After the explosive revelation from intelligence and law enforcement agencies that claim Russia intervened to help Donald Trump win the United States presidential election, the US has several response options and means to mitigate further attacks. All of these actions will be fraught with the danger of escalation, and ironically, they will have to be executed by a new administration that appears to have benefitted from them.
It seems Russians hacked into emails from both the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and Republican National Committee and then chose to release only the DNC emails. These attacks destabilise and undermine confidence in the US electoral process and they must be addressed in a serious and proportional way — just as America would for a non-cyberattack.
1. Define extent of the cyberattacks
America’s intelligence agencies must rapidly work together to provide both the executive and legislative branches with a coherent analysis that is timeline-driven and well-substantiated. Internal fights between various agencies — i.e. between the CIA and FBI — are highly counterproductive. The administration of US President Barack Obama has already launched one investigation and a full report will be released before he leaves office.
A bipartisan coterie of very senior senators (John McCain, Jack Reed, Charles Schumer and Lindsey Graham) is likewise demanding an independent congressional investigation — a very good idea. All of this will be occurring in the normal confusion of one administration leaving office and another trying to form a Cabinet and prepare to take up governance — but it mustn’t fall through the cracks.
2. Put attacks in the larger context
There are four key elements to the Russian approach to undermining sovereign states, which have been on display most obviously in Ukraine and are part of Russia’s hybrid warfare plan. The four elements are powerful propaganda campaigns using state-sponsored entities, such as Sputnik and Russia Today; internet “trolls” who plant fake news stories, social media posts and comments; endorsements and statements from Putin himself; and, most worryingly, cyberattacks designed to manipulate public opinion by exposing campaign plans and internal communications.
3. Provide detailed evidence
Much of the evidence underlying the conclusions will of course be highly classified and America’s sources and methods must be protected. But in order to maintain the public’s confidence in both the electoral process and in America’s response to the attacks, a convincing public case must be made — not only in the US, but in the court of world opinion as well.
4. A swift, proportional response
The US needs to construct responses that bear some similarities to the attacks it suffered. Some of the responses to consider include:
n Meeting privately with Russian leadership and laying out the full case of the attacks, proving America’s knowledge of their activities.
n Using clandestine cyber-capabilities to privately damage Russian financial accounts, particularly those belonging to Russian leadership, many of which are offshore.
n Overtly and publicly revealing embarrassing offshore financial holdings of Russian leadership and nationalist organisations.
n Attacking Russian internal security systems used to suppress dissidents and spy on Russian citizens.
n Revealing the level and extent of corruption in Russian corporations.
n Increasing America’s level of defensive cybersecurity across the spectrum of government.
5. ‘Mutually assured destruction’
The US needs to improve dialogue with Russia and China to begin to develop norms of behaviour in the area of cyberweapons that are similar to those regarding nuclear weapons. As cyberweapons and cyberattacks increase in scale and intensity, it will be difficult to defend against them all. America needs nations to choose to not launch such attacks because they know the retribution will begin a mutually defeating cycle of attacks. Much policy and theoretical work needs to be done in this area to make such thinking a reality.
6. Cybersecurity as a Cabinet position
The simplest way to quickly do so would be to take the existing position of director of national intelligence (DNI) and add cybersecurity to his or her portfolio, so that the DNI would become the DNIC: director of national intelligence and cybersecurity. Today, cybersecurity is shared by the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, the CIA, the Department of Defence and other interagency actors. A new DNIC would thus integrate these widely disparate cybersecurity efforts.
If the US discovers through a thorough and unbiased investigation that Russia has indeed attacked its electoral process directly with the intent to influence the process, America’s response needs to be robust, rapid and proportional. This will shape America’s relationship with Russia profoundly. Facing the cyberdogs of war is a difficult first issue to tackle and it will require both a willingness to confront Russia directly and some creativity to respond proportionately. This will be an early test of the nascent Trump administration — let’s hope it is up to the challenge.
— Worldpost 2016/Global Viewpoint Network
Retired Admiral James Stavridis was the supreme commander of Nato from 2009 to 2013 and is the dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.
