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So one of the older members of the Tories, Graham Stuart, has publically declared "We have to consider the possibility that President Trump is a Russian asset.". While these accusations have certainly been made more before, I don't think I've seen it so straightforward from parties that are traditionally allies for the Republicans. Graham isn't the only Tory seeming to turn either, Robert Jenrick (who once said if he was American he would vote for Trump and went to his inauguration) and Nigel Farage are two other examples of traditional conservative allies in the UK who have been increasingly critical of Trump's stance on Russia, although not as far as Graham Stuart has gone.
Which got me thinking, let's set aside all these accusations themselves and look at what I think is a better question.
If I was a secretly Russia aligned president who had been elected while hiding those views, who knew that I could not just take blatantly pro-Russia stances but I could perhaps slowly nudge public opinion of my supporters to be more friendly towards them and less friendly to Ukraine while taking pro Russian action under cover, what kind of things would I be doing and saying?
Main thing, I'd slowly start to split and incite America's international allies. A stable West is one of the main things that Russia is scared of the most. Destabilize NATO, NORAD, ANZUS, etc.
I'd have some underlings talk about how Russia shares conservative values eventually taking this discussion to the big stage and mentioning one or two things we can get along with. Play up the similarities we have with Russian culture while attacking the culture of other western democracies.
I'd continually frame it as a waste of money, claim Ukraine has been committing fraud and focus on total values instead of the main thing that has been given of outdated weapons and technology. Argue that it's just so much money that it's in the US's best interest to stop funding because they're using it on other things anyway.
I'd hide it all under a veil of trying to end the war. I'd direct blame towards the Ukrainians saying they aren't willing to compromise and that they don't want to end the assault on them, say that they aren't trying hard enough to stop being from conquered and killed. Instead of asking who is killing the Ukrainians going off to fight (Russian forces), I'd instead center it on Ukrainian leaders being responsible for the deaths.
I'd slowly ramp up the discourse more and more, trying to make each step seem natural and more of a reaction from the previous. Picking an early fight gives me cover for picking the next one which gives me cover for the next and so on.
I'd start a trade war with allies using classic protectionist rhetoric (an easy cover to deploy) while ramping down sanctions and trade restrictions on the Russian markets. Slowly putting American business connections back into Russia and away from western allies.
None of these on their own is necessarily a sign of pro Russian beliefs or actions, the point after all is to make for plausible deniability. Anything I do will be under reasons (protectionist rhetoric, "preventing fraud with the aid", etc) that ostensibly aren't pro Russia, as I slowly ramped up public opinion to turn on the west and view them as enemies.
The ambiguity and slow ramping is the point, make the callouts start from the radicals to give the appearance that accusations are always baseless and train people to ignore them from historic allies and partners. Make anyone who says this seem crazy by acting unpredictability and everyonce in a while lurching back to Ukraine when the heat turns up, but never going back fully. Slowly cranking more and more to Russia.
So for discussion what sorts of things would you do if you were a secret Russian operative in the White House trying to stay disguised? How would you try to manipulate American opinions over time while not being too blatantly obvious about it that you don't have built in deniability?
And then the point of the exercise, how does that differ with what we're seeing now? Do these actions line up like Stuart says and we should be considering the possibility, or do they not match and it's just alarmism from the Tories?
I think Trump sees Russia as an adversary, but not one he wants to start a war with. The US tried to help Ukraine, but at some point you're just throwing good money after bad. I don't think he see Russia as big enough threat to continue risking war, and the US is too exhausted (both financially and morally) playing world policeman for the last 3 decades with little to show for their efforts. The US needs a reset, because it's on the same unsustainable path (financially, demographically, culturally) that Europe is on. For that same reason, Europe is not going to be a reliable ally in the future, and they may even become a different type of adversary than Russia. Perhaps I'm completely wrong, but I expect the UK state to fail before I die unless they make big changes very soon; it's likely already too late. It's quite possible that hostile groups will gain access to European nuclear weapons during this time.
I am sure Trump has had many amicable and even friendly relationships with bad people throughout his careers--New York real estate and Hollywood entertainment are full of such people. I get the sense that he personally likes Putin, and that he believes (wrongly or rightly) that he can deal with Putin. I don't think that necessarily means he thinks Putin is a good person, or that Putin's government does good things. I think Trump knows that you can make deals with bad people, and sometimes you have to, and you might even like them even though they're bad. The question is not so much whether they're good or bad so much as whether you can get them to do the things you need them to, and sometimes you can. You may not be able to trust them entirely, but moralistic grandstanding achieves nothing unless you're willing to back it up with gunfire, and he isn't.
He and Putin went through a lot together on the same side.
Trump wants to be buds.
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