I was CIA’s top agent in Moscow – Putin has trained to manipulate men like Trump

I was CIA’s top agent in Moscow – Putin has trained to manipulate men like Trump



by robhastings

10 comments

  1. When Rob Dannenberg arrived in Moscow in the late 1990s to take on a senior role with the CIA, the Russian capital was a wild and dangerous place.

    With the post-Soviet state crumbling under the drunken presidency of Boris Yeltsin, armed gangsters and Chechen terrorists posed deadly risks. So too did the unruly security services trying to tackle them. “There were roadblocks set up around town, where the street militia were quite capable of being violent if it suited them,” Dannenberg recalls.

    Adding to the chaos were disgruntled Russian intelligence officers, upset at their beloved KGB being dissolved. Within its replacement, the FSB, certain elements “weren’t under complete control,” Dannenberg explains. They were “capable of undertaking actions” without seeking permission from the Kremlin.

    “There were plenty of Russians who held a deep grudge, and still do to this day, about the collapse of the Soviet Union,” he says.

    One of them, was Vladimir Putin.

    Dannenberg remembers meeting the former KGB colonel during the first of his two stints in Moscow, in the mid-1990s. He shook hands with Putin, who was merely a government official at the time, during a reception at the US ambassador’s residence.

    Dannenberg returned for a second spell in the early 2000s when the CIA promoted him to Moscow station chief – the top US spy in Russia. He had “full access” to every piece of intelligence on the country sourced by the agency’s officers.

    By then, Putin was President.

    “Those of us who served in Moscow understood Putin maybe a little bit better early on than others did,” says the CIA veteran, speaking to The i Paper from his home in Colorado. When the Russian dictator annexed Crimea and occupied eastern Ukraine in 2014, then launched his full-scale war in 2022, “none of us were surprised”.

    Dannenberg returned for a second spell in the early 2000s when the CIA promoted him to Moscow station chief – the top US spy in Russia. He had “full access” to every piece of intelligence on the country sourced by the agency’s officers.

    By then, Putin was President.

    “Those of us who served in Moscow understood Putin maybe a little bit better early on than others did,” says the CIA veteran, speaking to The i Paper from his home in Colorado. When the Russian dictator annexed Crimea and occupied eastern Ukraine in 2014, then launched his full-scale war in 2022, “none of us were surprised”.

    From the very start, Putin’s political ethos was about restoring state control, rebuilding the military and achieving mastery over other former Soviet republics. “Ukraine is the single most important element in that still unfulfilled part of Putin’s vision,” says Dannenberg.

    “I dealt with the KGB my entire life,” he adds. “I understand how this guy thinks.”

    It’s his knowledge of how Russian spies are trained to deceive and control people, sometimes without their victims realising, that makes him so concerned whenever he hears about Putin’s latest talks with Donald Trump.

    “Putin looks at Trump and sees a weak guy, vain, with huge ego,” says Dannenberg. He admits Trump is hardly the first US leader to have a big opinion of himself, but fears the current US President is “incredibly naive” and vulnerable to the Kremlin’s influence, as Putin seeks to further divide the US and Europe.

    Indeed, when Trump met with Volodymyr Zelensky for vital talks in Florida on Sunday night, it turned out that the US President had called Putin in advance. In a following press conference, Zelensky could scarcely contain his bewilderment when Trump declared that Putin “wants Ukraine to succeed”.

    And when Putin later claimed, with no evidence, that a Ukrainian drone had been aimed at his residence – which Kyiv has denied – Trump seemed to suggest he was wise not to provide Zelensky with Tomahawk cruise missiles.

    For critics like Dannenberg, these were just the latest examples of the American leader parroting what his Russian counterpart has told him.

    “He’s being manipulated, in the way that a good case officer like Putin would manipulate this guy. He’s not monogamous, he’s greedy, he’s fascinated by gold – all these are things that, if I were a case officer, I would be leveraging to get this guy to do what I want him to do.

    “When that happens to align with Trump’s ambition to get a Nobel Peace Prize, so much the easier, right? You’re pushing on an open door.”

  3. Trump has always been who he is, but he simply would not be in the position to do the incredible harm to US interests which he is now doing without the ongoing efforts of everyone who enables him. Rather than recognize a common enemy in Russia’s constant interference in our democratic processes, the billionaires and evangelicals instead encouraged this interference simply because they believe it to be a benefit to them.

    Words can hardly describe how profoundly the conservative movement has betrayed the American people, our long time allies around the world, their own voters and supporters, and the basic notion of objective truth itself. It is important to always remember that every bad thing Trump does is entirely the fault of the people who elevated him to the highest office in the land. These people are literal traitors by every reasonable definition of the word. Never forget this, and never forgive them.

  6. I was surprised to hear Trump during his last press conference bring up the 2020 Russian Hoax and somewhat pressing Putin!! Putin definitely got him!!

  7. Not hard to manipulate someone that will do anything you say if you compliment them one time

  8. Putin has effectively manipulated tens of millions of Americans, not just taco. Millions of Americans voted for taco twice, when it was obvious to anyone with two working brain cells that taco was/is compromised in countless ways.

    America is doomed unless taco and every one of his supporters are immediately removed from office and ALL tried for treason. taco is putting the entire planet at risk. WTF has no one dragged that fuker to a jail cell?

    Sure, there are tens of millions of Americans who have lost their fuking minds and support taco to this day. That stills leaves over 100 million Americans who do not support taco. WTF haven’t the sane Americans stood up for themselves and ended the taco clown show? taco cannot be allowed to remain in office for the balance of his term. If he does America is done.

  9. What? They trained KGB officers to manipulate people? Who would have guessed

  10. Trumps been a Moscow man since the 80s it’s blantly obvious and insane that the “right wing America first” could so easily fall for such an obvious patsy. USSR won the long con.

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