More than seven years after the Steele dossier was made public, former British intelligence operative Christopher Steele can’t confirm whether its most salacious detail, the “pee tape” involving Donald Trump and Russian prostitutes, is real or not. But Steele, who is an expert on Russia, says with confidence that if Trump wins the 2024 election, he would attempt to “run America in the way that Putin runs Russia.”

I spoke to Steele recently for “Salon Talks” about his new book, “Unredacted: Russia, Trump, and the Fight for Democracy,” where he offered a stark warning for all who treasure our democratic republic. Steele described Vladimir Putin as “basically a gangster” who came to power with his gang and is concerned about controlling power and wealth and making sure that his children, and those of his inner circle, are able to inherit that wealth and carry it forward.

That description also fits our former president, who also hopes to be the next one. So it was deeply concerning to hear Steele say that, if Trump wins, a Putin-esque “oligarchy is what might come to America.” The only thing that might prevent that happening is the allegedly solid checks and balances of our system. But Steele expressed concern that those would not hold up, given that the Supreme Court is controlled by justices likely to side with Trump and Republican members of Congress will do whatever he asks of them.

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From a geopolitical point of view, Steele said that we can expect Trump to further undermine our relations with Western democratic allies, while enabling Putin to potentially go further than Ukraine. Steele warned that Putin has “his eye on the Baltic states and Poland” and believes that's where the Russian president will seek to strike next. With Trump as president, Putin’s long-held dream of rebuilding the Soviet Union comes closer to reality.

Watch my "Salon Talks" with Christopher Steele to hear more on that and why, if Kamala Harris manages to defeat Trump, there will be “a very big sigh of relief” from our NATO allies.

The following conversation has been edited for clarity and length.

What first interested you in becoming involved in British intelligence?

I had been born abroad and brought up abroad and I was very aware of the world around me and the world outside. My parents had served in some fairly eventful places — in Yemen, initially, where there was a rebellion going on, and subsequently in Cyprus where all sorts of things unfolded, including the division of the island. Cyprus is a big issue in the Middle East, it's very close to Lebanon and Israel and Egypt. I think my interest in international affairs was obvious, it was what I'd lived. I think the interest in politics came through my family and the traditions of my family. Once you mold those two together, you end up in international affairs and diplomacy and intelligence.

There's a moment early in your career where you have a choice between learning Russian or Arabic, and you picked Russian. Did you ever think about how different your life would’ve been if you had picked Arabic instead?

There are a number of moments, crossroads if you like, including where you get posted to as a diplomat which do determine what you then become expert in and how your career progresses. Yes, it could have been very different, but it was what it was. I feel [in] many ways that I've ended up in the right place at the right time, or some might argue the wrong place at the wrong time. There's a fateful element to this, I think.

In your new book, “Unredacted: Russia, Trump, and the Fight for Democracy,” you talk about the rise of Vladimir Putin. What are Putin's goals, with regards to NATO and the EU?

The thing that's important to understand about Putin is he's an opportunist and he's a tactician, not a strategist. I think when he came to power in 2000, he did not have the same objectives and aims and goals that he has now. One of the themes in the book is that it's our failure to engage with Putin and Putin's Russia effectively that has led to this growing ambition that he's got now, where he's interfering in various elections around the world, where he's conducting a major war on European soil for the first time in two or three generations, where he's conducting sabotage and assassination operations.

"I think that anything that gets Putin off the hook in Ukraine, that delivers at least something of a victory, something of a win for him, would be catastrophic for the rest of us."

His goal is effectively a zero-sum game with the West. He realizes that the Western way of life, the rule of law and........

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