Budanov vs Poklad. Theory about what caused conflict that led DIU and SSU to exchange fire
Journalist Iryna Romaliiska collected all publicly available information about the shootings between the SSU and the DIU on September 1 and 2. She talked to more than a dozen people. And formed her own working version of what happened. She told about this on the YouTube channel "Butusov Plus".
I’d like to make an important point straight away: the Defence Intelligence (DIU), the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU), and their respective special forces units — ‘Timur’ and ‘Alpha’ — are carrying out brilliant operations in the war. Both on the front line and behind enemy lines. These are people fighting for Ukraine’s independence. Sadly, sometimes they lose their lives — for you and me. I ask everyone not to generalise. Because the military is a cross-section of our Ukrainian society. And often, one hand can do amazing things, whilst the other — not so much.
Footage that went viral in an instant: on 2 September, a clash broke out in Kyiv between personnel from the DIU and the SSU. And it escalated into a shootout.
In this video, SSU officers are firing at DIU personnel. Three intelligence officers have been wounded. One is in a very critical condition. So critical, in fact, that rumours are circulating that he has died. But our sources assure us that he is alive.
And this shooting is not the first. The first took place at the same location a few hours earlier. And, according to our information, it was a DIU officer who opened fire there.
I shall try to recount this convoluted story in order.
Within the DIU structure, there is a special unit called ‘Timur’. This is a large formation comprising several other units. In particular, the ‘Russian Volunteer Corps’ (RVC). It is made up of Russians. The deputy commander of the RVC is Stepan Kaplunov.
He was born and raised in Russia and was part of a far-right circle. In 2022, in an interview with CNN, he said that he had fought in Syria as a Russian special forces soldier. In 2014, he came to fight for Ukraine. He served in ‘Azov’ and ‘Right Sector’, and has been with the RVC since 2023. He has sustained several serious combat injuries. According to many accounts, he is indeed fighting with great determination in this war. In Ukraine, he was awarded the Order "For Courage", 3rd class. In Russia, he is on the list of extremists and terrorists.
And then, on 23 August, he was either abducted or detained by the SSU. Video footage of those events:
Three days later, his lawyer, Taras Borovskyi, declared: "My client has been abducted!" On the night of 1–2 September, SSU officers brought Kaplunov home to search his flat. Members of the DIU were also present. A confrontation ensued, lasting several hours. Shots rang out in a residential area of Kyiv during the night and again in the morning. Both sides in the conflict were armed (a fact not even concealed by RVC commander Denis Kapustin in an interview with "Ukrainska Pravda"). Present at the scene were the commanders of the ‘Timur’ and ‘Alpha’ special units, as well as representatives from the Defence Intelligence (DIU), the SSU and the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI). The police cordoned off the area.
On 2 September, the SSU and the Defence Intelligence simultaneously issued brief press releases stating that they were jointly conducting a special operation to apprehend a military officer who had been recruited by the FSB. They also claimed to have foiled a terrorist attack – allegedly, this officer was supposed to kill, amongst others, a Russian opposition figure. It later emerged from leaked information that the individual in question was Akhmed Zakayev, the head of the government-in-exile of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria.
However, the DIU’s press release subsequently disappears, leaving only the SSU’s press release. Later, to corroborate its version of events, the SSU publishes screenshots of Kaplunov’s own correspondence with a Russian recruiter and his video confession — or so-called confession. In this video, Kaplunov, for some reason wearing sunglasses, says:
"I was approached by an individual from the Russian Federation who was acting on behalf of the Federal Security Service with the aim of recruiting me to carry out active operations to eliminate fighters of the Ukrainian defence forces and other individuals."
The conflict, which involved gunfire, ended with Kaplunov himself being released by SSU officers. He went on an interview on Radio NV with Yulia Zabelina and gave his version of events: he had been abducted by SSU officers, held in secret prisons, and chained up. He was threatened. They did not beat him. But they exerted psychological pressure. And he, an experienced military man, was frightened by this psychological pressure and confessed to what they asked him to: that he had been recruited by Russia. At the same time, he himself says: yes, there was correspondence, but he — and I quote — "forwarded this communication to his immediate superior, Dmitry Ivanov". A few hours after this interview, another video featuring him appeared.
This was published by the RVC’s press office. In it, Kaplunov says:
"I, Stepan Grigoryevich Kaplunov, was abducted in a gangster-style operation by SSU officers on 23 August. According to our information, General Poklad worked directly with me for the first three days. Through physical and psychological pressure, they tried to use me to discredit Dmytro Ivanov, deputy commander of the Timur special unit, and Kyrylo Budanov himself. The aim was to pin cooperation with the FSB on them. Also, whilst I was away – and we have video footage of this – SSU officers attempted to break into my home and plant unknown items. They entered carrying large sports bags. Our side has approached the State Bureau of Investigation to look into this situation."
The RVC also showed the same video featuring the bags:
The SSU’s version is set out in their press release. And it goes like this. Kaplunov had been tasked by the FSB with preparing an assassination attempt on a Russian opposition leader for Independence Day, when the opposition figure was due to visit Ukraine. And also — to kill several military personnel. But the SSU acted pre-emptively — they stopped the preparations for the crime. The following is a quote from the press release: "Given that this military serviceman admitted to having contacts with the FSB of the Russian Federation and cooperated with the investigation, no preventive measure was applied against him. Whilst SSU officers were carrying out urgent investigative measures to gather and secure evidence of the aforementioned criminal offence, a completely unacceptable conflict arose, which led to a shooting."
The State Bureau of Investigation and the Office of the Prosecutor General are now looking into who is in the right and who is not. A criminal case has already been opened. Two people have been served with notices of suspicion. The SSU officer is charged with "abuse of authority or official powers" involving violence or the use of a weapon. He faces between three and eight years in prison. The second charge is against a military officer from the Defence Intelligence Unit. The investigation regards his actions as "an attempt on the life of a law enforcement officer". The penalty for this offence is between 9 and 15 years in prison, or life imprisonment. Today, the court has already imposed pre-trial measures on them — neither is currently in custody.
There is also a separate case concerning the disappearance (this is precisely the verb used by Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko in his post) of Kaplunov. And yesterday evening, in a video address, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy also commented on this matter: "It is important that the truth comes out. And that such situations do not happen again. Therefore, the heads of these two agencies — the SSU and the Defence Intelligence — will be assessed based on the findings of an internal investigation. Personnel decisions have already been made regarding both agencies. The deputy heads who are responsible for this situation will be dismissed. Quite rightly so — both agencies must be held accountable."
In other words, the President is saying that both the acting head of the SSU, General Poklad, and the head of the DIU, General Oleh Ivashchenko, will be assessed. Their deputies have already been dismissed. But will the actions or influence on events of the former head of the Defence Intelligence, the current head of the President’s Office, Budanov, be assessed? It seems that this question remains unanswered.
That covers the facts; now let’s move on to the theory.
Over the past two days, I have approached the SSU, the Defence Intelligence and the State Bureau of Investigation with requests for official comments and interviews. They refused. But over these two days, I have spoken to more than a dozen people from all these agencies, and not only from them. These conversations took place on condition of anonymity. I’ve read a whole host of official and not-so-official assessments. I’ve heard many versions of events – both public and private. And here is my version of what happened.
There is a long-standing conflict between the security services — DIU and the SSU. And there is a long-standing personal conflict between Budanov and Poklad. This became public knowledge in March 2022, when Ukrainian negotiator Denys Kireiev was killed in an SSU vehicle. The SSU labelled him a traitor and a spy. However, in an interview with Radio Svoboda, Kyrylo Budanov claimed thatDenys Kireiev was an employee of the DIU and that he had simply been executed. At the time, Poklad was head of the SSU’s counter-intelligence department. The confrontation between Budanov and Poklad has now intensified. Kyrylo Oleksiiovych, as part of the President’s team, opposed Poklad’s appointment as head of the SSU. Poklad, in turn, attempted to oust Budanov’s people from the current Defence Intelligence. And he succeeded to some extent. In particular, there were changes within the Internal Security Unit of DIU. And so, the operation to detain (or abduct) Kaplunov and the work carried out with him was a joint operation between the SSU and the DIU. Specifically, it involved that part of the DIU which is more aligned with Poklad. And the head of the DIU, Ivashchenko, was aware of this operation. It’s just that the ‘Timur’ unit wasn’t aware of it. Because they are aligned with Budanov. Furthermore, through their work with Kaplunov, Poklad’s people wanted to obtain either testimony against Budanov’s people or compromising material.
Arguments in favour of this version include the following: according to my information, on the night of the search of Kaplunov’s flat, SSU officers arrived together with DIU personnel — specifically, DIU personnel from this internal security unit. This also explains why the DIU initially issued a press release stating that it was a joint operation to prevent a terrorist attack, only for the press release to disappear afterwards. Without any explanation. Although I, for one, asked the people responsible for this for an explanation. Negotiations between all parties continued at the scene of the conflict. Because one must realise that both the SSU’s ‘Alpha’ unit and the DIU’s ‘Timur’ unit are large-scale, powerful, and very formidable units. And I would very much not like to see them used unlawfully, as the personal armies of one faction or another. Did Stepan Kaplunov really work for the FSB and organise the assassination of the Ichkerian leader Akhmed Zakayev? I do not currently have an answer to that question. Perhaps he was indeed preparing a terrorist attack on the FSB’s orders, but the SSU intervened in time and took control of the situation. Perhaps he was preparing it — but under the control of his superiors in the Defence Intelligence, and it was already their operation. Or perhaps this version is fabricated altogether. But I know for certain that Zakayev was indeed in Kyiv on Ukraine’s Independence Day. Because I’ve been asking him for an interview for several months now; organising it is quite difficult, as he lives in London and is under protection, because the Russian security services are genuinely trying to kill him. So, on 23 August, his representatives got in touch with me and said that Zakayev was ready to give an interview – on the 24th, in Kyiv. But I was physically in Kharkiv, then in Poland, so I wasn’t able to record the interview.
As things stand, it’s clear that everyone has made mistakes in this affair. What remains is to fully understand the motives of Budanov and Poklad. And, incidentally, the position of Ukraine’s current Minister of Defence, Yevhen Khmara, is interesting. He hails specifically from the SSU’s ‘Alpha’ unit. Meanwhile, the Defence Intelligence (DIU) is now under his command; it is a body within the Ministry of Defence. But Khmara has not commented on this publicly.
Many questions remain regarding the actions of both intelligence services.
For example, regarding the SSU: if Stepan Kaplunov was genuinely working for Russia and planning terrorist attacks here, and then agreed to cooperate, why wasn’t this formalised through due process? Why has he now been released? Does this mean that one law enforcement agency can simply ‘snatch’ a detainee from another agency? Because Kaplunov himself describes it exactly like this in an interview: ‘I was taken away by force by the lads from the "Timur" special unit’.
And this raises a question for ‘Timur’: why on earth would an armed military unit go to snatch one of its own men from the SSU? The commander of the Russian Volunteer Corps makes no secret of it: everyone was armed; there were even light armoured vehicles. On whose orders was the combat unit sent to a residential area of Kyiv to carry out investigative or operational activities being conducted by the SSU? Even if there were violations, it is a law enforcement agency, and its actions can be challenged. Kapustin states outright that he was personally armed and resisted the actions of SSU officers. Was that actually allowed?
There are a great many questions and contradictions in the accounts given by both special forces units. I do hope, however, that I will be able to raise them. And to all those involved in this conflict – Budanov, Poklad, Zelenskyy, ‘Timur’, the head of ‘Alpha’ and absolutely everyone – there is one big question: do you realise that such conflicts weaken both the Defence Intelligence and the SSU (which are simultaneously carrying out brilliant operations on the front line and behind enemy lines!), weaken the President, and, as a result, weaken the state? A state that is at war with a very powerful enemy.
Iryna Romaliiska, "Censor.NET"
