Why Russia would prefer Trump enough to hack Clinton’s emails

NEW DELHI: After 20,000 emails from the Democratic National Committee were hacked and posted online last week, there are now reports of online breaches of the Democratic

NEW DELHI: After 20,000 emails from the Democratic National Committee were hacked and posted online last week, there are now reports of online breaches of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and a Hillary Clinton campaign analytics programme. Western cyber security experts say the needle of suspicion points to Russia.

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With the national security division of the US Department of Justice being chosen to head the investigation, Washington clearly believes a foreign player is responsible. The New York Times reports that US intelligence agencies have told the White House they are relatively certain these cyber intrusions were done by two Russian hacking entities, dubbed Fancy Bear and Cozy Bear, both linked to GRU, the Russian intelligence agency.

That Russia has the capability to carry out such a straightforward hack is not in doubt. The question is whether Russian leader Vladimir Putin has sufficient motive. Governments, including the US, regularly hack each other, but they rarely let this spill out into the public domain. Handing over the hacked emails to Wikileaks, an organisation head by Julian Assange who has long disliked Clinton and would be expected to post them, was unusual for a state actor.

The motive being touted is a Russian preference for Clinton’ s Republican rival, Donald Trump, as the next US president. Putin is known to have no love for Clinton who, as US secretary of state, supported dissidents against Putin in Russia’s 2011 and 2012 elections. She remains a strong critic of his takeover of Crimea and eastern Ukraine. During her convention speech, Clinton said, “I’m proud to stand by our allies in NATO against any threat they face, including from Russia.”

Trump, on the other hand, has expressed admiration for Putin’ s style of leadership, questioned the purpose of NATO and spoken in favour of Russia’ s intervention in Syria.

Most strikingly, lines calling for the US to arm anti-Russian Ukrainian fighters were removed from the Republican Party platform by Trump aid es. Also, many of his advisors have had close business ties with Moscow.