News today that you should take President Bush's look into the soul of Russian President Vladimir Putin and that whole "trust" thing with a heaping dose of skepticism.

The Russian government had sources inside the American military command as the U.S. mounted the invasion of Iraq, and the Russians passed information to Saddam Hussein on troop movements and plans, according to Iraqi documents released as part of a Pentagon report.

The Russians relayed information to Saddam during the opening days of the 2003 war, including a crucial moment before the assault on Baghdad, according to the documents in the report Friday.

The unclassified report does not assess the value of the information or provide details beyond citing two captured Iraqi documents that say the Russians collected information from sources "inside the American Central Command" and that battlefield intelligence was provided to Saddam through the Russian ambassador in Baghdad.

We can trust Great Britain, Australia and maybe the Poles -- and that's it. Putin's Russia is little better than the one Gorbachev left more than a decade ago. Russia can no longer compete with the United States, so it should really come as no surprise that there are elements in the Russian government that would wish us ill.

If they find the source "inside the American Central Command" who believes that it's OK to share with Russia because the Iron Curtain has fallen...well, let's just say that the failure of the government in recent decades to seek the death penalty for treason has probably hurt the nation far more than it has helped.