The Danger of Our Russian Delusion by Publius Tacitus

I'm closing in on 65. Years, not miles. And I do not recall a time where so many people willingly have accepted lies and falsehoods about the threat from Russia and Russians. The combination of delusion and lies about Russia and Putin have attached themselves to our body politic and our public discourse like the monster in the movie Alien. We are infested by a malevolent collection of beliefs. Left uncorrected or unchallenged, these delusions could set off a series of events that could ultimately cause the destruction of our country. 

I realize that sounds over the top, but bear with me. Let's review the new obsession with Russia as the main threat we must defeat through the lens of Russian meddling in our election. Everyone knows, or so we are told on a daily basis, that Russia deliberately tried to subvert our democracy in last year's Presidential election and that Putin is a modern day Stalin intent of taking over the world. Here's an example from just the other day courtesy of CNN:

CIA Director Mike Pompeo stands by US intelligence assessments that Russia meddled in the 2016 election, the agency said Saturday, despite President Donald Trump saying he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin when he says his country didn't interfere.

"The Director stands by and has always stood by the January 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment entitled: Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent U.S. Elections," the CIA said in a statement when asked for reaction to the president's remarks. "The intelligence assessment with regard to Russian election meddling has not changed."

I can understand the media getting this wrong. But the so-called intelligence community also is participating in this charade. What is Mike Pompeo's excuse? 

Let's start with the specious  claim that the “U.S. Intelligence Community concluded” that Russia directed a campaign to influence the election. There never has been a "Community Conclusion." You only have a “Community Conclusion” when you have a coordinated, written document. That means something akin to a National Intelligence Estimate, which has been thoroughly coordinated among the relevant agencies.

What does “coordination” mean? Any analyst worth their salt at the CIA or the DIA are taught from their first day on the job that everything they write, especially if it uses material from the NSA and the State Department, must be reviewed and approved by their at State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research NSA. The purpose of such a review is to ensure that the source intelligence cited in the analysis is represented accurately.

It is different with the FBI. The FBI is not an intelligence organization per se. They don't gather "intelligence" that is shared with CIA and DIA. They collect evidence. Such evidence cannot be routinely shared with intelligence organizations.

If a CIA analyst is writing a piece on Russian computer hacking, and is using original intelligence generated by NSA, then the analyst would coordinate with his or her NSA counterpart. In addition, the analyst also would share the document with State INR and DIA. Only in the rarest circumstances would the analyst seek clearance from the FBI (this would mean the FBI produced and realized to the intelligence community a document that was not part of a criminal investigation).  

Are you keeping count? We are talking about a maximum of four agencies. So why does the media insist that the number is 17? That claim originated with Hillary Clinton.

“We have 17, 17 intelligence agencies, civilian and military who have all concluded that these espionage attacks, these cyber attacks, come from the highest levels of the Kremlin. And they are designed to influence our election. I find that deeply disturbing,” Clinton said during Wednesday's presidential debate in Las Vegas.

The ironically named "Politifact" added to the misinformation by insisting that Hillary was right and they cited the joint statement from DNI's Jim Clapper and Jeh Johnson at DHS (Homeland Security) issued on 7 October 2016:

The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations. The recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts. These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the US election process. Such activity is not new to Moscow—the Russians have used similar tactics and techniques across Europe and Eurasia, for example, to influence public opinion there. We believe, based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia's senior-most officials could have authorized these activities.

What a joke!! Clapper and Johnson insisted that the USIC was "confident." That's just a weasel word for "belief." But belief is not the same as having actual evidence. More telling was the fact that their written statement was not accompanied by a Community Assessment or Intelligence Memorandum. Just take their word for it.

The next “judgment” of the so-called intelligence community came via a "Joint Analysis Report" from Homeland Security and the FBI:

 

This Joint Analysis Report (JAR) is the result of analytic efforts between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). This document  provides technical details regarding the tools and infrastructure used by the Russian civilian and military intelligence Services (RIS) to compromise and exploit networks and endpoints associated with the U.S. election, as well as a range of U.S. Government, political, and private sector entities. The U.S. Government is referring to this malicious cyber activity by RIS as GRIZZLY STEPPE

 

This had nothing to do with the Intelligence Community. The FBI and DHS are principally law enforcement outfits. They do not issue intelligence judgments. They are supposed to produce things like affidavits. In other words, documents that can be presented to a grand jury and will hold up if presented subsequently in a criminal court.

 

The only written document from the Intelligence Community came on 6 January 2017 courtesy of the DNI's James Clapper, Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections”. Clapper maintained the fiction that this paper reflected the judgment of the USIC. However, the document itself says different:

 

This report includes an analytic assessment drafted and coordinated among The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and The National Security Agency (NSA), which draws on intelligence information collected and disseminated by those three agencies.

 

Missing form the drafting and coordination is the State's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) and the Defense Intelligence Agency aka DIA. The exclusion of the DIA is very curious given several of the conclusions in the report fingering the Russian GRU as one of the main culprits for meddling. This key judgment at the bottom of page ii is typical:

 

We assess with high confidence that Russian military intelligence (General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate or GRU) used the Guccifer 2.0 persona and DCLeaks.com to release US victim data

 

DIA has the most expertise in the USIC on the GRU. That is what DIA does. They track and analyze the activities of foreign military organizations. If you are doing a legitimate community analysis on the dastardly deeds of the Russian military then DIA should have been consulted. They were not. That point alone tells you that this so-called "Community Assessment" was a fraud.

 

The 17 Agency lie is now firmly a part of our national political meme. It is an assertion uncritically accepted by a host of seemingly smart people who should know better. As I noted at the beginning of this piece it is inexcusable that someone like Mike Pompeo should endorse this mendacity. It means he really does not know anything substantively about interagency coordination and the process for arriving at community judgments.

 

This is not a minor error. It is helping condition the American public to accept more lies about Russia. And those lies keep coming. They are cropping up in stories about Russia's activities in the Ukraine and in Syria. Instead of being encourage to see Russia as a potential ally in the war against radical Islam, the American public are being conditioned to see Russia as the reincarnated Soviet Bear intent on devouring the peaceful democracies. Accepting such a lie on such a broad scale moves us closer to war and our ultimate destruction. That's why I do not sleep well at night.

 

Comments

[JamesT]

I agree with TTG that governments attempt to influence one another all the time. There is an interesting post currently on zerohedge about Germany trying to "interfere" in Polish elections:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-11-12/germany-clumsily-admits-supporting-regime-change-poland

[Fred]

TTG,

How about Mexico?

[Fred]

Outthere,

That would be a neat trick since he's been dead half a decade and was out of the Senate almost 3 decades before that.

[LeaNder]

TP, picking up on some type of mental undercurrent.

Yes, without doubt Clinton's statement about the claimed unisono opinon of the 17 by Clinton was suspect from the very, very start. At least if degrading the US to some type of information tyranny wasn't her intention.

With a single statement she verbally turned the 17 into some type of echo choir. Without any doubt.

But: Can we assume she ever took the trouble to understand what the 17 actually signify? Did she ever try to seriously grasp it? Or did her statement suggest she may have never bothered to understand, and thus might even have misread whatever 'signals' she received? ...

Put another way: is she a highly well connected sly string puller, as your chronology may or may not suggest, well connected, relying on a neatly streamlined use or misuse of the US power under whatever US admin?

Hyperintelligent, since she studied law at Havard? Or alternatively stupid, or manipulating trying to score an easy point with the audience in a very, very special setting to get elected?

Less well connected to a more general public sentiment at the time?

******

Much harder to grasp the larger post 9/11 activities as far as cyberwar and related subjects: the semi-collective effort to open source intelligence (a new branch of business, it felt at one point) and the no doubt pretty neglected subject of cybercrime and its history within the respectively legal national limits to fight it in the real larger cyberworld out there for the commoners.

And last but not least. could it be that simple information warfare is mixed up with some of the former in the larger Russiagate debate? And how exactly would we define it in our brave new post 9/11 universe?

*****
In which of the respective jobs offered by the 17 could the latter four be neatly fitted in precisely? Would the problems for the commoners surface at all?

[Imagine]

TTG Sir,
The problem is not other states' putative meddling in American elections. The problem is the Deep State successfully creating a wave of McCarthyism II, keeping the American public emotional and off-balance, which leads to their being easily pulled in bad directions and brought down. Recall "The Crucible", and the wars with Iraq.

[Imagine]

Some evidence points to Internet Research Agency being a CIA false-flag operation. In particular, (1) this never was a real company, but apparently operated out of an address whose building had not been opened yet; (2) Russia apparently arrested the principals of IRA on charges of being foreign agents for America. If this line checks out, it would cast a whole new light on the matter.

https://thesaker.is/a-brief-history-of-the-kremlin-trolls/

[Imagine]

Other evidence points to this being a standard clickbait Internet marketing attempt. In particular, something like 56% of the "Russian" ads ran after the election. Clickbait artists run from all over the world, and it is certainly not surprising that some of them would be based in Russia. Basic steps: (1) Run ads based on what people are talking about; (2) Drive them to your website; (3) Capture names & emails, sell to other marketers; (4) and/or Sell them ebooks or widgets. Make a slim profit based on percentage sales vs. ad costs. Because none of the ads were "please overthrow your country in favor of glorious Mother Russia", this interpretation is actually the most likely explanation for the original ads. Why Congress is pumping the issue is a different matter.

http://www.moonofalabama.org/2017/10/3000-facebook-ads-the-russian-influence-campaign-is-a-profitable-click-bait-scheme.html

[LeaNder]

Sorry, first intended to respond to you, and then on the way seem to have changed my mind and addressed Publius instead ...

Will you forgive me, AIS?

[GeneO]

PT -

I have no clue as to TTG's experience. But I have long been impressed with his many posts and his rational comments on this blog. I tend to believe his points of view. Yours too sometimes. But you should tell us of your experience and what makes your opinions superior to TTGs on this matter.

[BillWade]

well, you can vote for another candidate come 2020 then. What I remember is the MSM telling me that HRC was a shoe-in while my eyes told me that there were 42 Trump yard signs for every 1 of HRC's in my town. Laughing here.

[The Twisted Genius]

Fred,

I just don't know. I would think Mexico would be foolish to the point of criminality if they did not attempt to influence the colossus to the north. Perhaps all the "we're not paying for your f$%king wall" was part of this. I think it was more of a visceral reaction to a series of insults from Trump.

[jld]

The portable thermobaric has been operational for quite a while, used in February by the Ukrainians to assassinate a DPR commander they could not take out in combat.

[Eric Newhill]

TTG,
IMO, Your focus is way too narrow, too fixated and, frankly, way too far into the geek zone.

As PT says, the Russia interference narrative is destructive to US internal political culture and fraught with serious risks for the future for the both the US and international relationships.

There is no real evidence to date that Russian activities had any meaningful impact on the election results. To repeat the meme that Russia both made efforts to interfere and that those efforts had tangible results is irresponsible.

I will go farther to say that even *if* Russian efforts were real and had tangible results, the meme should still be killed. The damage caused and risk created by that knowledge in the minds of the general populace far outweighs any benefits. As you (and PT and Col Lang) are certainly aware, all kinds of things happen all the time that influence the US in very real ways that the general public is not aware of and likely never will be. The general public wouldn't know how to handle the info, how to put it in context, assign the proper meaning and tie into a larger picture of the world. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing; more dangerous than no knowledge.

IMO, this is an issue that should be quietly studied and quietly addressed (if there's anything to it) by quiet professionals. That is what a responsible government would do.

[turcopolier]

GeneO

I do not want PT to describe his experience to you. To do so would be to reveal his identity. His experience is extensive. pl

[Fred]

TTG,

Would that response include incentivising Mexican citizens to move North without visas, to register to vote in the US without citizenship and to work on campaigns without lawful ability to do so? If so how many election cycles do you think this occurred in and how many local and state level elections may have been decided by such efforts?

[Peter AU]

If there was any reflexive control used, it was used directly on Obama and Clinton, rather than the US public.
Clinton kicked of Russian meddling as an election tool, and Obama cemented this in many peoples minds in the days after the election by publicly initiating an investigation and expelling Russian diplomats.
After a decade or so of being the sole superpower, the US moved to a wonderland where nothing is real, it could do or say anything. Political hacks posing as heads of intelligence...
Russia is now in the enviable position in the current information war where it only needs to put out facts, reveal information, be it ISIS oil convoys, emails or NSA/CIA hacking tools.

[rjj]

The Russian influence was secondary; it was Victoria Nuland and her Ukrainian meddling nulanding who changed a lot of votes.

[sid_finster]

Clapper is a perjurer.

[outthere]

Stephen F Cohen knows so much about Russia, and for so long. He just went again to attend the ceremony for the opening of the new memorial for Stalin's victims. He sat with his old friend Gorbachev. Here is the report:
https://www.thenation.com/article/the-unheralded-putin-russias-official-anti-stalinist-no-1/

[Charles Michael]

Personnaly I don't buy much of this Russia meddling, and anyway that's not the point I want to emphasize:
apart from the usefullness of the Putin did it during the camapign and after to bring some sollace to Hillary Clinton, the Russia story has now a very clear and strong utility: limiting the power to act of the newly elected POTUS.
and thus bringing a very divided population quite often clause to hysteria and rather unable to do some deep reflexion on itself and the real state of the Union.

[different clue]

Tel,

Not all. Some bernie supporters, even if only a few, came out and voted for Trump as a matter of principle AND vengeance . . . and saving America from the spectre of a President Clinton.

[Babak Makkinejad]

PT:

I agree with you about the dangers.

The failure of the Enlightenment Project (or a child thereof) in USSR has removed the pretension and the convenience of a common language between the these two antagonists, US and the Russian Federation (the successor to USSR).

That means that as this antagonism persists and develops fully, it will become another civilizational confrontation at the level of religion, culture, historical experience and what constitutes Justice.

Just like the antagonism with Iran.

At such a point, the differences will be cemented and frozen, with nary even the theoretical possibility of a resolution - a Hopeless Armed Peace.

The turbine-based jet-engines can reach Mach 2.5; the Ramjet ones start at Mach 3.5. US, Russia, China, India, Western European states are all working on developing hyper-sonic weapons to deliver a bomb within 15 minutes on any point on the surface f Earth.

The technology for seeding of the Earth's oceans with passive and active sensory arrays feeding manned and unmanned semi-autonomous submerged weapons-platforms is only a matter of time and money.

We are rapidly approaching a great dystopia, with robots, sub-humans, and humans slugging it out across the planet.

[different clue]

JohnB,

The ruling upper classes within this country also fear the longer term threat that the non-ruling middle and lower classes right here might want a
National-Economic Sovereignty system right here for this country.

The better the Russian economy does behind the unintended protection of the sanctions, the better Protectionism looks and the more Americans might want it for America. The globalist elites don't want Russia to live long enough to make the case for Protectionism by Russia's own better example.

[The Twisted Genius]

Fred,

Do you have any evidence of widespread, or even minimal, voter fraud perpetrated by Mexicans? As far as I know the only people pushing that story line are the same ones saying the moon landing and the Sandy Hook killings were both hoaxes.

[SmoothieX12]

Russia does not want to see a unified US government

Actually, Russia wants to see a US government which is treaty-worthy and could be reasoned with. This, by definition, requires unified government. The fact that Russia completely rejects neocon or US exceptionalist vision is not a secret and it is reflected properly from military Doctrine to the whole spectrum of opinions in media. It is not a secret. The other issue here is that this very "exceptionalist" approach to foreign relations is damaging to the US itself and mechanism of this increasing and accelerating damage is not something hidden--it is in the open.