Model Mossad: How Ukraine’s Secret Service Hunts Down and Kills Enemies of the State The Extent of the Once-in-a-Century Flood in Hong Kong in Photos and Videos

Israel’s foreign intelligence service has a legendary reputation. The world knows: anyone who carries out a major terrorist attack against Israel or commits crimes against the Israeli people will be hunted and hunted.

In July this year, the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence was asked by journalists whether his country was considering setting up a kind of Mossad.

Kyrylo Budanov’s answer:

‘We don’t need that. It already exists.”

Budanov is something of a living legend in Ukraine. The 37-year-old is an experienced elite soldier. He completed many missions, including behind enemy lines, when Russia occupied parts of eastern Ukraine from 2014.

In 2020, he was appointed head of HUR by President Volodymyr Zelensky. The military intelligence service is known by this abbreviation. On Thursday, the Ministry of Defense in Kiev announced that Budanov had been promoted to the rank of lieutenant general.

Interesting detail: On September 7, Ukraine traditionally celebrates Military Intelligence Day. And Budanov came up with something special, as evidenced by a video distributed on Telegram and the online platform X.

And that brings us to the Ukrainian intelligence operations against the Russian invaders. Whether on occupied Ukrainian territory. Albeit on the territory of the Russian Federation.

Over the past eighteen months, Ukrainians have killed dozens of state enemies during special operations. Some were shot, others were blown up. Or they died under mysterious circumstances.

Ukraine is keeping a low profile in its involvement in attacks, The Economist says in a recent article. But few doubted “the increasing competence” of Ukrainian intelligence officers.

An HUR officer told the renowned British news magazine:

How credible is that?

The Economist published a report on September 5 entitled “Inside Ukraine’s assassination program” published. The renowned British news magazine promised exclusive insights into a program aimed at the targeted killing of enemies of the state.

Now you should know that for fundamental reasons, The Economist does not include an authorship line on its articles. Because the authors are not named, important information is missing for us readers to assess its meaning and reliability.

But it is also a fact: The Economist has the best contacts and reliable sources within the Ukrainian armed forces and secret services. This was demonstrated last June by a revealing portrait of the head of military intelligence Budanov.

Is Ukraine overstepping its borders?

Leaked US documents revealed that the CIA intervened to prevent Budanov from ordering an attack on Moscow on the anniversary of the Russian invasion in February 2023. The acts of sabotage and attacks in Russia have increased concern among Ukraine’s allies that the continued provocation of a nuclear power could lead to the worst. The head of military intelligence’s statement that he wanted to bring about a collapse of Russia also upset politicians.

Budanov naturally ignores such concerns. Because of his nine years of involvement in Russian aggression, he is in a unique position to assess the risks of nuclear escalation.

The veteran fighter emphasizes that peace in Europe is impossible without a strategic defeat of Russia and a “reorganization of power” there.

Who carries out the attacks?

As is known, there are different actors and different Ukrainian secret services. Because those responsible remain silent, it is often not clear who carried out the operations.

According to The Economist, targeted attacks on Russian occupiers and collaborators date back to at least 2015. Ukraine’s domestic secret service SBU set up a new organization after Putin took over Crimea and the eastern Donbass region.

A counterintelligence department specialized in sabotage. Later the emphasis was on what in intelligence circles is euphemistically called ‘wet work’, that is, the targeted killing of enemies.

Secret service insiders told The Economist that the SBU’s Fifth Directorate plays a central role in operations against Russia. This security service is significantly larger and has far more financial resources than HUR, making it best able to carry out demanding operations, such as the bombing of the Kerch Bridge, which connects Russia to Crimea, in October 2022. However, other insiders pointed to the role of the military intelligence service HUR, which has extensive underground networks.

Another increasingly important player in the occupied territories are the Special Operations Forces (SSO), i.e. the elite soldiers who operate in smaller teams. These groups also coordinated partisan actions.

An SSO officer said, according to the report, that they were now pushing for more authority to conduct operations within Russia. However, this is generally not welcomed in Ukrainian secret service circles.

Finally, there is also the Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine (SZRU). There is no reliable information about his actions behind enemy lines.

What role does the Ukrainian government play?

According to The Economist, it can be assumed that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will approve the most sensitive operations, while other decisions will be delegated. However, a senior government source with insider knowledge declined to discuss details:

Zelensky gave clear orders to those responsible for the secret service to “prevent collateral damage among the civilian population.” The targets of attack – that is, Russians and collaborators – must be carefully selected.

However, the source, who is not mentioned in the article, adds that this may not always have been the case in the past.

Where is the problem?

According to the report, there was often disagreement in Ukrainian intelligence circles about which targets to combat. The insiders interviewed by The Economist all believed that “attacks on mid-level Russian propagandists” would not achieve enough.

According to the report, a former intelligence officer expressed concern that the targeted killings in Ukraine were “more impulse than logic.” Certain operations indicated a lack of strategy. This risks “exposing the sources, methods and extent of Ukrainian infiltration into Russia.”

After all, targeted attacks on the Russian side would “increase the costs of war crimes” and strengthen the morale of its own population. The shooting of a former Russian submarine commander, who is believed to have fired the missiles that killed 38 civilians in the Ukrainian city of Vinnytsia in July 2022, is cited as a ‘positive’ example.

Andriy Yusov, a military intelligence spokesman, stressed to The Economist that Ukraine is not engaged in “blind terror.” The aim is to drive the enemy out of the occupied Ukrainian territories.

Ukraine will continue to seek to identify and exploit Russian vulnerabilities. However, the infiltration of Ukrainian security services by Russian agents remains a major problem. According to some insiders, this is the biggest obstacle to the creation of a Ukrainian Mossad.

Sources