Among the few givens in the unfolding drama of alleged Russia-Trump collusion is that former MI6 intelligence officer Christopher Steele wrote the Donald Trump-Russia dossier, alternately known as the “Steele Dossier.”
This is the notorious document that purports to detail “Republican candidate Donald Trump’s activities in Russia and compromising relationship with the Kremlin.”
The above quote is from the subhead of the document, titled “Company Intelligence Report 2016/080.” Yet the same subhead hints at a disturbing pattern evident throughout the document: it appears to be written by someone whose native language is something other than English.
The phrase should read, “Republican candidate Donald Trump’s activities in Russia and his compromising relationship with the Kremlin.” As shall be seen, it is hard to believe that Christopher Steele actually wrote the original phrase or much of the rest of the eponymous dossier.
Christopher Steele, or “Chris Steele,” as he bylined his reporting, attended Cambridge University and wrote for the student publication, Varsity. At Cambridge, he also served as president of the Cambridge Union Society, a debating club.
Contemporaries remember him as an “avowedly [l]eft-wing student with CND credentials.” CND is shorthand for “Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament,” a British organization that was particularly active when Steele arrived at Cambridge in the early 1980s. At the time, MI5 monitored CND for its reported communist ties.
As the British Guardian observed in an article on Steele, “Cambridge had produced some of MI6’s most talented cold war officials. A few of them, it turned out – to great embarrassment – had secret second jobs with the…