How Robert Mueller Shredded the FBI’s Credibility. an article by Thomas Baker, a retired FBI special agent, published by the Wall Street Journal on September 25, 2022
FBI Counter-Intelligence is a special place. It's investigations are super-secret.
After Donald Trump became a candidate for President in June 2015, an FBI Counter-Intelligence investigation of him would be super-super-secret. Only a very few FBI officials would know about it.
This might be the context of some of the activities of Sergey Millian before he officially became an FBI source in March 2017. In fact, he perhaps was being used by FBI Counter-Intelligence in a super-super-secret investigation of whether Trump -- possibly the future US President -- was colluding with Russian Intelligence.
Usually knowledgeable FBI officials might be ignorant of that particular counter-intelligence investigation. They might have denied an FBI-Millian relationship honestly but ignorantly.
For sure, Millian was not a major agent in such an investigation. He was doing just some minor tasks, such as talking with George Papadopoulos.
Millian was not working directly for FBI Counter-Intelligence. Rather, he was dealing with some in-between persons. Millian did not understand who ultimately was pulling his strings.
The context is that John Durham apparently intends to indict Fusion GPS for fraudulently trying to cause the FBI to initiate an official investigation of alleged links between Donald Trump and Russia's Alfa Bank.
In particular, the company's co-founder Peter Fritsch told several journalists -- in a confidential meeting on September 23, 2016 -- about those alleged links. Then on September 27, one of the journalists -- Eric Lichtblau of the New York Times -- sent Fritsch an e-mail asking Fritsch to clarify whether Millian had an Alfa Bank e-mail address.
On that same September 27, Fritsch responded to Lichtblau by providing a print-out from the IPTracker.org website. That printout shows e-mail addresses related to Millian's Russian Chamber of Commerce, but I did not recognize any relation to Alfa Bank.
Perhaps Fritsch had explained that Alfa Bank relationship to Lichtblau and the other journalists on September 23. In general, these relationships are murky. However, Millian apparently was involved in the investigation of alleged links between Alfa Bank and Trump.
An excerpt from "Belarus-born businessman sought proximity to Trump’s world in 2016" an article written by Rosalind S. Helderman and Tom Hamburger and published by the Washington Post on November 12, 2021
[George] Papadopoulos said he thinks [Sergei] Millian was working with the FBI to target the Trump campaign. But two people familiar with the FBI’s Russia investigation said that Millian was not working with the bureau during his interactions with Papadopoulos.
[end quote]
In other words, Millian did not start working with the bureau until after his interactions with Papadopoulos.
=======
Another excerpt:
[quote]
Around the same time [last half of 2016] .... Millian was also seeking to build a relationship with Papadopoulos, a young energy consultant and foreign policy adviser to Trump who had been urging the candidate to meet with Putin.
Papadopoulos had helped trigger the initial counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign when he told an Australian diplomat that a London contact relayed to him that the Russians had thousands of emails that could be damaging to Clinton.
Papadopoulos said that he first heard from Millian on July 22, 2016 — the same day WikiLeaks published hacked Democratic Party emails.
In that note, Millian described himself as a Trump adviser and offered to help explain the U.S.-Russia relationship, Papadopoulos said.
The two struck up an online correspondence and met several times, Papadopoulos said. Millian claimed to be a business associate of the candidate [Trump] and told Papadopoulos that he had connections at Bashneft, a Russian energy company that he said was looking for American investors.
By October [2016], Papadopoulos said Millian approached him with an idea: He said he could get Papadopoulos a public relations contract with a New York firm connected to an unidentified Russian national. The job would pay $30,000 a month, Millian told him.
“It was an enticing offer,” Papadopoulos said. He said he was clear with Millian from the start that he would not work for any Russian under U.S. sanctions.
In the fall of 2016, Millian flew to Chicago, where Papadopoulos was living at the time, to discuss the proposal. The two met at the bar of the Trump International Hotel.
Papadopoulos said that Millian seemed nervous during the meeting. He was pacing, sweating and wearing a scarf around his neck, even though they were indoors.
Then, Millian explained that the job would require Papadopoulos to continue to work for Trump after the election.
“He said, ‘You know, George, in Russia it’s very common for people to work both in the private and public sector at the same time,’ ” Papadopoulos recalled Millian telling him.
Papadopoulos said he knew the offer was unethical — and possibly illegal. “I told him, ‘Absolutely not,’ ” Papadopoulos recalled.
Later, Papadopoulos said he concluded that the meeting may have been a setup — perhaps, he thought, by the FBI, which he learned had arranged for one of its confidential sources, a Cambridge University professor, to meet with him that fall.
He said his suspicions were deepened over drinks during the inauguration [January 20, 2017] at Russia House [restaurant in Washington DC].
Millian, he said, was accompanied by a friend from Atlanta, a Moroccan American music producer named Aziz Choukri, who Papadopoulos said announced that Millian had been working for the FBI. Papadopoulos said Millian looked sheepish.
[... Choukri denies saying anything about FBI ...]
A week after the Russia House gathering, FBI agents showed up at Papadopoulos’s apartment in Chicago to question him about his contacts with Russians. Agents first told the young aide [Papadopoulos] that they were primarily interested in his relationship with Millian, Papadopoulos’s lawyers have said.
"... two people familiar with the FBI’s Russia investigation said that Millian was not working with the bureau during his interactions with Papadopoulos."
Two people "familiar with the FBI's Russia investigation" might not know anything about a super-secret investigation conducted by FBI Counter-Intelligence.
Is it just me or does SWC seem to have just gotten a little religion vis a vis the behavior/nature of today's FBI? I'm not suggesting he's been some sort of shameless shill, just that he seems to be giving much less benefit of the doubt to the motives of the FBI bigwigs in these comments. And this strikes me as no small change in his usual take on things.
I'm wrong more than often enough that I'm wide open to having it explained to me why I'm wrong again here.
Durham is limited somehow, I’m not sure how. My guess is Barr somehow set Durham up to protect the Fbi institutionally. My guess is in the scope of who he is allowed to prosecute. It seems he can only go after non government people.
The positive is Durham is revealing a lot of unbelievable facts, even through nobody seems to be in danger of paying a price for their involvement in targeting Trump.
And if it is an "overt act," then is it also plausible that the SOL on conspiracy charges don't start tolling until AFTER Danchenko is no longer an FBI CHS (October 2020)?
No, the Durham "investigation" is not taking far too long. if you assume the possibility that Durham is 'legit' and really wants to get to the bottom of things, the revelations now coming out further his endeavor. Alongside this, current FBI dare I call them 'raids' on individuals and even President Trump seem to indicate that the FBI and DOJ are very concerned about what is coming out. Let the investigation take as long as it takes. What counts is that everything comes out, and these people are prevented from having any role in our government going forward.
So why this latest on Danchenko? Revelations could damage the FBI and others, and at a time the FBI raids on everybody and anybody are destroying their credibility. Durham should have caved to the establishment long ago.
More on Durham:
https://thefederalist.com/2022/09/15/exclusive-doc-indicates-special-counsel-failing-to-bring-collusion-hoaxers-to-justice/
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/14/us/politics/durham-inquiry-trump-russia.html
And, in the process of looking at Margot Cleveland's article about Durham, I found this:
https://thefederalist.com/2022/08/24/if-this-fbi-spys-scorched-earth-legal-strategy-backfires-hell-finally-pay-for-russia-hoaxing/
Which is an interesting update on the Stefan Halper/Svetlana Lokhova angle...
How Robert Mueller Shredded the FBI’s Credibility. an article by Thomas Baker, a retired FBI special agent, published by the Wall Street Journal on September 25, 2022
https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-robert-mueller-shredded-the-fbis-credibility-centralization-intelligence-investigation-crossfire-hurricane-bush-911-clinton-email-sussmann-11663173014?mod=opinion_lead_pos7
Saw last night, but can't get past the paywall.
https://archive.ph/XqoFD
FBI Counter-Intelligence is a special place. It's investigations are super-secret.
After Donald Trump became a candidate for President in June 2015, an FBI Counter-Intelligence investigation of him would be super-super-secret. Only a very few FBI officials would know about it.
This might be the context of some of the activities of Sergey Millian before he officially became an FBI source in March 2017. In fact, he perhaps was being used by FBI Counter-Intelligence in a super-super-secret investigation of whether Trump -- possibly the future US President -- was colluding with Russian Intelligence.
Usually knowledgeable FBI officials might be ignorant of that particular counter-intelligence investigation. They might have denied an FBI-Millian relationship honestly but ignorantly.
For sure, Millian was not a major agent in such an investigation. He was doing just some minor tasks, such as talking with George Papadopoulos.
Millian was not working directly for FBI Counter-Intelligence. Rather, he was dealing with some in-between persons. Millian did not understand who ultimately was pulling his strings.
The same goes for Igor Danchenko.
Good points, Mike.
In May 2022, I published on my own blog an article titled "Fusion GPS and "the outside computer experts".
https://people-who-did-not-see.blogspot.com/2022/05/fusion-gps-and-outside-computer-experts.html
That article dealt briefly with Sergey Millian.
The context is that John Durham apparently intends to indict Fusion GPS for fraudulently trying to cause the FBI to initiate an official investigation of alleged links between Donald Trump and Russia's Alfa Bank.
In particular, the company's co-founder Peter Fritsch told several journalists -- in a confidential meeting on September 23, 2016 -- about those alleged links. Then on September 27, one of the journalists -- Eric Lichtblau of the New York Times -- sent Fritsch an e-mail asking Fritsch to clarify whether Millian had an Alfa Bank e-mail address.
On that same September 27, Fritsch responded to Lichtblau by providing a print-out from the IPTracker.org website. That printout shows e-mail addresses related to Millian's Russian Chamber of Commerce, but I did not recognize any relation to Alfa Bank.
Perhaps Fritsch had explained that Alfa Bank relationship to Lichtblau and the other journalists on September 23. In general, these relationships are murky. However, Millian apparently was involved in the investigation of alleged links between Alfa Bank and Trump.
An excerpt from "Belarus-born businessman sought proximity to Trump’s world in 2016" an article written by Rosalind S. Helderman and Tom Hamburger and published by the Washington Post on November 12, 2021
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/sergei-millian-trump/2019/02/06/c7465a52-ec19-11e8-8679-934a2b33be52_story.html
===========
[quote]
[George] Papadopoulos said he thinks [Sergei] Millian was working with the FBI to target the Trump campaign. But two people familiar with the FBI’s Russia investigation said that Millian was not working with the bureau during his interactions with Papadopoulos.
[end quote]
In other words, Millian did not start working with the bureau until after his interactions with Papadopoulos.
=======
Another excerpt:
[quote]
Around the same time [last half of 2016] .... Millian was also seeking to build a relationship with Papadopoulos, a young energy consultant and foreign policy adviser to Trump who had been urging the candidate to meet with Putin.
Papadopoulos had helped trigger the initial counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign when he told an Australian diplomat that a London contact relayed to him that the Russians had thousands of emails that could be damaging to Clinton.
Papadopoulos said that he first heard from Millian on July 22, 2016 — the same day WikiLeaks published hacked Democratic Party emails.
In that note, Millian described himself as a Trump adviser and offered to help explain the U.S.-Russia relationship, Papadopoulos said.
The two struck up an online correspondence and met several times, Papadopoulos said. Millian claimed to be a business associate of the candidate [Trump] and told Papadopoulos that he had connections at Bashneft, a Russian energy company that he said was looking for American investors.
By October [2016], Papadopoulos said Millian approached him with an idea: He said he could get Papadopoulos a public relations contract with a New York firm connected to an unidentified Russian national. The job would pay $30,000 a month, Millian told him.
“It was an enticing offer,” Papadopoulos said. He said he was clear with Millian from the start that he would not work for any Russian under U.S. sanctions.
In the fall of 2016, Millian flew to Chicago, where Papadopoulos was living at the time, to discuss the proposal. The two met at the bar of the Trump International Hotel.
Papadopoulos said that Millian seemed nervous during the meeting. He was pacing, sweating and wearing a scarf around his neck, even though they were indoors.
Then, Millian explained that the job would require Papadopoulos to continue to work for Trump after the election.
“He said, ‘You know, George, in Russia it’s very common for people to work both in the private and public sector at the same time,’ ” Papadopoulos recalled Millian telling him.
Papadopoulos said he knew the offer was unethical — and possibly illegal. “I told him, ‘Absolutely not,’ ” Papadopoulos recalled.
Later, Papadopoulos said he concluded that the meeting may have been a setup — perhaps, he thought, by the FBI, which he learned had arranged for one of its confidential sources, a Cambridge University professor, to meet with him that fall.
He said his suspicions were deepened over drinks during the inauguration [January 20, 2017] at Russia House [restaurant in Washington DC].
Millian, he said, was accompanied by a friend from Atlanta, a Moroccan American music producer named Aziz Choukri, who Papadopoulos said announced that Millian had been working for the FBI. Papadopoulos said Millian looked sheepish.
[... Choukri denies saying anything about FBI ...]
A week after the Russia House gathering, FBI agents showed up at Papadopoulos’s apartment in Chicago to question him about his contacts with Russians. Agents first told the young aide [Papadopoulos] that they were primarily interested in his relationship with Millian, Papadopoulos’s lawyers have said.
[end quote]
"Papadopoulos said that he first heard from Millian on July 22, 2016 — the same day WikiLeaks published hacked Democratic Party emails."
That is a remarkable coincidence.
"... two people familiar with the FBI’s Russia investigation said that Millian was not working with the bureau during his interactions with Papadopoulos."
Two people "familiar with the FBI's Russia investigation" might not know anything about a super-secret investigation conducted by FBI Counter-Intelligence.
"In other words, Millian did not start working with the bureau until after his interactions with Papadopoulos."
Was Millian working for Steele or Danchenko before he began working for the FBI?
"He [Millian] was pacing, sweating and wearing a scarf around his neck, even though they were indoors."
In other words, Millian was recording this conversation with Papadopoulos.
Is it just me or does SWC seem to have just gotten a little religion vis a vis the behavior/nature of today's FBI? I'm not suggesting he's been some sort of shameless shill, just that he seems to be giving much less benefit of the doubt to the motives of the FBI bigwigs in these comments. And this strikes me as no small change in his usual take on things.
I'm wrong more than often enough that I'm wide open to having it explained to me why I'm wrong again here.
Overton Window on the fbi is changing. Michael Godwin’s column is another example.
https://nypost.com/2022/09/14/merrick-garland-stars-in-joe-bidens-the-godfather-part-iv/
Durham is limited somehow, I’m not sure how. My guess is Barr somehow set Durham up to protect the Fbi institutionally. My guess is in the scope of who he is allowed to prosecute. It seems he can only go after non government people.
The positive is Durham is revealing a lot of unbelievable facts, even through nobody seems to be in danger of paying a price for their involvement in targeting Trump.
Protect the FBI? Danchenko?
This is an FBI that few have seen before.
Could one say that making Danchenko (known to the FBI to be a liar) a CHS was an "overt act in furtherance of an ongoing criminal conspiracy?"
:-)
One could say that.
And if it is an "overt act," then is it also plausible that the SOL on conspiracy charges don't start tolling until AFTER Danchenko is no longer an FBI CHS (October 2020)?
:-)
Hope so.
No, the Durham "investigation" is not taking far too long. if you assume the possibility that Durham is 'legit' and really wants to get to the bottom of things, the revelations now coming out further his endeavor. Alongside this, current FBI dare I call them 'raids' on individuals and even President Trump seem to indicate that the FBI and DOJ are very concerned about what is coming out. Let the investigation take as long as it takes. What counts is that everything comes out, and these people are prevented from having any role in our government going forward.
So why this latest on Danchenko? Revelations could damage the FBI and others, and at a time the FBI raids on everybody and anybody are destroying their credibility. Durham should have caved to the establishment long ago.
They're sending a message. Resist the election manipulation and go to jail. Protest against the deep state, then go to jail. Make people afraid.
In all seriousness, I would argue that demon possession is commonplace among our “elites” — esp among those on the left.