Steven Strauss

Russia’s suspected interference in the 2016 election might not have influenced the outcome, but it broke American laws, violated our citizens’ privacy, and created a political climate of distrust. And, as FBI Director James Comey said, the Russians will "be back. They'll be back in 2020. They may be back in 2018.” Last year saw merely the first battle in the cyberwar against American democracy.

Our immediate problem, assuming America’s intelligence community is correct, is Russia. If Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to prefer the Republicans in power rather than the Democrats, and we continue to do basically nothing to defend ourselves, Democratic candidates disliked by Putin should expect to have their emails hacked and embarrassing material made public.

Most email accounts and computer systems are vulnerable to government-supported hackers, and nearly everyone has something embarrassing (even if not criminal) in their emails — especially if it’s taken out of context. Arguments politicians have with their spouses, children and staff; rude comments about important donors or constituents; references to extramarital affairs or other embarrassing sexual behavior. All this material can be made public, at Putin’s whim.

Further, as Barack Obama’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper pointed out, it’s within Putin’s ability to place child pornography on his opponents’ computers. Imagine a presidential or congressional candidate being found with child pornography on his or her computer. Even if the charges are later discredited, the damage would be done.

In 2016, Russian hackers accessed voter registration records in multiple states and did not change them. Suppose next time, Russia surreptitiously corrupts the voter registration files of registered Democrats. Imagine the chaos (and potentially lost votes) on Election Day, when people turn up to cast ballots and their data are either incorrect or not in the system.

The Donald is the light of the world: Steven Strauss

Trump bows to Russia again: Max Boot

Some of our states use electronic voting systems that can be manipulated by a determined adversary. In some cases, such as Georgia, the state’s voting system does not leave any paper trail. As a consequence, if the Russians (or other foreign powers) change the results remotely, there will be no method for that state to verify its election outcome.

Another opportunity for mischief could be targeted cyberattacks on America’s electric power grid. Power shutdowns aimed at predominantly Democratic districts, for example, could deter voter turnout or hamper the ability of polling sites to function.

Technology, particularly the advanced technology available to a government, makes it increasingly easy to fake audios and videos. Forged recordings of politicians purportedly making embarrassing statements (racist, sexist or otherwise offensive) could be widely broadcast via Russian-controlled news sites and social media accounts. Hopefully, such forgeries could be detected, but time will be wasted setting the record straight, and mud tends to stick.

Last year, as our government became aware of Russia’s interference in the election, the Obama administration warned Putin off — which might have limited the damage. For the 2018 and 2020 elections, however, if Putin focuses solely on the current administration’s opponents, my bet is President “I Love WikiLeaks” Trump won’t order an aggressive defense or retaliation. Trump might even “jokingly” and publicly encourage Russian hacking of his opponents, as he did in 2016.

At best, whichever political party emerges as the winner under this scenario would lack legitimacy. At worst, we’d have politicians far more dependent on a foreign power (say, Putin) than on American voters for getting elected and staying in office. As such, those politicians will likely be influenced by that foreign power’s preferences on policy matters.

Finally, keep in mind the sword of Damocles hanging over the GOP. America’s intelligence community has said that the Russians hacked the Republican National Committee’s email system, but that Russia hasn’t released any material it stole from the Republicans. Putin doesn’t need to directly collude with or blackmail members of the GOP. Merely recalling the havoc Russian hackers caused the Democrats (and dreading what Putin might know about Trump and other Republicans) could convince the GOP that irritating Putin isn’t good politics. Notably, Trump has antagonized the leaders of Mexico, Australia and many other countries. But Trump hasn’t antagonized Putin.

John McCain: Russia dissidents are our moral equals

POLICING THE USA: A look at race, justice, media

Some in the GOP might even be concerned that if the United States mounts a significant cyberdefense or investigation, Putin will retaliate by disclosing every damaging thing he has about the Republicans or Trump. In this context, it is troubling that the GOP leadership (with only a few exceptions) refuses to call for a special commission or independent counsel to conduct an arm's length investigation of the 2016 election cyberattacks.

If this dystopian scenario isn’t sufficiently frightening, or if you don’t believe Russia is the culprit, remember — next time, the interference could come from China, North Korea or any other hostile entity with a sophisticated cyberwarfare program. They might target the GOP instead. Or perhaps our future elections will be cyberwar battlefields with (for example) Russia supporting one side and China the other. In a sense, it doesn’t matter who attacked our elections in 2016 — the vulnerability has been demonstrated.

Perhaps I’m being overly pessimistic. But I’m certain about this: We need to understand what happened in 2016, and have a real strategy going forward to defend our elections and political system. Otherwise, our future elections could be decided by hostile foreign powers.

Steven Strauss, the John L. Weinberg/Goldman Sachs & Co. Visiting Professor at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, is a member of USA TODAY’s Board of Contributors. Follow him on Twitter @Steven_Strauss.

You can read diverse opinions from our Board of Contributors and other writers on the Opinion front page, on Twitter @USATOpinion and in our daily Opinion newsletter. To submit a letter, comment or column, check our submission guidelines.