The Plot to Hack America

Russia is changing Russia’s face and not towards democracy. Karen Dawisha, a Professor at Miami University, told PBS Frontline that “Instead of seeing Russia as a democracy in the process of failing, see it as an authoritarian system that’s in the process of succeeding.”²² Putin is that authoritarian. For him to succeed at the mission of damaging the United States he will use all tools of the Russian statecraft such as forging alliances, but also including blackmail, propaganda, and cyberwarfare.

To Putin, the best of all possible worlds would be an economically crippled America, withdrawn from military adventurism and NATO, and with leadership friendly to Russia. Could he make this happen by backing the right horse? As former director of the KGB, now in control of Russia’s economic, intelligence and nuclear arsenal, he could certainly try.

4 TRUMP’S AGENTS, PUTIN’S ASSETS?

There are no morals in politics; there is only expedience. A scoundrel may be of use to us just because he is a scoundrel.

—Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

DONALD TRUMP HAS LONG SOUGHT to establish real estate relationships with Russia’s wealthy elite. In 2013 he got his chance. He was invited by one of the richest families in Russia to co-host the 2013 Miss Universe Pageant in Moscow.

It would not be Trump’s first visit to Russia. His Trump’s interest in Russia predated the fall of the Soviet Union. Long before the pageant, in 1987 Soviet Ambassador Yuri Dubinin convinced Trump to visit Moscow and St. Petersburg to develop a Trump Tower for Russia. Trump went on an exploratory trip but the business and construction conditions were not optimal for him to take advantage of the Soviets or make a profit. He returned home without any projects in hand.¹

Trump didn’t have to wait long for conditions to change. The fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 led to an extreme concentration of wealth in Russia. With Putin at its helm, the money went straight to his cronies and the oligarchy developed—a premier class made up of Putin loyalists. Russian oligarchs must have very deep, personal ties to Russian strongman Vladimir Putin to get anything accomplished or even to hold onto their wealth. Having a “Roof” over one’s head—a Russian euphemism for sponsorship by the politically powerful—is a tradition as old as Russia itself.

Twenty years after Trump’s initial visit, there was a huge demand for more luxury and higher quality brands in Russia. Trump’s son Donald Jr. visited Moscow in 2008, looking to expand the Trump real estate brand beyond America to Europe and the Middle East. According to the Russian newspaper Kommersant, Trump had considered aiding the reconstruction of the city’s Moskva and Rossiya hotels.²

But it wasn’t hotels or the golden Trump name that won Russians over. It was his popularity as a finger-pointing, quick-firing boss in the NBC television show The Apprentice. His fame on that show brought him into contact with the wealthy Agalarov family. Their money, lavishness, and flattery won Trump over. Aras Agalarov, a billionaire Russian real estate mogul, and his son Emin, the rich pop singer, were big fans of his—Emin even had Trump appear in one of his music videos “In Another Life,” to “fire” Emin at the end of the video as he daydreamed about luxury houses filled with hot women. Emin has been called the Donald Trump of Russia due to popularity, wealth, and his personal relations with Vladimir Putin.^-72

Aras was born in Azerbaijan in 1956. His Forbes-estimated net worth is roughly $1.3 billion in real estate development. His company, Crocus Group, received Kremlin contracts for two World Cup 2018 stadiums. Putin even gave Aras a medal of honor in 2013. As with all things Putin, the medal itself wasn’t important or even valuable—it was Putin’s imprimatur in front of the nation that sealed Aras’s stature as a personal benefactor to the President.

“I have always been interested in building in Russia,” Trump said in an interview with the New York Post after returning from Moscow in 2013. He was also proud that “almost all of the oligarchs were in the room.”^-72

Trump negotiated the deal that brought the Miss Universe pageant to Moscow with the blessing and support of the Agalarovs. “We just had a meeting… we all seemed to like each other, shook hands and signed our contract within a week’s time,” Emin said in his Forbes interview, adding that the pageant would cost $20 million to host. Trump first announced Moscow winning the bid in June 2013. “Moscow right now in the world is a very, very important place. We wanted Moscow all the way.”³