Thread by @DavidCranmerUn1

Operation INFEKTION - Wikipedia

The operation involved "an extraordinary amount of effort — funding radio programs, courting journalists, distributing would-be scientific studies", according to journalist Joshua Yaffa, and even became the subject of a en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation…

report by Dan Rather on the “CBS Evening News”. At the beginning of September 1986, the tenth division of the HVA (HVA/X), responsible for organizing and coordinating the HVA's campaigns of active measures

KGB chairman Yuri Andropov reportedly struggled for power with

Leonid Brezhnev.[17] The Soviet coup attempt of 1991 against Mikhail Gorbachev was organized by KGB chairman Vladimir Kryuchkov.[16] Gen. Viktor Barannikov, then the former State Security head, became one of the leaders of the uprising against Boris Yeltsin during the Russian

constitutional crisis of 1993.[The second President of Afghanistan, Hafizullah Amin, was killed by KGB Alpha Group in Operation Storm-333. On July 1, 1992, the 15th brigade became part of the Armed Forces of Uzbekistan. In August 1992, the brigade took part in the liberation

of the Uzbek island of Aral-Paygambar on the Amu Darya, captured by the Mujahideen. According to Oleg Balashov, who was second in command of the assault group, the group was led by two elite units of Alpha and Vympel (15–20 each). The Alpha group targeted Amin, and the Vympel

group had the task of collecting factual evidence that Amin was collaborating with the United States. Both groups were brought to Afghanistan secretly and blended with Muslim Battalions to make an impression that the operation was carried out by local units, whereas in reality

nearly all work was done by Alpha and Vympel. As Balashov expected, Amin's troops targeted the 1st and last vehicle in the convoy of six. He placed his team of five men in the front BMP and, when the BMP got immobilized by fire from Amin's troops, ordered them to abandon the BMP

and run to the palace. All five were quickly wounded by intensive fire from the guards, but were saved by bulletproof vests and helmets. On Glienicke Bridge between Potsdam and Berlin during the February 10, 1962, prisoner exchange of Francis Gary Powers, who had been shot down

during the 1960 U-2 incident, and KGB Colonel Vilyam Genrikhovich "Willie" Fisher (alias Rudolf Abel), who had been convicted of espionage activities against the West during the Hollow Nickel Case, Drozdov (alias Jurgen Drews, Abel's purported German cousin) facilitated the

transfer with Abel's attorney, James B. Donovan.[6] The classic 1968 Soviet film, The Shield and the Sword depicting the prisoner exchange, inspired Russian President Vladimir Putin to join the KGB. He led the Directorate S until 1991 establishing Vympel within the KGB's First

Chief Directorate as a dedicated spetsnaz unit that specialized in deep penetration, sabotage, universal direct and covert action, protection of Soviet embassies and espionage cell activation in case of war.[Vympel, abbreviation of the Directorate в (Russian Cyrillic for V) of

the TsSN FSB of the Russian Federation, is still a classified and secretive unit. It took part in Russia's Chechen campaigns and in storming of the Supreme Soviet building during the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis. Little is known about its current operations and activities,

with the exception being the capture of the Chechen militant leader Salman Raduyev in March 2000 and the assault on the school in Beslan in September 2004. Vympel training is the same as Alpha Group. All Vympel operatives are trained in tactical operations, parachuting, driving

various vehicles, trained in methods of intelligence gathering, and other specialized skills. Selection is extremely hard. The Minsk territorial unit of Alpha continues to exist within the State Security Committee (KGB) of Belarus, known simply as "Alfa" («Альфа»).

The Almaty territorial unit of Alpha was turned into the special unit Arystan (meaning "Lions" in Kazakh) of the National Security Committee (KNB) of Kazakhstan.[

In April 2014, in the aftermath of the 2014 Ukrainian revolution, when Ukraine's Alpha snipers were alleged to shoot at the protesters,[5][6] it was purged and reorganised,[7] and soon used by the new government against the pro-Russian separatist forces in the war in Donbas.

Late April 2014 three officers were captured by members of the Donbas People's Militia armed group led by Igor Strelkov in the town of Horlivka, after which they were beaten up and shown on Russian television;[8] the SBU spokeswoman said the separatists acted on a tip from

infiltrators inside the agency. The SBU Alfa defector Alexander Khodakovsky, a former Alfa commander for Donetsk Oblast who has deserted from Ukrainian service along with several of his men following the revolution, became the commander of the rebel Vostok Battalion and later was

given the post of security minister of the separatist Donetsk People's Republic.[10]
Overall, SBU reported that about 30% of its Alpha group members in Donbas region were unaccounted for and were likely fighting alongside Donetsk or Luhansk insurgent groups and in March 2014 the

Alpha group only had about 200 active members still loyal to Ukraine.

This would establish a Russian "strategic hook" within Ukraine that could be used to prevent future integration of that country with the European Union or NATO.