emptywheel

Yeah, it's that larger point. If Akhmetshin was in on the loop on the dossier, in any way, there's a very good chance RU knew of and poisoned the dossier from the start. Which is consistent w/what Harding said abt Steele's sources.

Wait, what? What did Harding say? That they knew? I know he said something like "only one of them knew of Steele directly"... Is that what you mean? You think that person was Source D or his intermediary?

https://www.emptywheel.net/2017/11/25/how-did-christopher-steele-collect-information-after-sources-dried-up/ …

Possible that Akhmetshin could have learned of the dossier from Simpson, since "Simpson and Akhmetshin were in contact and have known each other for a long time, people with direct knowledge of the relationship told me." But it doesn't seem Akhmetshin was an intermediary.

Unless you think the article's sources are lying. Which is remotely possible, but it's not something I am willing to assume without good reason.

Agree that far.

"The committee cannot really decide the credibility of the dossier without understanding things like who paid for it, who are your source and sub-sources, though we have been incredibly... enlightened, in our ability to rebuild backwards the Steele Dossier up to a certain date"