Russian authorities immediately blamed Ukraine for the murder of Daria Dugina, the daughter of a prominent Kremlin intellectual, but this hypothesis, while possible, is considered unlikely by Western intelligence experts.
Dugina, who died in a car bomb explosion on Saturday, was the daughter of ultranationalist Alexander Dugin, who was an ardent supporter of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Kyiv has denied Russian intelligence accusations that a Ukrainian agent was sent to eliminate the 29-year-old journalist and then fled to Estonia.
“Can we get 400 grams of TNT into Russia? Theoretically yes. Can we plant a bomb? Yes,” a senior Ukrainian intelligence official told AFP on condition of anonymity. “But the real question is, what will it do? No one in Ukraine really knows who Dugin is. Who has a grudge against his daughter? Killing him doesn’t make any sense,” the source says.
Experts say that since Russia’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula in 2014, Ukraine has had time to develop an effective underground network in Russia and anticipates future tensions.
“I think a logistics and (…) operational structure has been established in Russia since March,” says Gérald Arboit, an intelligence specialist at the National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts (CNAM).
And although it does not exclude the involvement of Ukraine, which could be carried out with the help of Russian opposition groups, it is mandated that “for this type of attack you have to recognize, track (the target) and bring a team”. putting a bomb. “He can’t do everything alone,” this specialist recalls.
Possible but opposite effect
The infiltration of Ukrainian agents into Russia will likely require bypassing the Russian intelligence agencies that have been on the alert since the beginning of the war.
“Dugina’s murder took place in Moscow (a place that is incredibly difficult for Ukrainian services to penetrate),” said Colin Clarke, director of research at the Soufan Center in New York. Despite this, he says, “I think it will be possible. The elite Ukrainian special forces … are in a position to carry out the attack.”
Assassinations against high-profile Russian targets, particularly a young woman, could also backfire on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who relies heavily on the sympathy and military aid of Western allies.
“I don’t see any sense in such an operation for the Ukrainians,” says Alexander Grinberg, an analyst at the Jerusalem Institute for Security and Strategy. “I can’t imagine letting the Americans or the British do that,” he said.
Clarke agrees that if Ukraine wanted to assassinate a high-profile Russian, Daria Dugina would not be their choice. “I still suspect it’s some other entity, even insider business,” she says.
skepticism
Experts also note that the murder of the daughter of a supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin, although not very effectively, would serve the cause of the Kremlin strongman and increase popular anger, which turned into more support for the war.
“I do not exclude that Dugina was killed by the Russians, potentially with unconventional weapons such as thermobaric bombs, to intensify the war in Ukraine,” said a French intelligence source contacted by AFP.
In any case, the Russian accusations are unfounded, according to Alexandre Papaemmanuel, a professor at the Paris Institute for Political Studies (SciencePo) and an intelligence expert who is skeptical of the speed with which the Russian narrative is being presented.
“Often, investigations for a political assassination take much longer to bear fruit,” he says of the Ukrainian agent theory.
Nathan Sales, an intelligence consultant at Soufan Group, prefers not to speculate about this particular case, but admits to his “skepticism” about the Russian version.
“We know that the Putin government has killed Russian citizens in the past in the interest of its twisted domestic and foreign political agenda,” he says.
source: Noticias
