Mutual admirers (Photo : Getty Images)
The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) has incontrovertible evidence from multiple intelligence sources and spies that Russian President Vladimir Putin was personally involved in the Russian campaign that successfully interfered with the U.S. presidential election and got Donald Trump -- Putin's candidate -- elected President.
USIC are united in assessing with "a high level of confidence" that Putin was personally involved in the campaign to discredit Clinton, who Putin loathes, and elect Trump, who still professes admiration for Putin.
Its use of the term "high confidence" means the intelligence it has is nearly incontrovertible.
President Barack Obama later said the U.S. will respond to the Russian cyberattacks that twisted the outcome of the presidential election.
"I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections ... we need to take action. And we will -- at a time and place of our own choosing. Some of it may be explicit and publicized. Some of it may not be."
Sources in USIC said a covert campaign that began as a "vendetta" against Hillary Clinton later transformed into a campaign to show corruption in American politics, and to "split off key American allies by creating the image that (other countries) couldn't depend on the U.S. to be a credible global leader."
Media sources said senior USIC officials with direct access to the information revealed that new intelligence proves that Putin personally directed how hacked material from Democrats was leaked and used.
The CIA assessed the Russian government wanted to elect Trump. The FBI and other agencies don't fully endorse that view.
Few USIC officials, however, dispute that the Russian operation was aimed at discrediting and destroying Clinton's candidacy by leaking embarrassing emails about Democrats while refusing to leak the same kind of damaging information about the Republicans.
In October, all 17 intelligence agencies that constitute USIC signed onto a statement attributing the Democratic National Committee hack to Russia.
USIC said "only Russia's senior-most officials could have authorized these activities." That was an intelligence judgment based on an understanding of the Russian system of government, which Putin controls with complete authority.
USIC first publicly affirmed its confidence Russia interfered in the 2016 elections in an October joint letter. USIC included the Office of the Director of National Intelligence representing 17 intelligence agencies and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
On October 7, the DNI and DHS said USIC was confident Russia directed Democratic National Committee (DNC) cyber-attacks and the release of its private documents. In December, USIC told members of Congress they high confidence Russia's aimed to sway the election for Trump.
They said Russia arranged for WikiLeaks to acquire hacked emails from the DNC and Clinton campaign chair John Podesta. They also assessed that Russia hacked the Republican National Committee (RNC), and chose not to release the content.
