Summit fawning shows Vlad has dirt on Donald

IT was the moment the scales must have fallen from the eyes of any Donald Trump supporters who aren’t just plain stupid.

Anyone who believes Vladimir Putin does not have a huge amount of dirt on the US president cannot have witnessed the same meeting on Monday.

In a monumentally defining few hours a fawning Trump accepted a football from the Russian leader and handed him everything he wanted.

It was his chance to show strength against a despot waging a murderous campaign to weaken the West. Putin is behind the plot to meddle in the US elections, the attack on the Skripals, the invasion of Crimea and airstrikes in Syria; all aimed at exporting terror among his enemies, bolstering support at home and causing damaging divides abroad.

Intelligence officers who have been on the front line for years fighting Kremlin espionage all believe Putin is capable of and behind all of the above and more.

Yet instead of representing western democracy and choosing publicly to stand firm against Putin, Mr Trump licked his boots and denigrated his own agents.

This was an unparalleled act of treachery by the man who has given Putin the go-ahead to do what he likes.

He may as well have told Putin to make merry with his Novichok and do away with people on UK streets as he likes.

Yesterday a former British intelligence officer told me: “This was a shocking stance to take against your own people. Anyone who doubted the dossier about Trump compiled by former MI6 officer Chris Steele should reread the start of the summary.

“It says: ‘The Russian regime has been cultivating, supporting and assisting Trump for at least five years. Aim… to encourage splits and divisions in the western alliance. Former Russian intelligence officer claims the FSB has compromised Trump through his activities in Moscow sufficiently to be able to blackmail him’.”