Putin's winning strategy: the duping of the GOP

Update December 10, 2019 to reflect the articles of impeachment and the DOJ Inspector General Report on the FBI activities in opening and conducting the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 elections.

Putin's  strategy to shape US policy for Russia’s benefit is to attempt to dupe American voters and their government representatives.  It appears some have fallen under their spell.

On December 3, 2019, the House of

 Representatives voted on a resolution that opposed Russia's being readmitted to the G7. Russia had been kicked out of that prestigious group of world leaders for their grab of Ukrainian territory. There is an ongoing hot conflict there in which 13,000 Ukrainians have died .and for which the western leading government had sought critical anti-tank missiles, Javelins, to thwart further aggression.    Seventy-one Republicans voted against that  G7 resolution, including Colorado's own Rep. Ken Buck. That is a sad indication of how some in the GOP are becoming a supporter of Donald Trump's pro-Russian policies, a party that used to be firmly against Russian aggression. The resolution passed handily but in past, similar resolutions, including maintaining sanctions against Russia,  had received greater bi-partisan support. The seventy-one GOP votes in opposition on December  3 are a disturbing measure of how far the Russians have made inroads into the views of some voters and their representatives in Congress.  The Russian influence has also been felt in the issues surrounding impeachment, such as Cloudstrike and support of lethal military aid for Ukraine against Russian aggression.

That Russian influence and Donald Trump inviting them into the American system is a subject that appears throughout the articles of impeachment that will be voted upon in the House within a week or two. Within the same week, the long-awaited Inspector General report of the origins of the FBI's investigation into Russia's interference and active measures in the 2016 election verified the justification of the issue on its merits and that it was not done because of some "deep state" partisanship.  The GOP had tried to brush off and deny the Russian meddling as some conspiracy cooked up by Trump's opponents to unseat him. In a stunning role reversal, the once anti-communist GOP became an unwitting supporter of Russian activities and policies promoted by Trump and Democrats became the defense and Russian hawk party.  

It is likely those who used to be Russia hawks and now have flipped are also taking their cue from their leader, Donald Trump.  The mystery is Trump's Make Russia Great Again foreign policy. Why? Whatever the issue, Crimea, Syria, NATO, interference in the 2016 elections, he apologizes or supports Putin's policies and takes his word for Russian intelligence over his own US intelligence services.

The Mueller investigation found  widespread  Russian interference  in 2016 elections  and Special Counsel Robert  Mueller warned us that Russia is planning to do likewise in 2020. Constitution  law professors dominated the first day of the House Judiciary Committee impeachment hearings Dec. 4, citing the deliberations of the writers of our Constitution in formulating impeachment clauses.  The reason it was included in the Constitution, our founders  feared the re-establishment of a monarchy, a king,  by foreign influence, negating what the American Revolution.had accomplished. They also feared that waiting for the next election for the president to be disciplined for this might be too late  because the wrongdoing  practices of the chief executive could continue to get more foreign intervention to help get himself re-elected and perpetuate his ability to become a king, an autocrat.
That Russian influence and Donald Trump inviting them into the American system is a subject that appears throughout the articles of impeachment that will be voted upon in the House within a week or two. Within the same week, the long-awaited Inspector General report of the origins of the FBI's investigation into Russia's interference and active measures in the 2016 election verified the justification of the issue on its merits and that it was not done because of some "deep state" partisanship.

A propaganda initiative conducted by Russians has become central to the impeachment actions in the House. One of the two favors Donald Trump asked of the Ukraine president  was for him to open investigations of Cloudstrike in order to get an oval office visit, and later, to get the anti-tank missile aid Trump had frozen released.  The  Cloudstrike theory, that Ukraine, not Russia, hacked the DNC server is a conspiracy theory that contradicts the findings of the US intelligence services who traced it to a propaganda initiative of Russian intelligence. Both GOP Trump Congressional supporters and Trump himself have fallen for the conspiracy theory hook line and sinker, even after they were briefed by our intelligence services.

Putin  may be a younger generation than the Soviets,  but he was still trained by them as  KGB operative. The propaganda methods developed in the USSR were some of the most effective skills in modern history. I have seen them work from the inside, too, from my student days in Berlin as Communists consolidated control of their German zones. Putin has harnessed modern IT communications as his weapons to shape the minds of those he is trying to control. He is appearing to be succeeding.

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https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/09/world/meanwhile-in-america-december-10-intl/index.html?fbclid=IwAR1gbEhI4rMxpHmiuo0FOh6xxF2ydkMtliGTCN2icRe1StKzzCmA8gho0Ng

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/12/04/republicans-have-become-party-russia-this-makes-me-sick/ 
The GOP now the Gang of Putin

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/12/04/stop-calling-trump-russian-dupe-truth-is-much-worse/
Trump was not duped: he has used Russian interference for his own self interested reasons.