Who needs Russia when you have friends like the CIA?

In case you missed the latest allegation of "Russia might eat my homework", French officials have declared that they "would not accept interference by Russia or any other state in its presidential election, and would retaliate if necessary."

Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault told Parliament on Wednesday that "no foreign state can influence the choice of the French, no foreign state can choose the future president of the Republic."

Par for the course

That's good to know, because according to a new Wikileaks document dump:

All major French political parties were targeted for infiltration by the CIA's human ("HUMINT") and electronic ("SIGINT") spies in the seven months leading up to France's 2012 presidential election. The revelations are contained within three CIA tasking orders published today by WikiLeaks as context for its forth coming CIA Vault 7 series. Named specifically as targets are the French Socialist Party (PS), the National Front (FN) and Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) together with current President Francois Hollande, then President Nicolas Sarkozy, current round one presidential front runner Marine Le Pen, and former presidential candidates Martine Aubry and Dominique Strauss-Khan. The CIA assessed that President Sarkozy's party was not assured re-election. Specific tasking concerning his party included obtaining the "Strategic Election Plans" of the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP); schisms or alliances developing in the UMP elite; private UMP reactions to Sarkozy's campaign stratagies; discussions within the UMP on any "perceived vulnerabilities to maintaining power" after the election; efforts to change the party's ideological mission; and discussions about Sarkozy's support for the UMP and "the value he places on the continuation of the party's dominance". Specific instructions tasked CIA officers to discover Sarkozy's private deliberations "on the other candidates" as well as how he interacted with his advisors. Sarkozy's earlier self-identification as "Sarkozy the American" did not protect him from US espionage in the 2012 election or during his presidency.

Imagine what the CIA is doing now in 2017.

We await France's strongly-worded statement condemning American meddling in foreign elections.