President Barack Obama has said that the U.S. must and will take action against Russia in response to cyber interference with the election.
Obama told NPR (National Public Radio) News that U.S. will respond at a "time and place of our choosing." His comments are the clearest indication to date that whatever response the U.S. is planning has not yet occurred.
Obama says some of the response may be explicit and publicized and some of it may not.
He says he's spoken directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin about his feelings about the hacking.
Obama refrained from commenting on a CIA assessment, reported by NPR and other news outlets, that Russia's goal was to get Donald Trump elected as US President. But Obama did say that "everyone during the election perceived accurately — that in fact what the Russian hack had done was create more problems for the Clinton campaign" than it did for the Trump campaign.
"I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections ... we need to take action. And we will — at a time and place of our own choosing. Some of it may be explicit and publicized; some of it may not be," Obama said.
Obama has ordered the intelligence community to conduct a full review of the cyber attacks before Trump's 'Inauguration Day'.
"There are still a whole range of assessments taking place among the agencies," Obama told NPR, referring to his order.
Last weekend, The Washington Post reported a CIA evaluation that Russia had hacked the emails of US persons and institutions as a way to sway the election in favor of Republican Donald Trump, who eventually did beat Clinton on November 8.
Putin is said never to have forgiven Clinton -- then secretary of state -- for publicly questioning the integrity of parliamentary elections in 2011 in Russia, and accused her of encouraging street protests.
The intelligence officials told NBC that Putin's goals in the alleged hacking began as revenge against Clinton.
But they transformed into a broader effort to show that the world of US politics was corrupt and to, in the words of one official, "split off key American allies by creating the image that (other countries) couldn't depend on the US to be a credible global leader anymore."
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