Trump dossier: Fictional or not, Putin is the winner
Even if Moscow is not involved, the US has been weakened and its new leader compromised before he even takes power
Russia insists it had nothing to do with what it has described as the “pulp fiction” scandal swirling around Donald Trump. But for Vladimir Putin, the dossier affair, following allegations of a compromised presidential election, has the effect, deliberately planned or not, of advancing Moscow’s longheld aim of weakening the US, paralysing its political decision- making process, and avenging Russia’s humiliation at the close of the cold war.
It may be that Putin is entirely innocent, as the Russian president’s spokesmen claim. Or the opposite may be the case. In a sense it does not matter. The damage has been done, and for the Kremlin, it’s a no- lose. The unprecedented confusion and disarray in the US is what old KGB agents like Putin could only dream of.
Putin famously decried the collapse of the Soviet Union, which the US played a leading role in bringing about, as “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] century”. A quarter of a century later, having exhibited the calculated patience of Karla, John le Carré’s fictional Russian spymaster, Putin can savour his revenge – at arm’s length.
Whoever is responsible, doubts have been sown about the independence, trustworthiness, and political legitimacy of the US president- elect. American commentators even suggest Trump may be a Russian “asset”. That carries echoes of another story, Richard Condon’s The Manchurian Candidate, about political brainwashing at the centre of power.
The barrage of claims and counter-claims has fed the suspicions of a large number of Americans that Trump did not win fairly last November. Unease is compounded by an own goal in the electoral process – Trump’s victory in the electoral college despite attracting 3m fewer votes than Hillary Clinton.
The Obama admini s t r at i o n itself believes foreign agents, acting for Moscow, worked to influence the election on Trump’s behalf. All the US intelligence agencies agree. That finding has provoked a bitter public rift between Trump, the CIA and the National Security Agency, Washington’s first line of defence and the Russian intelligence agencies’ principal foes.
Since the sources who spoke to Christopher Steele, the for mer MI6 officer named as author of the dossier, are unidentified, it is impossible to know whether the information he reported concerning Trump’s alleged behaviour in Russia is accurate, or was fabricated by agents of the FSB (the successor agency to the KGB). Suggestions that the Russians have sufficient compromising information to blackmail Trump, and that Russian agents and hackers fed helpful intelligence to his campaign staff, are similarly alarming. Thus, true or not, some of the mud is certain to stick – the quintessential aim of any KGBstyle destabilisation conspiracy designed to destroy confidence and sow confusion.
With Trump yet to be installed in office, the ramifications of this continuing uproar are endless. There will be no honeymoon for him. The current congressional and media frenzy is likely to intensify rather than subside once Trump sits in the Oval Office.