The Russian Federal Guard Service officer who worked with Putin and fled Russia
dossier.centerA riveting read. Waiting at the airport for delayed departure, with your wife and daughter, while they are starting to search for you...
To me as a Russian (though I read the English translation) the part where he really never talked about it with mom rings true sadly. Watching TV is a good indicator too.
Also, made me feel a bit better about not thinking a war would begin, contrary to US intelligence, if even this guy (who saw Putin in person many times apparently?) did not see it coming.
I worry about this guy and his family by the way. I almost wish he didn't go public and draw attention for his family's sake. But I applaud the move.
Totally.
But on your final point, I imagine being public gives him more security, as security through obscurity when dealing with state actors isn't sustainable in the long run.
This was probably the most fascinating thing I’ve read to to bottom in several years
I have to second that thought. This is the most fascinating thing I've read in quite a long time. I don't even know what to comment in response, besides something trite, like "wow!"
"Honestly, I’d hoped there would be people who, at least in private conversations, would say something like, ‘Guys, this is war; people are dying.’"
This is just so naive. And people in the US Secret Service casually discuss how bombing Syria is wrong? Of course it's like that in those circles, people are selected by that criteria.
Is this website a legitimate source? I did some cursory searching about it but it didn’t give me confidence.
I guess this 2018 article from the AP gives it _some_ legitimacy… https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-ap-top-news-london-i...
This is one of Mikhail Khodorkovsky's media projects, quite reputable in my opinion: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Khodorkovsky
UPD The Guardian's take on this interview: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/05/russian-defect...
>The Guardian has reviewed an interview with Karakulov by the Dossier Centre, a political information outfit founded by the exiled Russian billionaire Mikhail Khodorkovsky, and confirmed the credentials of the senior Russian communications engineer, who travelled with Putin extensively and helped transmit some of his most secret messages.
Given the well documented long reach of Russia's security services when it comes to viciously killing people they or Putin don't like even in other countries, I really hope this guy takes major steps to protect himself and his family. I hope some government in the west is even willing to help him on that front, especially now.
I'm shocked that Putin seems to never use the internet or a phone. That indicates he feels he can trust his inner circle to feed him correct information. Russia may be more politically stable than one might assume.
Makes sense though.
He knows how much FSB puts propaganda on the internet and thinks it's successful, potentially overestimating it's reach...?
He probably thinks that every state is doing it ( since US does it), so for him => it can't be trusted.
Never thought of that, but it would explain some things.
To stop this war, his inner circle needs to be addressed in saying they can't win. Currently theirs a rain of money on the table, it's easy to pocket some.
Countries need to focus on actions that will make his inner circle claim they should retreat instead of publicly humiliating Putin.
Eg. Time linear bans on travel during the war for his inner circle.
Starting to confiscate properties ( including their families).
Banning their sons and daughters from our schools. + Their wives and exes from staying here.
Blocking opening a business, blocking circumventions for docking yachts.
...
Could you clarify why one might assume that Russia is politically unstable without this article? The same man has been in power in one way or another for the last 23 years.
Because the war in ukraine has hurt russian businesses
Protests, for one.
I'm most surprised that Western think-tanks wouldn't hire him. Seriously? Passing up a Russian patriot from Putin's security elite because they already have Russia Experts? Makes little sense to me.
In current situation you can't be sure about such individuals.
Just because Kremlin decided to run this "special military operation" it doesn't mean they stopped their espionage in the rest of Europe.
Haven't stopped but really undermined it. War allowed EU to take action, clean up Russian intelligence networks etc. Before war it was politically difficult to be outright calling Russia an enemy or a threat so they had to play games.
This smear content is produced by Khodorkovsky [1], oligarch in exile who is now for many years after release from jail in 2013 on a mission to destabilise Russian society trough various NGO and nonprofits.
In comparison, USA with its national state security policy and foreign power would never allow for any individual to destabilise country from foreign land for so many years.
NGOs give the impression that they are filling the vacuum created by a retreating state. And they are, but in a materially inconsequential way. Their real contribution is that they diffuse political anger and dole out as aid or benevolence what people ought to have by right. They alter the public psyche. They turn people into dependent victims and blunt the edges of political resistance. NGOs form a sort of buffer between the government and the public, between empire and its subjects. They have become arbitrators, the interpreters, the facilitators. In the long run, NGOs are accountable to their funders, not to the people they work among. They're what botanists would call an indicator species. It's almost as though the greater the devastation caused by neoliberalism, the greater the outbreak of NGOs. Nothing illustrates this more poignantly than the phenomenon of the US preparing to invade a country and simultaneously readying NGOs to go in and clean up the devastation. In order to make sure their funding is not jeopardized and that the governments of the countries they work in will allow them to function, NGOs have to present their work in a shallow framework, more or less shorn of a political or historical context. – Arundhati Roy, the Indian writer, about the NGO influence in India.[2]
[2] https://socialistworker.org/2004-2/510/510_06_Roy.php#Top
Smear content you say? Because it describes well-known aspects of the pervasive corruption in Putin's Russia? And your use of the word "destabilize" is interesting too. It's a favorite label of dictators, authoritarian fans, sock puppets and ideological cheerleaders, usually applied when dissidents try to expose grotesque corruption in shitty government. To them, destabilizing their gravy train of power is a terrible thing, of course.
Whatever their defects, NGOs aren't automatically the tools of western imperialism or whatever idiocy you seem to be promoting about conspiracies against the kleptocratic Russian state. As for Khodorovsky, regardless of his sins, the way in which he was legally treated inside Russia for years was a shameful demonstration of how the Russian state works against basic legal principles.
And yes, many foreign organizations regularly, openly work against the U.S. through NGOs and other organizations with much less danger to themselves than faced by people working against the Russian state. At least within the U.S. one can openly criticize its government without usually being in danger of a prison sentence or state murder.
(though to be fair, the slow creep towards authoritarian behavior by a growing number of governments even in the west is something to really worry about. Cheerleaders of things like blanket TikTok bans and "fighting disinformation" without very seriously qualifying such things should take note of the hole they're digging for the future of free expression.)
Imagine your country was so fragile an ngo focusing on climate change or human rights could destabilize it.
>> In comparison, USA with its national state security policy and foreign power would never allow for any individual to destabilise country from foreign land for so many years
If it's the Foreign Agent law (Foreign Agent Registration Act, FARA for short) you're talking about, a common Russian propaganda trick these days, it does allow this kind of activity, but imposes public disclosure of individuals or organisation receiving money from foreign governments, not other individuals as in this case.
He's a plant. And this will eventually help putin to explain his decisions to Russian people - that he was misled by his inner circle
That doesn’t seem likely to be true, or that it would even accomplish anything…
Russian agencies are not capable of these 3D chess anymore, and even if they were they would not take down Russian TV (the main method of public influence) the way this article does and reveal tons of details about special comms for a very questionable win. Everyone already knows Putin is a recluse so the "our spies lied to me" card can be played without this extra carnival
Any more? They've never been capable of it, unless you count the USSR.
Realistically the agencies (or the power really) haven't changed between the two except for the labels
Why would Putin have to explain/lie about his decisions in a new way?
Nothing in the piece makes a case for that at all.
The agent says Putin lives in a bit of an information bubble but also repeatedly says he’s solely responsible for the war.
If this guy is a plant… then his FSB handlers really screwed up!