Rian Malan Told You So...

The other day, I Was Woken from my afternoon nap by a thunderclap of stunned silence emanating from the United States, where special prosecutor Robert Mueller had just handed over the results of his probe into the allegedly cosy relationship between Donald Trump and Russian strongman Vladimir Putin.

In spite of 22 months of round-the-clock effort by an army of investigators who interviewed around 500 witnesses, issued 2,800 subpoenas and executed 500 search warrants, Mueller had found no evidence whatsoever of collusion between Trump and the Kremlin. On the contrary: the Trump campaign was inundated “by offers of assistance from Russian affiliated individuals,” and according to Attorney General William Barr, spurned them all.

This came as a terrible disappointment to those who hoped the Russia scandal would cause Trump’s downfall. Many Noseweek readers initially fell into that category, but our expectations were downgraded by Rian Malan, who authored a prophetic piece on the subject back in February 2018 (nose221). Operating from his armchair, Malan had deduced that the collusion charges were largely based on a stop-Trump ploy funded by the Clinton campaign and executed by Christopher Steele, a retired British spy who claimed Trump and Putin were engaged in a “well-developed conspiracy of cooperation”.

“It was a fascinating charge,” says Malan, “but when it emerged that Steele was secretly paid by Team Hillary, it began to look flimsy.” Hence the piece in Noseweek, which bore the following headline: “The evil Russians who robbed Hillary of victory. Only they didn’t.”