The National Resistance Center, thanks to concerned and cyber specialists, has gained access to the correspondence of senior rear officers who have found rear positions in order not to go to the war of aggression against Ukraine.
We continue to tell you about our work with requests to our anonymous chatbot and how it helps us to obtain valuable information. Recently, we received the following message.
Judging by the slogan at the end, the chatbot was written to by a resident of Russia or Belarus, which is quite rare. The information provided was verified, and thanks to the call, it was possible to contact not only the person in question, but also to obtain quite valuable information about the composition and mood in the elite Russian special forces of the Russian General Staff.
So, thanks to the phone number specified in the message, it was possible to find a page on the social networking site vk, which is run by a certain “valeriy velikolepnyi”. The OSINT analysis showed that this pseudonym was Valeriy Leonidovich Zhdanov.
The fact that Zhdanov is an ardent sympathizer of the Wagner PMC and its dead leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin, was already evident from a cursory glance at his VK page. However, more interesting was the fact that Zhdanov, at least in the period before 2017, served in the department of the 2nd Separate Guards Special Forces Brigade of the Russian General Staff (military unit 64044), stationed in Pskov. This was established from the court materials in Russia: it is clear that Zhdanov was suing the commander of the unit for dismissal from service.
After that, access was gained to the hidden information on Zhdanov’s VK page. It turned out that he was conducting correspondence related to military activities. One of these conversations contained details that directly indicate Zhdanov’s involvement in the Wagner PMC.
In particular, in one of the conversations dated January 17, 2023, the interlocutor directly asked Zhdanov if he was already “drinking champagne in Soledar”? As you know, it was on those dates that the Wagnerites’ “meat assaults” took place in the area of the city in Donetsk Oblast. Expectedly, Zhdanov, as a senior leader, did not drink champagne there.
In the dialog, the interlocutor Zhdanov’s phrase that he “spins in the state machine” and “does not like it” but “cannot quit” attracted attention.
Thanks to additional OSINT analysis and further access to information from his page, it turned out that this interlocutor was a certain Vyacheslav Pikan, and he is an active military officer. This was confirmed in one of his dialogues on the network.
The 16th Separate Guards Special Forces Brigade is another elite unit of the Russian General Staff. Further search helped to establish additional biographical and service data on Pikan. It turned out that Pikan and Zhdanov knew each other because they were former colleagues in the management of the aforementioned 2nd Brigade of the Russian General Staff (the same military unit 64044), from which Zhdanov had been dismissed with a lawsuit.
Thanks to the information obtained on the pikan, it was possible to understand that he participated in the aggression against Georgia and Ukraine as part of the 2nd Brigade of the Russian General Staff.
During the full-scale invasion, he was a company commander.
It seems that for some reason, the personnel of the Russian special brigade do not like the service in the Russian special forces too much. Therefore, at the end of 2023, Major Pikan moved to a job as a teacher at the Special Intelligence Training Center (CPSC) based at the 16th Brigade in Tambov.
Service in the CPSU seems to be only an intermediate stage. Pikan is trying to become a lecturer at the special intelligence department at the Ryazan Guards Command School of Airborne Troops.
To summarize, the elite Russian military personnel are not eager to return to the combat zone in Ukraine (the 2nd Pskov Brigade suffered serious losses in its time), but instead want to get quieter teaching positions to prepare cannon fodder for assaults, which is now being actively used by Russia. All the information about Pikan and Zhdanov was also passed on to the Peacemaker Center.
We should also add that a number of other servicemen from the 2nd and 16th brigades of the Russian General Staff were identified. The analysis of this information is ongoing.
The National Resistance Center calls on all those who care to join the fight against such enemy collaborators. Anyone can stop the policy of the Russian invaders and their collaborators by publicizing their crimes and demanding their international prosecution. You can also participate in rallies in support of Ukraine or donate to the Ukrainian Armed Forces.