In any case, there is a Russian clandestine military intelligence unit known as the 29155, and it is believed to behind a string of scandals – most recently, a reported scheme to pay bounties to Afghan insurgents to kill U.S. troops.
So what exactly is the shadowy assemblage?
“There’s no real U.S. analog. It’s like a mix of CIA and special forces,” Matthew Schmidt, associate professor of national security at the University of New Haven, told Fox News. “It’s trained to make mayhem. The overall goal is to destabilize targeted political systems, including in Europe, to attack the political will to maintain NATO, with other missions as opportunity allows, including the killing of traitors.”
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Ultimately, experts and analysts define it as something of an elite squad tasked with sabotage and targeted assassinations.
In this June 16, 2018 file photo, Taliban fighters gather with residents to celebrate a three-day cease fire marking the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Fitr, in Nangarhar province, east of Kabul, Afghanistan. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul, File)
Unit 29155 operates under Russia’s umbrella intelligence agency the GRU, officially termed the Main Directorate of the General Staff, which formed after the folding of the Soviet-era KGB. This specialized outfit is believed to have been birthed around 2008, two years after Russian President Putin legalized targeted killings on foreign soil and in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Georgia that same year.
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While it is unclear exactly how many operatives make up the unit, reports indicate that some involved have decades of experiences beneath their belt – dating back to the ultimately failed Soviet incursion into Afghanistan in the 1980s.
While it is unclear exactly when in recent years 29155 came onto the radar of Western intelligence, the Russian Defense Ministry is said to have lavished bonuses and praise on the team in 2012, and the Unit commander Maj. Gen Andrei Vladimirovich Averyanov – a veteran of the Chechen wars, starting in 1994 and 1999 respectively – was awarded the esteemed Hero of Russia medal in 2015, according to Business Insider.
It is also suspected that 29155 played a pivotal part in Russia’s 2014 takeover of Ukraine’s Crimea region, both through propaganda and media efforts and in the notion of “little green men” – as described to Fox News by locals – that mysteriously popped up in the peninsula ahead of the highly controversial annexation.
In this file photo taken on Wednesday, June 24, 2020, Russian President Vladimir Putin, center, watches the Victory Day military parade marking the 75th anniversary of the Nazi defeat in Moscow. Russian authorities seem to be pulling out all the stops to get people to vote on a series of constitutional amendments that would enable President Vladimir Putin to stay in office until 2036 by resetting the clock on his term limits. (Sergei Guneyev, Host Photo Agency via AP, file)
However, 29155 has spread its wings well beyond Eastern Europe in recent times.
The division is alleged to have been behind two 2015 attempts to assassinate Emilian Gebrev, a Bulgarian arms manufacturer, through poisoning. The following year, the unit was implicated for having likely orchestrated a botched coup in Montenegro, which entailed taking out Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic.
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And in 2018, U.K. officials pointed fingers at unit members as having carried out an assassination pursuit – using a nerve agent – on defected Russian spy Sergei V. Skirpal.
In 2019, French officials reportedly unearthed a clandestine GRU base in the Alps, used to execute regional missions, on the heels of media reports that the Unit was videoed giving a retired military leader a wad of cash in Serbia.
Spanish officials have also blamed the 29155 of rousing the Catalan independence push, which started in 2010 and gained momentum following a referendum in November 2014. German leaders are also wary of foul play by the group on their soil – and subsequently expelled two Russian diplomats late last year over the audacious murder of a Georgian man in Berlin.
