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  • American Kompromat

  • How the KGB Cultivated Donald Trump, and Related Tales of Sex, Greed, Power, and Treachery
  • Written by: Craig Unger
  • Narrated by: Jason Culp
  • Length: 12 hrs and 24 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (41 ratings)

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American Kompromat

Written by: Craig Unger
Narrated by: Jason Culp
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Publisher's Summary

THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

Kompromat n.—Russian for "compromising information" 

This is a story about the dirty secrets of the most powerful people in the world—including Donald Trump.

It is based on exclusive interviews with dozens of high-level sources—intelligence officers in the CIA, FBI, and the KGB, thousands of pages of FBI investigations, police investigations, and news articles in English, Russian, and Ukrainian. American Kompromat shows that from Trump to Jeffrey Epstein, kompromat was used in operations far more sinister than the public could ever imagine. 

Among them, the book addresses what may be the single most important unanswered question of the entire Trump era: Is Donald Trump a Russian asset? 

The answer, American Kompromat says, is yes, and it supports that conclusion backs with the first richly detailed narrative on how the KGB allegedly first “spotted” Trump as a potential asset, how they cultivated him as an asset, arranged his first trip to Moscow, and pumped him full of KGB talking points that were published in three of America’s most prestigious newspapers.

Among its many revelations, American Kompromat reports for the first time that:

  • According to Yuri Shvets, a former major in the KGB, Trump first did business over forty years ago with a Manhattan electronics store co-owned by a Soviet émigré. Trump’s decision to do business there triggered protocols through which the Soviet spy agency began efforts to cultivate Trump as an asset, thus launching a decades-long “relationship” of mutual benefit to Russia and Trump, from real estate to real power. 
  • Trump’s invitation to Moscow in 1987 was billed as a preliminary scouting trip for a hotel, but according to Shvets, was actually initiated by a high-level KGB official, General Ivan Gromakov. These sorts of trips were usually arranged for "deep development," even if the potential asset was unaware of it.
  • Before Trump’s first trip to Moscow, he met with Natalia Dubinina, who worked at the United Nations library in a vital position usually reserved as a cover for KGB operatives.
  • In 1987, according to Shvets, the KGB circulated an internal cable hailing the successful execution of an active measure by a newly cultivated American asset who took out full page ads in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Boston Globe promoting policies promoted by the KGB. The ads had been taken out by Donald Trump, who, Shvets said, would become a “special unofficial contact” for the KGB, that is, an intelligence asset.

A number of America’s highest national security officials have said they believe Trump is a Russian asset, but neither the Mueller Report nor the numerous congressional investigations throughout Trump’s presidency pursued that vital question. American Kompromat does.

In addition to exploring Trump’s ties to the KGB, American Kompromat shows that Russian kompromat operations documented the darkest secrets of the most powerful people in the world and transformed those secrets into potent weapons. It also reveals:

  • How Jeffrey Epstein and Trump jostled for influence and financial supremacy for years. A college dropout let go from his prep school teaching job, Epstein became a millionaire in part with the help of Ghislaine Maxwell’s father—media tycoon Robert Maxwell, who allegedly served as a Soviet and Israeli spy and likely gave Epstein a sum estimated between $10 and $20 million before his death in 1991. 
  • How the Jeffrey Epstein-Ghislaine Maxwell sex-trafficking operation provided a source and marketplace for sexual kompromat—dirty secrets of the richest and most powerful men in the world. Epstein knew that a multimillionaire—or future leader—caught committing adultery is nothing compared to getting caught on video in the act with a minor. 
  • How the Epstein-Maxwell ring helped enable young women with possible ties to Russian intelligence to gain access to the highest levels of Silicon Valley and the worlds of artificial intelligence, supercomputers, and the internet. This, at a time when Vladimir Putin has asserted, “Whoever becomes the leader in this sphere [artificial intelligence] will become the ruler of the world.”
  • How Epstein had ties to Russia through sex-trafficking. Epstein partnered with Jean-Luc Brunel, head of MC2 modeling agency and a major sex trafficker, who, in turn, had worked with Peter Listerman, the celebrated procurer, or “matchmaker” as he prefers, for Russian oligarchs. 
©2021 Craig Unger (P)2021 Penguin Audio

What the critics say

"For the first time a former KGB employee has gone on record to describe Donald Trump's historic relationship with the Kremlin. It's a bombshell that must be looked into." (Robert Baer, former CIA operative and author of See No Evil)

"By compiling decades of Trump’s seedy ties, disturbing and consistent patterns of behavior, and unexplained contacts with Russian officials and criminals, Unger makes a strong case that Trump is probably a compromised trusted contact of Kremlin interests." (John Sipher, Washington Post

"Craig Unger has just published a wonderful, well-written book. The jewel in the crown is how the KGB cultivated Donald Trump. With assistance of the eminent former KGB officer Yuri Shvets, American Kompromat establishes how it really took place." (Anders Åslund, senior fellow, The Atlantic Council) 

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Un regard privilégié dans l'origine du Trumpisme

Très bien écrit et recherché par Craig Unger et ensuite superbement raconté. Le livre tisse une toile complexe des liens de Trump et ses proches avec les Russes, la pègre Russe, l'extrême droite religieuse chrétienne et la soif de pouvoir du GOP qui transcende et tasse toute autre valeur morale ou étique. Il
est riche en références dans la bibliographie et celui-ci donne aussi de la couleur et de la profondeur aux nombreux événements qui ont suivi la publication du livre .

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  • EJG
  • 2021-03-14

Wow!

I am not a person who reads a lots of spy type books - but I may rethink my genre choice in the future. I am not a Trump fan but I was amazed at the action of both him & his administration over his time - running for & being president of the US. His behaviour was extremely bizarre & yet time & time again the GOP supported him. I had a hard time believing it was just political decisions that kept him unscathed. Even if half of what is been written in this book is true - it is very scary how close the states came to losing their democracy to fascism. And unfortunately - their problems are far from over - there are likely other Kompromats being developed even now.

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Wonderful Listen

The author writes clearly with a sharp eye for detail. This book reminds us that we must choose our leaders with great care.

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