Is Putin manufacturing Donald Trump’s psychological breakdown?
Vladimir Putin went to great lengths in helping Donald Trump to win the 2016 election and securing his place in The White House. Putin’s oligarchs laid out enormous amounts of cash for Trump’s campaign while also funding an anti-Clinton social media blitz, and may have had his hackers compromise voting machines in several districts in the United States that possibly stole the election for Trump. The payback for Putin would have been Trump removing all Russian sanctions so he could close on the 500 billion dollar Arctic Oil Deal with ExxonMobil.
It’s been 14 months since Trump took office, and still the original Russian sanctions remain in place. Maybe Putin is feeling he has been played and has decided to remind Trump that maybe he can’t reach him, but he can get to his family and anyone else he wants to. On February 12, 2018, Donald Trump Jr. was sent a suspicious letter containing white powder that they first feared was Anthrax but turned out to be cornstarch. It was sent by a man named Daniel Frisiello who lives in Boston, Massachusetts, who stated he did this as a hoax.
He mailed the same cornstarch powder to 4 other people including Senator Debbie Stabenow in Michigan, who has been vocal about Russia meddling and having an impact on the 2016 election. Was it a hoax? Or was it a subtle message engineered by Putin? Just yesterday, Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump were taking one of the Trump’s family helicopters to New York when one of the engines went out making them return to D.C. and forcing them to take a commercial flight instead (link). Just a coincidence?
On March 4, 2018, on London soil, a former Russian double agent Sergei Skirpal and his daughter Yulia were poisoned by a nerve agent Novichok, leaving them hospitalized in Salisbury in the UK. Nikolai Glushkov was found strangled to death in London nine days later (link). Both incidents are attributed to Putin’s orders on people who wronged him in the past. Were they just vendettas Putin suddenly decided to carry out now ,or a subtle message to Donald Trump about what happens when you cross him?
Maybe all these events, in addition to the Trump-Russia probe, are contributing to even more erratic behavior from Donald Trump of late. The angry tweets of late and lashing out at everyone are an indication of extreme panic and fear with no signs of slowing down.
Frank V. D’Ambra is an author, screenwriter, producer & director who was born & raised in The Bronx in NYC. He is the author of the books Annihilation and The Pledge.