While testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee this Thursday, terrorism and espionage expert Clint Watts was asked by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) “How can the committee track this fuzzy line between the Russian oligarchs, Russian organized crime and the Russian government?”
Watts explained that Russia’s interference in the 2016 U.S. election utilized two components: the internet and the real physical world.
According to Watts. the internet component consisted of a “disproportionate number of fake news outlets” and “conspiratorial web sites that are run from [Eastern Europe] that are English-speaking editors that are pro-Russian, trained in Russia sometimes. How are they funded? That would be one component.”
“My hypothesis, working in the intelligence field is that there is some sort of Russian intel asset that is funding them in one way or another through some sort of scheme.”
“The other part that I think we should be looking at is, follow the trail of dead Russians,” Watts said.
“There’s been more dead Russians in the past three months that are tied to this investigation who have assets in banks all over the world. They are dropping dead, even in western countries. We have seen arrests in, I believe, it’s Spain and different computer security companies that are based in Russia, which provide services to the United States. These are all huge openings to understand how they are funded by the Russian government. I don’t have the capability to do that from where I sit, but I think that’s a huge angle.”
Watch the video below:
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