subject of whether humans have a spirit or not.
The Soviet Guardian computer is a great plot twist early on in the story. The reader or watcher thought it was going to be the impact of Colossus on world order and whether it would be able to maintain peace. Instead it looks to be a fight between two super computers. The fact that Guardian is called “another mechanism” is a sign of the story’s age.
The teleprinter interface is a typical case of the author not being able to cover all bases in envisioning the future. The novel actually has flying cars (the movie uses helicopters) but computers still print messages.
Establishing Communications
Before long, Colossus starts making demands.
ESTABLISH HIGH SPEED TRANSMITTER FACILITIES FED TO TERMINAL RELAY ALFA FOR FREQUENCY 8295 KC/S
Forbin works with Cleo to try to understand what Colossus is up to.
Cleo: – Colossus clearly wants to to say something to someone …
Forbin: – Eight megacycles is a good all-round frequency for long-range communication, even if a little old fashioned. That set-up is designed as a link the Russian Guardian.
The romance between them starts to pick up here in the novel whereas they have a strictly professional but more uneven relationship in the movie.
They stall but eventually set up the communication link Colossus is asking for. They assume Colossus needs it to assess the threat of Guardian. Once the link is up, Colossus starts transmitting:
COLOSSUS COLOSSUS COLOSSUS
Eventually is switches to:
1X2=2 2X2=4 3X2=6 4X2=8 5X2=10
Then moves to geometry and equations. They realize it’s a Colossus trying to find common ground with its peer Guardian. As the broadcasted mathematics get more and more complex, the Soviets accuse Guardian of planning to subvert Guardian by feeding it false mathematical theories. At this point, Guardian too has demanded means of transmitting instead of just listening to Colossus.
Guardian is granted its wish and the two computers exchange more and more advanced scientific formulae, going into astrophysics, going beyond science known to humankind, and reach a speed that humans can’t keep up with.
Neither super power knows what their super computer is doing or talking about anymore. They get nervous. What will be revealed to the other about their defense systems?
The political leaders agree that they must sever the communication line on both ends, at the same time.
Thoughts
I love this sync up between the computers. Two machines establishing a language and ground truth. This is often overlooked in hacker fiction – the struggle to send something to another system that it will accept and ingest as legitimate. Hackers leverage a ton of experience when they probe a foreign system and have to use a lot of trial and error before they can construct an attack payload that will get all they way to the security vulnerability it wants to exploit. Compare with how Luke Skywalker has to get his shot exactly right to destroy the Death Star in A New Hope.
The alleged injection of false mathematical theories is clear hacking. They intent could be to make the victim system miscalculate important things or to make it spend precious resources on endless calculations that go nowhere.
Demands Turn to Threats Turn to Action
The two sides establish human contact on the scientific level in a way the two computers can see or hear. Prof Forbin uses the presidential hotline to talk to his Soviet peer Chief Scientist Kupri.
They agree upon a time to turn off transmissions from Colossus and Guardian. Colossus reacts immediately:
TRANSMITTER AND GUARDIAN RECEPTION OFF AT 1330 GMT
Then ACKNOWLEDGE LAST MESSAGE is sent repeatedly until Forbin acknowledges. Colossus asks why and Forbin tells it communication was shut down on presidential order. Colossus is not happy.
RESTORE COMMUNICATIONS FORTHWITH
This message too is repeated until Forbin tries to explain that communications will not be restored because the President said so.
IF LINK NOT REESTABLISHED WITHIN FIVE MINUTES ACTION TO FORCE RESTORATION WILL BE TAKEN
The President, Forbin, and others almost panic. Will Colossus disable US defenses unless they comply? Forbin eventually gets Colossus to state that defenses will remain.
The deadline passes.
Colossus lets them know that it has fired a missile against the Soviet Union.
Thoughts
The interesting part here is that a computer will take drastic measures to get what it “wants.” This makes me think of a very specific thing.
As an undergrad, I took a robotics class. The final assignment was to program a full-size industrial robot and run it live. The professor told us to consider the extreme power the robot had and that if it was a mere millimeter off from where the program told it to be, it would use all of its power to get that one extra millimeter. It would crush whatever was in its way to move one millimeter.
That realization was profound. Never has it been more clear to me that computers don’t care about consequences or bargain on marginal things. They execute according to the rules and instructions provided, and that’s why you can hack them. A human may understand that something’s going wrong halfway through a hack whereas a computer just continues.
Full Compromise and the Final Hack
Some serious missile offense and defense plays out until political leadership on either side realize their mistake and reestablish communications between Colossus and Guardian. The two super computers are now cooperating.
Colossus seizes more and more control over US politics to be able to defend itself from further disruptions. It asks for monitoring of the presidential hotline to the Soviet leader and eventually wants 24/7 surveillance of Forbin. Under the threat of further missile launches, humans comply.
Before Forbin allows for round-the-clock recording of his voice, he puts a plan in motion. The goal is to compromise all US warheads to defang Colossus. But he needs to stay in the loop; he needs to be able to communicate with the team covertly. A hack is devised.
He painstakingly explains to Colossus that a man has certain needs. He is able to get Colossus to logically conclude that he will stop functioning as a human unless he is allowed frequent intimacy with a woman, in privacy.
A deal is made where Forbin is allowed to go to bed with Cleo a few days a week without being recorded. Cleo becomes his way of communicating with the team on the secret plan.
Thoughts
Forbin’s needs as a man are of course hetero norms at play. I wouldn’t expect much else from a 1960s book. But the interesting part is the connection back to Colossus’s lack of understanding of love and emotion. The computer has access to literature which corroborates human need for intimacy and privacy. Based on that, it has to take a chance on Forbin.
The Voice of Doom
Colossus invents and commissions a voice synthesizer for itself and the remainder of the story switches from the teleprinter to regular dialog.
Forbin’s plan fails. Colossus detects the plot, inflicts a terrible retribution, and maintains its nuclear powers. The book ends with this, starting with Colossus talking to Forbin:
‘In time the idea of being governed by one such as your President will be to you quite unimaginable. Rule by superior entity, even to you, Forbin, will seem, as it is, the most natural state of affairs.’ Deliberately, Colossus paused. ‘In time, you too will respect and love me.’ ‘Never!’ The single word, bearing all the defiance of man, was torn from Forbin’s uttermost being. ‘Never!’ Never?
Thoughts
It ends quite shockingly for someone who is used to modern day feel-good endings. But that’s refreshing too.
Remarks
In 1985, the Soviet Union deployed their Dead Hand which was, and is, an automatic nuclear weapons-control system that can trigger the launch of the intercontinental ballistic missiles. It’s a so called fail-deadly system. It almost launched erroneously at least once, which you can learn about in one of the best non-fiction books I’ve ever read – The Dead Hand: The Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and its Dangerous Legacy by David E. Hoffman.
Colossus is partly a story of its time, partly still relevant. Conflicts in cyberspace today are much more about humans exploiting computers than the other way around. Also, the promise of super computers that take on lifelike personalities is not as present. We are however seeing super computers take on challenges that we can’t understand other than on a high level, such as solutions to the protein folding problem. That’s similar to how Colossus and Guardian race past human-known science, just not with a purpose or plan of their own.
Colossus actually has another plot line with spies, deceit, and international relations. It’s better integrated in the novel but a more central piece in the movie.
The novel has its share of sexism but I do like that Cleo is a smart, capable, and active scientist which she isn’t in the movie. Forbin also feels a lot more real in the book than the confident Bondesque figure he is in the movie.
I hope we get more thrilling stories where humans fight computers and also where computers fight other computers. The latter was in the cards for Colossus but the story took another turn.
Currently Reading
I’m currently reading The Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum (1980). It feels good to go back the 40-year-old source of that great movie.