Vox: Russia's role in this year's presidential election, explained by a media historian

The Kremlin’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election became apparent during the Democratic National Convention this summer. WikiLeaks, which now operates as a de facto Russian front, released a trove of stolen emails from the server of the Democratic National Committee. The leak served two purposes: to raise doubts about the legitimacy of Clinton’s nomination and to give a subtle boost to her Republican rival, Donald Trump. [...]

A specialist in Russian media history, Gatov is currently working on a book about the re-emergence of totalitarian censorship in Putin’s Russia. He has reported extensively in Russia for more than two decades and, more recently, has focused on the political and technological implications of mass media.

His perspective on Russia’s propaganda campaign is more measured than most. While he doesn’t deny Russia’s involvement or subversive intent, he believes their impact has been wildly overstated. Russia benefits from the surplus of fake news, Gatov concedes, but often they don’t create it so much as amplify it. By inflating Russia’s role, he told me, we “create the impression that they’re more powerful than they are.” [...]

Putin is not a strategist; he's a reactive and opportunistic tactician. For him and for many people in Russian government, Trump is unpredictable; they don't know what he'll do. He's a black box. For diplomats, a black box is much worse than a known evil.

In my view, the apparent support of Trump from Russia is nothing more than trolling. They want to distort the process rather than achieve a particular result. [...]

Russian ideology today is nonexistent. This is not ideology. The goal of current Russian politics is to be left alone. They don't want other states meddling in what they consider regional or domestic affairs.

On top of that, Russia wants to receive more respect as a global power, which means more respect for its interests beyond its national border. This is quite different from the Cold War. Russia doesn't want to destroy the United States as the Soviets did.

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