Blackmail !

The story of the moment is that the Russian FSB - which is the current version of the old Soviet Union KGB spy network - has the means to blackmail president elect Donald Trump just days away from his inauguration.

That will certainly have the news spin doctors working overtime.  There is credible evidence that Russian hackers penetrated both the Democrat and Republican email streams and chose to release only material damaging to Hillary Clinton.   Russia feared Clinton in the oval office and some credit this scandal campaign with tipping the balance to deliver victory to Trump.

Expect a huge volume of "sources "to emerge from the woodwork with claims that they have information to support this story.  As a billionaire businessman Donald Trump made frequent trips to Russia and as recently as 2013 Moscow was the host city to Trump's "Miss Universe "contest.  What better scenario than the worlds most beautiful women in close contact with a powerful man able to influence the judges decision.

Most likely this Russian blackmail claim will be a version of what is often called the "honey trap ".   The old Soviet Union actually had a school where beautiful Russian girls were trained to be seductresses.  Embassy staff were warned that finding a girlfriend in Moscow was usually part of a KGB plot to infiltrate and gain information.  Any liaison with a Russian citizen was viewed with suspicion.

The old KGB were notorious for involving visiting foreign businessmen in parties that involved prostitutes.  The rooms were carefully wired with hidden cameras and this form of entrapment was used to influence business decisions in Russia's favour.   As always, the purpose of blackmail is to pose a threat to the good name of the victim.

In the past, many American presidents had mistresses.   Even the much admired John Kennedy was courting disclosure as the bond with the media to ignore presidential peccadillo's began to fade.  The liaison between Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky was splashed across news headlines and brought calls for impeachment and it is now clear that presidential lives are firmly in the sights of news investigators.

The Russians have probably badly badly misjudged their target if they think releasing pictures of Donald Trump having sex with a bunch of hookers in a Moscow room will bring him down.  He would probably cheerfully agree that it happened - and comment that it was a lot of fun - and thousands of his red neck followers would give ecstatic support.

Trump won the presidency by converting what many believed to be death blows into attributes of success.   He refused to release his tax files, and agreed he had paid little tax on his billions - and claimed that made him "very clever "!   He even disparaged half the United States population with his "locker room "comments on how he engaged with women - and yet he won over half of the women's vote at the presidential election.  He had the knack of turning whatever seemed reprehensible - into an attribute.

Donald Trump simply does not have a saintly image to besmirch.  He is the sort of guy most people would expect to engage with a bunch of hookers on a business trip - and he just happens to be becoming the next US president.    From the Russians, this seems to be a very hollow threat !