The Washington Post revealed on Sunday that “U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies are investigating what they see as a broad covert Russian operation in the United States to sow public distrust in the upcoming presidential election and in U.S. political institutions.”
If there is such an effort under way, it would hardly be surprising. Russia has become a master of “active measures” in Europe, designed to spread dissension among the Western Alliance and to make the states of Eastern Europe easier picking for Russian domination. This type of information warfare has even become known as the Gerasimov Doctrine after Gen. Valery Gerasimov, the chief of the general staff of Russia’s armed forces. Russia has long been suspected of backing extreme parties of both the left and the right that oppose NATO and the European Union. Marine Le Pen, the French far-right leader, has admitted that her party has received millions of dollars in loans from a Moscow-linked bank.
Evidence that Russia’s intelligence services are playing a similar game in the U.S. became evident when Russian hackers broke into the Democratic National Committee computers and released 20,000 stolen emails via Wikileaks. The resulting embarrassment forced Debbie Wasserman Schultz to step down as head of the DNC on the eve of the Democratic convention.
The question is whether further Russian intrusions are coming and what form they will take. There is speculation that Russian hackers could interfere with electronic voting machines and/or release further emails stolen from the Clinton campaign or foundation. Given the pro-Russia stance of Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin certainly has every incentive to help him get elected–or, failing that, to at least spread doubt about the legitimacy of the U.S. electoral process, thus further undermining American standing in the world.
The Post notes: “Last month, the FBI issued an unprecedented warning to state election officials urging them to be on the lookout for intrusions into their election systems and to take steps to upgrade security measures across the voting process, including voter registration, voter rolls, and election-related websites. The confidential ‘flash’ alert said investigators had detected attempts to penetrate election systems in several states.”
As Republican Sen. Daniel Coats of Indiana, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told the Post, if Moscow is trying to influence the U.S. election, “such actions would be an outrageous violation of international rules of behavior and cannot be tolerated.”
Proving that Russia is responsible may not be possible, at least not to a legal standard of “beyond a reasonable doubt,” because the Russian intelligence services takes care to cover their tracks. Even when hacks can be traced to Russia, it’s very difficult to prove that the Kremlin was responsible. But the U.S. government doesn’t need to wait for definitive proof to act, assuming, as appears likely, the evidence is already overwhelming.
And yet no action has been forthcoming so far. The Post article notes: “Administration officials said they are still weighing their response.” As a friend noted in calling my attention to this line, this is “true for almost any foreign policy challenge facing the Obama administration.” Reflecting the professorial style of the president, this is an administration that has a tendency to talk problems to death even as they grow worse.
This Slate article provides a good rundown of possible American responses, including: public denouncement, sanctions, indictment, “in-domain” retaliation, harassment or “heckling” of Russian officials, and “take it on the chin.” So far the Obama administration, in this area as in so many others, is choosing the take-it-on-the-chin option. In fact one suspects that that the information-gathering now being conducted by the intelligence community can provide a convenient cover for administration inaction–how can the president possibly do anything before all the facts are in?
In reality the president normally has to act without having 100 percent knowledge. In this case it is imperative that the U.S. do something—anything—in response to the Russian provocations. As cyberwarfare expert Thomas Rid has noted, “American inaction now risks establishing a de facto norm that all election campaigns in the future, everywhere, are fair game for sabotage—sabotage that could potentially affect the outcome and tarnish the winner’s legitimacy.”
