August M
Ukraine’s military intelligence has described a covert operation that it says ended with Moscow paying out a bounty for a killing that never happened.
The episode, revealed publicly this month, blended misdirection, internal shifts in Kyiv’s leadership and a carefully managed narrative aimed at Russian security services.
Money first
At the center of the operation was a reward Russian authorities had offered for the assassination of Denis Kapustin, commander of the Russian Volunteer Corps.
Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, known as HUR, said it succeeded in convincing Russian services that Kapustin had been eliminated and later collected $500,000 tied to the bounty.
According to the Kyiv Independent, HUR said the funds would be redirected toward strengthening its special forces.
Russian intelligence, the agency said, believed the claim and did not initially question the outcome.
Power shifts
The disclosure coincided with changes at the top of Ukraine’s security apparatus.
Soon after HUR acknowledged the deception, President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that Kyrylo Budanov would leave his post as head of military intelligence to become chief of staff of the Presidential Office.
An official in the President’s Office told the Kyiv Independent that Oleh Ivashchenko, who currently leads the Foreign Intelligence Service, is set to take over as head of HUR.
The illusion
Claims that Kapustin had been killed began circulating in late December, with reports suggesting he died during a combat mission in southern Ukraine.
Days later, HUR said those accounts were deliberately fabricated. The agency confirmed that Kapustin was alive and described the reports as part of a special operation designed to mislead Russian intelligence agencies that had ordered his assassination.
HUR said it produced visual material to reinforce the story of Kapustin’s death, which Russian services accepted as authentic.
Background figure
Kapustin, known by the nom de guerre “White Rex,” leads the Russian Volunteer Corps, a formation of Russian citizens fighting on Ukraine’s side.
The group has operated since 2014 and has taken part in cross-border raids into Russia’s Belgorod and Kursk regions in recent years, the Kyiv Independent reported.
Those operations were carried out alongside other anti-Kremlin units linked to Ukraine’s defense and security forces, including the Freedom of Russia Legion and the Siberian Battalion.
Sources: Kyiv Independent
