On the Mueller Report … Mostly Sans Politics: Part I

Having now read Volume I of the Mueller Report (there will be a brief comment on Volume II in Part II of this note), I would most strongly urge every American to read pages 14 (page citations are those of the actual Report, with pertinent text beginning with, “II Russian ‘Active Measures’ Social Media Campaign”) through 51 (ending at, “D. Trump Campaign and the Dissemination of Hacked Materials”). In these sections, the Report’s references to the Trump Campaign are mostly tangential. I would submit that Republicans are so busy defending the President and the Democrats so intent on savaging him that they are paying too little heed to what I consider the main import of the Report, best captured in those 37 pages: the Russians’ comprehensive and sophisticated activities to undermine our system of government. These early sections set forth in detail – in a form not dissimilar to a spy novel, but terrifying because what is related is real – what former Vice President Dick Cheney declared in March, 2017, “[Would] in some quarters … be considered an act of war.”

A bit of the content follows; its weight is best absorbed from these Report pages themselves. These first sections describe how the Russians set up two different organizations whose mission was to disrupt our electoral processes. The first, Russia’s Internet Research Agency, LLC (the “IRA”), was tasked with social media operations targeted at large U.S. audiences “with the goal of sowing discord in the U. S. political system.” The IRA’s efforts ultimately resulted in the formation of social media presences (with specialists focusing on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter) and of operational divisions dedicated to areas such as social presences, analytics, graphics, and IT. The IRA reached as many as 126 million persons through its Facebook accounts. Acting through fake U.S. identities, it also recruited unknowing U.S. citizens to post social media entries and to host dozens of political rallies furthering its aims. Like a direct response business, the IRA monitored which of its presences and unwitting recruits were most effective.

Russia tasked the second organization, its Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff (the “GRU”), to conduct cyber hacking and information dumping operations. The GRU carried out computer intrusions into the Clinton Campaign, the Democratic National Committee, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. The Report states that one GRU department developed specialized malware while another “conducted large-scale spearphishing campaigns.” It further indicates, to me the most ominously, that one GRU unit “… hacked computers belonging to state boards of elections, secretaries of state, and U.S. companies that supplied software and other technology related to the administration of U.S. elections [my emphasis].” The GRU released the material it stole through two fictitious online personas it created (DCLeaks and Guccifer 2.0), and later through WikiLeaks to undermine then-Candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

Although it is hard after reading these Mueller Report sections not to wonder whether the Russians’ efforts against Sec. Clinton were sufficient to affect the outcomes of the close 2016 races in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, I would suggest that at this point … it doesn’t matter. What matters is what we do now. The Republicans are so focused on defending Mr. Trump’s election that they appear to have completely lost sight of a point FL Sen. Marco Rubio made soon after the extent of Russian interference in our election had become apparent: next time, the Russians could target a Republican. I would pose this to my Republican friends: if Mr. Trump dropped out of the race tomorrow (say, for sudden health reasons) and Mitt Romney – who, presciently, called Russia our “Number One Geopolitical Foe” during the 2012 campaign – was running for President in 2020 against almost anyone in the Democratic field, upon which candidate do you think the Russians would aim their assault?

It seems likely that during his youth in Russia, Mr. Putin learned how to split wood. One quickly learns when splitting wood that it is best to let the sawn segments of the felled tree cure – dry out – for a year before attempting to split them; but even then, to split successfully, after the log is placed on the chopping block, the splitter must accurately aim the maul at the log’s seams that resulted from its curing. If the splitter misses the seam, nothing happens; the log sits there in defiance. If s/he hits the seam, the log splits. I would suggest that lacking an existential enemy since the fall of the U.S.S.R. in 1989, we as a people have been curing – quarreling among ourselves, our bonds weakening in partisan rancor – due to a growing divergence of interest, culture, and financial means. Mr. Putin and his agents have identified our fissures and, using technology and the Russian espionage apparatus as their splitting maul, have and will again strike at our seams … to split us apart. Hopefully, we retain the sense and courage to defend ourselves.

In an effort to keep these posts to at least a somewhat manageable length, what remains of this note will appear in Part II.