> "It requires you to confront the fact that you have your arch enemy acting against your own people, your own intelligence workers, on your territory, and this

> "It requires you to confront the fact that you have your arch enemy acting against your own people, your own intelligence workers, on your territory, and this is nothing other than a declaration of war." That’s a fair point. The attackers know this. They know US officials may know. But they also figured US wouldn’t make it public that they know. However there are two problems: 1) this still opens the Russians for covert retaliation. Now their officials might start getting fast acting cancers , heart attacks, planes exploding, etc. 2) US intelligence has a lot money to offer for any defectors. Those conducting those operations know they have a golden ticket in their pocket if can defect to the West. I suspect some of these journalistic stories serve exactly that purpose - raise the profile of the issue to hopefully encourage someone to switch sides, hopefully with a bag full of evidence.