‘Common sense coming back to Washington; Russia not top US threat’ – ex-Pentagon spokesman

Even though Russia is “still a threat,” it is not among the top threats facing Europe and the US, former Pentagon spokesperson J.D. Gordon told RT’s Ed Schultz. It’s important to focus on ISIS, cybersecurity, threats killing Americans and allies, he added.

A leaked document from the Pentagon made it clear that Russia is no longer among the USA’s top defense concerns. The four top security priorities of President-elect Donald Trump do not include Russia.

RT: What is your take on the fact that this is definitely a focus shift, or at least it appears to be, from the Pentagon? And now what does the Trump administration want to do?

Jeffrey D. Gordon: It is great that we have common sense coming back to Washington. Russia is not one of the top four threats that America has. It is not the top four threats that Europe has. So that is important to focus on things like ISIS, things like cybersecurity – threats that are actually killing Americans and killing our allies.

RT: What is it going to take to convince the American people that Russia is not a threat? Or is there some evidence there that they are? Where are these officials in the Pentagon coming up with this?

JG: I think that Russia is a threat to America and to Europe, but it is not a top threat of ours. I think that the US and Russia have a lot to cooperate on, as far as defeating radical Islamist terrorists. That is a huge threat to both Russia and the US.

I just got back from Europe. I was in Hungary, in Slovakia, in Finland; met with a couple of foreign ministers, a deputy prime minister, and one of the things I brought up there is: when was the last time Russians were marauding throughout Europe killing people? 1956 in Hungary; 1968 in Czechoslovakia. However, radical Islamist terrorists are doing it right now. We just saw it in Berlin. We see it Paris, Brussels, Nice. I mean a list could go on, and on, and on. We have the same killers in Moscow and in the US just murdering people. That is what we have to focus on - defeating this radical Islamist terrorism.

RT: Is there a process within the Pentagon that there is going to be a bogeyman if you’re going to keep this budgets coming, and it just so happens that Russia looks pretty good right now?

JG: No, I wouldn’t say that. We have real threats – people are killing Americans right now. And so we have interest around the world that we have to spend money to defend ourselves. Cybersecurity is very important too. China has been hacking us like it is going out of style. We really have to focus on cyber security. It is not just China – other powers in the world are hacking America too, as we know.

RT: Hacking by China was slightly mentioned by President Barack Obama in his final news conference the other day and has been picked up by the MSM that China has hacked, and now they have a stealth fighter, the J20. And there’s a tremendous speculation if we can use that, just like they used the speculation on Russia hacking into the DNC, that the Chinese hacked into the Pentagon and they have the plans of the F22 stealth Raptor, and now the J20 is going to be able to compete at that level. If that is true, this is much more serious than some political hack job if that actually happened. Do you have any thoughts on that?

JG: You’re entirely right. That is much more serious. The level of industrial espionage from China is out of control. And it has been this way for a while. Fortunately, the US government is aware of it – we’re prosecuting people – thank goodness. But China is the one to watch because China wants to knock the US off, as a superpower; China wants to be the world’s dominant power. So we really have to focus on cybersecurity principally from attacks from China. It is not just attacks, but it is also espionage.