So how should we unpack the so-called Steele dossier from an intelligence perspective?
Russian dossier professional#
In fact, they were more inclined for professional reasons to put them in the “trust but verify” category. He and others withheld judgment about the veracity of the reports, but for the reasons I outline further below they did not reject them out of hand. Immediately following the BuzzFeed leak, one of my closest former CIA colleagues told me that he recognized the reports as the obvious product of a former Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) officer, since the format, structure, and language mirrored what he had seen over a career of reading SIS reports provided to CIA in liaison channels. This is not because they are not fond of Trump (and many admittedly are not), but because they understand the potential plausibility of the reports’ overall narrative based on their experienced understanding of both Russian methods, and the nature of raw intelligence reporting. Many of my former CIA colleagues have taken the Orbis reports seriously since they were first published.
Until we have another more credible narrative, we should do all we can to examine closely and confirm or dispute the reports.
As a result, they offer an overarching framework for what might have happened based on individuals on the Russian side who claimed to have insight into Moscow’s goals and operational tactics. Although the reports were produced episodically, almost erratically, over a five-month period, they present a coherent narrative of collusion between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign. Political supporters of President Trump simply tagged it as “fake news.” Riding that wave, even legendary Washington Post reported Bob Woodward characterized the report as “garbage.”įor professional investigators, however, the dossier is by no means a useless document. News editors affixed the terms “unverified” and “unsubstantiated” to all discussion of the issue in the responsible media. The furor quickly passed, the next news cycle came, and the American media has been largely reluctant to revisit the report over the months since.Īlmost immediately after the dossier was leaked, media outlets and commentators pointed out that the material was unproven. A lot of ink and pixels were also spent on the question whether it was appropriate for the media to publish the dossier. Trump himself publicly refuted the story, while Trump associates denied reported details about their engagement with Russian officials. The greatest attention was paid to the first report, which conveyed salacious claims about Trump consorting with prostitutes in Moscow in 2013. This seemed to complement general statements from US intelligence officials about Russia’s active efforts to undermine the US election.
Russian dossier series#
Taken together, the series of reports painted a picture of active collusion between the Kremlin and key Trump campaign officials based on years of Russian intelligence work against Trump and some of his associates. The collection of Orbis reports caused an uproar when it was published online by the US website BuzzFeed, just ten days before Donald Trump’s inauguration. The dossier is composed of a batch of short reports produced between June and December 2016 by Orbis Business Intelligence, a London-based firm specializing in commercial intelligence for government and private-sector clients. Recent revelations of Trump campaign connections to Russia have revived interest in the so-called Steele Dossier.
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