https://news.yahoo.com/vladimir-putin-wasted-no-time-224145273.html
Sonam Sheth
Mon, November 23, 2020, 5:41 PM EST
Russian President Vladimir Putin has wasted no time in seizing on the discord that US President Donald Trump and his allies have sowed about the 2020 election.
On Monday, Putin said he will not congratulate President-elect Joe Biden on his victory, claiming the election results are not clear. Biden has been the projected winner for more than two weeks, and multiple states have since certified their election results.
More importantly, Putin weaponized Trump's conspiracy theories about the election to denigrate the US's support of free and fair elections around the globe.
•••••
Trump's refusal to concede the election and paint the US system as rigged and unfair "plays directly into Putin's primary objective, which isn't necessarily to get a specific person elected, but to sow discord and reinforce the view that American democracy doesn't work well," John McLaughlin, the former acting director of the CIA, told Insider. "If he can make the point that our system doesn't work well, that takes the pressure off of him to go to a really democratic system, because he can point to the United States and say, 'Well, if it doesn't work there, why would you want me to do that?'"
•••••
That's especially true now, given that Putin's approval rating in Russia has been in steady decline and is currently somewhere near 60%, down from where it used to be in the high 80s and 90s. The US's electoral turmoil and rocky transition period are "absolutely a welcome distraction" for Putin, McLaughlin said. "He can take the heat off of himself by getting us to fight each other after what we would like to think of as one of the safest and fairest elections, but one that the president of the United States is saying is rigged."
•••••
Conversely, the Trump administration's foreign policy has yielded huge returns for Russia.
"They want to protect their boy in the White House, because Trump's policies have been strategically fantastic for Russia," Glenn Carle, a former CIA covert operative, told Insider in an earlier interview. "He alienated the United States from NATO and turned a blind eye to Russian influence in Crimea. His actions in the Middle East, especially in Syria and Libya, helped Russia gain a significant presence in the region for the first time in 48 years."
Trump also often heaps praise on Putin, describing him as a "strong" and "powerful" leader — comments that Russian state media uses to portray Putin as a global strongman and Trump as a puppet dancing to his master's tune.
•••••
No comments:
Post a Comment