Topic: WorldNetDaily
Here's how WorldNetDaily describes its favorite ex-Soviet bloc spymaster:
Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa spent decades at the very top of the Soviet bloc’s intelligence and disinformation world, only to undergo a profound awakening and change of heart, leading him to become the highest-ranking Soviet-bloc official ever to defect to the U.S. Naturalized as a proud American citizen, he spent years briefing America’s intelligence agencies on how the super-secret Soviet intelligence world operated, exposing all its tactics, techniques, dirty tricks and disinformation campaigns.
So vital were Pacepa’s insights to America’s security that President Ronald Reagan referred to the former spy-chief’s first book, “Red Horizons,” as “my bible for dealing with dictators.”
So you'd think Pacepa would have something to say about Donald Trump's cozy relationship with the Putin regime in Russia, which include receiving funding from Russian oligarchs, changing the Republican Party platform to remove a plank that supported arming Ukranian rebels against Russian forces and a former Trump campaign manager, Paul Manafort, who worked as a lobbyist for pro-Russian officials in Ukraine.
Apparently not.
The above-mentioned WND article promotes a new e-book by Pacepa and co-author Ronald Rychlak, "Looming Disaster," which purports to reveal, in WND's words, "reveal, with utter clarity, the real war into which Americans have been thrust, as well as the momentous decision they will make in November" from "one remarkable person with the unique experience and moral authority to cut through all the lies, political posturing and propaganda."
WND is giving away the book for free (well, you have to hand over your email address so WND can send you several emails a day promoting its content and various other things), which seems to be what the book is worth.
There's a lot of fact-free ranting about the Clintons by Pacepa and Rychlak, who at one point assert that "listening to campaign speeches of Hillary Clinton, we get the distinct feeling of listening to former Soviet Socialist bloc tyrants."
But what do Pacepa and Rychlak have to say about Trump, who actually has the cozy ties with Putin and Russian oligarchs that they wish they could ascribe to the Clintons? Why, nothing less than an unqualified endorsement:
We are not personally acquainted with Donald Trump, but we firmly believe that the whole of America – Republicans and Democrats and fringe thinkers – should unite behind him in order to defend capitalism and our great country during these existentially dangerous times. The alternative is unthinkable.
Pacepa and Rychlak are taking it on faith that Trump is a great guy, declaring without evidence whatsoever that "I know a few of Donald Trump’s intelligence advisers from my past cooperation with the U.S. intelligence community, and I have no doubt that a President Trump will start a new “Campaign of Truth” that will wreck ISIS and remake America as leader of the world without firing a shot."
Indeed, Trump's cozy ties to Putin and Russian oligarchs are not mentioned anywhere in Pacepa and Rychlak's book, though they declare that Putin was "enthroned in the Kremlin at the end of a KGB palace putsch" and "there is no end to his reign in sight."
In short: Pacepa and Rychlak's book is little more than an anti-Clinton screed dressed up in Cold War-era terminology that conveniently omits the closeness of Trump to Putin and his Russian oligarchs for the sake of an endorsement of Trump by two people who ought to know better. No wonder WND has no credibility.
