US versus NATO

[Remius]

Is he pretending to be otherwise?

Would anybody believe him were he to?

He is putting the interests of his nation ahead, as he should.

The FBI, on the other hand - or at least senior members thereof - put a political candidate ahead of their nation.

Sure.  Except it was the intelligence community.  FBI, DNI, CIA etc etc.  The Senate comitee on this also agreed that the Russians meddled.  So now the President cosies up to Putin and sides with him and throws the US INtelligence community under the bus. 

Trump put his own interests ahead of his country.  Even some of his most ardent supporters are decrying this.

 

[Loachman]

Why? Trump got NK to denuclearize and return the bodies of missing US servicemen.  Oh wait.  None of that seems to have happened.

Yet. We'll see. here has been more progress in the last few months than there has been since 1953, and more reason to hope. I am patient, although I recognize that the whole thing could fall through.

Now it seems Putin can also do whatever he wants.

He can? How?

So far, existing sanctions are still in place and nothing substantive has changed.

I'd rather that these people spoke with each other than didn't.

“Jaw jaw is better than war war."
- Harold Macmillan, but usually attributed to Winston Churchill

 

[Altair]

Is he pretending to be otherwise?

Would anybody believe him were he to?

He is putting the interests of his nation ahead, as he should.

The FBI, on the other hand - or at least senior members thereof - put a political candidate ahead of their nation.

Every intelligence agency, every investigation, the GOP itself said that the Russians tried to influence the 2016 Election.

Putin: No I didn't.


Russian Troops invade Crimea.

Putin: those aren't Russian troops.

Russian soldiers supporting Ukrainian Seperatists

Putin: There are no Russian soldiers in Ukraine. Only some russian soldiers on vacation

Russian jets ruthlessly bomb civilian areas and kills scores of civilians

Putin:Russian jets only killed terrorists in that region, there were no civilians.

Russian missile defense system shot down passenger jet said every expert and investigation

Putin: No, not us, that was definately Ukraine.


Russian intelligence agents poison ex spy and his daughter in the UK, exposing hundreds to deadly nerve agent

Putin: Not Russia, but you should definately send that ex spy and his daughter back to russia for their own safety


You trust that guy over the FBI? I'm done.

 

[Loachman]

Sure.  Except it was the intelligence community.  FBI, DNI, CIA etc etc.  The Senate comitee on this also agreed that the Russians meddled.  So now the President cosies up to Putin and sides with him and throws the US INtelligence community under the bus.

Sure. I've seen no credible proof of serious, government-led meddling - despite a lengthy "investigation" -  and the DNC refused to turn over their server for analysis of the alleged hacking. Why?

Trump put his own interests ahead of his country.

What interests were those?

 

[Jarnhamar]

Everything is horrible  :tempertantrum:

 

[Loachman]

Every intelligence agency, every investigation, the GOP itself said that the Russians tried to influence the 2016 Election.

Not in my recollection.

I am pretty sure that no definitive claim was ever made by any of them, just "probabilities" etcetera, despite what Hillary repeated at every opportunity to lay blame elsewhere.

I watched the Russian Facebook ads. I seriously doubt that anybody was fooled or influenced by those.

And even Obama claimed that the US election could not be hacked.

You trust that guy over the FBI? I'm done.

Please refresh my memory. Where did I use the word "trust"?

I did use "respect", but please don't take that out of context.

I am well aware of Vladimir Putin's past.

I "grew up" in the Cold War. I would never downplay the Soviet/Russian threat, nor trust them. I read and saw enough - including three years in 4 CMBG, which confirmed everything that I previously knew - and visited the former East Berlin a couple of months after the Wall came down, and before any significant changes had taken place. I wouldn't over-rate it either.

Anyway, I need to get to Loblaws.

 

[Altair]

Not in my recollection.

I am pretty sure that no definitive claim was ever made by any of them, just "probabilities" etcetera, despite what Hillary repeated at every opportunity to lay blame elsewhere.

I watched the Russian Facebook ads. I seriously doubt that anybody was fooled or influenced by those.

And even Obama claimed that the US election could not be hacked.

Please refresh my memory. Where did I use the word "trust"?

I did use "respect", but please don't take that out of context.

I am well aware of Vladimir Putin's past.

I "grew up" in the Cold War. I would never downplay the Soviet/Russian threat, nor trust them. I read and saw enough - including three years in 4 CMBG, which confirmed everything that I previously knew - and visited the former East Berlin a couple of months after the Wall came down, and before any significant changes had taken place. I wouldn't over-rate it either.

Anyway, I need to get to Loblaws.

https://www.dhs.gov/news/2016/10/07/joint-statement-department-homeland-security-and-office-director-national

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.

Some states have also recently seen scanning and probing of their election-related systems, which in most cases originated from servers operated by a Russian company. However, we are not now in a position to attribute this activity to the Russian Government. The USIC and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) assess that it would be extremely difficult for someone, including a nation-state actor, to alter actual ballot counts or election results by cyber attack or intrusion. This assessment is based on the decentralized nature of our election system in this country and the number of protections state and local election officials have in place. States ensure that voting machines are not connected to the Internet, and there are numerous checks and balances as well as extensive oversight at multiple levels built into our election process.

That is a nice piece of redirection.

Sure, they may not have been effective, but the point was that they tried to do it.

And the president could have spun it very easily. This happened in the past, it wasn't effective, I beat Hillary on my own terms, I wasn't the president then, I am the president now, and if Russia attempts to do that again, I will sanction their entire economy, and I any personal relationship between me and Mr Putin will be dead, hugely dead. As President of the USA I will not tolerate Russia or any other nation meddling in our elections. In the meantime, I will focus on improving relations with Russia

Thats all he had to say. Instead he sided with the Russian president over his own intelligence agencies and his own parties senate investigation into election meddling.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/16/politics/senate-committee-agrees-intelligence-community-election-meddling/index.html

he Senate Intelligence Committee's leaders said Wednesday they believed that the intelligence community's 2017 assessment of election meddling was correct, breaking with Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee who questioned the conclusion that the Russians were trying to help President Donald Trump get elected.

"There is no doubt that Russia undertook an unprecedented effort to interfere with our 2016 election," Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr, a North Carolina Republican, said in a statement. "Committee staff have spent 14 months reviewing the sources, tradecraft, and analytic work, and we see no reason to dispute the conclusions."

 

[Brad Sallows]

Many people are talking past each other about different things - maybe not here so much, but certainly elsewhere.  The "Russian interference/collusion" topic has the same problem as "climate change" - if people are not clear about exactly what they mean, others are prone to assume the wrong frame.

Three different things:
1) Russia conducted information operations during the US election.
2) One or more people involved with the Trump campaign colluded with Russians to influence the presidential election.
3) Trump colluded etc.
Some people might prefer to break things down a little more, but surely the general idea is clear.

(1) only recently moved from "probable" (ie. based on assessments) to "indictments".  So far all of the relevant charges are against foreigners.  Only some "process" and other charges have been laid against the handful of US people so far accused of anything.  Appealing to the authority of the "intelligence community", among others, is still a weak play after that business about WMD in Iraq.
(2) is still really, really weak.
(3) is still completely unproven.

If Trump only ever sees the entire issue in frame (3), expect him to continue to deny Russia did anything (if he knows he did not collude, then Russia can not have colluded with him).  Maybe it's that simple: a journalist asks what Trump thinks about Russian interference with the election, and Trump interprets and answers it as an accusation involving him.  Likewise, some of the people who want to see Trump go down treat every confirmed nugget of information about (1) as a confirmation of (3).

Too bad Romney didn't win in 2012.

 

[McG]

I deleted all of my comments.  I have nothing to say.  I am frankly stumped by the latitude that is offered to this man by otherwise functioning people.

What you are seeing is the effectiveness of the Soviet information warfare machine. It can sow the desired doubts and perceptions even in intelligent & rational audiences. As today’s indictment showed, it is not just hackers and social media messenging. There are influencers in western countries engaging political parties and advocacy groups.
 

 

[Journeyman]

It can sow the desired doubts and perceptions even in intelligent & rational audiences.

To say nothing of the stupid & the propagandists (not mutually exclusive).

 

[beirnini]

I'd have a little more respect to an honest potential enemy than a lying, backstabbing "friend" as well.

What world do you live in where Putin is a honest potential enemy?

This really needs to be answered.


Also, as a point of order since we're talking about the president explicitly siding with an enemy over the American intelligence and law enforcement community we're really not talking about the US or NATO anymore, versus or otherwise.

 

[Altair]

This really needs to be answered.


Also, as a point of order since we're talking about the president explicitly siding with an enemy over the American intelligence and law enforcement community we're really not talking about the US or NATO anymore, versus or otherwise.

Might be a reach, but since NATO main raison d'etre is to counter Russian expansion or aggression, the US president siding with Russia is the US acting against NATO, in a sense.

 

[tomahawk6]

The US has more to worry about than Russia, like terror and China.

 

[Good2Golf]

The US has more to worry about than Russia, like terror and China.

...because technically MH17 wasn't terror, in the formally defined sense.

Regards
G2G

 

[Remius]

I guess Russia supporting the Taliban or Bashar Al-Assad isn't too much of a worry either then.

 

[tomahawk6]

The US supports anti Assad forces in Syria while Iran and Russia support Assad.In Vietnam China and Russia supported the North.During Korea both Russia and China supported the North Koreans.

 

[Altair]

The US supports anti Assad forces in Syria while Iran and Russia support Assad.In Vietnam China and Russia supported the North.During Korea both Russia and China supported the North Koreans.

And as far as I can remember, no president supported Russian and Chinese leaders on the other side over their own intelligence agencies, political parties, or armed forces.

None of them capitulated so fully to a foreign leader who has worked so hard to undermine America and her interests. Until yesterday.

Again, replace "Trumps" name with Obama, look over the transcript of that press conference, and tell me with all honesty that you would feel that Obama was making the USA safer.

 

[Journeyman]

Appealing to the authority of the "intelligence community", among others, is still a weak play after that business about WMD in Iraq.

I'd recommend James Clapper's Facts and Fears: Hard Truths from a Life in Intelligence  (2018).  While it accepts that, in peoples' minds, "there are policy successes and intelligence failures," he does cover the WMD debacle in detail -- notably the changes that have been made since, to avoid a repetition and rebuild credibility.

 

[tomahawk6]

Brennan is very opposed to Trump.With Putin claiming the intelligence agencies gave $400m to Hillary I wouldn't be supportive either.Its now looking like the CIA and others worked against Trump.Until he cleans the Democrats out of those agencies he would be smart not to trust them.I know I don't.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

I deleted all of my comments.  I have nothing to say.  I am frankly stumped by the latitude that is offered to this man by otherwise functioning people.

See, that's exactly how I feel about Trudeau. Just wanted to toss that. Not discuss it.