Spy movies make the world of international espionage and politics look flashy and exciting. Real spy work, however, is a lot more subtle and complicated, and if it’s done right, you’ll only know that it succeeded after the fact. Right now, we are living through the aftermath of a successful Russian operation aimed at playing off the divisions in American society. That operation helped a TV star with an addiction to conspiracy theories and opaque ties to post-Soviet oligarchs become president. Now, he upsets the modern world order for all the wrong reasons..
But believe it or not, the election of 2016 is just one part of a much bigger story. You’ve probably heard plenty of hushed whispers or outright panic about Russia’s information warfare against the West, but it’s seldom been put in context. We’re going to fix that in our deep dive into exactly how the Trump/Russia saga unfolded. This is one of the most consequential stories of our lifetime, and it’s not over, so get ready to bookmark this piece now.
It’s going to be a wild ride and a pretty long read, but we owe it to ourselves to really understand what happened if we want to make sure we’re choosing our own leaders in the future, rather than outsource this task to cruel and power-hungry authoritarians with plans of their own. They’re interested in helping us isolate ourselves and exacerbate our internal problems, not move us forward and find solutions to what ails us. And knowing how they do it is the first step in not letting it happen again.
