Nato squares up to Putin: As Russia beefs up its military might on Europe's border, West responds with biggest show of force since the Cold War

Europe

The FBI said in July that it was looking into the hacking of the Democratic National Committee computer system, after WikiLeaks published nearly 20,000 internal emails on the eve of the party's convention.

The White House and the Kremlin have been at loggerheads for weeks over the Syrian civil war with the US backing rebel groups attempting to overthrow the government and Putin supporting President Assad

At the debate the subject of Russian hacks also came up in a separate voter question about a WikiLeaks document published earlier this month, which showed that Clinton allegedly said in a Wall Street speech that 'you need both a public and a private position on certain issues.'

Clinton went on to blame the leak on Russian meddling, saying: 'We have never, in the history of our country, been in a situation where an adversary, a foreign power, is working so hard to influence the outcome of the election.'

The recent criticism has clearly rubbed Putin up the wrong way, who reacted today by saying: 'If somebody out there wants confrontation this is not our choice but this means that there will be problems,' according to The Mirror.

Both have accused each other of air strikes on aid convoys and civilians.

Though the Russian military said Tuesday the weeklong halt of Russian and Syrian air strikes on the besieged city of Aleppo will continue and humanitarian corridors will remain open even as the Syrian army has unleashed a new offensive on the rebel-held neighborhoods.

As well as a bulging stock of nuclear missiles in Russia itself, Putin is looking to flex his muscles around the world.

Russia is considering reopening military bases in Vietnam and Cuba as Putin looks to assert his army's presence around the world.

Bases in those countries served as pivots of the Soviet global military power during the Cold War.