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1:12

Hello, it's Claudia here and you're

1:14

listening to the slow news cast from

1:16

Tortoise. This week, a

1:18

Cold War spy thriller. Except

1:22

it's Russia, not the Soviet

1:24

Union. It's the 2020s,

1:26

not the 1980s. And

1:28

as my colleagues, Alexei Mostris

1:30

and Gary Marshall reveal, the

1:33

hits are not all that subtle. This

1:36

is the unpredictable, violent world

1:38

of the modern Russian

1:40

intelligence services. Over

1:42

to Alexei. If

1:48

I have a telephone call at

1:50

night, I understand that

1:53

something happened. Something awful

1:55

happened. It's

1:57

the middle of the night in the Latvian

2:00

capital. Riga. Solvita Viba is woken by

2:02

a phone call. The person on

2:04

the other end has some

2:06

alarming news. It's about the

2:08

Museum of Occupation, a museum

2:10

that Solvita runs. It's one

2:13

of Latvia's most famous institutions.

2:15

To many in the country,

2:17

the museum is a symbol

2:19

of resistance to the Soviet

2:21

Union and to the Nazis.

2:24

And now, Solvita is being

2:26

told, come quickly, there's trouble.

2:29

and fire in a museum.

2:31

This is the most awful

2:33

thing in the museum. And

2:36

I was shocked, but I

2:38

immediately ran to the museum.

2:41

It's a cold February night

2:43

last year, but Solvita makes

2:46

her way to Riga's old

2:48

town at once, to see

2:51

for herself. Soon enough, she

2:53

learns what took place. At

2:55

around one o'clock, a window

2:58

of my... office on the

3:00

ground floor of the museum

3:03

here, you can see it,

3:05

was smashed and a volatile

3:08

cocktail was thrown in and

3:10

my office was exploded. I've

3:13

seen photographs from the scene.

3:15

They show Solvita's office covered

3:17

in shattered glass. The walls

3:20

are blackened with smoke. This

3:22

was no accident. Someone had

3:25

targeted her An attack on

3:27

the museum is an attack

3:30

on the story of our

3:32

country and our values. Therefore,

3:35

I think that this is

3:37

an attack on the foundations

3:39

of the Latvia State, the

3:42

constitution and the truth. The

3:44

Russian occupation of Latvia was

3:47

brutal. Russian troops only left

3:49

in 1994 and memories are

3:52

still fresh. The museum was

3:54

set up to teach the

3:57

public about exactly this. and

3:59

the 50 years when the

4:01

country was occupied. So

4:04

the Molotov cocktail thrown into

4:06

Solvita's office wasn't just a

4:09

random display of arson. It

4:11

was a political act. This

4:13

is important to say that the

4:15

main decision at that night was

4:17

the museum would be open

4:19

the next morning. In a gesture

4:22

of defiance, Solvita welcomes

4:24

in visitors. This was the

4:26

main decision and... We had

4:28

to prove that the museum

4:31

could not be silent by

4:33

such a method. And the

4:35

museum's message was we

4:37

cannot be intimidated. The

4:39

fire bomb at the museum

4:41

was shocking. If it

4:44

hadn't been for the modern

4:46

fire prevention system, it

4:48

might have burnt down the

4:50

whole building. But to be

4:53

honest, it's still not

4:55

a huge story.

4:57

A local TV

4:59

station reported on

5:02

it, but unsurprisingly

5:04

the news didn't

5:06

travel. Windows were

5:08

patched up. Solvita's

5:11

office was repainted.

5:13

Life went on.

5:16

That's if you look

5:18

at it in isolation.

5:21

But this wasn't an

5:24

isolated attack. Latvia

5:26

is close to the centre,

5:28

its western border pushed up

5:30

against the Baltic Sea. To the east,

5:33

like a bare towering over a

5:35

mouse, is the old enemy, Russia,

5:37

a country more than a thousand

5:39

times its size. So imagine a

5:41

little light going off in Riga,

5:43

marking the attack on the museum.

5:45

Then imagine similar lights going

5:48

off in Paris, in Madrid,

5:50

in Birmingham, in Bavaria, in

5:52

Walsor, in Vilnius, in Taln,

5:55

Cologne, all over Europe, all

5:57

in the last 18 months

5:59

or so. apart, these incidents would

6:01

be easy to miss. A

6:03

few warehouse fires, a cyber

6:05

attack, an attempted assassination of

6:08

a German businessman, but as

6:10

soon as you start to

6:12

see them as connected, organised

6:14

and perpetrated by the same

6:16

small group of people, then

6:18

you're dealing with something very

6:20

different. It'll be clear to

6:22

you that MI5 has one

6:24

hell of a job on

6:27

its hands. The first 20

6:29

years of my career here

6:31

were crammed full of terrorist

6:33

threats. We now face those

6:35

alongside state-backed, sabotage and assassination

6:37

plots against the backdrop of

6:39

a major European land war.

6:41

The head of MI-5 is

6:43

a tall, thin man called

6:46

Ken McCullum. He doesn't look

6:48

much like I imagine a

6:50

spy would look, less James

6:52

Bond, more management consultant with

6:54

architects' glasses. In recent years,

6:56

McCullum has done something very

6:58

unspy-like. He stepped momentarily... out

7:00

of the shadows to tell

7:02

the public about the most

7:05

pressing security threats facing MI5

7:07

each year. The UK's leading

7:09

role in supporting Ukraine means

7:11

we loom large in the

7:13

favoured imagination of Putin's regime.

7:15

And we should expect he

7:17

continued acts of aggression here

7:19

at home. In his latest

7:21

speech last October, McCallum didn't

7:23

mince words. But actually most

7:26

of what he said isn't

7:28

surprising. He mentions Islamist and

7:30

extreme right-wing terrorism, state enemies

7:32

like Iran and China, all

7:34

supercharged by the power of

7:36

the internet, all depressingly predictable.

7:38

But something intriguing in his

7:40

speech did stand out. The

7:42

GRU in particular is on

7:45

a sustained mission to generate

7:47

mayhem on British and European

7:49

streets. We've seen arson, sabotage

7:51

and more. Dangerous actions conducted

7:53

with increasing recklessness. and having

7:55

precisely the opposite effect. A

7:57

particular organisation causing mayhem across

7:59

Europe. Europe, the GRU, a

8:01

branch of Russia's

8:04

intelligence network. You might

8:06

not be familiar with their

8:08

name, but I bet you've

8:10

heard of their work. In 2018,

8:12

two GRU agents flew

8:14

to Salisbury, a pretty

8:16

cathedral city in Wiltshire,

8:18

to murder a former

8:20

Russian spy called Sergei

8:22

Scripal. The officers used the

8:25

highly dangerous Novichok chemical to

8:27

poison Scrippel by wiping it

8:29

on the handle of his

8:31

front door. They ended up putting

8:34

Sergei and his daughter in hospital.

8:36

The pair survived, but another

8:38

woman who came into contact

8:40

with the Novichok did not. By

8:42

all accounts, it was a

8:45

messy, chaotic, and dangerous operation.

8:47

But what the Scrippel operation lacked

8:49

in sophistication, it made

8:51

up for... in aggression.

8:53

It exhibited a certain

8:55

sort of recklessness, a willingness

8:58

to hurt with no thought

9:00

to the consequences, that has

9:02

come to define the GRU

9:04

and its operations ever since.

9:07

But the question that lingered

9:09

after I watched Ken McCullum

9:11

speech was this, why was

9:14

the MI5 chief name-checking the

9:16

GRU now? The group has

9:18

been carrying out operations for

9:20

years. So what's changed? I

9:22

started by compiling a timeline

9:25

of every attack that the G.R.U.

9:27

is suspected of being involved in

9:29

across Europe, and it soon became

9:32

obvious that these suspected G.R.U.

9:34

attacks had ramped up in

9:36

the last 18 months. In

9:38

the UK, a group of men set

9:40

fire to a Ukrainian-owned business

9:43

in London. In Germany,

9:45

two men were arrested over

9:47

arson attacks. A few months

9:49

later... German security services disrupted

9:51

a plot to assassinate Armin

9:54

Papaga CEO of the defense

9:56

company Rhine Matal. In Poland,

9:58

16 people were concerned. for installing

10:00

secret cameras to film transport

10:03

infrastructure. You can see similar

10:05

looking arrests taking place in

10:07

countries from Hungary to Spain.

10:09

By my calculations in the

10:11

last two years close to

10:13

a hundred people have been

10:16

arrested on suspicion of carrying

10:18

out crimes either on behalf

10:20

of Russian intelligence or specifically

10:22

for the G. Most of

10:24

these alleged incidents are not

10:26

actually that serious. We're talking

10:29

vandalism or sabotage. But that's

10:31

not always the case. Three

10:33

months after the fire in

10:35

the London warehouse, for instance,

10:37

another warehouse in the UK

10:39

was targeted. This time it

10:42

was a DHL storage unit

10:44

in Birmingham, where a package

10:46

exploded after it arrived by

10:48

air from Europe. Authorities believe

10:50

that this package and another

10:52

one that set fire to

10:55

a similar warehouse in Germany

10:57

was part of a Russian

10:59

plot to detonate explosive packages

11:01

on cargo flights to the

11:03

United States. And if that

11:05

happened, that's not far off

11:08

an act of war. So

11:10

what ties together these random

11:12

acts of minor vandalism and

11:14

plots that could see a

11:16

plane fall out of the

11:18

sky. Why are Russia and

11:21

the G.I.U. specifically ramping up

11:23

attacks across Europe? And is

11:25

this just the beginning? The

11:27

interesting thing is that despite

11:29

the fact that we all

11:31

know about the KGB, and

11:34

of course the KGB is

11:36

a bit more famous, especially

11:38

in the West, but at

11:40

least... After 1991, after the

11:42

Soviet Union, there was at

11:44

least some attempts to reform

11:47

the KGB. That is why

11:49

the present version of the

11:51

KGB is called the FSP,

11:53

because they tried, at least

11:55

they tried, to reform the

11:57

agency. But the military intelligence...

12:00

When my producer Gary told

12:02

our colleague Chloe that we

12:04

were looking into the GRU,

12:06

her immediate response was, you

12:08

have to talk to Andre.

12:10

Andre Soledotov has been writing

12:13

about Russian intelligence since

12:15

1999. In 2022, he was

12:17

threatened with arrest in Russia, so

12:20

now he's living in exile in

12:22

London. Now it is by

12:24

far the most aggressive agency

12:27

if you think of Russian

12:29

intelligence agencies. Russian intelligence has

12:31

lots of acronyms. There's the FSB,

12:34

the SVR and the GRU and

12:36

the GRU. Each have slightly different

12:39

roles and there's a lot of

12:41

overlap but the GRU tends to

12:43

attract a different sort of recruit.

12:45

More military, more hardcore. Five, seven

12:48

years ago, there were several reforms

12:50

inside of the military intelligence, and

12:52

at some point we lost a

12:54

lot of people, and after that

12:57

we needed to hire more people,

12:59

and because they needed to expand

13:01

the agency very quickly, they needed

13:03

to find new people. And the

13:06

way you might find very quickly

13:08

trained professionals, if you have no time to

13:10

train them, you find them in special

13:12

forces. So now as a military intelligence

13:15

is sparked with people with

13:17

special forces background, which means

13:19

that they are not really

13:21

good spies, they are not extremely

13:23

competent, but they are extremely aggressive

13:25

and they don't think about the

13:27

cause, they just want to get

13:30

things done. What Andre was telling

13:32

me was that the GRU isn't

13:34

the sort of spy agency which

13:37

spends years painstakingly turning a British

13:39

spy into a double agent, like

13:41

the KGB did with Kim Philby

13:44

and the infamous Cambridge spy ring.

13:46

But that doesn't mean they're

13:48

not effective. It's like the

13:50

difference between a sniper rifle

13:52

and a shotgun. You don't hit

13:54

precise targets with a shotgun, but

13:57

you can still do some serious damage.

13:59

Like... Ken McCollum, the head

14:01

of MI5, Andre had also

14:03

noticed a pickup in GRU

14:06

activity and he had one

14:08

simple answer to why this

14:10

was happening. I think what

14:12

we need to remember that

14:15

for it is a very

14:17

not just important but a

14:19

crucial moment historically for Russian

14:21

agencies, just remember that for

14:23

them they are fighting the

14:26

third round of a century

14:28

long bottle with Western intelligence

14:30

agencies. For them it looks

14:32

like that. So where it

14:35

was the first round, that

14:37

was immediately after the revolution

14:39

and it lost it until

14:41

the end of the Second

14:44

World War. And they believe

14:46

they won it, mostly because

14:48

of the Cambridge Five and

14:50

that they succeeded to steal

14:52

the atomic bomb, this kind

14:55

of success stories. The second...

14:57

round was the Cold War

14:59

and obviously they lost and

15:01

it ended with the dissolution

15:04

of the Soviet Union the

15:06

collapse of the KGB and

15:08

now they are in the

15:10

third round and they want

15:12

to win. In Russia's global

15:15

prize fight with the West

15:17

Ukraine is the third round

15:19

and Ukraine is the first

15:21

step in understanding why G.R.U.

15:24

sabotage is ramping up. Every

15:26

day President Putin receives reports

15:28

of the Russian death toll.

15:30

Up to 1,200 soldiers are

15:32

killed each day in the

15:35

meat grinder of his foreign

15:37

war. One intelligence source I

15:39

spoke to said that Putin

15:41

holds the West, Britain, France,

15:44

Germany and America as responsible

15:46

for these deaths as Ukraine

15:48

itself. He said that post

15:50

the Ukraine invasion there was

15:53

an atmosphere of permission. among

15:55

Russia's intelligence agencies. An unwritten

15:57

rule that says now the

15:59

gloves are off. Open season

16:01

for acts of... Vandalism, social

16:04

media disinformation campaigns and even

16:06

assassinations. And for what purpose?

16:08

To demonstrate to Western

16:10

audiences that supporting Ukraine

16:12

has a heavy price

16:14

and to start to

16:17

undermine support for the

16:19

conflict itself. Especially after the

16:21

start of the full-scale invasion

16:23

in 2022, I would say...

16:26

back then you could have

16:28

detected some arrogance and the

16:30

Western intelligence community towards Russian

16:33

military intelligence. There was a

16:35

lot of talks about how

16:37

incompetent these people were, how

16:39

lovable they are, and how

16:42

easy it is to identify

16:44

them. Then Andre said something

16:46

that made me think maybe

16:49

we're partly responsible for letting

16:51

all this happen. The basic

16:54

concept was these people are

16:56

so incompetent they couldn't be

16:59

a serious threat. And it

17:01

was mostly the result of

17:04

the failing Souls Bay. But

17:06

the thing is that to

17:09

conduct sabotage operations. You don't

17:11

need to be extremely sophisticated.

17:14

It's not about penetrating the

17:17

highest allowance of British

17:19

or American society. It's

17:21

just about killing someone

17:23

or blowing something up.

17:25

And for that, Russian

17:27

intelligence is perfectly

17:30

trained and they have a

17:32

lot of people. In other words,

17:34

dismiss a man with a

17:36

shotgun at your peril. If you

17:38

really want to know about the

17:41

GRU and what it's capable of,

17:43

and whether all these attacks are

17:46

building to something more significant, then

17:48

we should look to the Baltic

17:50

states, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. Three

17:53

countries that share a border with

17:55

Russia. Three countries who are particularly

17:57

concerned about what happens when... Donald

18:00

Trump takes office and three

18:02

countries that worry that Russia

18:04

could invade them next. So

18:06

a few days ago we

18:09

got an email from Estonia's

18:11

internal intelligence agency which is

18:13

Estonia's equivalent of MI5 and

18:15

Estonia more than any other

18:17

country has had to face

18:19

the threat of Russian aggression

18:22

and particularly sabotage events from

18:24

the They would speak to

18:26

us, but on one condition.

18:28

They couldn't do it over

18:30

the phone, and they couldn't

18:33

do it over Zoom, because

18:35

of security considerations. So they

18:37

said, if you want to

18:39

speak to us, you've got

18:41

to come to Tallinn, which

18:43

is why we're sitting here

18:46

in a bar in Luden

18:48

Airport, about to get on

18:50

the play. It's notoriously difficult

18:52

to speak on the record

18:54

to spies. But there's been

18:56

a subtle shift in recent

18:59

years in recent years. a

19:01

recognition that sometimes there are

19:03

benefits to telling journalists and

19:05

the public about their work.

19:07

Like Latvia, Estonia was occupied

19:09

by the Soviets until the

19:12

1990s. It's now a fully

19:14

paid-up member of NATO and

19:16

the European Union. And as

19:18

a result of this temerity

19:20

to embrace the West, Estonia

19:22

has had to deal with

19:25

the full spectrum of G.R.U.

19:27

capabilities, cyber attacks, street vandalism.

19:29

and sabotage. It turns out

19:31

we weren't alone. Nick Ferrari

19:33

at breakfast. Good morning. It's

19:36

four minutes after eight on

19:38

Tuesday. I'm coming to you.

19:40

It turns out we weren't

19:42

alone. Nick Ferrari at breakfast.

19:44

Good morning it's four minutes

19:46

after eight on Tuesday the

19:49

17th of December. I'm coming

19:51

to you live from Estonia

19:53

if you... Ten European countries

19:55

gathered together to discuss security

19:57

with a focus on Russia.

20:00

A reminder, not that it was

20:02

needed, that what the GRU is

20:04

trying to do is all part

20:06

of Russia's broader strategy against

20:09

the West. Working against

20:11

that, in the shadows, is

20:13

Capo, the Estonian Internal Security

20:16

Service. You can probably hear it

20:18

in my voice. It's freezing.

20:20

Ten minutes from our hotel is

20:22

the entrance to the Capo building.

20:25

It's this imposing mass of grey

20:27

covered in a kind of mesh

20:30

scaffolding. After we navigate our

20:32

way through the entry gate, we're greeted

20:34

by no one. This is like something

20:36

out of a film. When you get

20:39

these two kind of locked entrances, like

20:41

they're kind of like air gap, air

20:43

lock. If you ever watch the BBC

20:46

series spooks, it's kind of similar. A

20:48

pod opens up, allows you to enter,

20:50

and then shuts again before the other

20:53

side opens. Yeah,

20:55

just a moment there

20:57

will be someone

20:59

just to meet you.

21:01

Sure. Please, you have

21:03

the microphone turned on?

21:05

Yeah. Yeah, before any

21:07

control or check, please

21:10

turn it off. Okay,

21:12

sure. Thank you. Thank

21:14

you. Yeah. On the

21:17

other side is Marta

21:19

Tool. The official Capo

21:22

spokesperson. It's the first

21:25

time the organization has

21:27

allowed a podcast to

21:30

be recorded in the

21:32

building. Why do you

21:35

just like to speak

21:38

to us? You ask so

21:40

nicely? Actually, we

21:43

do think that talking

21:45

about hybrid activities

21:48

and not only...

21:51

telling about them

21:53

to our society but

21:55

to EU widely, it

21:57

gives the same power.

22:00

in 2007 Estonia was the

22:02

victim of Russia's first ever

22:04

cyber attack, who is behind

22:06

it, and what is its

22:08

goal, you can already understand

22:11

what is hybrid and what

22:13

is not, and you can

22:15

prevent it. In 2007, Estonia

22:17

was the victim of

22:19

Russia's first ever cyber

22:22

attack. Websites of newspapers,

22:24

banks, ministries, and broadcasters

22:26

were all hacked. And

22:28

since then, the country

22:30

has faced Russian aggression

22:32

again and again and

22:34

again. Four years ago,

22:36

Estonia wasn't ready to

22:38

attribute any of these

22:40

attacks directly to the

22:42

GRU. But now, that's

22:44

all changed. One of

22:47

the things that was

22:49

interesting to me is

22:51

that you as a

22:53

country have faced years

22:55

of cyber attacks and

22:57

other kinds of attacks

22:59

from pro-Russian groups. But

23:01

I think it's right

23:03

that... It was only

23:05

in this year that

23:07

you attributed some attacks

23:09

that took place in

23:12

2020 to the GRU.

23:14

Yeah, we did. So

23:16

tell me about why

23:18

you felt confident for

23:20

the first time to

23:22

attribute it to not

23:24

just pro-Russian hackers, but

23:26

the Russian state. Well,

23:28

because the Operation Toy

23:30

Soldier was done by

23:32

10 different countries and

23:34

14 services over the

23:37

world, EU and NATO

23:39

members, and we got

23:41

the evidence who is

23:43

behind it, we got

23:45

the names and we

23:47

managed to share our

23:49

information with others. and

23:51

this was definitely why

23:53

we could attribute it

23:55

to GRO. Operation Toy

23:57

Soldier was an investigation

23:59

run by several Europe.

24:02

European intelligence agencies into

24:04

cyber attacks launched against

24:06

Ukraine and Estonia in

24:08

2020. The result of

24:10

the investigation pinpointed the

24:12

GRU as responsible. Calling

24:14

out the GRU spy

24:16

operations, according to Marta,

24:18

serves to diminish their

24:20

mystique and shows them

24:22

up for what, in

24:24

reality, they are. changed.

24:27

They're a bit more

24:29

robust. They use low-level

24:31

agents that are not

24:33

trained and are motivated

24:35

not by ideology, but

24:37

more of, for example,

24:39

money. They might have

24:41

addictions that they try

24:43

to find relief to.

24:45

And if you have

24:47

those kind of low-level

24:49

agents, they're more unpredictable.

24:52

What they do when

24:54

they are in a

24:56

difficult situation, do they,

24:58

they might do some,

25:00

let's be frank, stupid

25:02

things that might hurt

25:04

people. I think the

25:06

unpredictability is really important

25:08

in terms of looking

25:10

at the threat. Of

25:12

course. Just a week

25:14

before we arrived, Capo

25:16

issued a new press

25:19

release about GRU sabotage.

25:21

Last December. Our interior

25:23

minister's wife woke up

25:25

in the morning and

25:27

discovered that their family

25:29

car windows are smashed.

25:31

And they thought it

25:33

was just a small

25:35

act and nothing larger.

25:37

We started to investigate

25:39

and during the day...

25:41

We discovered there's another

25:44

coral soap that belonged

25:46

to a journalist, actually

25:48

ahead of Russian outlet

25:50

in Estonia, the largest

25:52

one. On the same

25:54

night, in December 2023,

25:56

two targeted attacks. One

25:58

against a senior politician

26:00

and another against a

26:02

journalist who runs a

26:04

Russian language service broadcasting

26:06

to the Russian speakers

26:09

in Estonia. The attacks feel similar

26:11

to the fire bomb thrown into

26:13

Solvita's office. More vandalism

26:15

than coordinated campaign but threatening

26:18

nonetheless and only three months

26:20

apart from each other. The

26:22

Estonian police quickly determined that

26:25

the attacks are organized by

26:27

an Estonian man called Alan

26:29

Hansen. But he's just one

26:31

part of it. And Alan

26:34

Hansen was hired by

26:36

two men, or they

26:38

were working together with

26:40

Alik Huchbaro and Iliabacharo,

26:42

were working for the GRU.

26:45

After the invasion of Ukraine,

26:47

Estonia kicked out

26:49

dozens of so-called Russian

26:52

diplomats operating in the

26:54

country. Overall, more than

26:57

700 were expelled across

26:59

Europe. In reality, this

27:01

meant that Russia lost a

27:03

lot of its professional spies

27:05

on the ground, many worked

27:08

in embassies under diplomatic

27:10

cover. It is quite

27:12

known that Russia has used

27:15

their embassy workers for doing

27:17

the intelligence work also, so

27:19

the less we have them

27:22

here, the better it is

27:24

for us. The consequence of

27:26

this great expulsion is

27:29

that for the last

27:31

few years the Russian

27:33

spy agencies have had

27:36

to pay local criminals

27:38

to carry out their dirty

27:41

work. Men like Alan

27:43

Hansom. And they gave

27:45

Hansom a list of

27:47

people whose property should

27:50

be vandalised. Whether

27:52

he didn't want to do

27:54

it himself or he needed

27:57

help recruited other people to

27:59

help him with the work

28:01

and those recruited also other

28:03

people to do the work.

28:06

Hansom didn't actually carry out

28:08

the attack on the cars

28:11

himself. He subcontracted that work

28:13

out to people who had

28:16

no idea what they were

28:18

caught up in. They were

28:21

people who were in problems,

28:23

whether it was addictions. or

28:25

money problems. The one who

28:28

smashed the car windows did

28:30

it because he had a

28:33

debt. So to cover the

28:35

debt, he smashed the windows.

28:38

And we discovered that chain

28:40

using communication data. That is,

28:43

that has had... criticism of

28:45

why secret services need to

28:47

use it. But that's why

28:50

we need to use it.

28:52

To discover those change to

28:55

people who are working, who

28:57

might even not know who

29:00

they are working for and

29:02

what for, but this data

29:05

gave us the locations and

29:07

who is talking to whom.

29:10

The Estonian police managed to

29:12

arrest handsome the night before

29:14

the attacks were carried out,

29:17

but his two accomplices weren't

29:19

arrested and they were able

29:22

to vandalise the cars the

29:24

next day. Marta revealed that

29:27

while those two attacks did

29:29

go ahead, the Estonians prevented

29:32

something much worse happening too.

29:34

Handsome and the GRU had

29:36

much bigger plans. If all

29:39

of the attacks that he

29:41

had planned had taken place,

29:44

what would that have looked

29:46

like? It would

29:49

have looked a lot

29:51

larger than just two

29:53

smashed cars. There is

29:55

a lot of material

29:58

that we can't share.

30:00

even today because behind

30:02

the East border we have

30:05

GRU who also would

30:07

like to know what

30:09

we discovered and would

30:11

like to have access

30:13

to this information. After

30:15

speaking to Marta it's

30:17

clear that Europe's intelligence

30:20

services are caught in

30:22

a bind. There are

30:25

experts who argue with some

30:27

force that there's little point

30:29

in naming and shaming the

30:32

G.R.U. It's an intelligence

30:34

agency that resolutely refuses

30:36

to be shamed. However, in

30:38

both Britain and Estonia, the

30:41

decision appears to have been

30:43

made that the risk is

30:45

worth it. Better to call out

30:47

the problem than to cover it

30:50

up. Could you tell

30:52

us how high a

30:55

priority that you

30:57

argue it for

30:59

your agency?

31:01

I don't want

31:03

to give them

31:06

credit. We

31:08

keep an eye

31:10

on GRU, of course.

31:12

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Wealthfront.com to start today. It's

32:46

not anymore a question whether Russia

32:48

is a threat or not, but

32:50

how big of a threat it

32:52

is. Back

33:03

home, a source close to

33:05

the intelligence community had told us

33:07

that Ken McCullum's speech was

33:09

a warning, not so much to

33:11

Russia and not to the

33:13

British public either, but to the

33:15

criminal networks in the UK

33:17

carrying out Russia's work. The

33:21

involvement of criminals is perhaps

33:23

the biggest new development I

33:25

learnt about how the GRU

33:27

now operates. It's what links

33:30

a professional agent in Moscow

33:32

with a seemingly random act

33:34

of vandalism in Paris or

33:36

London or Riga. A

33:39

lot of that criminal recruitment

33:41

happens online, and there's one social

33:44

media platform that is thought

33:46

to be used by the GRU

33:48

more than any other –

33:50

Telegram. As we're leaving Marta's office,

33:52

she tells us we should

33:55

speak to an investigative journalist in

33:57

the city who exposed just

33:59

how important that... site is. My name is

34:01

Marta Wunsch. I work here

34:04

in investigative team of Delphi

34:06

Estonia. I am a fact

34:08

checker originally. Marta who confusingly

34:11

has the same first name

34:13

as Marta Toul is a

34:16

colleague of the journalist whose

34:18

car was smashed up allegedly

34:21

by G-I-U-paid operatives in December.

34:23

She's also an expert on telegram,

34:26

the shady social media channel created

34:28

by a Russian man called Pavel

34:30

Jurorov. Jurorov was arrested

34:32

last August in France, charged

34:35

with letting telegram become a

34:37

free-for-all for criminality, child abuse

34:40

and terrorism. He denies all

34:42

wrongdoing. But what Marta the

34:44

journalist found out was that

34:46

for the GRU, telegram was

34:48

an important recruiting tool. The site,

34:50

if you haven't seen it, is

34:52

made up of channels where people

34:55

can post about subjects they're

34:57

interested in. On one of

34:59

these channels was an innocuous-looking

35:01

post. It looks like a

35:04

regular telegram post. There's a

35:06

picture of this Privet-Bod logo,

35:08

and there's a text inviting

35:11

to join this mysterious Privet-Bod

35:13

to fight against Ukraine's Western

35:16

allies. We didn't know what

35:18

they mean because it was

35:20

quite cryptic at first. It

35:23

just said that join us

35:25

to fight to the West

35:27

and that's it. And we

35:30

didn't know what they want or

35:32

what they need. There was

35:34

no talk about money.

35:36

It was more like

35:38

political, ideological, but we

35:41

started preparation

35:43

process to contact the bot.

35:45

The post invited people in

35:47

European countries to say high,

35:49

priviet means high in Russian.

35:51

Marta suspected that this

35:53

was the first step in recruiting

35:55

saboteurs, criminals prepared to work for

35:58

the GRU on the ground. So

36:00

she created a fake identity

36:02

to find out exactly how

36:05

far the Russians would go.

36:07

We knew that if Russia

36:09

or Russian services want to

36:11

recruit someone, they usually look

36:13

for people with criminal background,

36:15

they usually look for people

36:18

in desperate position in the

36:20

need of money. So we

36:22

created a persona who we

36:24

thought would be like the

36:26

most classic case for such

36:28

recruitment. So yeah, it was

36:31

a whole life story, family

36:33

background, friends, hobbies, work experience,

36:35

military background and experience, and

36:37

also whole social media presence.

36:39

We created accounts for him.

36:42

His name was Valerie Ivanov,

36:44

the most classic and the

36:46

most used name in Estonia

36:48

and also in Russia, like

36:50

Valerie the first name and

36:52

Ivanov last name. Eventually, Valerie

36:55

was ready to speak to

36:57

Privat pot. And Privet Boat

36:59

was ready to speak back.

37:01

So first of all, Valerie

37:03

was asked about his background,

37:05

family, job experience and military

37:08

experience. Where he served, when,

37:10

what kind of grenade launchers

37:12

he used, does he know

37:14

how to use them and

37:16

such stuff? So a lot

37:19

about military experience and we

37:21

of course were prepared for

37:23

that. Then... He started asking

37:25

why did you even contact

37:27

us? What do you need?

37:29

Why? Then we said our

37:32

strategy was to just ask

37:34

about money because we wanted

37:36

to look like a guy

37:38

who just wants money. It's

37:40

not ideological. It's not like,

37:43

I don't know, for a

37:45

mission or something. We just,

37:47

we played a guy who

37:49

wanted money and we kept

37:51

asking them of money. But

37:53

before he got to money.

37:56

wanted to know if we're

37:58

ready for serious stuff. dangerous

38:01

stuff as he said or

38:03

she I don't know and

38:05

as soon as we confirmed

38:07

that yes we are ready

38:09

Valerie is ready for dangerous

38:11

stuff then he also asked

38:14

if we have ever killed if

38:16

we if we've been convicted

38:19

and if we have gotten

38:21

into fights or something and

38:24

then as soon as he

38:26

understood that yes we're like

38:29

interested, he asked what kind

38:31

of mission you're ready for.

38:33

He provided three options, I

38:36

think. The first one was

38:38

to burn military equipment, NATO's

38:40

equipment, then he asked to

38:42

burn, if we could burn

38:45

a military, not a military

38:47

truck, but a truck carrying

38:49

military equipment. and the last

38:51

one was to kill a

38:54

fascist in Baltic states or

38:56

like pre- Baltic as pro-Russian

38:58

language says. A fascist in

39:00

this case being anyone who

39:02

supports Ukraine or the West. When

39:05

I heard this initially it

39:07

surprised me a bit. Some of the

39:09

G.R.U. attacks did include assassination

39:11

attempts like the plot to

39:14

kill a Bulgarian weapons maker

39:16

in 2023. or the CEO

39:18

of the German arms firm

39:20

which sent weapons to Ukraine.

39:22

But these were more

39:24

professional operations carried out

39:27

by actual GRU members.

39:29

What Marta was saying

39:31

in a way was more

39:33

troubling. Here was Russia apparently

39:35

offering money to anyone

39:37

on telegram prepared to

39:40

kill. It was 10,000... US dollars

39:42

for a mission. It was

39:44

both for killing someone and

39:47

for burning expensive military equipment.

39:50

Crazy that it's the same

39:52

price to kill someone as it

39:54

is to burn them. Yeah, we

39:56

were super shocked by this because

39:58

it seems like killing... for Russia

40:00

is not a big deal.

40:02

But hold on, how did

40:04

Martin know that Privatbot was

40:06

connected to the G.I.U? Did

40:08

you do any work to

40:10

connect Privatbotbot specifically to Russian

40:12

military intelligence? The only thing

40:14

we could do is talk

40:16

to experts, talk to intelligence

40:18

officials in different countries and

40:21

services. We talked to intelligence

40:23

services from four countries and

40:25

five different services. So we

40:27

just showed them the actual

40:29

conversation, actual chat, and asked,

40:31

what do you think about

40:33

this? Does it look legit?

40:35

And have you seen something

40:37

like this before? And almost

40:39

all services said that it's

40:41

super and it very closely

40:43

resembled what they have seen

40:45

before when working on those

40:47

cases with a Russian sabotaging

40:49

Russian recruitment. So they point

40:51

to Russian intelligence and special

40:53

services. What Marta is saying

40:55

ties in with what we've

40:57

heard from security sources, both

40:59

in Britain and abroad. Russia

41:01

has been forced to rely

41:03

on criminal civilians and social

41:05

media is at the centre

41:07

of this recruitment. After I

41:09

spoke to Marta, I decided

41:11

to search for Privipot on

41:13

telegram myself. It may be

41:15

banned in Europe, but if

41:17

you're a telegram user in

41:19

the UK, you can still

41:21

access the site. Given that

41:23

we in Britain have seen

41:25

G.I.U. sabotage, the fact that

41:27

Privatbotbot is still operating, is

41:29

worrying. I should say that

41:32

we don't know whether any

41:34

British person has been recruited

41:36

through Privatbot, although there are

41:38

some cases that are currently

41:40

going through the courts which

41:42

might reveal if the site

41:44

was involved. When I messaged

41:46

Privatbot, I got no response.

41:48

A bit more searching on

41:50

telegram revealed other sites offering

41:52

cash to carry out pro-Russian

41:54

sabotage. One offered $3,000 to

41:56

anyone willing to burn a

41:58

fascist car and showed videos

42:00

of what it said were

42:02

previously successful operations. When

42:04

I messaged the owner of

42:07

the channel, asking if they

42:09

would pay for such a service

42:11

in the UK, the answer

42:13

came back quickly. Yes,

42:15

sure. Over the Christmas

42:18

holidays, an undersea power

42:20

cable connecting Finland to

42:23

Estonia was cut.

42:25

It was the latest in a

42:27

series of suspected attacks on

42:30

essential infrastructure and the finger

42:32

was once again pointed at

42:34

Russia. It's a sign in a way

42:36

that the G.I.U. has achieved one of

42:39

its main objectives. It wants Western

42:41

nations to see it as

42:43

this all-powerful force, a kind

42:45

of shadowy criminal organisation you

42:47

see in James Bond films,

42:49

able to touch anyone anywhere.

42:53

Looked at another way though, Russia seems

42:55

to be losing. Most of the GRU's

42:57

attacks don't amount to much. Many

42:59

are carried out by petty criminals

43:02

because so many actual

43:04

spies have been expelled,

43:06

and consequently Western nations

43:08

have generally been successful

43:10

in disrupting them. But the

43:12

truth is that these same agencies

43:15

also worry that the low-level acts

43:17

of vandalism could be a preview

43:19

of more damaging operations to come.

43:21

In some cases, G.R.U. attacks have

43:24

already killed people or come

43:26

close. People like Dawn Sturgis,

43:28

the woman who died after

43:30

ingesting Novichok in Salisbury, or

43:33

Armin Papaga, the CEO of

43:35

Ryan Matal, who was only

43:37

saved from a G.R.U. assassination

43:39

last year, when U.S. intelligence

43:41

agents uncovered the plot to

43:44

kill him. Perhaps most shocking of

43:46

all is the case of

43:48

Maxim Kuzminov. a Russian helicopter

43:50

pilot who defected to Ukraine

43:52

in 2023 before moving to

43:55

a small resort town on

43:57

Spain's Mediterranean coast. In February, the

43:59

20... year -old's body was found

44:01

riddled with bullets. All

44:04

these are indications that

44:06

despite European efforts to stamp

44:08

out Russian intelligence capabilities

44:10

in Europe, the Kremlin's agents

44:13

remain active and able. I

44:16

think back to what Andrei

44:18

said about the GRU never

44:20

reforming, unlike the KGB, that

44:22

they represent a more Soviet,

44:24

more Stalinist approach to spycraft,

44:26

less Cold War, more hot

44:29

war. For the West, it

44:31

seems like fighting the GRU

44:33

is a game of whack

44:35

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44:37

get more frantic and more

44:39

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45:23

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45:25

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45:28

you enjoyed it, please do leave

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45:32

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45:34

and by Gary Marshall. The sound

45:36

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45:38

editor was Jasper Corbett. The executive

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producer of The Sloan Newscast is Matt

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you haven't noticed,

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it's winter, and

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now more than

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ever, I'm... I'm in

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