By Reginald Johnson
It’s a shame that
the important news coming out of the summit between Russian President Vladimir
Putin and US President Donald Trump about the US and Russia beginning to patch
up their relationship and avoid nuclear catastrophe has been buried amid the
furor over Trump’s comment doubting whether Russia was responsible for meddling
in the 2016 election.
After years of a declining
relationship between Russia and the United States the leaders of the two
countries met in Helsinki and had what they both said were constructive talks
dealing with nuclear nonproliferation and other key geopolitical
issues.
Speaking at a press
conference following the summit, Putin said that the talks had been “very
successful and very useful.”
He added, “The
difficulties and tensions between the two countries do not have any objective
grounds. The Cold War is over. The times of ideological confrontation are
in the past and the situation in the world is drastically changed.”
Putin continued that
only by the US and Russia “standing together” can the world overcome issues of
nuclear proliferation and regional conflicts.
Trump said that the
leaders had a “deeply open and productive dialogue and it went very well.”
The president added,
“The disagreements between our two countries are well known and President Putin
and I discussed them at length today,” Trump said. “If we’re going to solve many of the problems
we face in the world then we’re going to have to find ways to cooperate in
pursuit of shared interests.”
Together the US and
Russia hold 90% of all the nuclear weapons in the world. According to the
American Federation of Scientists, the United States has 4000 nuclear warheads
and the Russian Federation has 4300.
A nuclear conflict
between Russia and the United States, should it ever break out, would be the
ultimate catastrophe. There would be no winner. For those who might escape the
immediate effects of a nuclear attack, they wouldn’t live long due to massive
radiation fallout and nuclear winter. All life on the planet would be
effectively ended.
Negotiations between
the US and Russia are imperative to avoid a potential Armageddon.
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| Hiroshima, Japan in August, 1945 after US dropped an atomic bomb. Today's nuclear warheads are far more powerful. (Photo- metro.co.UK) |
Donald Trump did
the right thing by going to Helsinki and meeting Putin. He followed in the
footsteps of many presidents before him who have met with Russian leaders to
work out agreements on arms control and conflict resolution.
By the accounts of
the two leaders, the summit went well and was a step towards improving
US Russian relations and avoiding catastrophic conflict.
But that important news was all lost amid the furor --- really
hysteria --- over an inept comment Trump made during the press conference when
he was responding to a question about who was responsible for the alleged
hacking of Democratic Party emails
during the 2016 election campaign.
Trump said he
wasn’t sure whether the US intelligence agencies were correct in their
assessment that the Russians were responsible for the hacking, and not someone
else. He seemed to indicate that he believed Putin’s firm denial that the
Russian government had any role.
Immediately, there
was an avalanche of criticism. Political leaders on both sides of the aisle and
many in the media blasted Trump for appearing to take sides with the Russians
over the word of US intelligence.
A number of Democratic
politicians as well as some media pundits went so far as to call Trump’s
performance “treasonous.”
Former CIA Director John Brennan
said Trump’s performance “rises to and exceeds the threshold for high crimes
and misdemeanors,” which under the Constitution justifies impeachment. “It was
nothing short of treasonous,” he said.
US Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn, said that the United States was now
facing “a 9/11 type emergency” due to Trump’s performance at the summit.
In truth, much of the criticism and comments about “treason” were way
over the top and in the case of members of the media, totally unprofessional.
There is no question President Trump said a really dumb thing. But it
was more a political blunder than a factual misstatement.
In point of fact, Trump has every reason to doubt the accuracy of the
claims about Russian hacking and election meddling. To this date, nothing ---
nothing --- has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the Russians were
behind the much-talked about hacking of Democratic National Committee emails in
2016.
The main foundation for claims of Russian hacking came out of an
Intelligence Community Assessment in early 2017 which blamed the Kremlin for
directing the theft of the emails and then turning over the information to
WikiLeaks for publication. The revelations about Democratic candidate Hillary
Clinton, such as the effort by the DNC to undermine the candidacy of Bernie
Sanders, was damaging to the Clinton campaign and helped Trump in the polls.
The ICA, as it is known, authorized by then Director of National Intelligence
James Clapper, used a “handpicked group” of analysts from the big three
intelligence agencies, namely the CIA, FBI and NSA, to investigate the hacking
claim. The ICA did not represent , as was erroneously reported at the time, a
community-wide assessment by all 17 intelligence agencies.
The assessment drew on the findings of an investigation by a
private firm, CrowdStrike. The FBI itself did not do its own investigation of
the hacking, after DNC officials first reported there had been an intrusion, as
the agency was denied access to the email server by the DNC. Even though the
agency clearly had the power to subpoena the email server, as this was a
national security case, the FBI decided not to do so. Instead it agreed with
the Democrats to let CrowdStrike do the inquiry.
CrowdStrike’s founder is both friendly with
the Democrats and also a member of the anti-Russian, neocon Atlantic Council.
The
CrowdStrike findings, which maintain that the email metadata showed evidence of
hacking by Russian operatives, has been strongly disputed by cyber experts such
as John McAfee and former intelligence officials from the NSA, FBI and CIA.
Critics of the
report contend that instead of the emails being hacked, there was actually a download of email
information by a disgruntled Bernie Sanders supporter on the DNC staff who then
turned over the information to WikiLeaks.
It is disturbing
that the email download scenario never got any attention from the FBI.
Even the ICA report does not claim to be definitive in showing that the
Russians committed hacking.
“Judgments are not intended to imply that we have proof that shows
something to be a fact. Assessments are based on collected information which is
often incomplete or fragmentary as well as logic argumentation and precedents,”
the report said.
The recent indictment of 12 Russian military
officials for their role in the hacking case also does not constitute firm
evidence of Russian intrusion in the US election since these are allegations
and have not been aired before a jury. There’s been no conviction. It also
should be noted that the indictment document relies again in part on the disputed CrowdStrike findings.
It is very dismaying that so many politicians and media types alike are waving
the indictment around as if it’s final proof of Russian guilt. I saw Shepard
Smith on Fox News the other day doing that, saying that Trump was wrong to
express misgivings about who was responsible for the hacking because we now
have "proof" of Russian involvement due to the indictment.
Come on Mr. Smith, go back to the dictionary and find out what an indictment
is.
President Trump has every right to be skeptical about the intelligence
community findings, due to the flawed ICA, together with the mounting evidence
coming from a recent inspector general’s report and congressional testimony
showing that FBI officials carried a heavy political bias against Donald Trump
as they conducted their investigation of both the possible Russian hacking and
collusion between the Trump campaign in Russia.
It’s well known that both Clapper and Brennan disliked Trump and played
a key role in drumming up support for an investigation of collusion which led
to the appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller. This has all been part of
an effort to drive Trump from the presidency, either through impeachment or
resignation. Pro-war neo cons and major press outlets have backed this
campaign.
So far, Mueller has not been able to charge anyone connected with Trump
for conspiring with the Russians to influence the election.
Politically, Trump made a very stupid mistake in openly questioning the
intelligence agencies. And he paid a dear
price.
Needless to say, the hyper controversy about Trump’s comment has totally
overshadowed the much more significant development coming out of the summit, which
is that nuclear-armed United States and nuclear-armed Russia have begun to
start working cooperatively again on the issue of proliferation and resolving regional
conflicts.
This effort should be supported widely and not undermined by the
continued blather about Trump-Russia collusion and Russian hacking.
Endless repetition of unproven claims about collusion and mindless
vilification of Russia just serves to impede the peace process and make the
possibility of a catastrophic war more likely.
It’s too bad many progressives and members of the Democratic Party have
endorsed the Russia-gate narrative. But it’s time to change focus. Russia-gate
is a waste of time and a distraction from dealing with the more central issues
important to this country.
There are plenty of very potent political
issues upon which to wage a campaign to elect somebody better than Trump.
Russia-gate is not one of them. A determined campaign centered around
Medicare-for-all, establishing an equitable tax system, and slashing the bloated
defense budget to provide money for education, new infrastructure and job
training might well elect someone good.
However flawed Donald Trump is as
a president on a wide range of issues, he’s doing the right thing to try to
broker better relations with the Russian Federation. The stakes are too high not to make the effort.
Stephen Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies at NYU and one of
the leading scholars on Russia, told
Tucker Carlson of Fox News this past week that he was stunned by what he called
the “mob violence” atmosphere in the reaction to Trump’s comments at the summit
press conference.
Warning that relations between the US and Russia had hit a dangerous new
low, Cohen said it’s imperative to get a better relationship going.
He offered this question and comment: “Do you prefer to try to impeach
Trump to trying to avoid war with nuclear Russia? That’s the bottom line.
That’s where we’re at today.”
