> It is awfully high risk and awfully low reward for Russia to hack the DNC right before the 2016 election. The Democrats are likely to win, and they'll come into office with a fresh memory of Russia having screwed with them.
The Russian government is jonesing rather openly for a Trump win, so even if it is a bad decision on their part it seems quite likely they went ahead and did it anyway. If Clinton does win it certainly wouldn't be the first time that Putin's eagerness to square up to the US has left him in a situation where he generated American antagonism for no particular benefit to Russia. I get the impression that the Russian government enjoys its own infowars escapades a bit more than is healthy for it, and likely overrates their effectiveness a bit.
Besides, I'm not sure it really is a clearly bad decision (from a Machiavellian perspective, of course). Relations between Russia and the Clintons, the US foreign-policy set etc. seem to have already got so bad that it's not clear that even a fairly big provocation like this is likely to cause US actions to be that much more hostile than they would be anyway. For example, if Clinton gets in it seems there's a near-certainty of a big and imminent intensification of US/Russian proxy conflict, especially in Syria. Conversely if Trump does win the likely changes in US foreign policy promise to be a major and enduring victory for putinismo: it's a rare opportunity, and Trump's odds of winning aren't (yet, at least) a hopeless long-shot.
The Russian government is jonesing rather openly for a Trump win, so even if it is a bad decision on their part it seems quite likely they went ahead and did it anyway. If Clinton does win it certainly wouldn't be the first time that Putin's eagerness to square up to the US has left him in a situation where he generated American antagonism for no particular benefit to Russia. I get the impression that the Russian government enjoys its own infowars escapades a bit more than is healthy for it, and likely overrates their effectiveness a bit.
Besides, I'm not sure it really is a clearly bad decision (from a Machiavellian perspective, of course). Relations between Russia and the Clintons, the US foreign-policy set etc. seem to have already got so bad that it's not clear that even a fairly big provocation like this is likely to cause US actions to be that much more hostile than they would be anyway. For example, if Clinton gets in it seems there's a near-certainty of a big and imminent intensification of US/Russian proxy conflict, especially in Syria. Conversely if Trump does win the likely changes in US foreign policy promise to be a major and enduring victory for putinismo: it's a rare opportunity, and Trump's odds of winning aren't (yet, at least) a hopeless long-shot.