The ninth department of the Department of operational information of the FSB has been engaged in operations for many years, the purpose of which was to force Ukraine to be submissive to the Kremlin.. This department is headed by Sergei Beseda, who began his career back in the 1970s as a KGB officer.. He served abroad, in particular in Cuba, but then returned to Moscow and led operations in Ukraine, Georgia and other post-Soviet countries..

According to The Washington Post, after protests erupted in Kyiv in late 2013 against the pro-Russian government of Viktor Yanukovych, Beseda traveled to the Ukrainian capital. There he persuaded Yanukovych to use lethal force against people on the Independence Square. However, the protesters won, and Yanukovych fled to Russia along with a group of close advisers.. There are suspicions that in subsequent years they collaborated with the Conversations department, hoping to return a government loyal to Moscow to Kyiv.. Two years before the February invasion, this project seems to have taken on a special urgency..

In 2019, the FSB began a major expansion of its branch dealing with Ukraine. Group of 30 officers grew to 160 as of last summer. This was told to the American edition by Ukrainian officials with reference to intercepted communications and other intelligence data.. To poach personnel from other units, the Russian intelligence service offered bonuses and free apartments in buildings belonging to the FSB Academy on Michurinsky Prospekt in Moscow.. New officers were distributed among the regions of Ukraine. They were given the task of developing a network of collaborators, as well as compiling lists of enemies to neutralize.

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A security official in Kyiv who was involved in spying on FSB operations said the behavior was initially viewed as actions aimed at “bringing Russian influence back to Ukraine.”. But in retrospect, we can now say that this was a signal of a change in Russian focus from trying to influence events in Ukraine to preparing a " As military mobilization intensified last year, Ukrainian security services were inundated with additional intelligence from colleagues in the West.. On January 12, CIA director William Barnes arrived in Kyiv with a detailed dossier on Russian plans.. He was also accompanied by a team of US officials who were supposed to convince President Volodymyr Zelensky and his entourage that war was inevitable.. But when the CIA team left, Ukrainian intelligence chiefs held a meeting with Zelensky to present him with more controversial findings..

“We passed on all the information from the Americans without changes. But at the same time, our information said that the Russians were not planning a large-scale war, ”an unnamed participant in that meeting told the publication..

Ukrainian findings given the same weight as CIA warnings. The Washington Post writes that Ukrainian intelligence services recorded direct communication between the FSB and Russian paratroopers.. Such direct contacts were unusual and spoke of joint operational planning.. As it turned out, the concern about the cooperation of the FSB with the military was justified. Because it was these airborne units that later tried to capture the airfield in Gostomel, which was supposed to become a springboard for an attack on Kyiv. FSB officers were seen at the airfield before Russian forces were forced to retreat from there.

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However, other Ukrainian intelligence data sowed doubts that Russia was really preparing for a large-scale war.. In mid-February, the Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine sent its agents to Russia to establish surveillance of the operations of Russian military units.. One of the teams discovered the " Dozens of tanks stood almost without protection. There were no tankers or maintenance teams on site..

Elsewhere, Ukrainian spies discovered that Russian units were in disciplinary chaos.. Russian military vehicles were stuck, and they were accompanied by soldiers who exchanged fuel and other supplies for alcohol.

“Many of them were drunk,” a Ukrainian official who saw Ukrainian intelligence reports told the publication..

The scenes heightened the doubts of Zelenskiy's security advisers that Russia is preparing for war.. Even now, as the fighting continues for several months, some Ukrainian officials refuse to believe that Moscow is so ill-prepared.. European officials were also skeptical. On February 8 in Kyiv, French President Emmanuel Macron said he had received personal assurances from Putin that Russia would not escalate the situation..

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German intelligence chief Bruno Kahl said days before Macron that the Russian autocrat had not yet decided on an attack. Actually, Kal was in Kyiv on the day of the Russian invasion, he was evacuated to Poland.

In the end, many Ukrainian security officials were convinced that Russia was pulling troops to the borders mainly for the sake of psychological pressure.. However, they also conceded that Moscow could use missile strikes and airborne and elite spetsnaz incursions to overthrow the government in Kyiv..