Who was really behind Igor Strelkov's Incursion into Donbass?
Continuing our review of Alexander Zhuchkovsky's 85 Days in Slavyansk
Autumn 2012, Kiev. Two fools were sitting under Bandera's portrait in the Svoboda party office. One considered himself a Ukrainian Nationalist and spoke with self importance, the other considered himself a Russian Nationalist and listened attentively. One had recently joined the Ukrainian Parliament and shared his political experience. The second really wanted to get into the Russian Parliament and came to learn from the firsts practical know how. One fool's name was Andrei Ilyenko, the other was Alexander Zhuchkovsky.
Winter of 2025. Andrey Ilyenko is now a soldier of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Kramatorsk area. In an interview with the Ukrainian media, the former parliamentarian says that Ukrainians have been standing in Donbas to the death for 11 years and will not surrender it now. Alexander Zhuchkovsky is a soldier of the Russian Armed Forces in the Kramatorsk area. He never became a parliamentarian, but he serves in an engineering battalion specializing in mining and is working on a book called "How I lost the war."
By the time this book is finished, the Ukrainian Armed Forces will no longer be in Donbass and where will Andrei Ilyenko be? Will he survive and give an interview about how "the battle is lost, but not the war"? Will he be captured and testify? Or will he say nothing more and die like a fool?
However, I don't care about Ilyenko at all. I mention him only in connection with these memories of pre-war life, in which another character (I) was so politically amorphous that I went to learn from the practical experience of people who two years later, would begin to ban the Russian language and crush Russians in Novorossiya with tanks.
Why did I know the word "Ukraine" since childhood, and "Novorossiya" only shortly before the war broke out there? Why was I in Kiev three times before the age of 14, but never in Donbass? Why didn't I have any contacts with Donetsk organizations, but instead participated in consultations with Ukrainian Nationalists? Why did three of my St. Petersburg friends take the side of Ukraine, having moved there even before the SMO began? A strange way of acting and choosing friends for a man who considered himself a Russian Nationalist and Imperialist. Was I like that?
Who I was and considered myself at the time has long lost any relevancy. Back then my Nationalist-Imperialist views were easily combined with Liberal-Democratic ones, and the ideas of counterrevolution (restoration of Empire) coexisted in my mind with purely revolutionary ones. The goal of "saving Russia" justified any actions, including the closest cooperation with liberals and contacts with Banderist.
I was a passionate oppositionist, and despite my Nationalist Leanings I suffered from a typical liberal ailment – my dislike of the state was clearly stronger than my love of Russia and created all these distortions and contradictions in my worldview.
This carousel started spinning in 2012. We ran around the city squares, wrote pamphlets and dreamed of great upheavals. The tires of Euromaidan were already smoking, and our political drunkenness continued unabated.
Sobering up only came with the first bloodshed. At the moment of real choice, all this husk instantly fell away and only Nationalist Conviction remained. This feeling led me and thousands more volunteers to Donbass.
The above is a post from the Author of 85 Days Telegram Page where he has been more active lately, writing about his life in the years leading up to the Russian Spring. This new book he is working sounds like pure gold for people that want to really “get” Russia and a review will be mandatory after its released and I have read it. In that post we see a vivid description of the ideological chaos reigning in Russia in the years leading up to the Donbass War. Russian Nationalist Imperialist, Navalnyite Shitlibs and Banderist/neo nazis were all caught up together in the same storm directed against Moscow. Friends that brawled with Cops together in Peter and Moscow would end up trying to kill each other in Donbass. Even more striking is Zhuchkovskys admission that he had never even heard the term “New Russia” until shortly before the war popped off. Meanwhile he knew all about Ukraine and Ukrainian Nationalism. He had contacts with Ukrainian Nationalist and friends on the Ukrainian side but didn’t know anybody in Donbass. Why was Russian Nationalism in such an abjectly terrible state on the eve of Maidan and the War in Donbass? Do Zhuchkovskys brutally frank admissions here retroactively discredit Russian Nationalism?
No imo, the Kremlin created this intellectual climate in the first place and it’s their fault that Russians like Zhuchkovsky knew all about “Ukraine” and its rich history but jack shit about New Russia. Zhuchkovsky passed through the Russian Federations Education system after all. In the years leading up to the war the Russian Authorities via their inept propaganda which made the USSRs seem sophisticated and Kleptocratic Politics had united all the Passionate, Idealistic and Disillusioned Young People of Society against the State Apparatus. This opposition would only be divided when the blood started flowing, the blood of Russians stranded and abandoned in Ukraine. As Zhuchkovsky says, all that remained when the scorched and mutilated bodies started piling up was Naked Nationalist Conviction, who are yours and who is killing them. For many Russians hatred of the State was transferred to the people of Donbass who wanted to join the RF. Years of ideological pin ball had so disfigured the minds of these Russians that “their own” was anybody fighting against Moscow, even those killing Ethnic Russians in Donbass. For others like Zhuchkovsky, they saw the burnt corpses of Russians in Odessa and realized something along the lines of “Oh Shit those are my people” and that was that. They went off to war. None the less, these Russians like Zhuchkovsky were just reacting to events, those driving them initially were the long forgotten regular people of Donbass that were acting on their own. If Moscow had driven a large portion of the Russian Nationalist Subculture to such a state of disillusionment that they could no longer see the difference between a Donbass Coal Miner and a Chabad Lubovich Learned Elder, then how likely is it that the Official Authorities were building a pro-Russian Network of Agents in Donbass before the Russian Spring? I say pro-Russian specifically because the Kremlin did have a Pro Kremlin Network in Ukraine, and it was because of this Network that the Kremlin ultimately lost the country. Furthermore, this pro Kremlin network did not want Donbass joining Russia, and these were the people that Moscow was cultivating, not the Russians of Donbass waving the tri color.
As we touched on in part 1 Crimea’s reunification with the RF created an expectation amongst the Russian Population of Historical New Russia that they too would soon be brought home from “Independent Ukraine”. Contacts were established between Leading Russian Spring Activist in Donbass and a network of people in Russia that appear to have been at the very outer fringes of influence. The names of all these people aren’t publicly known to this day, but Zhuchkovsky gives us 3 at least, Constantin Malofeev, Seregei Glazyev, and Sergei Aksyonov. The activities of this group were conducted through intermediaries like ex spook/political operator Alexander Borodai with pro Russia Donbass Activist such as Pavel Gubarev and Sergei Tsiplakov. To say though that there was an aggressively pro re-unification slice of the Russian Elite would be a huge overstatement and distortion as we will see moving on that the people supporting Strelkov did so very tentatively and they tried to call his operation off when the moment of truth came, necessitating him to turn off his phone. As a matter of fact, the people who signed off on Strelkov’s Operation before trying to pull the plug at the last moment never had annexation of Donbass in mind. We will analyze all this in turn starting with the situation in Donbass on the eve of Strelkovs arrival.
In Donetsk Pavel Gubarevs Team coordinated the arrival of Strelkov’s Armed Company from Crimea. By the time Strelkov crossed the border Gubarev had already been in prison for over a month. A very important and often over looked role in the Donbass Rebellion was played by Sergei Tsiplakov. He was responsible for maintaining contact with Strelkov via encrypted messages and by the end of May he worked at the HQ in Slavyansk. There he provided secret channels of communication with Donetsk and Russia.
According to Gubarev who we met in part 1 without Tsiplakov there would have been no way for the Donetsk Activist and Strelkov’s Group to coordinate their activities in secret. Apparently, Strelkov and the Donetsk People were just using regular email but Tsiplakov worked out a code system that was never broken. Nobody to my knowledge has ever presented real evidence of Tsiplakov being FSB and he was a citizen of Ukraine. He is an illustrative example of how the locals took things into their own hands with admirable success. IMO if Tsiplakov had been FSB then FSB would have leaked the code system to SBU without a doubt. It’s precisely because the Russian Spring Leaders were not being coordinated by official Moscow that Kiev was unable to stop Strelkovs Company from occupying Slavyansk. Remember, at the last second Strelkov had to turn off his phone as to avoid stand down orders, if FSB was reading his emails then they would have turned them over to Ukraine once Strelkov went rouge.
Tsiplakov, a lifelong Donbass Resident, historian by profession and pro-Russian Activist since his university days described the situation in Donbass in April of 2014 thusly:
By April of 2014 we had reached something of a dead end. Peaceful Protest weren’t going to be enough, and we didn’t have the strength or resources for armed rebellion. In theory nonviolent resistance like organizing mass strikes and paralyzing industry in the region which accounted for 25% of Ukraine’s economy could have forced the local elite to side with the us as happened in Crimea. Unfortunately, in Donbass there was nobody for us to reach an agreement with. The Donetsk Political Elite were indistinguishable from organized crime. Elected Representatives were more often than not members of Mafia Clans with many years of experience in turf wars and bloody take overs of industrial operations. Go ahead and try to convince such people to vote against Kiev. You would disappear into a landfill with a few bullets in you. In general, we understood that peaceful protesting was a dead end but we didn’t possess the means for violent uprising. Besides not possessing enough weapons and money we didn’t have enough people willing to see things through to the end. For the most part simple workers made up the majority of the population in Donbass, people with low levels of personal initiative and used to following clear instructions. The habits ingrained from decades of abiding by the rules of the mine and factory floor negatively impacted on the revolutionary initiative of the local population when we needed to move independently, decisively and without pity.
What Tsiplakov is saying here ought to be fascinating stuff to self proclaimed Edgy Western Dissidents. Unfortunately, that is not the case for the most part. Tsiplakov trying to find a means of seizing power “decisively and without pity” is likely low human capital coded and thus unappealing to many of our esteemed new right intellectual vanguard. To many others what Tsiplakov is saying simply can’t be true because the Russian Spring was a Kremlin op from start to finish and all local mafia bosses had to be pro Russian as opposed to pro Kiev like Tsiplakov is saying. To others this can’t be true because the Russian Spring was well supported and handled by the Kremlin who are based and red pilled so Tsilplakov implying that wasn’t the case is heresy and probably CIAMOSSADMI6 propaganda. In short due to retarded ideological biases the Edgy Western Right does not study this pretty recent case of White Europeans rising in armed rebellion. What’s especially ironic about this is I know for a fact that ZOG has thoroughly and objectively studied it. Higher Ranking Special Forces Officers and CIA spooks collect all the open source info about stuff like this they can find and write studies which occasionally find their way to pay walled websites and Military Journals. How much impact these studies have is debatable, and I assume it isn’t much in the scheme of things. However, the very fact that our overlords do study this stuff for real and try to make changes and recommendations on how to conduct unconventional warfare/social engineering based on said studies is funny in light of the fact that our esteemed human capital titans could care less, exactly like our passionate ideologs who are supposedly ride die about getting out from under the clutches of ZOG.
For the few that are serious though what Tsiplakov is describing is a state of affairs we should instantly recognize. The local authorities are synonymous with organized crime and are loyal to the system. Non-Violent resistance will go nowhere, the locals aren’t ready for a blood bath, nor is there any means to properly arm and support an uprising anyway. In Spring of 2014 however, a confluence of events took place which allowed for a partially successful uprising. Thankfully instead of contenting himself with blogging Tsiplakov had figured out a way to securely coordinate revolutionary activity using normal email. He could not find a way to solve all his issues locally, but his activities, figuring out a coded/sypher language that the spooks couldn’t brake enabled him to find help in Russia from sympathizers with more resources. The elite human capital dunce can say “but see, he needed wealthier more powerful human capital people to save him" and this is partially true. The point is though that if Tsiplakov had not been proactively putting his energy into building his local network and inventing his own code/sypher language he would have just totally failed despite tepid wealthy benefactors in Russia. To put it simply, if Tsiplakov had focused on blogging about IQ studies, how revolution is brown coded, owning the commies and or capitalist, and pseudo edgy socio-political commentary than he would have achieved nothing at all.
Tsiplakov on the State of Affairs just prior to Strelkovs arrival:
After unsuccessful attempts to seize administrative centers and the arrest of Pavel Gubarev, the protest began to slow down. Tsyplakov recalls. “Buildings were occupied and then abandoned. The uprising flared up and subsided off and on. It was necessary to act more radically - to immediately seize the SBU, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the TV tower”. Another mandatory point of the program was the seizure of the airport, because we hoped for the arrival of “polite people”.
Local elites withdrew. Some were waiting for steps from the Russian Federation and wanted reinforced concrete guarantees, others took a pro-Ukrainian or neutral position. Therefore, it was necessary to seize weapons and dictate terms to them. And we watched the news about Crimea and hoped for Russia’s help.
After the 20th of March the Ukrainian Military began arriving in Donbass and repressions and arrests of key participants in the uprising began. We only responded with new rallies, remaining, in fact, hostages of the system.
For the first time, this scenario was broken on April 6-7, when we again occupied the buildings of the Regional State Administration and the Security Services of Ukraine. Here we got hold of weapons for the first time, but there were very few of them as the Local Authorities had already managed to evacuate almost everything. These weapons were not enough - we had up to sixty rifles and pistols and Oplot [a local militia] a few more. In general, no more than a hundred weapons - with such a number we couldn’t organize an uprising in the whole region. The People’s Militia of Donbass then had a couple of hundred people without discipline and a single leader (Gubarev does not count, since he was already in a pre-trial detention center) who would lead everyone, and people just sat in their apartments with these weapons and waited for someone to come and arrest them.
From the point of view of Ukrainian legislation, we had long entered the sphere of serious criminal offenses, but fundamentally nothing had changed or happened. Everyone understood that it was necessary to go to the end, otherwise the consequences would be deplorable - as in Odessa, Kharkov... But soon Igor Strelkov’s group would arrive and begin the defense of Slavyansk, saving the Russian Spring from total collapse.
Overstating just how much recent Russian History hinged on what Igor Strelkov set in motion in Donbass is difficult. The man was only a retired FSB Colonel and having such an impact on world affairs is typically an honor reserved only for people that have flown with Epstein or kissed the Wall in Jerusalem. Given that Moscow had no interest in annexing Donbass a very rational question to ask is how the hell did Strelkov end up there in the first place? There is a straightforward answer to that question that we will get to in a minute but first some basic background on Strelkov for those who might not know his basic backstory.
Strelkov was born in 1970 in Moscow. In 1992 he graduated from the Moscow State Institute of History and Archives. During the summer of 1992, he participated in hostilities in Transnistria, where he went as a volunteer. From November 1992 to the end of March 1993, he fought as a volunteer in Bosnia in the Serbian Army, first as a reconnaissance group gunner, then as an 82-mm mortar gunner.
From June 1993 to July 1994, Strelkov served in the Russian Armed Forces, in the Moscow Air Defense District. From March to November 1995, he served under contract in an artillery battalion. From the end of March to mid-October, he took part in hostilities on the territory of the Chechen Republic.
From August 1996 to March 2013, he served in operational and managerial positions in various units of the FSB of Russia. From 1999 to 2005, in different periods (on long business trips), he served in Chechnya and Dagestan in the fight against terrorism and the bandit underground. From the end of 2005 to 2013, he served in Moscow, repeatedly participating in various tasks in other regions of the Russian Federation. In March 2013, with the rank of colonel, he was retired due to seniority.
Importantly:
In February 2014, Strelkov went to Crimea, where he became the commander of a separate volunteer special forces battalion that took part in the military operation to reunite Crimea with Russia.
Strelkov was directly involved in the Liberation of Crimea, apparently, he did such good work in the course of that operation that he caught the attention of people that thought one more op in Donbass might be necessary. Who were these people, and why did they think such an operation might be called for? Zhuchkovsky notes that to this day in Russia, and I would add for anyone in the world that has strong opinions about Russia whether for or against that the question of how Strelkov ended up in Donbass is much argued over. Zanon 5D chess cultist argue that the Kremlin was deftly managing the situation to buy time until Russia was ready to crush NATO which they are currently doing now apparently. Pro hohols whether liberals or neonazis claim that Putin personally sent him as the vanguard of a full-scale Russian Invasion which plucky Ukrainians stopped dead in its tracks. Both those variants are wrong, horrendously so. Zhuckovsky offers 3 variants and gives us the correct one:
Let’s consider three versions.
The first version. At the beginning of April 2014, the Russian authorities were planning to send troops to Ukraine and implement the Crimean scenario, at least on the territory of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. Therefore, by analogy with the Crimea, an armed group was sent to Donetsk to “prepare the ground” so that regular troops would follow it.
The second version. The top Russian leadership did not have firm intentions and plans regarding Ukraine, so they could not give such an order and give the “go-ahead” for the actions of the Strelkov group. However, “patriotic elements” in the Russian elite, mainly among the leadership of the army and special services, as well as people working closely with them, who had already proven themselves to be good performers in Crimea, were interested in such a scenario – in particular, the well-known “Orthodox oligarch” Konstantin Malofeev, the new head of Crimea Sergei Aksyonov and political strategist Alexander Borodai. Realizing that the Kremlin is hesitant but “in principle is not opposed”, these “patriotic elements” took responsibility by authorizing Igor Strelkov to act in the Donbass.
Third version. The decision to march on the Donbass was entirely made by Strelkov and the Crimean militia. They went to the Donbass at their own risk, just as a few weeks later, without any “go-ahead” from above, many hundreds of volunteers from all over Russia would go there.
Each of these versions has serious logical flaws. On the one hand, it seems that nothing could have happened without the approval of the top Russian Leadership. On the other, if no Crimean scenario in the Donbas was ever planned - then, of course, there was no point in the Russian Federation sending Strelkov there. If we take the second version as a basis, then the decision to take such actions by a part of the Elite seems unlikely without tacit approval from National Leadership. The third version seems completely fantastic: it is difficult to imagine fifty-armed people freely moving around the territory of Russia without cover from above.
So, the second variant, that certain people at the outer fringes of power were interested in sending people to Donbass and eventually did so works as a basis, but as Zhuchkovsky says this can’t be the full story. While these people, Malofeev, Aksyonov, and Sergei Glazyev (whom the Author doesn’t mention in the above passage but later does) were influential, they were very from shot callers. These are “petty” Elite not the ruling class and they don’t get to act independently on such important matters, their influence is limited to them having access to the Kremlin, not making important decisions that effect the State on their own. But if the Kremlin was not interested in bringing Donbass home, why did they give a tepid nod to the idea of sending in Strelkov? Zhuchkovsky gives us a credible answer.
Strelkov says that if there were no war in the Donbass, it would have been in Crimea. This is often talked about, and this consideration gives rise to another version of events: Russia needed the war in the Donetsk region to divert attention from Crimea, to transfer the epicenter of events to Donbass
I don’t doubt that Aksyonov and Glazyev are sincere enough in their love for Russia, they are careful with their speech, not too edgy, and altogether stay within the confines of respectability but they aren’t villains imo. Malofeev is more suspect and strikes me as a Prigozhin figure. IMO he is mostly self-interested but like Prigozhin he likely has real conflicts with the more influential people in the RFs ruling class. So, what we have is a situation where pro Russians in Donbass like Tsiplakov and Pavel Gubarav established contact with the few people sympathetic to them at the outer margins of influence in Russia, and these influential people got onto contact with the Kremlin. But the Kremlin did not say “get er done let’s do this shit or hey let’s send Strelkov to buy time until we are ready to crush NATO”. Moscow made a much more calculated decision that ensured when fighting broke out that it wouldn’t be in Crimea. The Russian Authorities were protecting their Crimean Investment by transferring the inevitable violence elsewhere, and when the fight got going in earnest it was Moscow trying the hardest to end it. Furthermore, Strelkov’s incursion was poorly financed, poorly armed, and generally just operating on a shoestring. That is Strelkov was sent to do just enough to make sure the ruckus stayed out of Crimea and nothing more, Moscow knew a fuss was coming and they wanted that fuss somewhere else and over with quickly and them getting the credit for ending it. The Russian Authorities succeeded in keeping the fight out of Crimea but failed at keeping the ruckus to a minimum and getting accolades for concluding it. Also, as we have already noted someone tried to pull the plug on the operation at the last second and in a few minutes, we will see that it was more than likely because Moscow had received reassurances from its esteemed Western Partners that Crimea was safe enough. However, Strelkov turning off his phone and immortalizing his place in history with the phrase “fuck your optics I’m going in” threw a wrench in whatever his handlers and his handlers handlers originally had in mind.
So, what we have is actually the polar opposite of the Zanon claim. Moscow was not buying time to crush NATO in the future. They likely calculated correctly enough that war might come to Crimea, so they made sure that it was fought elsewhere, but the intent was to keep it as limited as possible and also to end it ASAP and get credit for doing so, thus facilitating renormalization of relations with the West. That is evidenced by the abysmally poorly resourced operation Strelkov conducted, the Kremlin recognizing Poroshenko and the New Crew in Kiev while refusing to recognize either the LNR or DNR. They wanted Kiev to reintegrate both Republics, albeit “peacefully” and for the West and Kiev to thank Moscow for making this possible. But Strelkov was absolutely the wrong guy to send for achieving those objectives. In the end Slavyanks was lost, but he gave Ukraine such a war that there was no going back once it was unleashed. Kiev and the West realized this by September 2014, Moscow is still in denial.
As for Aksyonov, Malofeev and Borodai, their role in the "Slavyansk Epic" was different. The participation of the head of Crimea [Aksyonov], apparently, was the most direct: at that time, he had a trusting relationship with Strelkov, and it was from Crimea that an armed detachment moved to the Donbass. Strelkov himself does not hide the role of Aksyonov in sending the group. The role of Konstantin Malofeev, apparently, was to finance this enterprise. Although, according to Strelkov, Malofeev was initially against sending an armed group to the Donbass. Igor Strelkov assesses the role of Alexander Borodai as insignificant, emphasizing the fact that Borodai appeared in Slavyansk only once.
Judging by the Substack Statics not too many people read my post about the Espanola Brigade but those that did might recall that Aksyonov also had a good relationship with that Overtly Russian Nationalist Formation. So its not a shock to me that he had a good relationship with Strelkov and Strelkov is comfortable dropping his name. Also as the Head of Crimea he would have a fairly straightforward interest in ensuring that war didn’t come to the Peninsula.
Why Malofeev would agree to finance the adventure isn’t clear, maybe in exchange for favors from Aksyonov, maybe to get some credit from Russian Patriots. Malofeev does associate himself with figures sharply critical of the ruling elite, like Andrei Pinchuk for example and there is no shortage of articles on his Tsargrad Project critical of the migrant flood. It’s only possible to speculate why Malofeev agreed to help but my hunch is that generally he wants Russias Patriotic Opposition to be dependent on him, and he wants to establish himself as a go between between them and the ruling class.
He gets favors from the ruling Oligarchy in exchange for keeping Patriotic Opposition Discourse within Respectable bounds. Borodai is a cog in Malofeev’s Operation, it is through him that Strelkov met Malofeev.
Alexander Borodai is a Russian political strategist from the "patriotic camp” who participated in the wars in Transnistria and Chechnya. He has known Igor Strelkov since the early nineties, and they crossed paths in Chechnya. Borodai introduced Strelkov to Konstantin Malofeev even before the start of the Crimean events. Borodai became widely known in May 2014, when, after the referendum on the independence of the Donetsk Republic, he became the first prime minister of the DNR. Borodai stayed in this position until August 7, 2014. In August 2015, he created the Union of Donbas Volunteers (UDV) and is its head.
Borodai and Strelkov would eventually have a big falling out and the UDV is closely associated with the hated arch villain Vladisov Surkov who created Putinism. I have mixed feelings about Borodai simply because he really has fought on behalf of Russia. I don’t think he was always a shill, or I cant prove that at least but somewhere along the way he sold out and that appears to have happened around the time that Strelkov entered Donbass. It appears that Borodai was supposed to be Strelkovs direct handler, but Strelkov was having none of it.
When Strelkov and his detachment were already preparing to step into the unknown and enter the Donetsk region, some responsible comrades in Moscow decided to issue him stand down orders.
Alexander Borodai tells about these circumstances:
After a trip to Rostov, during which Strelkov was given another batch of money and his actions in Shakhtersk were discussed, I returned to Moscow. It was already on the eve of the shooters departure. People gathered at the Moscow airport who had just arrived from an important foreign trip directly related to the Ukrainian events. We discussed the situation with this group of five people. I suggested that my colleagues treat the situation with extreme caution and I was asked to recall Strelkov to Moscow. I left the airport, got into the car and dialed Strelkov on the mobile number on which we maintained contact. The number was unavailable. Later I found out that he was still on the territory of the Russian Federation at that time, but he had already turned off the phone, anticipating such a development of the situation and not wanting to change his own plans for Donbass.”
Why did Borodai advise his “colleagues” (whom he does not name) to treat the situation with caution and agree to recall Strelkov? According to the “curator”, who became the head of the DPR a month later, he doubted the success of the Donbass uprising:
After my trip to Rostov, I returned to Moscow with a not very positive opinion of people representing different protest groups in the Donbass,” Borodai says. “I had some concerns about the affairs outcome. First, I saw that the level of support for our actions would not be as high and serious as in Crimea. Secondly, I began to understand that there would be no repetition of the Crimean scenario in the Donbass. Yes, it was a broad popular movement, most people wanted to reunite with Russia. But in Russia itself, it has not yet been decided whether it is worth getting involved in all this. In general, we decided to wait for the results of this popular movement, its crystallization. Therefore, it was decided to slow down the situation with Strelkov. But Strelkov had his own opinion on this matter, and he rushed forward.”
Strelkov….the absolute Mad Man. Borodai drops some very important bombs there and mixes them up with BS that we need to unpack. The most important thing he lets slip as that on the eve of Strelkovs planned departure he already knew the Crimean Scenario wasn’t going to be repeated in Donbass and furthermore “In Russia itself that it has not yet been decided whether it is worth getting involved in all this”. He says that there is broad popular support for Russia in Donbass but also, it’s apparently not high enough to warrant getting too involved yet. It’s as if he is trying to subtlety imply that the reason the Crimean Scenario won’t be repeated is because the level of local support was not as high as in Crimea. Well, how much popular support was there in Feb 2022 when Russia went in? Was there more or less than in the middle of the 2014 Russian Spring? This is how we can safely assume that Borodai is dissembling.
What happened is that he met with 5 people he can’t name who had just returned from abroad on business having to do with Ukraine, he is told there will be no Crimean Scenario in New Russia, Moscow isn’t sure it wants to get too involved with Donbass, and he was “asked” to have Strelkov stand down. Borodai says that “he advised his colleagues to treat the situation with extreme caution” but the day before he had delivered bags of money to Strelkov. It’s like Borodai wants us to think that his advice to treat the situation with caution is why these individuals asked him to recall Strelkov. But reading between the lines it’s obvious that Borodai was acting as an intermediary between Malofeev/Askyonov/Moscow and Strelkov, but he did not have any strong pull over making decisions. The day before he was delivering Malofeev’s money to Strelkov, the next he is calling the whole thing off. Why would Borodai have to tell people that just told him there would be no Crimean scenario and that Moscow didn’t want heavy involvement to “proceed with extreme caution” when they clearly weren’t enthusiastic about the operation in the 1st place? What actually took place IMO is that these people returned from abroad after talking to their Western Colleagues who told them Ukraine wouldn’t attack Crimea which made Strelkov’s trip redundant, and they told Borodai to call it off. Strelkov likely knew Borodai was scheduled to meet with these people and being FSB himself, he had fair idea about what they would tell him so he turned off his phone. And thank God, because if the Russians beloved, dear Western Partners said they weren’t going to attack Crimea that means they definitely were planning to once the AFU was up to the task. Strelkov’s tendency to do his own thing very well may have saved Crimea on top of the fledgling DNR and LNR Republics.
Yet another bomb hidden in what Borodai said is that the day before…apparently when he had no serious misgivings about the project, he and Strelkov had discussed the plans in regards to “Shakhtarsk”. Borodai is confirming Strelkov’s claim that he alone took the decision to move into Slavyansk. The original plan had nothing to do with Slavyansk in other words and this operation that Moscow tried to call off and Borodai suddenly isn’t sure about was about sending Strelkov’s crew into Shakhtarsk, a town far less than half the size of Slavyansk, about 1/3 the population and 30 kilometers from the border. I’ve super helpfully circled Shaktarsk and Slavyansk on the map below. THAT IS THE TOWN MOSCOW WAS OKAY SENDING STRELKOV TO BEFORE THEY GOT REASSURANCES FROM THIER PARTNERS ABOUT CRIMEAS SAFETY.
One look at that map and you know there is no way to defend either the DNR or LNR from Shakhtarsk. If Strelkov had set up shop in that town it would have meant letting Ukraine occupy the everything to the West including the entirety of the DNR, and Shakhtarsk isn’t close enough to Luhansk city to be of much help in defending it. We can conclude that Moscow’s original scheme already involved surrendering most of the LDNR and holding some little bridgehead just barely inside Donbass. Strelkov making the decision on his own to liberate Slavyansk, which shielded the entire LDNR as opposed to a tiny border town 30 miles from Rostov is another example of how he basically changed world history.
As for the men who accompanied Strelkov from Crimea Zhuchkovsky writes:
The actions of the Russian army on the Crimean peninsula and its annexation to Russia inspired the inhabitants of Novorossiya, who expected the Crimean scenario in their regions. Russian assistance to Novorossiya, including military, was expected by all Russians both in the Russian Federation and in the South-West of Russia, seething with popular activity, which, due to an unfortunate historical accident, ended up in “independent Ukraine”.
Igor Strelkov and his associates, who were still in Crimea in early April 2014, also expected this. They had taken an active part in the liberation of administrative institutions and military garrisons on the peninsula, acting until the arrival of the main forces - the world-famous “little green men” or “polite people”, that is, the Russian military. The militias who arrived from Crimea in the Donbass later counted on exactly the same thing: to occupy government buildings, unite local residents around themselves and prepare the ground for the arrival of the Russian army.
The first detachment of volunteers who came from the Russian Federation to Donbass was the unit of retired FSB officer Igor Strelkov. The unit arrived from Crimea, so in the initial period of the defense of Slavyansk it was called the “Crimean detachment” or “Crimean company”. It was the core of the Slavyansk Garrison and the future Slavyansk Brigade, which today is part of the Armed Forces of the Donetsk People’s Republic.
I consider Strelkov an honest man but I have doubts when he claims he only suspected something had gone wrong later in June when Moscow told him to show his face on TV. I think he suspected something was wrong when he was told that the plan was just to occupy Shatkharst, and he would not have turned off his phone had he not suspected something was up. IMO he was playing his own game from the start, and I think Zhuchkovsy knows this too. Everyone knows. Like Strelkov says, there was real danger of the war starting in Crimea and by shifting events to Donbass that could be mitigated, but I can’t see how you prep the ground for liberating Donbass by occupying a town right next to the border. I think he knew that Moscow wanted him to just go make a ruckus by the border to distract attention from Crimea, but he took it upon himself to start a Liberation War. While there is turmoil on Russia’s border Moscow could bluff and be like “it would be a shame if we had to introduce troops here to” while in reality they had no intension of ever doing so. That would be enough to keep the Ukrainians out of Crimea, and this was 2014 when Moscow had way, way more credibility and people actually feared them. Then when Strelkov turned off his phone and went rouge Moscow’s approach turned into what I described earlier on, de-escalation and getting credit for forcing the LDNR to peacefully re-integrate into Ukraine. That there was no chance of this happening after the bloody siege of Slavyansk is proof that the Kremlin has been in denial about the reality on the ground in Donbass and New Russia in general since Autumn of 2014.
The Crimean company, which moved from Simferopol and arrived in the Donbass through the Rostov region, numbered 52 people. The complete list of Slavyansk "pioneers" was destroyed along with other documents before the retreat from the city, and it’s not possible to restore it completely. Firstly, some fighters still do not want to reveal their names, secondly, many of the Crimean company could not be found - over time, they left the Slavyansk garrison or went missing during the revolutionary chaos in the Donbass. Thirdly, about a quarter of the group was killed, and some of the names or call signs of the dead are no longer possible to know. Here are the call signs of the fighters who were definitely part of the Crimean company.
Balu, Romashka, Medved, Motorola, Prapor, Terets, Ded, Abwehr, Edward Pitersky, Babai, Vandal, Kedr, Tikhiy, Fang, Krot, Fritz, Argun, Glaz, Nemoy, Odessa, Shadow.
We will cover the exploits of some of those men in the next installment.
During the Liberation of Crimea Strelkov led about 200 men, and once that was all wrapped up they went home save 15 of them who stayed in an abandoned health resort in Yalta curtesy of Aksyonov the Governor. But Strelkov and his 15 remaining guys were not chilling on the beach.
After the completion of the military operation in Crimea and its admission to the Russian Federation, the separate special forces battalion [the 200 men just mentioned], commanded by Igor Strelkov, was disbanded. Two weeks passed from the moment the battalion was disbanded to the entry of Strelkov's group into Slavyansk.
2 weeks between Strelkov’s Crimean Battalion being disbanded, and him entering Slavyansk. Obviously if Moscow had been planning an “invasion” they wouldn’t have disbanded the original Battalion.
During these 2 weeks, a decision was made to enter Donbass, contacts were established with activists from Donetsk and people were selected from whom the New Crimean company was formed.
We know who these contacts were, Tsiplakov and Gubarev. Something very, very important should be made clear here Respected Readers. We read earlier that Borodai had doubts about the activist in Donbass, why would that be exactly? It would be down to them wanting to liberate all of New Russia as opposed to being content with causing a border fracus to distract Ukraine from Crimea. On the other hand, Strelkov wanted a war of liberation just like the activist in Donbass. Therefore, he was of one mind with them and took the plunge into the unknown hoping to force Moscow’s hand. He literally had less then 2 weeks to assemble a new crew on top of the 15 men he had left.
The core of the group was selected by Strelkov from people primarily with military skills and combat experience, who had gone through hot spots in the North Caucasus, Central Asia and other places, as well as fighters who distinguished themselves well during the Crimean events and showed themselves to be ideological and decisive people, ready to take risks and sacrifice themselves for a big goal. The business was started dangerous and risky, with an unpredictable outcome, so the appropriate people were needed.
What other people were there in the Crimean militia, if not ideological and decisive? – the reader will ask. There were different people there, and not all of them showed themselves worthily. There were enough adventurers, opportunists, and those who wanted to enrich themselves or get hold of weapons “on the sly” in the ranks of the militia. There were many such people in the Donbass militia. As in any war and in any revolutionary events. Igor Strelkov, who had already been to three wars, understood this well and tried to immediately determine who was suitable for his detachment and who was not.
Some relevant info there. First is that presumably some people from Strelkovs original 200 came back when he called and said they had more work. These would be those that had proved dependable during the Liberation. But also some riff raff were trying to tag along as well, that is Strelkov was not working with professional Spetsnaz. He was seriously having to work with whoever was volunteering off the street.
Each candidate for the Crimean detachment underwent a double interview. At first, Sergei Zhurikov (Romashka) spoke to the fighters, and then the people selected by him were checked by Strelkov.
“I immediately indicated to everyone where and why we were going,” Strelkov recalls. “I informed people that we would not have any official status. And if nothing works, no one will sign for us. Some people immediately fell off due to the unpredictability of the situation, the lack of any guarantees. As it turned out later, there were random people in the group, frivolous and morally unscrupulous, although some of them even had good skills. Of those who entered Slavyansk, up to a quarter deserted. They were not ready for the war that unfolded there.”
No official status, no one coming to help if it all goes South..no guarantees at all. Doesn’t it seem like Strelkov kinda knew that he was setting off to do his own thing? He obviously had way more in mind than just occupying Shatkharst across the border. The fact that some scum bags made it into the group indicates just how fast he intended to move as he didn’t have time for especially detailed background checks and screening. This was a man who saw a very small window for lighting a fire and time was critical.
In the end 54 people were assembled in Simferopol. Among were a dozen fighters from the original disbanded battalion who remained with Strelkov; 8 people from the First Regiment of the Crimean militia, who were brought by Baloo (including the famous Motorola), and 6 people of the "Kiev group" (who came to the Crimea from Kiev at different times) - Romashka, Vandal, Kedr, Mole, Fritz and Fang. The rest of the people were recruited in the barracks of the military registration and enlistment office - they were natives of Odessa, Kharkov, Donetsk and other regions of New Russia. Of the Simferopol Cossacks with the group, only one remained in the end - Terets, the future commandant of Kramatorsk. Approximately 80% of the group were former citizens of Ukraine, including Crimeans, 20% were citizens of the Russian Federation, such as Strelkov and Motorola. On the way, two more people dropped out, and as a result, a detachment of 52 fighters crossed the border.
Strelkov led a full scale Russian Invasion of Ukraine with 52 people, over 40 of which were Ukrainian Citizens. Anyway, guess its time to wrap this one up. What we have covered is quite a confluence of events and if any one element had been missing it all would have flopped. Without the Donbass pro Russian Activist raising the banner on their own and IRL nothing would have got off the ground. Strelkov coordinated with the Donbass Activist, and it was the Activist that came up with a means to do this. In the next installment we will see how it was the Activist that convinced Strelkov to move to Slavyansk, and it was them that drove his Company there. If the Activist had stuck to blogging nothing would have happened. If anyone besides Strelkov had been in charge of the Crimean Company, all the Activist work would have been in vain. In my post about Nothing Ever Happens Culture I said that IMO the fate of our Nations and Humanity in General is outside of our control and that our immediate sphere of influence is those around us. Another way of putting that is we are at the mercy of fortune, and fortune does indeed favor the bold. Pro Russia Ukrainians bold enough to flip Kiev the bird IRL met a Retired Russian FSB Colonel bold enough to flip his former employers and Moscow the bird IRL, and the result was that the DNR and LNR were born. Eventually Moscow was forced against its will to in act the interest of Ethnic Russians for once. Granted the war has been horrendous and in general things have not turned out how we would like. But the Russian Spring showed that normal people legit can put pressure on the course of history if the events converge properly and the people are morally and technically prepared. By morally I mean they are ready to die and risk leaving the comfort zone that the system provides, and they are technically able like the Donbass Activists were. The Donbass Activist brought a coded system of communication that was life or death critical to the table, and when Strelkov showed up, they were able to show him where to go and they took him there in a matter of hours, and literally every minute was important in those days.
So even if we don’t decide the fate of Nations with our internet posts that doesn’t mean that those who do decide aren’t watching us from the other side of the veil. And if they find us ready to act for real, they just might put wind in our sails. That is exactly what happened during the Russian Spring IMO.
One of the most enlightening articles I’ve ever read about Donbass. Спасибо брат
The more I learn about Strelkov, the more respect I have for him.