Russia

Democrats and Republicans alike should prioritize responding to interference from Beijing, imposing additional sanctions on malign actors, closing financial loopholes, raising standards for technology companies and improving election security.

The last treaty that limits the United States’s and Russia’s nuclear weapons, the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), will expire in February 2021 unless both states agree to its extension. Opponents of extension, including some U.S. officials, have argued against extending the treaty by citing Russia’s new, developmental strategic weapons, which they claim will not be covered by the treaty. Yet the reality is more complex.

Editor’s Note: With the exception of the president of the United States, we all know that Russia and other powers have run amok in their attempts to influence U.S. elections and those of other democracies around the world. Learning the scope of the problem, however, has proved difficult. In a groundbreaking study, Arya Goel, Diego Martin and Jacob Shapiro, all of Princeton University, find that more than 20 countries have been targeted. Russia (no surprise) is by far the most active, but Iran, China and Saudi Arabia all are joining the fray.

The New York Times reported on June 15 that “the United States is stepping up digital incursions into Russia’s electric power grid in a warning to President Vladimir V. Putin.” In particular, the Times reported that the United States has deployed code “inside Russia’s grid and other targets”—that is, “potentially crippling malware inside the Russian system, ...