Since Trump has appointed the little sycophantic clown Pulte to manufacture “evidence” Russiagate was some kind of conspiracy, and also since most of the actual facts have already been revealed in open source material, I’m going to describe the genesis of the discovery of cooperation between Russia and the Trump campaign in 2016 and follow it through to an election Trump claims was not stolen (For Trump, a win is always legit, a loss always rigged or stolen).. All of this, and much more, will come out if Trump is stupid enough to have former DCI John Brennan indicted. John has recently filed a lawsuit against both Trump and the Dept of Justice. If Trump has any brains---doubtful---he will drop the “investigation” of Brennan. Besides bringing all the documentation of the matter into court, Brennan’s lawyers will also call those people who were given access to all the documents and intel, and who know both there was cooperation between Russia and the Trump campaign, but also that both John Brennan and James Comey followed proper procedures in doing their jobs and carrying out the investigation. These witnesses Brennan’s legal team will call include current SecState Marco Rubio and former prosecutor Durham. The matter all began, oddly, due to Russia’s shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH 17. Many of those killed were Dutch citizens, so the Dutch intel service---the AIVD---went after proof of Russia’s guilt. The AIVD discovered a hacker group belonging to the FSB. They code named this hacker group Cozy Bear. Cozy Bear was trying to cover for Russia’s guilt, even manufacturing a story that the crash scene was a CIA psyop, an old plane filled with anonymous corpses. The AIVD put its own cyberexperts on it, and they traced Cozy Bear malware back to a building that is part of a university near Red Square. This was July 2014. Once in the Russian system, the Dutch gained access to a security camera inside the facility. The got some facial recognition software from the CIA and identified the men in the room as FSB agents. The Dutch AIVD had penetrated the FSB, and from that they began to learn of Putin’s plans to engage in a cyberattack against the US. The Dutch turned this over to the agency, via the Station Chief in Amsterdam, who then passed it to CIMC within the agency, and from there it was passed to Comey at FBI as well as NSA. This was before Trump rode down the escalator. The NSA then discovered Cozy Bear had created emails ostensibly coming from US Think Tanks and universities, which were sent to various government agencies, including State, the Pentagon and the White House. The emails contained malware that gave the hacker access to the unclassified computer networks of those departments, if the receiver clicked on a link. From there, the hackers gained yet more email addresses, so that they could try to hack new individuals and systems. The deepest penetration was made into the Dept of State, because Putin hoped to gain intel on a person he hated, Hillary Clinton. The NSA, following Cozy Bear, discovered that the FSB controlled a large number of servers located all over the world, servers used for spoofing, spearfishing and hacking. By mid 2015, Cozy Bear, now joined by its GRU counterpart codenamed Fancy Bear, had hacked into the Democratic National Committee system and stolen thousands of documents. The Russians made much of what they had stolen from the DNC available to their asset Julian Assange of Wikileaks. By December of 2015, Putin saw how the US Presidential Election was shaping up. Putin said, “He [Trump] is the absolute leader of the Presidential race [against Putin’s enemy Hillary Clinton], as we see it today”. Putin had named a former KGB agent named Sergei Ivanov as the conductor of the attack against the US election, hoping to use disinformation to denigrate Clinton and praise Trump. Putin was particularly angry that the US had been supporting elements in Syria against Russia’s man Assad, and Putin saw Clinton as the force behind that. Putin also blamed Clinton for the fall of Putin's lapdog in Ukraine and the protest movement at Maidan. Trump secured the Republican nomination by March 2016, and shortly thereafter he hired Russian foreign agent Paul Manafort as part of the campaign. Manafort had worked as a registered foreign agent promoting Russian and Putin’s interests since 2005. Manafort’s business partner was Konstantin Kilimnik, a long time asset of the GRU. A few years earlier in 2013, Manafort and Kilimnik had worked to promote the pro-Kremlin Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovytch and disparage protests against him, for which Manafort was paid $17 million. Manafort laundered just under $13 million of that, for which he was later charged with tax evasion. Manafort also had borrowed money for a business deal from some Russian oligarchs, which he failed to repay, when the business deal flopped. In May of 2016 Manafort was named by Trump as Campaign Chair, offering to work for free. Trump was happy because he didn’t have to pay, and Putin was happy he had his man on Trump’s team. In his first week as Chair, Manafort traveled to Spain to meet his former partner and GRU asset Kilimnik. Perhaps hoping to make his oligarch paymasters happy, Manafort gave Kilimnik detailed internal polling data from the Trump campaign, which Kilimnik then passed to the Internet Research Agency (IRA), a GRU disinformation entity in St Petersburg. The IRA then used the polling data to microtarget voters in key swing States like Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania with fake reports about Hillary Clinton and endless praise of Trump. The IRA eventually reached the Facebook pages of 126 million Americans, based on what Manafort had provided. Putin had tasked Kilimnik with briefing Manafort on a peace plan for Ukraine (Russia had already seized Crimea) to take to Trump, a plan that would give control of much of eastern Ukraine to Russia. Putin loved it that Trump constantly praised him, and knowing Trump’s personal insecurity, Putin offered his own fake praise of Trump. (Intel agencies run psychological profiles on leaders and potential leaders and put the assessment into briefing books for their respective leaders. Trump is well known to be insecure and needing of endless praise.) At the end of March 2016, Trump held a meeting of campaign staff. A junior staffer named George Papadouplous said he could arrange a meeting between Trump and Putin via a man named Joseph Mifsud, a Maltese professor and a Russian asset. Papadopolous flew to London and met Mifsud at the Andaz Hotel in London on 26 April 2016. Mifsud told Papadopolous that Russia had compromising material on Clinton such as her emails. Papadopolous passed that tip back to the Trump campaign. On 10 May 2016, Papadopolous was drinking in a bar and struck up a conversation with a man who happened to be Alexander Downer, Australia’s Ambassador to the UK. Papadopolous told Downer of the Russian hack of Clinton and the DNC. Downer reported this back to Canberra, but the info just sat. Downer reported it, but it seemed too outlandish that some 28 year old had such access. Trump was nominated as the official Republican Presidential candidate on 26 May 2016. In June of 2016, Donald Trump, Jr, Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner met with a Russian lawyer in Trump Tower, who promised to give the campaign dirt on Hillary Clinton. Junior, when told the meeting would take place and why, emailed back “I LOVE IT!”. In early June, a GRU entity called DCLeaks, via an online persona who went by the name Guccifer 2.0, began publishing the stolen DNC emails. Already working for the Russian network RT, Julian Assange offered to take any emails Guccifer 2.0 or RT might have, claiming Wikileaks had a wider audience. Assange sent a private message to DCLeaks asking for whatever they had. Someone from RT went to the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where Assange had sought refuge, and gave him a thumb drive with thousands of the stolen emails. On July 14, 2016, the GRU sent a gigabyte of additional files to Assange. He spent about two weeks collating them, and then right before the DNC Convention, Assange announced online, “Are you ready for Hillary?” From that point on, the Trump campaign worked with Assange and Wikileaks, with Trump constantly praising Wikileaks and asking for more. Trump’s friend Roger Stone, who was also a former partner of Paul Manafort, was the link between Trump’s campaign and Assange. Trump always had a head’s up on what Wikileaks was going to release next. Because of Papadopolous, Trump knew full well who had stolen the emails: Russia. The NSA monitored hundreds of communications between Assange and the GRU, leaving no doubt Assange was a Russian asset. Toward the end of July, when all intel indicated Russia was heavily involved in trying to influence the US election, DCI Brennan held a meeting of all relevant agency heads, gathering all the different intel inputs. The FBI had learned that Russia was in the internal structure of the election apparatus and might even be able to erase voter rolls. The meeting was a place to develop a plan of action. Around this time, as Wikileaks began to release stolen documents, the Aussie Ambassador to the UK, Downer, realized this is exactly what George Papadopolous had told him about in the bar back in May. Downer went to the US Embassy in the UK and briefed the DCM as well as the agency Station Chief in London, Gina Haspel. The day after Brennan had called the all hands meeting in Langley, Trump announced at one of his rallies, “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you can find the 30,000 emails that are missing.” Trump knew full well Russia had them already. One day later, Brennan went to the Oval Office to brief President Obama on the intel and Russia’s efforts to sway the election in Trump’s favor. Brennan also told Obama that a deep penetration of Putin’s inner circle, one Oleg Smolenkov, told them Putin himself was behind the effort. SIGINT intercepts backed up the HUMINT from Smolekov. (Smolenkov was exfilled in 2017 in an operation in Montenegro and is now safe outside of Russia.) Obama decided the matter had to be pursued, despite how delicate it was. It was virtually impossible to have any investigation not appear political, but since the integrity of a Presidential election was at stake, there was no choice. It would have been a dereliction of duty for the matter not to be investigated. Since US Persons were involved. Brennan had to hand everything over to FBI Director Comey. Comey took all the intel, assumed responsibility, and began what became known as Crossfire Hurricane. The investigation had to handle uncomfortable questions, such as were any members of the Trump campaign, or even Trump himself, assets of Russia? How much did they know? How much cooperation---besides what Manafort and Stone were clearly doing---might there be? It was obvious Trump knew Putin was out to help him. Comey had to determine if Trump was an asset, a willing partner, or a polezni durak, which translates roughly as witting fool. For the next few months, Trump’s verbal attacks on Clinton mirrored what the IRA was sending to American Facebook users. They were on the same page. President Obama still had to consider if he should publicly announce the Russian operation, despite its appearance as political. He was advised by James Clapper not to admonish Putin directly, because intel had discovered that Russia had hacked the US electrical grid and could selectively shut off power wherever it wanted on election day, such as in areas expected to vote Democrat. Eventually the Administration decided they had to say something. James Clapper and Homeland Security Chief Jeh Johnson wrote a release noting Russian attempts to influence the election, naming DCLeaks, Wikileaks and Guccifer 2.0, but with no mention of Trump or Putin by name. They made the release public mid afternoon on 7 October. An hour later, Access Hollywood released the infamous tape of Trump boasting about being able to “grab them by the pussy”. Access Hollywood got all the attention. The release from Clapper and Johnson got short shrift. John Brennan had even gone to Capitol Hill to meet the Gang of Eight to brief them, asking them to issue a joint statement condemning Russian actions. Mitch McConnell refused. He put Party over the US and democracy, just as McConnell had when he blocked the confirmation of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, because “it was an election year”, but had no problem confirming Amy Barrett just weeks before the election. A month later the election was held. The key swing States---heavily targeted by the IRA, and where a candidate funded by Putin based on Putin’s reading of 1992 (Perot) and 2000 (Nader) had taken votes from Clinton---went Trump’s way. Trump won Michigan by 10,704 votes, Wisconsin by 22,177 votes, and Pennsylvania by 46,765 votes. In both Michigan and Wisconsin, Putin’s shill Jill Stein garnered more votes than Trump’s margin over Hillary. How much did Russia help? That’s impossible to say. What is undeniable are two things: 1) Putin was hellbent on having Trump win 2) The Trump campaign cooperated with Russia and its agents during the campaign Intel from clandestine assets (HUMINT) as well as SIGINT intercepts, identified 38 meetings and 272 email or telephone exchanges between Russians and members of the Trump campaign. The FBI interviewed everyone from Trump to Mike Flynn to Jeff Sessions and others, all of whom denied or dismissed these contacts, not knowing there was proof they were lying. All of this is taken from open sources, including the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Report, signed off by then-Chair of SSCI Marco Rubio, the Mueller Report, reports made public from the Durham investigation, as well as numerous accounts that have been declassified and appear in books and news articles. There is no AI involved. Note that everyone from Rubio to Durham to former AG Barr have said the investigation followed the letter of the law and was 100% legitimate. Durham personally spent many days interviewing John Brennan and gave him a clean bill of health. Also note there is no mention of the “Steele Dossier”, as that played no part in any investigation. That dossier had come into the hands of Sen McCain, who passed it on to numerous people, but it was not considered to be of any value. HUMINT and SIGINT provided all the proof needed to show active and willing cooperation between the Trump campaign and Russia.
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