‘Master of Weapons’: Who is the ‘death dealer’ that Putin bailed out of prison?

Viktor Bout was released in a prisoner exchange that included basketball player Brittney Griner. But who is he? Why is it so important for Moscow?

• He was serving a 25-year sentence in a federal prison for “conspiring to kill American citizens and aiding terrorist organizations.”
• Bout gained a reputation as a mysterious figure and was once referred to as the “death merchant”.
• It inspired Hollywood film directors, as in the movie “Lord of the Guns” starring Nicolas Cage.
• Viktor Bout was born in 1967 in Dushanbe, the capital of the Tajik Soviet Republic.
• He is a former officer who served in the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union.
• In the 1990s and early 2000s, he owned what he claimed was an air freight company that delivered goods to dangerous parts of the world. In fact, he smuggled Soviet-made weapons.
• He was investigated by the UN for collaborating in mass murders and war crimes in African countries such as Angola, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Congo.
• The United States did the same, accusing it of aiding the Taliban and al-Qaeda militarily. Bout denies any involvement and claims to have supplied weapons to groups fighting the Taliban.
• In 2002, Belgian authorities issued a warrant for his arrest, but Bout managed to leave the country and sought refuge in the United Arab Emirates, South Africa and eventually Russia.
• His assets were frozen in 2004, but they found no legal basis to take him to court.

How was your arrest?

In 2008, agents from the United States federal drug enforcement agency, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), contacted Bout through his former associates. The agents posed as buyers working for the FARC, a left-wing guerrilla group in Colombia.

In March 2008, Bout was detained in Thailand when American agents disguised as a left-wing guerrilla managed to get him into negotiations for arms shipments to the FARC. Bout was extradited to the United States in November 2010 after serving a 25-year sentence for conspiracy to murder American citizens and agents in 2012.

Bout was found guilty by the US court of selling weapons to the FARC, which is classified by the US as a terrorist organization.

Why did Russia want to release Bout?

Many experts claim that Bout is useful for Russia’s secret services. But he denies any ties to the Russian government or access to state secrets.

“I have no confidential information about the Russian state and I do not know its leaders. I have not worked for Russian companies or government agencies,” he said in an interview.

Over the past decade, Russian officials and the press have implied that Bout would be exchanged for US prisoners in Russia.

US-Russia expert Alexandra Filippenko argues that Bout’s importance to President Vladimir Putin’s government stems from a Cold War mentality anchored at a time when the United States and Russia faced strong competition.

“In the eyes of many people, both American and Russian, Bout is part of and at the same time incarnation of the Soviet system. He does not recognize the new world order. That is why it is very important for the country,” says Filippenko. “He’s an insider, and in the Russian tradition you wouldn’t abandon people who serve the system.”