President Barack Obama put Russia’s Vladimir Putin on notice on December 16, that the U.S. might use offensive cyber muscle to retaliate for interfering in the U.S. presidential election.

Obama declared, “Whatever they do to us, we can potentially do to them”. Caught in the middle of a post-election controversy over Russian hacking, Obama has defended strongly his administration’s response. This included his refusal before the voting to ascribe motive to discuss the effect it might have had. U.S. intelligence assessments said that it had been aimed at the part on helping Donald Trump to defeat Hillary Clinton, and some Democrats.

Though Obama had avoided criticizing President-elect Trump by name, he called out Republicans who according him had failed even now to acknowledge the seriousness of Russia’s involvement in U.S. elections.

US will retaliate against Russian hacking: Obama

Obama expressed his bewilderment about GOP lawmakers and voters who said that they had approved of Putin. Obama said that without these changes, U.S. will be vulnerable to foreign influence.

Obama said as he closed out the year at a White House news conference, “Ronald Reagan would roll over in his grave,”He left afterwards for the family’s annual vacation in Hawaii.

Obama refused to state that Putin explicitly knew about the email hacking that roiled the presidential race, but he left no doubt that whom he felt was responsible.

He said that “not much happens in Russia without Vladimir Putin” and repeated one U.S. intelligence assessment “that this happened at the highest levels of the Russian government.”

By Prakriti Neogi