Secret order: Hegseth orders an end to cyberoperations against Russia

Click here for an article in The New York Times by Julian E. Barnes, David E. Sanger, and Helene Cooper entitled "Hegseth Orders Pentagon to Stop Offensive Cyberoperations Against Russia."

According to the article, "U.S. officials have said Russia has continued to try to penetrate U.S. networks, including in the first weeks of the Trump administration." Nevertheless, Hegseth issued this secret order last week, a few days before the blowup in the Oval Office on Friday.

I had seen this message before, but it was from a partisan source with anonymous sources, so I felt I couldn't trust it; I take the NYT, while it has taken some flak the last while over its political positions, as still trustworthy.

The article says "The move is apparently part of a broader effort to draw President Putin of Russia into talks on Ukraine and a new relationship with the United States."

Former officials said it was common for civilian leaders to order pauses in military operations during sensitive diplomatic negotiations, to avoid derailing them. Still, for President Trump and Mr. Hegseth, the retreat from offensive cyberoperations against Russian targets represents a huge gamble.

It essentially counts on Mr. Putin to reciprocate by letting up on what many call the “shadow war” underway against the United States and its traditional allies in Europe.

Lots of luck with that:

Over the past year, ransomware attacks on American hospitals, infrastructure and cities have ramped up, many emanating from Russia in what intelligence officials have said are largely criminal acts that have been sanctioned, or ignored, by Russian intelligence agencies.

Sabotage efforts in Europe — including suspected Russian attempts to cut communications cables, mysterious explosions and Russian-directed assassination plots, including against the chief executive of Germany's largest arms maker — have accelerated in the past year. The United States has, until now, been central in helping European nations fight back, often in covert cyberoperations, but that cooperation could now be in jeopardy.

Then there's this:

Russia also ran an aggressive influence campaign during the last presidential campaign, according to reports by U.S. intelligence agencies during the Biden administration. In recent election cycles, U.S. Cyber Command has conducted secret operations to hamper or curtail those influence efforts.

But the Trump administration has already begun to dismantle efforts by the F.B.I. and other agencies to warn about Russian propaganda, and the order by the Pentagon would halt, at least for now, any further Cyber Command efforts to interrupt future Russian influence campaigns.

 Disgraceful. The U.S. is becoming a puppet of the Kremlin. (We'll have to allow Hillary Clinton a bit of schadenfreude.)