The DNI reports that Russian intelligence has "infiltrated" American media, industry, and government.
Gee whiz -- who'da thunk it!
C'mon, get real! Of course! This is what nation-states do, even to their allies. Were we not recently caught bugging German Chancellor Angela Merkle's telephone? I'd like to believe that whatever snooping the Russians are doing we are doing it better. If we are not listening in on Putin's conversations and reading his mail, then we are wasting the billions of dollars that we have invested in covert intelligence. Perhaps the Russians are far more careful than we are about the security of their strategic information. If so, then their effective access to and use of our secrets are our fault, not theirs.
Sorry, but I am not moved by all this lamentation over Russian "espionage."
VILet's step back for a moment and recall how this demonization of Putin has evolved over the past few years, from George Bush's claim to have seen Putin's "soul" in his eyes, to the current description of Putin as "an autocrat" and "dictator," and of Russia as an "existential threat" to the United States. Then let us ask ourselves just where this growing mutual hostility might be leading us.
We might be on a fast track to disaster. Richard Clarke, George Bush's "cyber czar," warns that "It's highly likely that any war that began as a cyber war would ultimately end up being a conventional war, where the United States was engaged with bombers and missiles."
Who and what gains from this escalating national hysteria? Obviously, the careers of military officers, the executives and stockholders of military contractors, and the media, the audience of which expands as that media, with a single voice, stokes the Russophobia and heats up the Cold War.
Who loses? All of us, as our essential national institutions -- health, education, research, infrastructure -- are underfunded, and our national crises -- income inequality, racial strife, unemployment, environmental pollution, climate change -- are neglected.
And if the tension between the US and Russia escalates out of control, everyone stands to lose, including the aforementioned military officers, military-industrial complex and media.
Has no one noticed? This growing fear and hatred of Putin, his government, and by extension all things Russian (and reciprocally in Russia, of all things American), is the sort of national frenzy that typically leads to war. We've seen it in the lead-up to the wars in Viet Nam and Iraq. Those who call for moderation and accommodation are condemned as "traitors." Facts and warnings become irrelevant. We are captivated by confirmation bias and "group-think." Communication and mediation between the rival nations breaks down.
"O judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts, and men have lost their reason." (Shakespeare, Julius Caesar).
"But Vladimir Putin is a brutal dictator -- another Stalin or even Hitler." Personally, while I find much not to like about Putin, I don't believe that Putin's Russia is remotely as bad as Stalin's Soviet Union. Neither do my friends in Russia, who should know. (That's the topic of my next essay). But more to the point, if Putin is a brutal autocrat, that is the Russians' problem and they should be left alone to deal with it. I am confident that most Russians, who seem to approve of Putin and his government, devoutly wish that we Americans bug-off and mind our own business.
So let us pause, reflect, and, if we are wise, disembark and reverse course. Let us to resume a conversation with the Russians, listen to their complaints even if we do not credit them, and then trade de-escalating concessions. (As I have suggested most recently in my essay, "A Martian View of the New Cold War).
The alternative is too horrible even to contemplate. Even so, I wish that more of our leaders, our media, and our fellow citizens would pause and consider where we all may be heading.
"Look down that lonesome road, before you travel on."
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