Letter bombs in Spain: the long hand of the Russian services

American and European officials believe so Russian military intelligence agents ordered associates of a Russia-based white supremacist militant group to conduct a recent letter bomb campaign in Spain, the most important targets of which were the prime minister, defense minister and foreign diplomats, according to US officials.

Spanish and foreign investigators investigated who sent six letter bombs in late November and early December in places mainly located in Madrid, including the official residence of the President of the Government Pedro Sánchez, which also serves as his office; the US and Ukrainian embassies; and the Ministry of Defence. There were no deaths in the attacks that US authorities consider terrorists.

An employee of the Ukrainian embassy he was injured using one of the packages.

Russian imperial movement

Researchers have focused in recent weeks on the Russian imperial movementa radical group with members and associates across Europe and military-style training centers in St. Petersburg, officials said.

They added that the group, which has been designated global terrorist organization by the United States Department of State, has links with Russian intelligence agencies. Prominent members of the group were in Spain, and police there traced their ties to Spanish far-right organisations.

US officials say the Russian officers who led the campaign seemed intent on doing so keep European governments off guard and they could test intermediate groups in case Moscow decides to escalate the conflict.

The target

The ostensible purpose of the action was to emphasize that Russia and its proxies could carry out terrorist attacks across Europe, including in the capitals of NATO member states, which is helping to defend Ukraine from a Russian invasion, said US officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity surrounding the investigation.

Spain is a member of the alliance and has provided military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine, as well as diplomatic support.

One of the letter bombs was sent to installationan arms manufacturer from Zaragoza who produces grenade launchers that Spain is delivering to Ukraineand another ended up at Torrejón de Ardoz air base on the outskirts of Madrid.

There is no indication that Moscow is willing to carry out covert attacks or widespread sabotage in Europe, Russian officials say could prompt a NATO response and, potentially, a larger and more costly conflict, according to US and allied officials.

For this very reason, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his generals have not ordered any conventional strikes against a NATO country.

covert operations

Putin’s calculation on terrorist attacks could change if Russia continues to suffer major setbacks in UkraineUS officials say. Putin has given his military intelligence agency wide latitude to develop and carry out covert operations in Europe, but it is unclear to what extent the Kremlin has been involved in the letter bomb operation, they say.

“This looks like a warning”said Nathan Sales, the State Department counterterrorism coordinator in the Trump administration, when the Imperial Russian Movement was designated a terrorist organization. “It is Russia that is sending a signal is willing to use terrorist proxies to attack in the rear areas of the West”.

The Russian officers behind the bombing campaign work for the Main Directorate, commonly known as the GRU, one of Moscow’s most aggressive intelligence agencies, US officials say. In the last few years, the group carried out bold and deadly covert actions with impunity.

Members of the agency have engaged in a variety of shady activities, from interfering in the 2016 US presidential election to the downing of a Malaysian civilian plane over Ukraine in 2014, according to US officials.

A specific part of the agency, Unit 29.155, has been trying to destabilize Europe. through coup attempts Y murdersaccording to US and European security officials.

Its agents include Russian war veterans, and it was so secret that most GRU agents probably didn’t know it existed. US and allied authorities were unaware of its existence until a few years ago.

US authorities suspect that the Russian officers involved in the action in Spain are part of the group 161st Special Purpose Training Center, whose headquarters in eastern Moscow are home to Unit 29155, among other groups, US officials say.

Spanish investigators have identified “persons of interest” they believe were involved in the bombings, a senior US official said.

A spokesman for the Spanish embassy in Washington declined to comment, citing the ongoing investigation.

Fiona Hill, executive director for Europe and Russia at the White House National Security Council in the Trump administration, said it would not be surprising if The GRU would lead the Russian imperial movement to perform attacks.

“Most of these types of organizations are, of course, linked to Russian intelligenceGRU or FSB,” he said, also referring to the Federal Security Service, Russia’s domestic intelligence agency. “Often they are just front groups for the activities of the intelligence services.”

Intelligence operatives use these groups to sow confusion and create “implausible deniability,” he added.

US and British intelligence officials collaborated with the Spanish National Police and counterintelligence officials on the investigation. His suspicions about the Russian Imperial Movement and the GRU surfaced late last year, shortly after the bombings were discovered, according to US officials.

The radical group is only partially aligned with the Russian government. The movement’s leadership criticized the incompetence of the Russian leadership in the war in Ukraine and accused Putin of corruption. However, because the group shares Moscow’s goals of undermining Western governments and wreaking havoc in Europe, Russian intelligence has been able to influence its operations, according to US officials.

The ability to use the Russian Imperial Movement as an intermediary force is useful for Russian intelligence at some point, especially since it makes it more difficult for rival countries to attribute actions to the Russian government.

The State Department designated the group and its leadership global terrorists in April 2020, the first time that label has been applied to a white supremacist group.

“The Imperial Russian Movement has provided paramilitary-style training to white supremacists and neo-Nazis in Europe and is actively working to rally these types of groups into a common front against their perceived enemies,” the department said in the designation announcement.

The department said the group had two training centers in St. Petersburg which “are likely used for urban and woodland assaults, tactical weapons, and close-quarters combat training.”

State Department-appointed leaders were Stanislav Anatolyevich Vorobyev, founder of the group in St. Petersburg in 2002; Denis Valiullovich Gariyev, head of his paramilitary arm, the Imperial Russian Legion; and Nikolay Nikolayevich Trushchalov, organizer of the group’s activities abroad.

The department said two Swedes who carried out a series of bombings in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2016 had attended a training course run by the Russian group. The perpetrators, convicted in court, had attacked a reception center for refugees, a shelter for asylum seekers and a canteen.

The Stanford University Center for International Security and Cooperation describes the Russian imperial movement as “white supremacist, royalist, ultra-nationalist, pro-Russian Orthodox and anti-Semitic”. The group supports the restoration of tsarism in Russia and maintains ties with neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups in the United States and Europe.

American and European security officials have been increasingly concerned about white supremacist groups with transnational ties for most of the last decade.

In 2019, for example, an Australian man who killed 51 people at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, posted a manifesto online before the massacre claiming he was inspired in terrorist attacks by white extremists in Europe and United States.

In the wake of the recent letter bombs, US intelligence and counterterrorism services have stepped up their surveillance of the Russian Imperial Movement, including updating terror watchlists to target suspected leaders or members of the group, US officials said.

Russian intelligence operatives have attracted increased attention from counterintelligence officials and police departments in recent years as they have conducted ever more audacious operations, particularly in Europe.

In 2018, they attempted to kill Sergei V. Skripal, a former GRU officer recruited by Britain as a spy, by poisoning him and his daughter at their residence in England; those two barely survived, but a British woman died.

According to European intelligence officials, Russian agents have also carried out attacks and assassination attempts in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria and attempted a coup in Montenegro.

The same elite group active in Europe, Unit 29155, operated in Afghanistan and offered rewards to Taliban-linked militants for killing US and coalition troops, according to a US intelligence assessment first reported by the New York Times.

US officials said in 2021 that they have no evidence that the Kremlin ordered the covert action.

c.2023 The New York Times Society

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