The EconomistFebruary 24th 2018 7I
N THE late 1980s, as Mikhail
Gorbachev launched peres-
troika, Russia made peace with
the West. It was possible to be-
lieve that each would give up
trying to subvert the other with
lies and cold-war conspiracy
theories. With the indictment of
13 Russians on February 16th by the American special counsel,
Robert Mueller, it is clearjust how fragile thatbelief was.
Mr Mueller alleges that in 2014 Russia launched a conspira-
cy against America’s democracy, and he believes he has the ev-
idence to withstand Russian denials and a court’sscrutiny. Per-
haps because VladimirPutin, Russia’s president, thought the
CIAwas fomenting an uprising in Ukraine, the Internet Re-
search Agency, backed by an oligarch with links to the Kremlin,
set up a trolling team, payments systems and false identities.
Its aim was to widen divisions in America and, latterly, to tilt
the vote in 2016 from Hillary Clinton to Donald Trump.
Europe has been targeted, too. Although the details are
sketchier, and this is not the focus ofthe Mueller probe, Russia
is thought to have financed extremist politicians, hacked com-
puter systems, organised marches and spread lies (see page 15).
Again, its aim seems to have been to deepen divides.
It is futile to speculate how much Russia’sefforts succeeded
in altering the outcomes of votes and poisoning politics. The
answer is unknowable. But the conspiracies are wrong in
themselves and their extent raises worries about the vulnera-
bilities of Western democracies. If the West is going to protect
itself againstRussia and other attackers, it needs to treat Mr
Mueller’s indictments as a rallying cry.
Trolleology
They hold three uncomfortable lessons. One is that social me-
dia are a more potent tool than the 1960s techniques of plant-
ing stories and bribing journalists. It does notcost much to use
Facebook to spot sympathisers, ferret out potential converts
and perfect the catchiest taglines (see page 53). With ingenuity,
you can fool the system into favouring your tweets and posts.
If you hack the computers ofDemocratic bigwigs, asthe Rus-
sians did, you have a network of bots ready to dish the dirt.
With a modest budget, of a little over $1m a month, and
working mostlyfrom the safety of St Petersburg, the Russians
managed botnets and false profiles, earning millions of re-
tweets and likes. Other, better-funded, groups exploit similar
techniques. Nobody yet knows how the outrage they generate
changes politics, but it is a fair guess that it deepens partisan-
ship and limits the scope for compromise.
Hence the second lesson, thatthe Russia campaign did not
create divisions in America so much as hold up a warped mir-
ror to them. It played up race, urging black voters to see Mrs
Clinton as an enemy and stay at home on polling day. It sought
to inflame white resentment, even as it called on progressives
to vote for Jill Stein, of the Green Party. After Mr Trump’s vic-
tory, which it had worked to bring about, it organised an anti-
Trump rally in Manhattan. Right after the Parkland school
shooting, Russian botsbegan to pile into the debate about gun
control (see page 30). Europeans are to a lesser degree divided,
too, especially in Brexit Britain. The divisions that run so deep
within Western democracies leave them open to intruders.
The most important lesson is that the Western response has
been woefully weak. In the cold war, America fought Russian
misinformation with diplomats and spies. By contrast, Mr
Mueller acted because two presidents fell short. Barack
Obama agonised over evidence of Russian interference but
held back before eventually imposing sanctions, perhaps be-
cause he assumed Mr Trump would lose and that for him to
speak out would only feed suspicions that, asa Democrat, he
was manipulating the contest. That was a grave misjudgment.
Mr Trump’s failing is of a different order. Despite having ac-
cess to intelligence from the day he was elected, he has treated
the Russian scandal purely in terms of his own legitimacy. He
should have spoken out against Mr Putin and protected Ameri-
ca against Russian hostility. Instead, abetted by a number of
congressional Republicans, he has devoted himself to discred-
iting the agencies investigating the conspiracy and hinted at fir-
ing Mr Mueller or his minders in the Justice Department, just as
he fired James Comey as head of the FBI. Mr Mueller is not
done. Among other things, he still has to say whether the con-
spiracy extended to the Trump campaign. Were Mr Trump to
sack him now, it would amount to a confession.How to win the woke citizens vote
For democracy to thrive, Western leaders need to find a way to
regain the confidence of voters. This starts with transparency.
Europe needs more formal investigations with the authority
of Mr Mueller’s. Although they risk revealing intelligence
sources and methods and may even please Russia—because
proof of its success sows mistrust—they also lay the ground for
action. Party-funding laws need to identify who has given
money to whom. And social media should be open to scrutiny,
so that anyone can identify who is paying for ads and so that
researchers can more easily root out subterfuge.
Then comes resilience, which starts at the top. Angela Mer-
kel successfully warned Mr Putin that there would be conse-
quences if he interfered in German elections. In France Em-
manuel Macron frustrated Russian hackers byplanting fake
e-mails among real ones, which discredited later leaks when
they were shown to contain false information. Finland teaches
media literacy and the national press works together to purge
fake news and correct misinformation.
Resilience comes more easily to Germany, France and Fin-
land, where trust is higher than in America. That is why retalia-
tion and deterrence also matter—not, as in the cold war,
through dirty tricks, but by linking American co-operation
over, say, diplomatic missions, to Russia’s conduct and, if need
be, by sanctions. Republican leaders in Congress are failing
their country: at the least they should hold emergency hear-
ings to protect America from subversion in the mid-term elec-
tions. Just now, with Mr Trump obsessively blaming the FBI
and Democrats, it looks as if America does not believe democ-
racy is worth fighting for. 7The meddler
Why the West’s response is inadequate
Leaders