How Russia Targets the U.S. Military

[swag]

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/06/12/how-russia-targets-the-us-military-215247

With hacks, pro-Putin trolls and fake news, the Kremlin is ratcheting up its efforts to turn American servicemembers and veterans into a fifth column.

By Ben Schreckinger June 12, 2017

In the fall of 2013, Veterans Today, a fringe American news site that also offers former service members help finding jobs and paying medical bills, struck up a new partnership. It began posting content from New Eastern Outlook, a geopolitical journal published by the government-chartered Russian Academy of Sciences, and running headlines like “Ukraine’s Ku Klux Klan – NATO’s New Ally.” As the United States confronted Russian ally Bashar al-Assad for using chemical weapons against Syrian children this spring, the site trumpeted, “Proof: Turkey Did 2013 Sarin Attack and Did This One Too” and “Exclusive: Trump Apologized to Russia for Syria Attack.”

In recent years, intelligence experts say, Russia has dramatically increased its “active measures” — a form of political warfare that includes disinformation, propaganda and compromising leaders with bribes and blackmail — against the United States. Thus far, congressional committees, law enforcement investigations and press scrutiny have focused on Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin’s successful efforts to disrupt the American political process. But a review of the available evidence and the accounts of Kremlin-watchers make clear that the Russian government is using the same playbook against other pillars of American society, foremost among them the military. Experts warn that effort, which has received far less attention, has the potential to hobble the ability of the armed forces to clearly assess Putin’s intentions and effectively counter future Russian aggression.

In addition to propaganda designed to influence service members and veterans, Russian state actors are friending service members on Facebook while posing as attractive young women to gather intelligence and targeting the Twitter accounts of Defense Department employees with highly customized “phishing” attacks. The same Russian military hacking group that breached the Democratic National Committee, “Fancy Bear,” was also responsible for publicly posting stolen Army data online while posing as supporters of the Islamic State in 2015, according to the findings of one cybersecurity firm. And the hacking group’s most common target for phishing attacks in the West has been military personnel, with service members’ spouses making up another prominent target demographic, according to another cybersecurity firm.

While the military and its contractors have long been the targets of cyberattacks from hostile foreign powers, the Russian campaign is noteworthy for its heightened intensity, especially since the imposition of Western economic sanctions following the 2014 annexation of Crimea, and for the novel tactics it is employing online. All of it amounts to a new kind of low-intensity or “hybrid” warfare that Western governments are still struggling to effectively counter.

“We are focused on the azalea bushes at the edge of a redwood forest,” said retired Gen. Philip Breedlove, who stepped down last June after three years as supreme allied commander of NATO, where he witnessed a surge in Russian active measures against Baltic states and in efforts to spread negative disinformation about the alliance’s soldiers stationed in Europe.

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[JayhawkSD]

2. This article uses the magic phrase.

It is all based on "intelligence experts say..." The "intelligence experts" are, of course, not named and so we cannot examine their credentials, expertise and/or reputation for honesty.

Many "intelligence experts" also told us in 2002 that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.

I'm not saying that anything in the article or original post is false. I'm just saying that I believe nothing that comes from anonymous sources.

[Nitram]

3. An anonymous source led to Nixon's resignation to avoid impeachment.

[JayhawkSD]

4. And the relevance of that is...? nt

[Nitram]

5. You just said anonymous sources are worthless. When Deep Throat pointed two investigative

journalists in the right direction to take down Nixon, was that worthless? Sorry, I thought you might be able to connect the dots all by yourself. Anonymous leaks have long been a source of both invaluable information and dangerous misdirection. Like everything you read or hear, just pay attention, remember, and evaluate the truthfulness and utility of each piece of information within a larger context of information. Welcome to reality!

[JayhawkSD]

6. You discredit your own point.

"Deep Throat pointed two investigative journalists in the right direction..."

Since the facts related by the anonymous source were not published until after they had been verified by other means, the importance of the anonymous source was of reduced importance, and the credibility of the anonymous source was established. It was not the anonymous sources which led to Nixon's resignation, it was the verifiable facts uncovered by real journalists, who did not publish what they were told by Deep Throat until they were able to verify its truth by investigation of the underlying facts and finding them to be verifiable.

Today, the entire story starts and finishes with what "sources who remained anonymous because they are not authorized to speak on the subject" say to reporters. Or, more properly, stenographers because they no longer go out into the field and dig out the truth, they sit in their office and type up whatever their sources tell them on the telephone. They go into the field only for photo ops, or to obtain a nice sexy backdrop while relating a story to the camera.

[Nitram]

7. Jay, do you feeel the same way about all the information released by Wikileaks?

Ignoring any potential source of valid information is foolish.