How latest twist to Red Bull F1 drama exposes dirty war at the top

But beyond the impact of what could be a significant change at the top, the development has shone a spotlight on what now appears to be an all-out-war for control of the squad.

For what originally started as the story of an isolated complaint by a female employee against the behaviour of Red Bull boss Christian Horner, has morphed into a fight to the death that could well decide the fate of the F1 team itself.

With Marko almost certain to learn his future on Saturday, when he meets with Red Bull CEO Oliver Mintzlaff, any move to suspend him or hasten his retirement could well trigger the exit of Max Verstappen sooner than his current contract intends. And where would all that leave Adrian Newey?

It is a situation that could lead to the whole house of cards tumbling down, as the key pillars that have helped turn Red Bull into a dominant force are potentially pulled away.

Where things go from here is hard to predict right now, but what is significant is how the latest drama surrounding Marko has exposed perhaps best what has really been going on behind the scenes.

It’s been clear since the Bahrain Grand Prix – when anonymous emails were sent to senior F1 personnel of alleged evidence at the heart of the Horner investigation – that there were dark forces at play here.

Information had already been leaking out for weeks in various publications, which are known to have close affiliations with certain figures within the Red Bull organisation.

The leaks included alleged evidence and information regarding details of the case, as well as letters sent from interested parties that could only have been seen by a limited number of people.

Then there was that anonymous email dossier of files that was sent out in Bahrain, which was deliberately designed to embarrass Horner and potentially push Red Bull to rethink its decision to support him and dismiss the evidence against him.

Those emails proved a dirty war was in play, but equally they exposed a few clues about who was behind things and why all was not as it seemed.

The alleged evidence of messages provided inconsistencies, and as Red Bull and F1’s own IT experts got to work in trying to trace the email sender back to an IP address, even though VPNs were in play, it is understood there were other significant clues given away about the culprit.

There was the way the list of email recipients was…