Spooky Season

As she prepared for Prime Minister’s Questions, let Kemi Badenoch consider that Liam Byrne, Dame Anneliese Dodds and Sir Chris Bryant were all Privy Counsellors, yet Richard Holmes and Camilla Turner write:

Senior Labour MPs asked planted questions in Parliament after being lobbied by a former MI6 officer, The Telegraph can disclose. The MPs included Liam Byrne and Anneliese Dodds, both former ministers, and Sir Chris Bryant, a Cabinet minister. They spoke in the Commons after being lobbied by Christopher Steele, the former spy behind the infamous Trump-Russia dossier. They made claims about individuals conducting espionage, having secret ties to Russian spy agencies and having illicit financial dealings. Several of the allegations were later found to be inaccurate. In some cases, the questions directly benefited paying clients, a whistleblower has claimed. Statements made in Parliament are protected by law, and MPs cannot be sued for defamation – a rule known as parliamentary privilege – leaving targets without legal recourse. There is no suggestion Mr Steele knew the information he shared was inaccurate, or that he acted recklessly.

In 2013, Mr Byrne called for a debate on the alleged links between the Kremlin and Fraser Perring, a British financier whom he described as a “not infrequent visitor to Moscow”. This comment was based on a briefing from Mr Steele. Documents suggest Mr Steele was working with a private intelligence agency, which was acting on behalf of one of Mr Perring’s business rivals. Mr Perring claims never to have been to Moscow. Many of those targeted in Mr Steele’s briefings are on the political Right. Speaking in Parliament in 2018, Sir Chris accused Christopher Chandler, whose company backs GB News, and his brother Richard of taking money from “decidedly dodgy sources” then attempting to conceal this through “money-laundering”. These allegations were based on a briefing by Mr Steele, and were later found to be false.

Ms Dodds, a former foreign minister, raised questions in Parliament in 2022 about a Tory donor after a briefing by Mr Steele. She claimed a donation was made by a businessman with links to Russia. The Electoral Commission later dismissed the allegations. A spokesman for Ms Dodds said she had “raised questions in the Commons based on information taken in good faith”. A Labour party spokesman said that Mr Byrne, Ms Dodds and Sir Chris have never received money to ask questions in Parliament. Complaints submitted to the Labour Party, the Cabinet Office and Parliament’s Standards Commissioner have all been rejected because of parliamentary privilege.

‘We need rules for MPs’

The revelations raise questions about whether MPs had been carrying out sufficient checks before making allegations that could damage innocent people, and whether parliamentary privilege might be open to abuse. Under current rules, ministers and permanent secretaries of government departments must declare any meetings with lobbyists. However, no such rules exist for back-bench MPs. Dame Margaret Hodge, the Government’s anti-corruption champion, said: “The Telegraph’s investigation has demonstrated that we need rules for MPs – I would go further to say that a register of lobbying for all parliamentarians should also be explored and implemented.” Lord Young, director of the Free Speech Union, said: “Parliamentary privilege is an ancient right that protects democracy and free speech. But its survival depends on MPs checking their sources and facts, and being careful not to put damaging allegations into the public domain unless they are well founded.”

Liam Byrne

Documents seen by The Telegraph reveal that in 2023, Liam Byrne, a former Treasury minister, was briefed by Christopher Steele before he accused Fraser Perring, a British trader, of being a Russian agent working with the Kremlin. Mr Perring, a short-seller who finds overvalued companies and bets that their share prices will fall, was “a not infrequent visitor to Moscow”, according to Mr Byrne. The Labour MP, who was the author of the infamous note in 2010 telling the incoming coalition government there was “no money” left, is now chairman of the business select committee. Mr Byrne called for a debate in the Commons and urged MPs to stop short-sellers from becoming “another weapon in Putin’s arsenal”. 

A statement was written for him by Mr Steele, who was paid on behalf of a private intelligence firm, Audere International, a whistleblower claims. Its client was Steward Healthcare, a now-defunct hospital giant based in Texas and accused of fraud by Mr Perring. Later bankruptcy filings by Steward show millions of dollars of payments to Audere. The Telegraph has seen evidence that Walsingham Partners, Mr Steele’s management consultancy, was subsequently given £29,000. According to communications seen by The Telegraph, Audere drafted the question for Mr Byrne, and was particularly keen to ensure it named Viceroy Research, Mr Perring’s company. Mr Steele said he had “slightly modified” the text and sent it to “Liam” for “consideration”. The next day, Mr Byrne submitted a written parliamentary question about foreign short-selling threats against defence manufacturers. Two weeks later, he took to the Commons floor and explicitly named Viceroy and Mr Perring. 

Afterwards, Penny Mordaunt, then leader of the House of Commons, raised the allegations with Tom Tugendhat, Britain’s then security minister. An Audere associate sent a copy of this letter to the company’s founder, Charles Blackmore, who responded with, “Top banana! Well done”, and forwarded a message from “the client”, Steward Healthcare, praising the “great work”. A source close to Mr Steele said his businesses had never been “contracted” by Audere and had never engaged with or been aware of Steward Healthcare.

Mr Perring staunchly denied the allegations and said he had never been to Moscow. He was later sacked from the board of a renewable energy company, which said the allegations made his employment “untenable” and could “significantly inhibit” the firm’s ability to raise funds. Mr Perring has filed complaints with the Parliamentary Standards Commission, his local police force, and the Cabinet Office, urging them to investigate the claims and the motivation behind them, but no investigation has been launched. Regulators and the police said parliamentary privilege was a block to any meaningful inquiry. Mr Byrne has not corrected the record or offered an apology to Mr Perring.

Sir Chris Bryant

In May 2018, Sir Chris Bryant wrongly accused Christopher and Richard Chandler of taking money from “the Russian people” or “decidedly dodgy sources” then attempting to conceal this through “money-laundering”. He added that the Chandler brothers’ money had “infected our country’s political system” and warned that this “should be a matter of concern for us all”. He accused the brothers of “maintaining relations” with a “Chechen mafia figure, who was expelled from Monaco”. However, the claims were false. Sir Chris was forced to issue a rare apology for making them. He had been briefed by Christopher Steele, as were a handful of other MPs who spoke in Parliament about the Chandler brothers. Ben Bradshaw, a Labour MP at the time, called for an “urgent investigation by the UK authorities”. Bob Seely, a Tory MP at the time, claimed Mr Chandler could be “vulnerable to malign influence”. 

Claims about the Chandlers were first made in a written report in 2002 by Donald Berlin, an American private investigator. It included allegations of “illicit activity” by the brothers, including claims they were money-laundering “on behalf of high-level Russian officials and Russian organised crime”. These claims were false. A source close to Mr Steele said he was aware of the report but did not possess a copy. They added that neither he nor his company had been “paid for expressly targeting the Chandlers”. Mr Chandler is the chairman and a founding partner of Legatum, the private investment partnership, which is an investor in GB News. He ultimately won a defamation case against Mr Berlin and was awarded $8m (£6m) in damages in 2024 by a US court. 

After the debate in Parliament, Sir Chris repeated the claims in a letter to Liz Truss, the then foreign secretary, which he published on X. Unlike his comments in the Commons, this was not covered by parliamentary privilege. After being contacted by lawyers acting for Mr Chandler, he posted an apology: “It was not my intention to repeat those allegations which I accept have subsequently been disproved.” He agreed to correct the record in Parliament, and said he “regret[s] any distress caused to Mr Chandler”. He was required to make a charitable donation of £1,000 to settle the case, instead of a substantial damages award to Mr Chandler. Sir Chris, who has been a Labour MP since 2011, served as a junior minister under Gordon Brown’s Government. He is now a Cabinet minister, serving as Northern Ireland Secretary. Mr Chandler declined to comment.

Anneliese Dodds

In May 2022, Anneliese Dodds stood up in Parliament to claim there were “genuine questions to answer” about whether a donation to the Conservative Party from Sir Ehud Sheleg had links to Russia. At the time, Ms Dodds was the Labour Party chairman and a member of the shadow front bench. After Labour won the election, she was made a Cabinet minister by Sir Keir Starmer. Sir Ehud, a British-Israeli businessman and art dealer, gave £3.8m to the Tories between 2017 and 2020, making him one of their main donors. He was appointed Conservative Party treasurer in 2019 and spent two years in the role before stepping down. 

Ms Dodds asked a series of questions about Sir Ehud in Parliament, some based on an article published days earlier in the New York Times that alleged Sir Ehud received a substantial gift from Sergei Kopytov, his father-in-law, before donating to the Tories. However, some of Ms Dodds’s questions appeared to be based on new information that had not previously been in the public domain. These included questions about a Mercedes car apparently used by individuals involved in the Russian state, and the Sheleg-Kopytov family’s alleged connections to the Russian state. Ms Dodds claimed in Parliament that Mr Kopytov was a “former senior pro-Kremlin politician in Ukraine”. She then asked whether electoral law had been broken and whether Britain’s national security had been compromised.

Sir Ehud’s spokesman said the claims were false. They said Mr Kopyotov was “a Ukrainian victim and ... no Putin ‘ally’” who had sought refuge in the Czech Republic after losing his civil service job when the Russians annexed Crimea. The Russians planned to seize and nationalise his assets. The spokesman added: “Mr Kopytov has not made a donation to the Conservative Party, whether through Sir Ehud or by any other means. It’s completely untrue.” The Electoral Commission examined the allegations and concluded there was “no evidence that the party has committed an offence”, so it would not investigate.

Before Ms Dodds raised these issues in Parliament, she met Christopher Steele in her parliamentary office, where he presented her with research on Sir Ehud. This research included claims about the Mercedes. Documents seen by The Telegraph reveal that in early 2022, Mr Steele contacted one of his most trusted researchers about a particularly “sensitive” assignment: “The subject/target of interest is Sir Ehud Sheleg or, more specifically, his possibly Russian or Ukrainian second wife (further details unknown) whom he married in 2014. Can you identify her and any links she might have, especially familial, with the Russian authorities and particularly the political leadership in Crimea?” His researchers gathered information about Sir Ehud, his wife and his father-in-law, including their movements and business interests. The New York Times article alleged that Barclays Bank flagged a “suspicious activity report” with the National Crime Agency (NCA) over Mr Kopytov’s gift to his son-in-law.

‘Challenging potential foreign interference’

Sir Ehud’s lawyers said at the time that this was “entirely separate” from his political donation. The NCA ultimately said the donation was from a “permissible source” and took no action. A spokesman for Ms Dodds said: “Anneliese Dodds has a strong track record of challenging potential foreign interference in our politics. In 2022, Anneliese raised questions in the Commons based on information taken in good faith – the vast majority of which had already been reported on in the media.” A Labour source said that several MPs had previously raised questions about Sir Ehud as part of the “legitimate scrutiny that should be expected by MPs seeking to safeguard our democracy”. They added that the “vast majority” of information that had shaped the questions Ms Dodds asked in Parliament had already been in the public domain.

Christopher Steele

After spending more than two decades working for the British secret services, Christopher Steele now runs Orbis Business Intelligence, a private-investigation firm specialising in Russia. He is also a director at Walsingham Partners, a management consultancy. He came to public attention as the writer of a highly controversial and contested report about Donald Trump, which was leaked in 2017. It contained contested allegations that members of the US president’s campaign team had conspired with Russia to interfere in the presidential election in 2016 and that the Kremlin had kompromat, including a tape of prostitutes performing a sex act for Mr Trump in a Moscow hotel. A federal criminal investigation into Russian interference in the election, led by Robert Mueller, the special prosecutor, did not verify the existence of such a tape.

Mr Trump said the dossier was “fake” and contained “totally made up facts”, claiming that it was politically motivated. It later transpired that Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign had helped to fund the dossier via intermediaries. The FBI launched a criminal inquiry into the report’s claims, which in turn led to Mr Trump ordering an investigation into the FBI and Mr Steele’s involvement. The US department of justice’s inspector-general published a report in 2019 stating that the CIA had dismissed the Steele dossier as little more than “an internet rumour” and that the FBI had only been able to corroborate “limited information” from it, much of which was publicly available. Mr Steele told journalists that he believed the contents of the dossier to be between 70 and 90 per cent accurate, with certain aspects – including the claim that prostitutes had carried out a sex act in Mr Trump’s presence – as little as 50 per cent.

‘Entirely normal and proper’

Mr Bradshaw said: “As one of the first MPs to raise concerns about hostile Russian interference in Britain, I was approached by several experts who shared my concern that the then Conservative government was not taking the Kremlin threat seriously, including Chris Steele, a former UK intelligence officer, Russia specialist and someone of integrity for whom I have the utmost respect. “Our concerns were subsequently borne out by events and the 2020 report by Parliament’s intelligence and security committee which found the Government had ‘taken their eye off the ball’ and ‘seriously underestimated the Russian threat’.”

Mr Steele declined to comment. A source close to him explained that Orbis Business Intelligence had commercial clients and was contracted by them for their benefit, which was “entirely normal and proper in business”. They said Walsingham Partners was run on a not-for-profit basis and funded by donors who did not gain from its work, or from engagement with parliamentarians or others, adding that all of Walsingham’s donors in recent years had been British citizens. They added: “In no case would Orbis or Walsingham provide parliamentarians with intelligence or assessment which we believed was not produced from credible sources.”

Damian Collins, the former Tory MP who is now a non-executive director of Orbis, told The Telegraph: “Orbis Business Intelligence does not engage in lobbying as defined by UK law. Furthermore, in my experience, MPs who have met Christopher Steele are fully aware of who he is and the nature of the professional services his company provides. In any case where information obtained by Orbis Business Intelligence through a commercial relationship with one of its clients has subsequently been shared with an MP, that client relationship has also been disclosed to them.” He said Mr Steele had “considered it his patriotic duty to make such information available to trusted contacts in Parliament when requested”. He added: “The use of that evidence, whether in reports published by Parliament or in statements made on the floor of the House, is ultimately the responsibility of MPs and their decision alone.”

Meanwhile, Kit Klarenberg writes:

Private messages show show Hamish De Bretton-Gordon, a top British pundit on the Salisbury poisoning incident, was a close associate of the MI6 officer who handled the Russian intelligence defector at the center of the scandal — and reaped considerable benefits from his proximity to the case.

This September, a former British Army officer named Hamish De Bretton-Gordon filed a column with the UK Telegraph complaining that “Russian bots” had “tried to make out that I’m part of a security service conspiracy.” Having shot to prominence as a media commentator on chemical and biological weapons after the alleged poisoning of turncoat Russian spy Sergei Skripal, De Bretton-Gordon dismissed accusations that he collaborated with UK intelligence as the product of the “Kremlin’s malign tactics.”

Despite his fervent denials, leaked emails reviewed by The Grayzone indicate that De Bretton-Gordon has spent years privately coordinating his public statements with senior British military and intelligence figures. The correspondences show him training operatives in Turkey and instructing Israeli military figures on Syria’s still-elusive stockpile of chemical weapons, “and a bit of Novichok,” referring to the Russian toxin supposedly used to poison Skripal.

They also suggest he stood to profit personally from exaggerating the threat posed by Russia. In the emails, De Bretton-Gordon described his day job as “flogging gas masks” to British military and law enforcement. He seemingly grew his firm’s business with outlandish warnings of imminent Novichok hand grenade attacks by Russian agents. As his prominence grew, the BBC hired De Bretton-Gordon to serve as an advisor on a drama about the Skripal poisoning.

His principal contact listed in the emails is Pablo Miller, an MI6 officer and veteran of the Royal Tank Regiment. Miller is widely believed to have recruited and handled Skripal before the Russian GRU defector was allegedly poisoned in Salisbury, England in March 2018 under questionable circumstances.

After the Salisbury incident, the British government issued a D-notice to prevent mainstream reporters from investigating Miller’s relationship with Skripal. Despite being an obvious subject of interest, Miller went completely unmentioned during the rolling coverage that dominated British media for months as a result.

The emails show Miller was nonetheless following that coverage closely. In June 2018, he wrote to De Bretton-Gordon thanking him for his “sterling media work” during what he called the “dark days of March and April.” During that period De Bretton-Gordon appeared in British newspapers and television reports on the poisoning on a near-daily basis, consistently attributing blame to the Kremlin without evidence and emphasizing the chemical weapons threat he claimed Russia posed.

The next month, De Bretton-Gordon sent his MI6 pal a lengthy Telegraph article warning of potential all-out chemical and biological wars with “rogue” states. De Bretton-Gordon’s commentary featured extensively in the piece, which framed Britain as a sitting duck in the event that Moscow were to target the country with missiles equipped with nerve agents or other toxic weapons.

When not hyping up De Bretton-Gordon’s apocalyptic warnings of potential Russian chemical weapons attacks, the article functioned as a long-form infomercial for his then-employer, Avon Protection Systems. The firm, which manufactures protective equipment for military, law enforcement and fire personnel, stood to profit handsomely from inflated perceptions of what governments call Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear (CBRN) threats. De Bretton-Gordon’s email signature at the time identified him as the company’s Managing Director for CBRN.

De Bretton-Gordon’s big break 

The Telegraph noted the company’s business was “booming,” with orders “flooding in” from government clients the world over, supposedly reflecting how “a new age of poison weapons is upon us.” Later in the piece, an Avon executive boasted that the Salisbury incident and other recent alleged CBRN usage had “been good for us.” Britain’s elite SAS were among the cited customers for the “sinister looking” gas masks sold by Avon Protection Systems, which were said to be “worthy of Darth Vader.” At no point did the Telegraph article mention De Bretton-Gordon’s employment by Avon.

But thanks to his newfound media prominence, De Bretton-Gordon wouldn’t have to stay with the company much longer. In January 2020, he emailed Pablo Miller bragging that he had “been offered a fellowship” at Cambridge University. De Bretton-Gordon wrote that he’d decided to accept the role because, in his words, “it beats flogging gas masks!” Four months later, De Bretton-Gordon founded a dedicated personal “CBRN and bio security” consulting firm, in an apparent attempt to derive profit from his talent for stoking public fears of looming chemical and biological catastrophe.

De Bretton-Gordon helps MI6 officer avoid media scrutiny 

The leaked emails show De Bretton-Gordon quickly emerged as a preferred adviser for the BBC, and repeatedly served as a go-between for Miller and the British broadcaster, whose journalists had apparently become aware that Miller was an MI6 officer. Correspondence from November 2018 shows De Bretton-Gordon was also rewarded for his relentless media appearances with a position as a “senior CBRN mentor” in Britain’s Ministry of Defence. Though the work was unpaid, he received an MOD ID card and Ministry railcard, saving him substantial sums on train travel. De Bretton-Gordon wrote Miller to inform him of his new title, noting that he was currently advising the BBC on what he derided as “CBRN ‘pisch’” for a forthcoming “drama on Salisbury.”

“I’ve been asked by the writer if you would be interested in contributing,” he mentioned to Miller, adding that he’d told the British broadcasters that the spy was unlikely to agree. The MI6 veteran responded, “you correctly guessed my answer to the BBC question… it would not be appropriate for me to comment in public on the issue.” Miller lamented that the British state broadcaster’s cognizance of his clandestine involvement with Skripal indicated his “true professional provenance” had “long ceased to be much of a secret.” But he wished De Bretton-Gordon good luck, telling his colleague that he was sure the drama would succeed given his “expert guidance.”

The next January, De Bretton-Gordon explicitly described Skripal as Miller’s friend when forwarding him a Forces News article on the removal of the roof of the Russian defector’s former home, excitedly informing him, “I see your mate is in the news again!” De Bretton-Gordon was quoted liberally in the report, explaining it was necessary to remove the roof as it had allegedly accumulated “enough Novichok to kill thousands of people.” The chemical warrior claimed British authorities were now “much better prepared to deal” with future CBRN attacks in the aftermath of the incident. 

Weeks later, De Bretton-Gordon emailed Miller to warn him Salisbury “will be awash with journos” on the March 4 anniversary of Skripal’s poisoning. In response, Miller thanked his friend for the “heads-up,” and wrote that he’d likely be leaving the country to ensure he was far away from the city while it filled up with reporters. 

The correspondence also reveals how close the two men had become, and how their relationship had begun to blur into commercial territory. In October 2019, Miller asked De Bretton-Gordon to help publicize a Kickstarter for his daughter’s theatre production — a personal favor suggesting a friendship rather than a purely professional engagement. But Miller refused to let media contacts anywhere near it, explaining that following the Salisbury incident his daughters were forced to close their social media accounts after being relentlessly hounded by the press. 

During the same exchange, De Bretton-Gordon reminded Miller he’d been contracted for an upcoming BBC drama on Salisbury, and once again offered him a role. Miller declined, saying he was firmly opposed to playing “any part for any BBC show. Ever.” De Bretton-Gordon defended his participation in the project by revealing that the MOD had specifically requested he “help on the Salisbury piece… to make sure the military bit looks right.”  The production in question was a three-part BBC One series that aired in 2020 called “The Salisbury Poisonings.” The project’s IMDB page lists De Bretton-Gordon as a “military advisor.”

De Bretton-Gordon wants critics “prosecuted for treason” 

As The Grayzone previously revealed, De Bretton-Gordon played a deeply malign, multifaceted role throughout the Syrian dirty war. On top of endless media appearances as a bogus “expert” on CBRN matters, he was part of a covert MI6 effort to smuggle soil samples out of opposition-controlled areas in an effort to prove the Syrian government used chemical weapons. A report on this initiative in the Mirror tabloid made clear the purpose of British intelligence was prodding the US into military intervention against Assad.

It seems plausible whatever samples De Bretton-Gordon gathered in Syria were concocted, perhaps by his own hand. He provided evidence to a number of official investigations into purported chemical attacks during the conflict. In at least one instance – an OPCW/UN Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM) probe into an alleged April 2014 toxic gas strike in Talmenes – videos submitted by an opaque NGO De Bretton-Gordon founded called CBRN Taskforce were found to show clear signs of falsification. 

De Bretton-Gordon’s communications with his spy buddy contain references to him visiting Turkey, “to do a bit of training.” The country was the central hub for MI6 and CIA operations during the dirty war on Syria. It is an open question whether his training sessions covered staging chemical weapons attacks, and if other states in the region were taught in this dark art.

The self-styled CBRN expert also bragged about sharing his purported expertise with the Israeli military. In an email sent in December of 2018 De Bretton-Gordon boasted to Miller that he’d just returned “from Israel,” where he said he’d been “briefing the IDF (and no doubt others!) on Syrian [chemical weapons] and a bit of Novichok.” He was clearly impressed by the Israelis, crowing, “Those boys don’t mess about!” De Bretton-Gordon’s work overseas was apparently taking a toll on his day job, however. In an email that month to Miller, he explained how he was “always on the edge of sacking with all my ‘extra’ activities.” These machinations also put him in conflict with Peter Ford, Britain’s ambassador to Syria from 2003 to 2006, who’d become an outspoken critic of the dirty war against Damascus.

After De Bretton-Gordon authored an op-ed for The Telegraph in May 2019 demanding the West intervene to prevent Syrian government forces from recapturing Syria’s Idlib, Ford issued a response nailing his failure to acknowledge that the province was at the time under the control of the MI6-supported Al Qaeda affiliate, Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham. In response, De Bretton-Gordon emailed Miller a note deriding Ford as a “complete See You Next Tuesday” who parroted “Assad and Putin propaganda.” He called for Ford – and the members of a now-defunct collective of antiwar academics known as the Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media – to be “prosecuted for treason.” De Bretton-Gordon seemed particularly piqued that the academic collective had poked holes in the narrative he’d spun about Syrian chemical attacks.

De Bretton-Gordon cheers as his enemies “exposed” 

In August that year, De Bretton-Gordon contacted Miller to celebrate The Times publishing a hit piece on David Miller, a member of the Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media. “Glad to see that some of Assad’s and Putin’s ‘useful idiots’ who try and give me a hard time are being exposed,” De Bretton-Gordon cheered, before suggesting “must get more of them out in the open.” This prompted a wider discussion about the so-called “stooges” who publicly challenged established, MI6-approved media narratives on Syria and Russia.

For his part, Pablo Miller expressed disgust over a recent “fawning evaluation” of Putin’s 20 years in power by dissident journalist Mary Dejevsky. Miller derided Dejevsky as one of many media figures who foolishly believed “Putin was the answer to Russia’s woes,” and suggested without evidence that she was likely “taking Moscow gold.” Thankfully, he added, events “Crimea, Syria, and Salisbury” had managed to “wake the twits up.”

The slanted manner in which these events were framed in the media did indeed coincide with a perceptibly negative shift in public sentiment towards Russia throughout the West, helping make a world-threatening standoff with Moscow a fait accompli. At every step, De Bretton-Gordon and other intelligence-aligned commentators acted as military and intelligence propagandists, ensuring the media and popular culture was constantly deluged with paranoia over a multi-spectrum Russian “threat.” Those who question the narrative are denigrated as “useful idiots,” and much worse.

This August 6, De Bretton-Gordon based an entire op-ed for The Telegraph on a conversation he’d recently had with an unnamed “Western intelligence officer” of his acquaintance. Could that anonymous spy have been Pablo Miller? The self-styled chemical warfare expert was clearly not keen to discuss his relationship with the MI6 man. De Bretton-Gordon immediately hung up the phone when I reached him and identified myself as a journalist.