Russia could be using Donald Trump to try to topple the United States

(Image credit: Getty Images)

published 28 July 2016

Some have worried that Donald Trump is in cahoots with Vladimir Putin, although sources close to the Kremlin allege Russia could be after something even bigger — like using Trump to destabilize the United States:

Konstantin Sivkov, who had served as a strategist for the Russian General Staff between 1995 and 2007, was keen to tell me all about the theory, which the chief of the General Staff, Valery Gerasimov, had set out in 2013 as a strategic vision for wars of the future. "Hybrid warfare," Sivkov began, "relies on the use of the enemy's own internal resources against him." Against an adversary with "a wobbly political base" and a "fractured moral core," Russia could use disinformation, cyber attacks, and other means of covert political influence to make the enemy "devour itself from within," Sivkov said. [Time]

For the first time, the nominee of a major party has questioned the U.S. commitment to defend NATO allies from a Russian attack. He has promoted the use of torture and called for a ban on Muslims coming into the country. Most recently, during a press conference on July 27, he suggested that he would even "look into" recognizing Russia's annexation of Crimea and lifting the sanctions subsequently imposed on Russia.Taken together, these shifts appear to have created the nascent conditions — the wobbly political base, the fractured moral core — that would make the U.S. a fitting target for Russia's new approach to conflict. [Time]

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Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.