Russia cannot be said to be ‘losing’ the war as long as people are dying in Ukraine, but nor do they appear to be winning
Photo: Russian President Vladimir Putin
22 March 2022 | James Porteous | Clipper Media News
Vladimir Putin’s KGB background likely affected intelligence disaster in Ukraine
21 March 2022 | Dan Stanton | The Record
A few days after Vladimir Putin publicly humiliated Sergei Naryshkin — director of the SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence agency — the embattled spy chief reappeared in a video on state television to demonstrate his change of heart:
“Russia cannot allow Ukraine to become a dagger raised above us in the hands of Washington,” Naryshkin intoned. “The special military operation will restore peace in Ukraine ….”
Two days later, on Feb. 24, Russia attacked Ukraine. What role did Russia’s intelligence services play in shaping Putin’s fateful decision to invade Ukraine? What advice and changes of heart were sincere?
When Vladimir Putin became president of the Russian Federation, he inherited two of the world’s most efficient foreign intelligence services.
In various iterations, the SVR and GRU (military) had been running covert collection operations on a global scale since the time of the czars.
For various legal reasons, the Fifth Section of the FSB — the foreign branch of Russia’s security service — was created in 1992 to run operations in the former Soviet republics.
As a former director of the FSB, Putin put his stamp on the Fifth, which served him well in Chechnya, Georgia, and Crimea, but not so well in Ukraine.
All wars start with assumptions, most of which prove to be false. Did Putin’s false assumptions about the scope and strength of Ukrainian resistance stem from faulty intelligence, or did he impose his delusional beliefs on his spymasters?
Putin either disregarded advice, or like Stalin, the intelligence chiefs told him what he wanted to hear.
Stalin created a system in which the most crucial intelligence — date and time of Germany’s attack in 1941 — was kept from him because it contradicted his delusion that Hitler would not attack the Soviet Union.
Putin’s background in the KGB is frequently cited as proof that he understands intelligence. However, this presupposes that he worked in the appropriate department. Putin spent his 15-year KGB career in the wrong department, never collecting or analyzing foreign intelligence.
Putin joined the KGB in 1975 and was assigned to the Leningrad office of the Second Chief Directorate, which was responsible for domestic security.
In 1985, Putin was transferred to Dresden, East Germany. Becoming liaison officer to the dreaded Stasi, he was able to put his counter-subversion skills to practical use. Putin never served in the KGB’s foreign intelligence directorate, which would become the SVR in 1991.
Having met SVR officers, one remains impressed by how knowledgeable and curious they are about the world.
Historically, the SVR plays a more significant role in shaping foreign policy than Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Its intelligence collection — embassy-based officers or deep cover illegals — is legendary.
Its insight into Ukrainian capabilities would have been significant. Yet, Putin either dismissed what he did not want to hear or foisted his illusion — that a blitzkrieg to Kyiv would be a walk in the park — on his intelligence chiefs.
While the FSB’s Fifth has primacy in Ukraine, it is safe to assume the SVR and GRU would have effectively penetrated Ukraine, notwithstanding Yeltsin’s 1992 agreement.
Rather than entertain dissenting opinions from Naryshkin, Putin welcomed the FSB spin, echoing and flattering his grandiose and provincial mindset. Putin implicitly trusted information from FSB director Alexander Bortnikov, a KGB pal from the Leningrad office. His preference for FSB briefings and disdain for the cliquish SVR probably contributed to his disastrous miscalculation on Ukraine.
The FSB’s Fifth became Putin’s imperial gendarme and, it would seem, his sounding board. If providing assessments on Ukrainian resistance, armament deliveries from the West and engineering a coup in Kyiv were their primary responsibilities, they did a poor job.
On the other hand, they did a great job setting themselves up to take the fall over Ukraine as Col.-Gen. Sergei Beseda, head of the Fifth Service, and his deputy were recently placed under house arrest.
The enraged Russian president’s poodle is in the doghouse, and Putin himself serves as his exclusive analyst and adviser. Careful what you wish for, Putin has the intelligence system and intelligence failure he deserves.
Retired from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, Dan Stanton is an instructor on national security at the University of Ottawa’s Professional Development Institute.
