American Kompromat: how the KGB cultivated Donald Trump and related tales of sex, greed, power, and treachery

THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. American Kompromat unravels the Russian-influenced operations that amassed the dirty little secrets of the richest and most powerful men on earth. American Kompromat is based on extended and exclusive interviews with high-level sources in the KGB, CIA, and FBI, as well as lawyers at white-shoe Washington firms, associates of Jeffrey Epstein, and thousands of pages of FBI reports, police investigations, and news articles in English, Russian, and Ukrainian. A narrative offering jaw-dropping context, and set in Upper East Side mansions and private Caribbean islands, gigantic yachts, and private jets, American Kompromat shows that, from Donald Trump to Jeffrey Epstein, Russian operations transformed the darkest secrets of the most powerful people in the world into potent weapons that served its interests. Among its many revelations, American Kompromat addresses what may be the single most important unanswered question of the entire Trump era — and one that Unger argues is even more important now that Trump is out of office: Was Donald Trump a Russian asset? Just how compromised was he? And how could such an audacious feat have been accomplished? To answer these questions and more, Craig Unger reports, is to understand kompromat — operations that amassed compromising information on the richest and most powerful men on earth, and that leveraged power by appealing to what is, for some, the most prized possession of all: their vanity. This is a story that transcends the end of the Trump administration, illuminating a major underreported aspect of Trump’s corruption that has profoundly damaged American democracy.

About the Author :
Craig Unger is the author of six books, including the New York Times bestsellers House of Trump, House of Putin and House of Bush, House of Saud. For fifteen years, he was a contributing editor for Vanity Fair, where he covered national security, the Middle East, and other political issues. He was a longtime staffer at New York Magazine, has served as editor-in-chief of Boston magazine, and has contributed to Esquire, The New Yorker, and many other publications. He also appears frequently as an analyst on MSNBC, CNN, and other broadcast outlets. Unger has written about the Trump-Russia scandal for The New Republic, Vanity Fair, and The Washington Post. He is a graduate of Harvard University and lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Review :
‘For the first time a former KGB employee has gone on record to describe Donald Trump's historic relationship with the Kremlin. It's a bombshell that must be looked into.’ ‘Trump's loyalty to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin was deeper and more insidious than merely envying his wealth and power. America has removed Putin's puppet from the White House, but the KGB man who controlled him is still in the Kremlin, eager to repeat the success of his greatest operation: President Trump. Read Craig Unger to understand why the danger to American democracy is far from over.’ ‘By compiling decades of Trump's seedy ties, disturbing and consistent patterns of behaviour, and unexplained contacts with Russian officials and criminals, Unger makes a strong case that Trump is probably a compromised trusted contact of Kremlin interests.’ ‘Craig Unger has just published a wonderful, well-written book. The jewel in the crown is how the KGB cultivated Donald Trump. With assistance of the eminent former KGB officer Yuri Shvets, American Kompromat establishes how it really took place.’ ‘A must-read. The gun's not quite smoking, but the barrel's plenty hot, and there are Russian shell casings all around.’ ‘Unger shows how the most powerful people in the world use kompromat — Russian for compromising information — to further their political goals. Think Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein, Russians and Israelis — and ask how they get this information.’ ‘Make[s] the unassailable case that Donald J. Trump has been cultivated by Soviet and Russian leaders.’ ‘Craig Unger, who gave us the important books House of Bush, House of Saud and The Fall of the House of Bush, once again delivers. Unger probes the matter deeply. Indeed, the entire book is meant to serve as the counter-intelligence investigation that was promised by the Mueller report, but which failed to materialise. Among many useful aspects of this book, American Kompromat provides a detailed retelling of that particular disappointment and highlights the role that Attorney General William Barr played in lying to the American public about Mueller’s work.’ ‘Unger has compiled a mountain of fascinating information, revealing how dark forces, working behind the scenes, attempted to use potentially compromising acts that threatened to drag potential targets down the rabbit hole of betrayal, all in an effort to control our politics. [A] fascinating book.’