Independent counsel Robert Mueller has indicted 13 Russians for waging information warfare against the US by tampering with the American electoral process in 2016. Sadly but predictably, America’s commander-in-chief did not respond by rallying his country to meet the threat. Rather, President Donald Trump went out of his way to dodge the question of Russian interference.

This episode has a broader significance: It gives the lie to the idea that the US can have a constructive foreign policy while a profoundly destructive individual is president.

This idea has commanded a respectable following since Trump took office. The fact that Trump appointed mostly mainstream figures to key positions, and that his “America First” agenda has been considerably watered down in practice, has led a number of Republican policy hands to argue that the administration’s actions have been broadly praiseworthy even if the president’s rhetoric has not.

This argument is not entirely wrong. Despite his campaign promises, Trump has not (yet) launched an all-out trade war with China, torn up US alliances, or quit NAFTA and the World Trade Organization.

Even with respect to Russia, a similar pattern has prevailed. Trump continues to talk up the dangerous fantasy of a rapprochement with Putin, yet his administration has increased funding for forward defense in Eastern Europe and resolved to provide lethal weaponry to Ukraine.

It is important to stipulate here that we don’t know precisely why Trump is so reflexively dismissive of the mountains of concrete evidence documenting a deliberate Russian campaign to suborn American democracy. It could be that Moscow possesses some compromising information on him or his prior business dealings. It could be that he genuinely believes he is a diplomatic genius who can strike a grand bargain with Russian President Vladimir Putin. It could be that Trump perceives any discussion of Russian electoral interference as an assault on his presidential legitimacy, and that he is simply too narcissistic to separate that issue from the broader national well-being.

Whatever the answer, Trump’s refusal to personally take on the information-warfare threat from the Kremlin is crippling US policy in several ways.

First, it is discouraging concrete -- and badly needed -- responses to the threat. If there are covert efforts that the intelligence community might undertake either to strengthen US defenses or retaliate against Russian attacks, they would likely require additional legal authorities or presidential findings -- neither of which this president is likely to support.

In the same vein, European officials have privately advocated greater transatlantic cooperation to address the common danger posed by Russian meddling, but Trump’s indifference to that danger has limited the possibilities for such collaboration. Within the US government, too, Trump’s attitude is raising the political costs and risks for advisers who seek to counter Russian measures. It is hardly surprising, then, that the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies have made so little progress in hardening American defenses, even as intelligence officials have warned in increasingly dire tones that the Russians will seek to re-run the 2016 playbook in 2018. In the American system, decisive action generally requires presidential buy-in, and that has been sorely lacking.

Second, Trump is making it impossible for the US to issue clear and believable deterrent threats. Information warfare and cyberattacks are inherently difficult to prevent, and so a better approach may be to go on the offensive, by threatening sharp retaliation through reciprocal cyberattacks or other measures. But such threats only work if they are seen to be credible, and why would anyone believe that Washington would inflict significant costs on Russia -- and risk significant escalation of bilateral tensions -- when Trump declines even to acknowledge that a threat exists?

Third, the president’s position is not just having pernicious effects within the executive branch; it is undercutting the broader national will and consensus needed to meet a grave security challenge. The genius of the Russian meddling in 2016 was that it avoided the normal “rally around the flag” effect that often occurs in the wake of a foreign attack. Instead, it pitted Americans against one another -- Republicans against Democrats, state authorities against the federal government.

Finally, Trump’s performance is reminding us of the critical role the American president plays in leading not just his own country but the larger “free world,” and how powerfully the absence of that leadership is felt at times of crisis. The liberal international order America has anchored for generations is facing an array of challenges from authoritarian, revisionist powers, namely Russia and China. Yet rather than placing himself at the vanguard of the international response, Trump is shirking that obligation. And in doing so, he is exacerbating the demoralization and division that is weakening the liberal West just as the dangers are mounting.


Hal Brands
Hal Brands is the Henry A. Kissinger Distinguished Professor at the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies. -- Ed.

(Bloomberg)