Editor's note: Keith Lamb is a University of Oxford graduate with an MSc degree in Contemporary Chinese Studies. His primary research interests are international relations of China and China's "Socialism with Chinese Characteristics." The article reflects the author's opinions, and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

As President Trump and Joe Biden faced off in their final presidential debate for the 2020 election Joe Biden took a swipe at the traditional "bogeymen" China, Russia and Iran, when commenting on claims of interference in the election, by saying: "It has been overwhelmingly clear in this election — I won't even get into the last one — this election, that Russia has been involved. China has been involved to some degree, and now we learned that, that Iran is involved. They will pay a price if I'm elected. Interfering with American sovereignty. That's what's going on right now."

The U.S. Director of National Intelligence, John Radcliffe, gave a statement on Wednesday saying that Iran and Russia had obtained voter registration information with the aim to sow confusion in presidential election. Furthermore, Iran had sent content designed to undermine the election.

Traditionally, U.S. democracy has done a fine job of undermining home elections itself without the help of foreign powers. I'm not referring to the fact that elections are a loaded dice where both parties are funded by the same corporate interests but outright machinations to change who gets to vote.

For example, in 2000 George Bush was declared the winner over Al Gore of the presidential election in Florida, run by George Bush's brother Jeb Bush, by 537 votes out of almost six million cast. With such a small margin of victory an investigation was held into voting irregularities such as African Americans being denied their vote due to being on a flawed list of felons and ex-felons.

National Public Radio (NPR) reports that: "There were confusing ballots marked for third-party candidate Patrick Buchanan in heavily Democratic precincts, suggesting they were cast by voters who had thought they were voting for Gore."

The election of George Bush led to the grossest of violation into another state's sovereignty with the illegal invasion of Iraq headed by the U.S. and a coalition of willing liberal democracies.

Of course, the invasion was based on false claims that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction which calls into question whether we can even trust the claims made currently about foreign electoral interference into the current U.S. election.

The U.S. has many other methods to meddle in state sovereignty besides direct invasion. For example, being one of the 80 countries with a U.S. military base blurs the line between being the host of the most powerful fighting force and being occupied by them. The trump card will always be hard military power.

Inciting dissent and staging coups are another favored tactics for sovereign interference. In the case of Hong Kong, the faux NGO the New Endowment for Democracy (NED) funded by the U.S. government for the purpose of regime change was actively funding anti-Beijing protest groups while prominent U.S. politicians fervently fanned discord.

The NED was set up to conceal CIA regime change operations. Direct funding from the CIA to support U.S. interests abroad would naturally be seen as undemocratic.

For example, the neo-liberal Chilean coup of 1973, which overthrew the democratically elected socialist president Salvador Allende, saw Augusto Pinochet rise to power. This coup as documented in Tim Weiner's "Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA" was supported by the CIA.

Iran, as shown by declassified documents, has itself suffered a CIA coup that overthrew its democratically elected government. In 1953, the CIA along with British Intelligence cooperated to overthrow the Premier Mohammad Mosaddeq and reinstates the Shah of Iran. This was carried out by the Iranian military with support and financial assistance from the U.S.

Mosaddeq's crime was that he wanted to nationalize his country's oil that was under British control. U.S. involvement in the overthrow of Iranian democracy led to 40 percent of Iran's oil going to U.S. companies.

Russia has also not been free from U.S. operations against it. With the victory of the Bolsheviks and Russia withdrawing from WWI, but the U.S., along with a coalition of Western states, sought to aid the Tsarist regime. More recently Boris Yeltsin backed by Russia's oligarchs and U.S. and transnational capital bought the 1996 election.

The aforementioned are not occasional "one-offs." Military campaigns, coups and electoral interference are the norm. Don H. Levin from Carnegie Mellon University study into U.S. electoral interference into other sovereign states between 1946 and 2000 show that the U.S. has attempted to influence elections of foreign countries as many as 85 times.

These elections are not just "enemy" states. His dataset shows that the U.S. has attempted to influence elections in ally states such as Italy and Japan in four or more separate elections.

Assuming the evidence is truthful, it's fine to call others out on interference with one's election. However, the U.S. to do so from a "holier than thou" position is truly disingenuous and even dangerous, considering the U.S. has a history of using extreme force based on false evidence to further interfere sovereignty. The sad truth for Americans so proud of their democratic traditions is that history shows that the U.S. is a greater danger, than a supporter, to global sovereignty and democracy.

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