Only long after the election was over were officials willing to explain the full reason for the switched-off video and the secrecy. In fact, the president’s top advisers had received a detailed plan from the National Security Agency and Cyber Command about possible retaliatory strikes against Russia. Some would have fried the servers used to mount the Russian attacks against US targets; others would have put the Internet Research Agency out of action; still more were designed to embarrass Putin or make his money disappear. “It was strikingly detailed,” one former official said.
