Ukraine intelligence forces, built up with significant investment from the CIA, have carried out attacks behind enemy lines on what Ukraine says are figures and infrastructure important to the Russian war effort.
U.S. officials are often not consulted ahead of a strike and are not involved in Ukraine’s assassination operations. Ukraine’s intelligence and spy operations are as capable as they are because of significant investment from the U.S. over the past decade, however, according to The Washington Post.
After Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, the CIA began investing what would eventually become an estimated tens of millions of dollars in Ukraine’s intelligence services. American officials built up Ukraine’s spy services to run intelligence operations against Russia – mainly intercepting Russian communications. Ukraine intercepted hundreds of thousands of Russian messages and routed them through facilities in the U.S. for American officials to parse through.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine last year, Ukraine has used its intelligence services to carry out several highly sensitive and lethal missions, such as blowing holes in Russian naval vessels and bombing the Kerch Bridge connecting the Russian mainland to the Crimean Peninsula. Other operations have included targets less directly related to the war effort, raising concerns that Ukraine’s covert operations may cause rifts between it and its allies.
No operation is conducted without approval from Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, officials told the Post. The Security Service of Ukraine, known as the SBU, and the intelligence division of Ukraine’s defense ministry, known as the GUR, have carried out dozens of assassinations against Russian targets since the war began.
Ukraine’s operations “has risks for Russia,” a former senior CIA official told the Post, “but it carries broader risks as well.”
“If Ukraine’s intelligence operations become even bolder — targeting Russians in third countries, for example — you could imagine how that might cause rifts with partners and come into serious tension with Ukraine’s broader strategic goals,” the official said.
Ukraine has targeted non-military partisans backing Russia’s war effort with bombs, such as a pro-Russia blogger who died in a St. Petersburg café. Another Ukraine intelligence operation targeted one of Russia’s best-known political philosophers, Aleksandr Dugin, an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The mission missed Dugin, however, and killed only his daughter.
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One high-profile operation that Ukraine’s intelligence service has denied involvement in is the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines in September of last year. U.S. officials have reportedly obtained evidence linking the pipeline explosions and Ukraine; the CIA obtained plans for a Ukrainian operation against the pipeline drawn up months before multiple explosions ripped through the lines.
“All targets hit by the SBU are completely legal,” SBU director Vasyl Malyuk said in a statement. Ukraine “does everything to ensure that fair punishment will ‘catch up’ with all traitors, war criminals and collaborators.”
Ukraine’s covert operations have sparked criticism and concern that the missions are going too far, including from inside Ukraine. Valentin Nalivaychenko, former head of the SBU and current Parliament member, suggested last month that Ukraine should restrain its assassinations.
“Clowns, prostitutes and jokers are a constant around the Russian government,” he said. “Kill one of them, and another will appear in their place.”
“Our security services shouldn’t do things just because they can,” he added.