Spies and lies

There are two Trump-Russia ‘conspiracies’. In one, the US President is bought or blackmailed by the Kremlin. In the other, the FBI and the intelligences agencies — the ‘deep state’ — commit a monstrous abuse of power to try to overturn the election result. The first conspiracy is described in the ‘dossier’ written by a former British intelligence officer, Christopher Steele; the second, in a series of memos and leaks over the past week, from Congressional Republicans defending Donald Trump.

They accuse Steele of setting out to destroy Trump for money. They want to see him prosecuted for ‘lying’ to the FBI about his contacts with journalists. They say the FBI used Steele’s information to get a surveillance warrant from the US secret intelligence court without telling the court he was being paid by the Democrats. They support the President’s claim that the Obama administration broke the law to spy on his campaign: ‘Obama tapped my phones!’ The real collusion, they say, was not between Trump and Russia, but between Clinton loyalists in the FBI.

I have spoken to a number of people with first-hand knowledge of how the dossier was compiled. Almost all, for various reasons, must remain anonymous, but here is their account of what happened. It is the case for Steele’s defence.

When Christopher Steele began investigating Trump and Russia, in June 2016, he thought he would be looking for financial connections. He set about asking his contacts if the Kremlin had funded Trump in any way. He was taken aback when he received intelligence of a bizarre incident. One of his informants spoke about Trump being filmed watching prostitutes urinate on a bed once used by the Obamas in the Ritz-Carlton in Moscow. This was the now notorious story of the ‘pee tape’.