Did Donald Trump just sell out a U.S. asset to Vladimir Putin?

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Vladimir Putin released footage of Russia’s latest hypersonic missile technology this week, followed by an announcement that an investigation is being launched into the scientists who are working on the top-secret project. The main target of the investigation seems to be Viktor Kudryavtsev from the Central Research Institute of Machine Building near Moscow. He is accused of High Treason and passing information about the weaponization of hypersonic technology to the West.

This information reputedly came to Putin from a NATO country. But Hmmm…Who was recently socializing with NATO and visited Putin right afterwards? Wow, the timing sure seems suspect. If we had more transparency from Trump, we might not be asking ourselves these questions, but now it is our civic duty to consider them. Right now, it appears as if a Russian spy, installed in one of the NATO countries, passed information to Trump at the recent NATO Summit, knowing he would then pass it along to Putin in their upcoming secret meeting. This information is not likely something Putin would want to sit on for long, so a week passes and then Putin announces a NATO country informed him of this scientist’s alleged treason.

What would make an esteemed 74-year-old scientist, working in a state-owned lab of a brutal regime, turn traitor and spy? Perhaps he is afraid of the technology that Russia is developing and considered it his civic duty to the world to pass that information along to NATO in the hopes that the West would pick up the torch and do the right thing. Now, guilty or not, he will likely live the rest of his life in the notorious Lefortovo Prison in Moscow.

Built in 1881, Lefortovo is known for being the torture chamber of political prisoners. If Donald Trump is part of the underground chain of Putin’s spies, then he may have consigned this person to a life of torture. If accurate, did Trump act on Putin’s orders because he is under duress, or it is more of a quid pro quo arrangement? Perhaps a bit of both. Also, does Trump’s lack of enthusiasm over NATO center around the fact that this new, Russian, hypersonic missile technology can defeat the U.S. led NATO missile defense system? Either way, we need to have more transparency from the Trump Administration so that we can prevent future disasters in this time of political uncertainty.