Clinton Watts, a consultant to the FBI’s Counter Terrorism Division, is an expert on cyberwarfare. He has served as:

• An FBI Special Agent on a Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF);
• The Executive Officer of the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point (CTC); and
• A consultant to the FBI’s Counter Terrorism Division (CTD) and National Security Branch (NSB). 

In a statement he prepared for the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Watts outlined cyberwarfare measures that Russia used to subvert the 2016 Presidential campaign.

He delivered this on March 30. 2017. Part of this reads as follows: 

This pattern of Russian falsehoods and social media manipulation of the American electorate continued through Election Day and persists today.

Many of the accounts we watched push the false Incirlik story in July now focus their efforts on shaping the upcoming European elections, promoting fears of immigration or false claims of refugee criminality.  

They’ve not forgotten about the United States either. This past week, we observed social media campaigns targeting Speaker of the House Paul Ryan hoping to foment further unrest amongst U.S. democratic institutions, their leaders and their constituents. 

As we noted two days before the Presidential election in our article describing Russian influence operations, Russia certainly seeks to promote Western candidates sympathetic to their worldview and foreign policy objectives.

But winning a single election is not their end goal. Russian Active Measures hope to topple democracies through the pursuit of five complementary objectives: 

1. Undermine citizen confidence in democratic governance;
2. Foment and exacerbate divisive political fractures;
3. Erode trust between citizens and elected officials and democratic institutions;
4. Popularize Russian policy agendas within foreign populations;
5. Create general distrust or confusion over information sources by blurring the lines between fact and fiction.

From these objectives, the Kremlin can crumble democracies from the inside out creating political divisions resulting in two key milestones:

1. The dissolution of the European Union and 
2. The break up of the North American Treaty Organization (NATO).

TREASON EXAMPLE #6: On January 20, 2017—the day Donald J. Trump became the 45th President of the United States—Michael T. Flynn took office as the nation’s 25th National Security Adviser.

Michael T. Flynn

Flynn, a former United States Army lieutenant general and director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, seemed the perfect choice for safeguarding the country’s security.

Two days later, The Wall Street Journal reported that Flynn was under investigation by U.S. counterintelligence agents for his secret communications with Russian officials. 

On February 8, Flynn denied having spoken to Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak in December, 2016, about removing the sanctions placed on Russia by the outgoing Obama administration.

The sanctions had been placed in retaliation for Russia’s efforts to manipulate the 2016 Presidential election.

On February 13, The Washington Post reported that Acting Attorney General Sally Yates had warned Trump in late January that Flynn had lied about his contacts with Kislyak—and that he could be blackmailed by Russian Intelligence. 

Sally Yates

Flynn was forced to resign that same day—after only 24 days as National Security Adviser.

Officially, the reason given was that he had misled Vice President Mike Pence. But Flynn’s deception had already been known—via the warning to Trump by Yates.

Only after Yates’ warning became known to the media was Flynn forced to resign.  

The same Washington Post story reported that, in December, 2015, Flynn had appeared on Russia Today, the news network that American Intelligence agencies consider “the Kremlin’s principal international propaganda outlet.” 

He had also received more than $45,000 as a “speaking fee” from the network for a talk on world affairs. At the gala where Flynn received the fee, he sat next to Russian President Vladimir Putin for dinner. 

On December 1, 2017, Flynn appeared in federal court to formalize a deal with Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III.  He pleaded guilty to a felony count of “willfully and knowingly” making “false, fictitious and fraudulent statements” to the FBI.

On November 25, 2020, Trump pardoned him, tweeting: “It is my Great Honor to announce that General Michael T. Flynn has been granted a Full Pardon.” 

TREASON EXAMPLE #7: On May 9, 2017, President Trump fired FBI Director James B. Comey for investigating Russia’s subversion of the 2016 Presidential race. 

James B. Comey

There were four reasons for this:

1. Comey refused to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump. Trump had made the “request” during a private dinner at the White House in January.
2. Comey told Trump that he would always be honest with him. But Trump wanted the head of the FBI to act as his personal secret police chief—as was the case in the former Soviet Union.
3. Trump had tried to coerce Comey into dropping the FBI’s investigation into Michael Flynn, for his secret ties to Russia and Turkey. Comey had similarly resisted that demand.
4. Comey had recently asked the Justice Department to fund an expanded FBI investigation into well-documented contacts between Trump’s 2016 Presidential campaign and Russian Intelligence agents. The goal of that collaboration: To elect Trump over Hillary Clinton, a longtime foe of Russian President Vladimir Putin.