Mike Pompeo is of two minds about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. On the one hand, the former secretary of state is critical of America’s failure to deter the attack. . . . On the other hand, Pompeo has a great deal of respect for the man who has ordered the invasion. Those are his words, not mine: “I have enormous respect for him.” Even though Pompeo says he saw the attack coming, he’s spent the lead-up lavishing praise on Vladimir Putin. In an interview last week, he called the Russian president “very savvy” and “very shrewd,” adding, “I consider him an elegantly sophisticated counterpart and one who is not reckless but has always done the math.” In January, he said, “He is a very talented statesman. He has lots of gifts … He knows how to use power. We should respect that.”
You can guess which of Pompeo’s takes on Putin entered heavy circulation on Russian state television.
Trump’s statements about Ukraine are as confusing as ever, at least if you try to read them for anything other than improvisatory self-aggrandizement. Trump’s Ukraine policy was all over the place: . . . This week, Trump has said that “Putin is playing Biden like a drum,” and also, “I know Vladimir Putin very well, and he would have never done during the Trump Administration what he is doing now, no way!” Yet at an event at Mar-A-Lago last night, Trump, like Pompeo, praised Putin’s strategic genius: “I mean, he’s taking over a country for $2 worth of sanctions. I’d say that’s pretty smart.”
What is galling about these comments from Pompeo and Trump is not their break with the White House but their insistence on heaping praise on Putin, a habit that springs from Trump’s personal affection for Putin as well as his admiration for authoritarian politics. . . . A West Point grad and Army veteran, Pompeo knows better.
Tucker Carlson, another orthodox Trumpist and the dominant conservative pundit of the moment, is unreservedly pro-Putin. . . . . Democrats are not alone in hating Putin, who is a likely war criminal who has repeatedly broken international law, poisoned dissidents, and killed journalists, to pick just a few offenses. Carlson is smart enough to know all of that, so maybe he’s playing dumb, or maybe he doesn’t find those things objectionable.
Frighteningly, I believe the answer is that Trump, Pompeo, and Carlson do not view murder and lawlessness as objectionable if it furthers their personal agendas. Equally frightening is the reality that Russian interference in the 2022 mid-terms and 2024 presidential elections will likely pale compared to what we witnessed in 2016 and those in MAGA land and thrall to Fox News will be oblivious to how they are being manipulated to harm America's best interests. With Putin now threatening Sweden and Finland - the latter once the Grand Duchy of Finland in the pre-Bolshevik revolution Russian Empire - everyone who values democracy and the rule of law ought to realize that Putin must be stopped through any means necessary. A column in the Washington Post looks at what may well happen in the future elections. Here are excerpts:
Maybe now that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is well underway, the implications of President Vladimir Putin’s actions against the United States in 2016 will finally sink in, especially for Republicans in Congress. The Vladimir Putin who planned, staged and launched a large-scale war on Ukraine is the same Vladimir Putin who ordered an aggressive, multifaceted, clandestine campaign to interfere in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Putin’s Ukraine goal: pull that country from the West and back into Russia’s sphere of influence. His U.S. goal in 2016: undermine the democratic process, disparage and undercut Hillary Clinton and her campaign for president, and help elect Donald Trump.
The outcome of his Ukraine campaign is yet to be decided. His U.S. effort found full success. . . . Putin was clearly playing a long game: put in place a U.S. president who would pursue policies that weaken the European Union and NATO, the bulwarks against Russian expansion into former Soviet countries. Trump was the answer.
In Trump, Putin finally had a U.S. president who generated more anti-American sentiment in Europe than the Kremlin could ever have hoped to produce on its own.
Perhaps now, Republicans will reappraise reports — which many of them discounted — of Russian social media campaigns aimed at provoking discord in this country. The Russian disinformation campaign to bolster domestic support for an invasion into Ukraine reminded me of the targeted disinformation operations in the 2016 election . . . . .
Now that it has been reported that Russian propaganda and misinformation campaigns have been launched on social media platforms and have targeted websites, including those of Fox News in the United States, Le Figaro in France, La Stampa in Italy, and Der Spiegel and Die Welt in Germany, maybe more people in this country will believe findings that the Internet Research Agency purchased political advertisements on social media in the names of Americans and U.S. organizations, and even staged political rallies within the United States in support of Trump.
The simple truth is that Putin believed Russia would benefit from having Trump in the White House, and he pushed his intelligence services to help secure that outcome. Just as he perceives that a subjugated Ukraine benefits Russia and is now working to achieve that end.
There’s a lesson in this for the United States.
Putin said he would not invade Ukraine. He lied. He said Russia did not interfere in our 2016 presidential election. He lied about that, too.
In the present crisis, President Biden has been stalwart in rallying a unified response from NATO and the West. If Americans didn’t believe it before, they sure should believe it now: Putin sees Biden, as he saw Clinton, as an impediment to what he wants.
And Trump, who calls Putin a “genius” and accepts his lie about the presidential election, wants back in.
Russia had success with its information-warfare playbook in 2016. Count on a Russian influence operation conducted through social media to disparage Biden, undermine his leadership and stoke support for his opposition. The goal: defeat an American political enemy.
It worked once before. Wake up, America, to another Russian threat. This time, no one can claim to have not seen it coming.
1 comment:
Why are the Murdochs never called out for their so-called news network? The scripted shows of Hanity, Carlson and Ingraham only go out because of their approval. People complain about the mouthpieces, why are the Murdochs ignored? Even if it didn't change their tune, they would not go away unscathed.
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