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Russian Collusion and Active Measures
I spent most of my 30 years in the FBI dealing with counterintelligence. I have been retired for 20 years and have no inside information. My comments are based on facts reported in the news.
The idea that the FBI opened a counterintelligence case on facts that led them to believe President Trump was an agent of Russian Intelligence is an interesting one. What could have been the predication that was sufficient to set this in motion in the FBI? I think it is possible there was more to this than some short-sighted bureaucrats striking out against a person they regarded as a political enemy.
Consider the following:
- The Russian intelligence services have long engaged in “Active Measures,” which are sophisticated disinformation actions to influence or disrupt its enemies. For years, particularly during the Cold War, western counterintelligence services suspected that the KGB was sending us false (perhaps, “fake” is a better word here) defectors and recruitments in place.
- Anatoliy Golitsyn, a KGB officer who defected in 1961, was suspected of being such a fake defector. Among several things he reported that were believed to be false, was information that UK Prime Minister Harold Wilson was a KGB informer and an agent of influence of the Soviet Union.
- The Russian security services must have known that Christopher Steele was collecting information about Donald Trump for Hillary Clinton. It is impossible that a former British intelligence officer could have moved around Russia collecting information from Russians without coming to the attention of Russian security services. It is hard to believe that the Russians would have passed up such an opportunity to contribute disinformation to Steele’s dossier.
- The FBI has fought tenaciously to hide the information on which the Russia investigation was initiated. If the basis for the investigation was just the George Papadopoulos information and/or the Steele dossier, why would they fight so hard to keep it secret? Was there something much more secret that the FBI would not disclose?
- Several Republican Senators and Congressmen have seen the pertinent FBI documents and say that the basis for the investigation was sound. Would they say that if the basis was the Papadopoulos information and the dossier?
- When we try to find out something important in the intelligence world, the first place professionals go is to their defectors and recruitments in place. In an investigation of what the Russian intelligence services were doing in our election, wouldn’t the FBI and CIA ask their Russian defectors and recruitments? Could such a source be what the FBI is protecting?
- Is it possible the FBI had the Steele dossier and found it was confirmed by a recruitment in place or a defector? If the FBI had information from such a source, they might have believed it and that would be the sort of thing they would protect until the end. Anatoliy Golitsyn may have been just the first Russian intelligence agent to provide disinformation that a Western head of state was an agent of Russian Intelligence.
These facts suggest the Russians may indeed be behind the Russia story — not by colluding with President Trump, but by running a disinformation action and, perhaps, a fake defector or recruitment at the FBI and CIA. If so, they fooled CIA Chief Brennan and Director Comey and produced much more disruption than they could have imagined. Golitsyn’s information about Prime Minister Wilson was disruptive but, in the end, most counterintelligence professionals were not fooled. If the Russians have done such a thing now with the Trump collusion narrative, it surely has been the most damaging disinformation program that they ever pulled off.
The counterintelligence world is a complicated and multifaceted place. If the Russians were running a collusion disinformation effort, the situation called for the leadership of the FBI to exercise the greatest sophistication and act with great care. One would hope that senior FBI officials would be sophisticated enough not to be taken in by such a scheme. Director Comey may have known a lot about criminal investigation, but he was a rookie in the counterintelligence world. I doubt Comey was a person who would have enough self-awareness to recognize he didn’t know very much about counterintelligence and his chief advisors, McCabe and Strzok, don’t strike me as careful, sophisticated people.
Published in Law, Politics
At a minimum, symmetry would demand a “Robert Mueller-like Special Counsel” to investigate it. There is much more smoke with Hillary and Uranium One than Donald Trump and Russian “collusion”. Of course, Hillary would set up the structures for “plausible deniability” that the SOS didn’t make the decision. And yes, the Arkansas grifters have perfected form over substance. What you call in form not true, are true in substance.
I think your denials of the Clinton Pay To Play Uranium One Scandal really require a willing suspension of disbelief.
Let’s get a multi-year Bob Mueller-like investigation going to put the screws to associates of hers and find out the truth.
Symmetry. It’s a beautiful thing.
I am saying that the Russians have done it before with Anatoliy Golitsyn who told us that UK Prime Minister Harold Wilson was an agent of influence of the KGB. It is hard to believe that the current Russian intelligence service would refrain from inserting disinformation into the Russia collusion investigation. Further, I suspect that Comey, a rookie in the CI world, lacked the self awareness necessary to realize how little he knew and, therefore, if the Russians did run a fake recruitment at us, he might have been inclined to believe it.
If the senior people at the FBI were taken in then they didn’t do their job and should be accountable for it.
No, it would not. Not by any reasonable standard.
First, there is barely a wisp of smoke on Uranium One. Hillary did not set up the structure of The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, it has been around for more than half a century.
Second, if the Trump appointed leaders of the DOJ had cause to investigate the Hillary Clinton/Uranium One, there is absolutely nothing stopping them from doing so.
Lastly, if they did decide to investigate it,there would be no reason to appoint a special counsel because there would be no conflict of interest.
I think what you are saying is our great intelligence services and their respective leaders, Comey, Brennan, Clapper, Strzok, etc, were duped And, maybe worse, they were all too eager to be duped because of irrational fear of the unknown (Trump) while disrespecting the will and the wisdom of the American people. After all, we’re dumb and they can smell us in Walmart. I have thought that of this keystone cops fiasco from the beginning. And, the bastards should go to jail. I’ve also wondered where our lauded FISA court judges are in this case. You’d think just one of them would ask Mr. Rosenstein to come before him and explain how he presented unverified BS (whatever mr. filter), while hiding from the court the creator of said BS, in order to get a warrant. But, maybe I expect too much of them too.
And a little story below about Mr. Ohr and willful deceit in pursuit of a FISA warrant.
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/425739-fisa-shocker-doj-official-warned-steele-dossier-was-connected-to-clinton
The article you link to states, “Clinton played a pivotal role in the Uranium One deal which ended up giving Russian interests control of 20 percent of our uranium supply in exchange for donations of $145 million to the Clinton Foundation.”
This statement is simply not true. There is no evidence Clinton played any role at all!
I always thought her leverage, and what got her and slick willie the payola, was not voting against it. In other words, she could have blocked it.
The State Dept could have objected to the sale, just as 8 or so other agencies could have. At the State Dept, these decisions are normally made at the Assistant Secretary level and there is no evidence this specific proposal was handled differently and Clinton herself played any role at all in the State Dept decision.
Is your thought that there is no need to understand if there is any connection between the Uranium One deal and very large contributions to the Clinton Foundation by the same principals involved in the commercial Uranium One transaction? These things just happen?
The issue, at the very least, is the unseemly appearance when any cabinet member has any approval authority over financial transactions, especially with national security implications, with countries which are currently paying family members for “speaking engagements” and making “charitable” donations to your foundation.
Yes, I’m sure John Kerry would have objected.
Yes, Uranium One is a nonissue, a big nothing burger.
As I said earlier, there is plenty of reason to be concerned about influence peddling when the spouse of a Cabinet member gives paid speeches to interests with business before the Department that Cabinet member heads. Uranium One does not advance that concern.
Neil, I don’t want to join the pile-on, but your rugged defenses of Hillary and her minions, adherence to the mythical Trump/Russia collusion, combined with your history of NeverTrumpism and general belief in the purity of bureaucrats makes me wonder exactly where you’re coming from.
Your statement is simply not true. There is plenty of evidence (and an incredible amount of highly suspicious DNC media denials – the ‘lady’ doth protest too much, methinks and all). The very idea that those 8 other agencies, in addition to State, under the Barack 0bama administration, cared not a twit about what the SOS wanted is preposterous on its face. Hillary is notorious for rage at staff and controls everything.
It makes this investigator very suspicious. I can smell the subterfuge and criminality.
Hillary apologists on a “right of center” website are like fingernails on the chalkboard, I always say.
My general feeling of late is that Ricochet regularly employs a bit of the ol’ bait-and-switch.
I say again, “there is plenty of reason to be concerned about influence peddling when the spouse of a Cabinet member gives paid speeches to interests with business before the Department that Cabinet member heads. Uranium One does not advance that concern.”
Totally my opinion, but that’s right and some people are for sale and some aren’t. And, in your example, one was and 7 weren’t. The state dept could have objected but they didn’t and funds transfers to the Clinton Foundation ensured that it wouldn’t. Are you saying there were not contributions to the Clinton Foundation from parties with interest in this transaction. Perhaps you don’t think Hillary was open for business.
If stating the facts of the Uranium One nonissue constitute a rugged defense of Hillary and her minions the concept of truth has been lost. Hillary Clinton is an awful human being but not because of anything she did regarding Uranium One. Largely because there is no evidence she did anything.
So where I’m coming from is the truth.
Are you concluding that the described financial relationships did not ever exist?
That “article” is a joke,l. There is absolutely nothing to support the only damning charge it makes;
Mid 2009 through Late 2010: While Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton intervenes on multiple occasions on behalf of Uranium One/Rosatom and the inner workings of the transfer of the sale of U.S. uranium assets in her official capacity.
This statement is made with no supporting evidence because there is no such evidence.
I’m saying, the mere existence of the contributions is insufficient to support the charges made. You would need, at a minimum, involvement by Clinton to overrule objections within the State Department to the sale. There is no evidence Clinton was involved at all.
I’m saying there is no evidence the financial relationship led to any change in State Dept assessment of the deal, pressure to change the assessment, or any personal involvement of Secretary Clinton in developing the assessment.
I may have missed it if ever made available or maybe it has not been publicly revealed but I would be helped a lot in adjusting my tentative conclusion with respect to the Clinton Foundation if I had facts regarding those individuals remunerated through compensation as employees or contractors and for all associated reimbursed expenses.
I think there is an ongoing federal inquiry into the operations of the Clinton Foundation so perhaps some insights will result.
One reason there is no report, is that the “victim” of the hack refused to give its server to the FBI for examination. Now isn’t that strange?
I don’t think it strange at all, considering the potential range of information, both political and criminal, that might have revealed. What is strange is the acceptance by the intelligence agencies of the word of private contractors in the employ of a political party. This is beyond strange, like bizarre.
Is it?
People “lose” 33,000 e-mails under congressional subpoena everyday don’t you know … come on man give the gal a break, she just lost an election to Donald Effing Trump for God’s sake.
Yes. “Our servers were hacked! You must do something about this! What? No you can’t examine our servers to see if they really were hacked or by who. Trust us!”
What? The issue is the DNC email being hacked not Hillary’s email. They are two separate issues.