Did Clinton Pay Spies to Lie About Trump and Russia?
Is the US doing the same to Ukraine?
SPYING on heads of state, including US President Trump? US presidential candidates, like Hillary Clinton, involved in manufacturing false information spread by the media selectively, and producing widespread lies to investigators and courts?
In an explosive development last week, these issues came to fore as John Durham, special counsel to investigate the basis of the investigations of the alleged Russian collusion with Trump, filed motions and indictments related to alleged conflicts of interest and lies by Hillary Clinton lawyer Michael Sussmann and her other campaign employees, meant to discredit Trump (and Russia?) with planted evidences — destabilizing not only domestic US politics but also world security.
In the US, this finding, with what appears to be significant documentation, has caused shifts in the support even among Biden’s democrats. Daily Mail reports that from a minority of party loyalists believing Clinton should be interrogated, the number is now at 66 percent, eroding the already precarious situation of the Democrats and Biden as elections come up.
This is complicated further by the National Security Adviser of Biden for Ukraine, Jake Sullivan, having been a key person in the organization of Clinton at the time of this alleged manufactured evidence.
Many ask if the same techniques of faking information and coverups are being practiced in Ukraine and a dozen other places, bringing the world to the brink of nuclear world war? The supposed “imminent invasion” by Russia repeatedly announced by the State Department and Biden, repeated regularly by UK’s Boris Johnson, is not only questioned by key allies France, Germany, Italy and others asking for the basis of that announced danger level, but even by Ukraine itself. The invasion, however, has not come to pass.
What does the Republican-Democrat battle show us?
It turns out that the Steele dossier that alleged misconduct and conspiracy between Trump and the Russian government was written by former British intelligence MI6 Christopher Steele, who it turns out was writing the report for the firm Fusion GPS, paid for by Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC).
Igor Danchenko, the key source of the Steele dossier, was indicted for giving false information to former British spy Christopher Steele to create the dossier against Trump and Russia, which then passed on to the FBI. Danchenko got his information from a Clinton ally, Charles Dolan.
It appears that the Clinton campaign was paying for an investigation and was also providing the information that went into it, passing the information to the FBI and to the media. Even with many tip-offs and red flags, including allegations by Trump, this information was dismissed and ridiculed by CNN, MSNBC and other mainstream media, and many in government.
Sussmann told the FBI that Trump was dealing with a Russian Alfa Bank. Asked directly, he denied being paid by Clinton, but it turns out he repeatedly billed Hillary for visits to the FBI. Sussman’s source of information was Rodney Joffe, Hillary’s IT consultant.
Sussmann, who was also indicted, had hired CrowdStrike, which admitted years later that they had no evidence. Their reports were mostly not made available, and most remaining sections made public were redacted, which are by a private company and not a national security agency.
CrowdStrike, hired by the Democratic party as its cybersecurity firm, apparently did not secure the deleted emails of Hillary, yet started the “Russiagate” accusations that email downloads were done by Russia. It was eventually proven these emails were local downloads, not hacked by Russia. But the DNC never turned over the servers, despite FBI requests, which in turn never insisted on investigating the servers independently, or those blocking the turnover.
Former director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe had pointed Durham to a declassified CIA memo of Clinton approving looking into Trump’s Russia ties during investigations of her email scandal.
The FBI earlier had investigated the underlying data and ruled out any improper cyber links between Trump and the Russian government, according to the Justice Department inspector general. A bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report said in 2018 that it accepted the FBI’s conclusions.
The Robert Mueller investigation into Trump’s alleged Russian liaison yielded: Volume I concludes that there was not sufficient evidence that the campaign “coordinated or conspired with the Russian government in its election-interference activities.” Investigators claimed having an incomplete picture of what happened, and that the investigation “does not conclude that the President committed a crime.” However, “it also does not exonerate him.” The Democrats and oppositionists waiting for an indictment of Trump and Russian collusion were disappointed.
It appears now the tide has turned in the investigations — against the Democrats and Clinton, even during a Democrat government of Biden. But the mainstream media is unusually downplaying and even disputing the Durham findings, which actually threaten to indict several more players, expose the bias of major media players. Some are asking for direct interrogation of Hillary.
Former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith, when charged with making false statements, pleaded guilty in 2022 to falsifying a document used by the FBI to surveil Trump and aides.
With all the manipulations and coverups, planted information, there are undoubtedly the same games being played on perceived unaligned nations like Russia, Iran, Venezuela, Ethiopia and China, among others — even if countries are not military threats.
The world’s peoples are mostly easily deceived by news and social media, this will always be the case. It is up to the leaders and influencers to develop better judgment and ability to move their nations forward.
This is especially important where the stakes are so high now in the world’s flashpoints in Central Asia and Southeast Asia. The wrong decision or impractical application can set the nation back for decades, maybe cause its destruction, as with Iraq and Libya, which despite their cooperation on de-escalation, and in fact because of their cooperation, were destroyed and occupied.
The Philippines needs special application, whose population has been found to be ranked third in the world in being the “most confident, and least informed” (2018 Indy100 survey). Called the Dunning Kruger effect, or just plain “bilib sa sarili…na walang karapatan!”
“Rules-based order” apparently means, “I give the order, you follow my rules!”
Adolfo Paglinawan served as press attaché of the Philippine Embassy in Washington and to the United Nations in New York. He is the author of “A Problem for Every Solution,” editor of sovereignph.com and resource expert in several news programs. He is a director of the Phil-BRICS Institute for Strategic Studies.
Also published in Manila Times. We welcome logical feedback and possibly working together with compatible frameworks. (idsicenter@gmail.com)