Did Pres. Obama and CIA Help Donald Trump Win?

News stories about purported Russian hacking in the presidential election continue to omit a very important fact. The Russian government has arrested four of the hackers, including Col.Sergei Mikhailov, and charged them with working for the CIA.

Thus if Russians did any election hacking it was with the knowledge and consent of the CIA and President Barack Obama. The knowledge received would have allowed the Obama administration to prevent any action that could have affected the outcome of the election. If the president knew terrorists threatened to attack, he would assign federal agents to protect those who might be attacked. Wouldn’t a president who thought foreign government hackers threatened an organization assign government computer experts to protect against the attack?

If the hackers tried to help Donald Trump win, it was because someone in the Obama administration wanted Trump to win. It seems unlikely the CIA would have tried to help Trump win without Obama’s approval. Incidentally with an FSB colonel on the CIA’s payroll it would have been easy to have Russians meet with Trump’s associates where the meetings would be noticed. [The FSB is the successor to the KGB.]

Why would Barack Obama want Donald Trump to win the election? Perhaps Obama thought if Trump won, it might be possible to convince Congress to change the Constitution to allow Obama to seek a third term in 2020, particularly if Congress thought Trump was involved with the Russians. That strategy wouldn’t have been possible if Hillary Clinton had won.

I doubt the claim that Russian hackers did anything that affected the outcome of the election. even if they tried to do so. However, if they did then any federal investigation should ask what did the CIA and President Barack Obama know, when did they know it and what did they do with the knowledge? If CIA officials didn’t tell Obama about the Russians, why didn’t they?

Was “Russian Hacking” a CIA Sting?

Until I found stories about FSB’s [Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation] arrest of Col.Sergei Mikhailov, I thought the claims about Russian hacking during last year’s presidential
election  were probably false.   I know  the FSB is unlikely to be as effective as the legendary KGB, but  I wouldn’t expect it to engage in the amateurish activities attributed to Russian hackers.  The CIA’s connection with Col. Mikhailov raises the possibility the CIA was operating a sting to discredit Donald Trump.
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For example,  the KGB wouldn’t have been satisfied with using hacking to get some emails from the Democratic Party headquarters.  The old KGB would have planted an agent in Hillary Clinton’s campaign headquarters.  This agent  would have occasionally downloaded documents, including summaries of meetings,   onto a zip drive.   Russians have been planting people in American organizations for 70 years. Why would the FSB switch to  a less productive means of acquiring  information?  A human agent can overhear conversations that contain information that doesn’t get into the computer.

The CIA could have used Col. Mikhailov for more than just a  source of information about Russian activities.  The association potentially allowed the CIA to use Russian hackers to spy on Americans or on “friendly” governments like Britain or Germany.  Those detecting  the hacking would blame the Russians rather than the Americans.  European governments would complain if they caught the CIA spying on them.  Using Russian hackers potentially allowed the  CIA to gain information risk free.

CIA could also have had Mikhailov send Russian agents to try to compromise American politicians.   Spy agencies sometimes have trouble resisting an urge to become power brokers.  The CIA has a history of involvement in other countries, particularly in the Middle East.  An agent of the World War II OSS [predecessor to the CIA]  admitted before he died that he was responsible for killing American World War II General George Patton.  Many Americans believe the CIA was involved in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963.

The following statement is not intended to accuse the CIA of attempting to interfere in the process of determining who is the President of the United States.  I merely want to point out its actions are consistent with that possibility.  The CIA could have used the Russian hackers to keep Hillary Clinton from winning the election and then used other Russian agents to discredit her opponent Donald Trump and make him appear to be responsible for the Russian hackers.