Russia has a strategy to enhance its image in the world and to expand its influence in a location it identifies as vulnerable. That strategy involves identifying a vulnerability anywhere and then exploiting it to the Kremlin’s advantage. This practically assures victory. Russia has applied the strategy to its own domestic troubles, charging and imprisoning more dissenters recently t okeep the citizenry feeling uneasy. It entered the Middle East when the region seemed vulnerable to falling into a new era of chaos, and asserted its military weight. Russia utilized social media to confuse, anger and divide American voters, by using its own “cyber-trolls” to further the cause of a candidate the Kremlin preferred. And finally, Russian cyber-soldiers have escalated online warfare by using cyber-weaponry to take down Ukraine’s power grid and disarm many of its government’s agencies, all to send a signal to Western powers that Russia has entered the era of cyber-war. The odd thing about this strategy is it mirrors that of terrorists, who have always identified a vulnerability and then exploited it. Terrorists are fighting an asymmetrical battle, they being less powerful than the entities they attack. Is Russia admitting a similar relationship of power? Or are its actions clever judo moves?