Orders to Kill

by Amy Knight

  In early May of this year, before he was dismissed by Trump, FBI Director James Comey testified before the United States Senate and called Russia the greatest threat to democracy “of any nation on earth.” Comey was evidently referring in part to Russia’s interference in the U.S. electoral process. (The Trump administration, significantly, was quick to dissociate itself from the statement, stressing that this was the view of the FBI.) But if one goes beyond this reference and considers the murders of political opponents and journalists by the Putin regime, as well as its sinister role in the terrorist attacks discussed here, it becomes even more clear that Russia is a dangerous and unpredictable adversary. The U.S. and its allies need to present a forceful front against the Kremlin, and that should include a strong demand that the Kremlin observe the canons of human rights set forth by the community of nations in the UN as well as by the Helsinki Accords. These rights include citizens’ protection from politically-motivated extrajudicial killing.

  As I did research and writing for this book, I realized that its implications went beyond the story of a criminal, dictatorial regime and how it operates. The book has a broader, more universal message about the phenomenon of political murder and what it means for our world today. This message is best conveyed in the words of Franklin Ford, who I drew upon in my introduction: “History has repeatedly demonstrated that assassination … has tended to ignore man’s hard-won regard for due process and to defeat the highest purposes of political life. If governments and their declared opponents were to act (or, sometimes better still, refrain from acting) in the light of that knowledge, a world facing a host of other problems would have at least one good reason to rejoice.”11

  Hopefully, the courageous efforts of the men and women I describe here, who died for “the highest purposes of political life,” have contributed to a democratic future for Russia and a better world.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  My first thanks are to my literary agent, Philip Turner, for his encouragement of my book project from the beginning and his invaluable help, including editing, in moving the manuscript through to publication. I also want to thank my editor at Thomas Dunne, Stephens Power, for his enthusiasm for my book and his excellent editing. Thanks are also due to Thomas Dunne for taking on my book and for his valuable suggestions on how to improve my manuscript.

  There are several people who have provided me with indispensable help as I worked on the book. Galina Frid gave me much-needed assistance in my research, as did Jessica Landy. Rosa Cortez and Mike Krivetz were always on call for me when I needed them for my computer issues. I am also grateful to John Dunlop, David Satter, Peter Reddaway, Martin Dewhirst, Ed Lucas, Yevgenia Albats, Andrei Soldatov, David Law, Christian Caryl, Catherine Fitzpatrick, Vladimir Milov, Brain Gyln Williams, and Vadim and Kathryn Birstein for providing me with many sources of information, as well as advice. In addition, the late Robert Silvers and Hugh Eatkin at the New York Review, in editing and publishing my writings on the subject of the book, helped me in formulating my ideas and expressing them. And Mike Wicksteed, communications officer for the Litvinenko Inquiry, graciously facilitated my attendance at the Inquiry hearings.

  This book could not have been written without the cooperation of those who kindly allowed me to interview them: Nadezhda Azhgikhina, Akhmed Zakaev, Musa and Peter Klebnikov, Congressman William Keating, Tanya Lokshina, and Alex Goldfarb. Alex also kindly read my manuscript and gave me useful suggestions.

  I am especially grateful to Marina Litvinenko, to whom this book is dedicated, for giving me so much of her valuable time for interviews and for inspiring me in writing the book. Thanks are also due to her son, Anatoly Litvinenko, for allowing me to interview him.

  And finally I owe a debt to my daughter Molly Knight Raskin for encouraging my book project and for help in various stages of editing the manuscript.

  NOTES

  *Please note that some of the links referenced in this work are no longer active.

  Introduction

    1.  Boris Nemtsov and Vladimir Milov, Putin. Itogi. Nezavisimyi Ekspertnyi Doklad (Putin: The Results: An Independent Expert Report) (Moscow: Novaia gazeta, 2008). My article, “The Truth about Putin and Medvedev,” appeared in The New York Review of Books, 55, no. 8, May 15, 2008.

    2.  Franklin Ford, Political Murder: From Tyrannicide to Terrorism (Boston: Harvard University Press, 1985), 367.

    3.  Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., “The CIA Keeps Putin’s Secrets,” The Wall Street Journal, January 3, 2017, http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-cia-keeps-putins-secrets-1483488301.367.

    4.  “Poison in the System,” Buzzfeed, June 12, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/heidiblake/poison-in-the-system?utm_term=.qe6Bz8pqw#.gyaLzKRqX. This is one of an excellent four-part series investigating suspicious deaths of Russians in Britain.

    5.  Ford, Political Murder, 1.

  1.   Covert Violence as a Kremlin Tradition

    1.  Hélène Carrère d’Encausse, The Russian Syndrome: One Thousand Years of Political Murder, translated by Caroline Higgitt (New York: Holmes & Meier, 1992), 393.

    2.  James Cracraft, The Revolution of Peter the Great (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003), 15–16.

    3.  Carrère d’Encausse, 156.

    4.  Ibid., 396.

    5.  Amy Knight, Who Killed Kirov? The Kremlin’s Greatest Mystery (New York: Hill and Wang, 1999).

    6.  As quoted in Ishaan Tharoor, “Echoes of Stalin in the Murder of a Russian Foe,” The Washington Post, March 4, 2015, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/03/04/echoes-of-stalin-in-the-murder-of-a-putin-foe-in-moscow/.

    7.  “Boris Nemtsov: Liberal Martyr,” the Economist, February 28, 2015, http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21645432-russias-rising-political-hatred-claims-victim-scrupulously-honest-reformist-leader-liberal-martyr.

    8.  Arkady Vaksberg, The Murder of Maxim Gorky: A Secret Execution (New York: Enigma Books, 2007), 328–329.

    9.  Ibid., 364.

  10.  See Vadim J. Birstein, The Perversion of Knowledge: The True Story of Soviet Science (Cambridge, MA: Westview Press, 2001).

  11.  Pavel Sudoplatov and Anatoli Sudoplatov, Special Tasks: The Memoirs Of An Unwanted Witness—A Soviet Spymaster (Boston: Little Brown, 1994), 80.

  12.  Svetlana Alliluyeva, Only One Year, translated by Paul Chavchavadze. (New York: Harper & Row, 1969), 154.

  13.  Paul Goldberg, The Yid: A Novel (New York: Picador, 2016), 5.

  14.  See Amy Knight, Beria: Stalin’s First Lieutenant (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993).

  15.  See Amy Knight, “Pyotr Masherov and the Soviet Leadership: A Study in Kremlinology,” Survey: A Journal of East and West Studies, Winter 1982, 26, no. 1 (114), 151–168.

  16.  Pravda, June 15, 1980.

  17.  Nikolai Khokhlov, In the Name of Conscience, (New York: David McKay, 1959), 363.

  18.  Kelly Hignett, “The Curious Case of the Poisoned Umbrella: The Murder of Georgi Markov,” The View East, September 9, 2011, https://thevieweast.wordpress.com/2011/09/09/the-curious-case-of-the-poisoned-umbrella-the-murder-of-georgi-markov/. Also see Oleg Kalugin, The First Directorate: My 32 Years in Intelligence and Espionage Against the West (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1994), 178–186.

  19.  Paul Klebnikov, Godfather of the Kremlin: The Decline of Russia in the Age of Gangster Capitalism (Orlando: Harcourt, Inc., 2000), 144–169.

  20.  Boris Yeltsin, Midnight Diaries, translated by Catherine A. Fitzpatrick (New York: Public Affairs, 2000), 222.

  21.  Karen Dawisha, Putin’s Kleptocracy: Who Owns Russia? (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2014), 142–162.

  22.  Ibid., 172.

  23.  Yuri Felshtinsky and Vladimir Pribylovsky, The Corporation: Russia and the KGB in the Age of President Putin (New York: Encounter Books, 2008), 118.

  24.  S
ee Nemtsov’s autobiography: Ispoved’ buntaria (Confessions of a Rebel) (Moscow: Partizan, 2007), 53.

  25.  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/monitoring/415278.stm.

  26.  Klebnikov, Godfather, 305.

  2.   How the System Works: Putin and his Security Services

    1.  Brian Taylor, State Building in Putin’s Russia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 2.

    2.  Masha Lipman, “Putin’s Halting Progress,” the Washington Post, April 24, 2002, https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/2002/04/24/putins-halting-progress/4f457fef-05f1-4450-8367-ddd97b270aed/?utm_term=.99581670646d.

    3.  On Yeltsin and his security services, see my book Spies Without Cloaks: The KGB’s Successors (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996).

    4.  Ewen MacAskill, “Putin calls internet a ‘CIA project’ renewing fears of web breakup,” The Guardian, April 24, 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/24/vladimir-putin-web-breakup-internet-cia.

    5.  Khristina Narizhnaya, “Russians Go West,” World Policy Journal, Spring 2013, http://www.worldpolicy.org/journal/spring2013/russians-go-west.

    6.  http://cook.livejournal.com/11/9/2015. On Putin and his plagiarized dissertation, see “Researchers Peg Putin as a Plagiarist over Thesis,” the Washington Times, March 24, 2006, http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2006/mar/24/20060324-104106-9971r/.

    7.  Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, The New Nobility: The Restoration of Russia’s Security State (New York: Public Affairs, 2010), 22.

    8.  Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, The Red Web: The Struggle Between Russia’a Digital Dictators and The New Online Revolutionaries (New York: Public Affairs: 2015), ix.

    9.  Aliide Naylor, “How Russia is Trying to Rein in the Internet,” Vocativ, May 19, 2017, http://www.vocativ.com/430843/russia-internet-government-social-media-censorship/, https://rns.online/internet/FSB-razoslala-rekomendatsii-po-borbe-s-virusom-vimogatelem-WannaCrypt-2017-05-13/.

  10.  Vladimir Putin, First Person: An Astonishingly Frank Self-Portrait, translated by Catherine A. Fitzpatrick (New York: Public Affairs, 2000), 144;201.

  11.  “Neofitsial’naia bibliografiia N. Patrusheva,” Internet-biblioteka “Antikompromat,” http://www.anticompromat.org/patrushev/patrushbio.html.

  12.  “Ochen’ nezametnyi Patrushev,” Sobesednik, June 25, 2007, http://sobesednik.ru/publications/sobesednik/2007/06/24/patruchev-career.

  13.  Soldatov and Borogan, The New Nobility, 22.

  14.  Ibid.,153.

  15.  Victor Yasmann, “Putin Orders New Counterterrorism Committee,” RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty, February 17, 2006, http://www.rferl.org/content/article/1065889.html.

  16.  See: The Litvinenko Inquiry. Report into the Death of Alexander Litvinenko, by Sir Robert Owen, London, January 2016 [hereafter cited as The Owen Report and available at www.litvinenkoinquiry.org], 91.

  17.  Viktor Cherkesov, “Nel’zia dopustit’, chtoby voiny prevatilis’ v torgovtsev,” Kommersant, October 9, 2007.

  18.  Irina Shcherbak, “Fond Naval’nogo: glava Sovbeza Nikolai Patrushev vladeet osobniakom, na kotoryi pri dokhodakh ego sem’i prishlos’ by kopit 3666 let,” Znak, December 9, 2014, https://www.znak.com/2014-12-09/fond_navalnogo_glava_sovbeza_nikolay_patrushev_vladeet_osobnyakom_na_kotoryy_pri_dohodah_ego_semi_pr.

  19.  https://lenta.ru/lib/14160892/full.htm; http://www.rumafia.com/ru/news.php?id=738.

  20.  Kirill Mel’nikov and Elena Kiseleva, “Andrei Patrushev osvoit ‘Sakhalin-3,’” Kommersant, September 27, 2013, http://www.kommersant.ru/doc/2305845.

  21.  “Vysshie chinovniki uvodiat den’gi na zapad,” the New Times, May 21, 2007.

  22.  David Kramer, “U.S. invites a Russian Fox into the Chicken Coop,” the Washington Post, February 19, 2015.

  23.  On the Magnitsky case, see Bill Browder, Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder, and One Man’s Fight for Justice (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2015).

  24.  Taylor, State Building Under Putin’s Regime, 46.

  25.  Aleksandr Khinshtein, “Shofer eks-glavyi MVD Nurgalieva razoblachen kak glavar’ prestupnoi gruppirovki,” MKRU, May 23, 2013, http://www.mk.ru/politics/2013/05/23/858761-shofer-eksglavyi-mvd-nurgalieva-razoblachen-kak-glavar-prestupnoy-gruppirovki.html.

  26.  Pavel Chikov, “Nasledstvo Rashida Nurgalieva,”Forbes, May 16, 2012, http://www.forbes.ru/sobytiya-column/vlast/82231-nasledstvo-rashida-nurgalieva.

  27.  Brian Whitmore, “Russia: Powerful New Investigative Body Begins Work,” RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty, September 10, 2007, http://www.rferl.org/content/article/1078611.html.

  28.  See the committee’s website: http://sledcom.ru/sk_russia.

  29.  Aleksandr Khinshtein, “Bogemskoe pravo,” Moskovskii komsomolets, July 1, 2008, http://www.mk.ru/editions/daily/article/2008/07/01/33710-bogemskoe-pravo.html.

  30.  Robert Coalson, “Russia’s Top Investigator, Aleksandr Bastrykin, In Hot Water Again,” RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty, July 30, 2012, http://www.rferl.org/content/russia-aleksandr-bastrykin-profile/24658719.html.

  31.  As quoted by Andrew Kramer in The New York Times, July 26, 2012.

  32.  Roman Anin, “Kvartirnyi vopros,” Novaia gazeta, September 18, 2012, https://www.novayagazeta.ru/articles/2012/09/19/51504-kvartirnyyvopros.

  33.  http://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-september-28-2016/.

  34.  http://cook.livejournal.com/246676.html.

  35.  The English version of the film, “Chaika: An Investigative Documentary by the Anti-Corruption Fund,” appeared on YouTube on January 26, 2016: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eO8ZHfV4fk.

  36.  Mark Galeotti, “THE FSO: praetorians, protectors, political force,” In Moscow’s Shadows, October 24, 2013, https://inmoscowsshadows.wordpress.com/2013/10/24/the-fso-praetorians-protectors-political-force/.

  37.  Yekaterina Sinelschikova, “‘Putin’s people’: The mysterious agency that guards the president’s life,” Russia Beyond the Headlines, June 1, 2016, http://rbth.com/politics_and_society/2016/06/01/putins-people-the-mysterious-agency-that-guards-the-presidents-life_599181.

  38.  “Pered uvol’neniem glava FSO Murov zavladel nedvizhimost’iu 2 mlrd,” Sobesednik, May 26, 2016, http://sobesednik.ru/rassledovanie/20160526-pered-uvolneniem-glava-fso-murov-zavladel-nedvizhimostyu-na.

  39.  On Kochnev, See Mark Galeotti, “Why the Departure of Putin’s Chief bodyguard Actually Matters,” European Council on Foreign Relations, May 26, 2016, http://www.ecfr.eu/article/commentary_why_the_departure_of_putins_chief_bodyguard_actually_7032.

  40.  Sinelschikova, “Putin’s People.”

  41.  See Dawisha, Putin’s Kleptocracy, 74–80.

  42.  As quoted in Ibid., 309–310.

  43.  Mark Galeotti, “Putin’s New National Guard—what does it say when you need your own personal army?” In Moscow’s Shadows, April 5, 2016, https://inmoscowsshadows.wordpress.com/2016/04/05/putins-new-national-guard-what-does-it-say-when-you-need-your-own-personal-army/#more-3346.

  44.  See the Russian website agentura.ru, of Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, a crucial source of information on the security services, http://www.agentura.ru/dossier/russia/fskn/.

  45.  “‘Drug lords danced with joy, when US blacklisted me’-Russian anti-drug chief,” RT, March 20, 2015, https://www.rt.com/politics/official-word/242485-viktor-ivanov-rt-interview/.

  46.  Mikhail Fishman, “Putin Closes Drug Agency, Casts Aside Longtime Supporter Ivanov,” the Moscow Times, 5/19/2016, https://crimerussia.ru/gover/viktor-ivanov-prigrel-narkotorgovtsa/.

  47.  “Ivanov nazval slukhi o likvidatsii fskn preuvelichennymi,” Forbes.ru, February 17, 2015, http://www.forbes.ru/news/280475-ivanov-nazval-slukhi-o-likvidatsii-fskn-preuvelichennymi.

  48.  http://www.agentura.ru/dossier/russia/svr/specnaz/.


  49.  Leon Neyfakh, “The Craziest Black Market in Russia,” Slate, May 22, 2016, http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/cover_story/2016/05/the_thriving_russian_black_market_in_dissertations_and_the_crusaders_fighting.html.

  3.   Galina Starovoitova: Putin’s First Victim?

    1.  https://www.unodc.org/tldb/pdf/Russian_Federation/CPC_2001_EN.pdf.

    2.  http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/f3fdcaaf9392117283647654a419a905.

    3.  See my article on the murder: “Crime, but No Punishment: Crimes Frightening Effects on Russian Democracy,” Washington Post Outlook, December 6, 1998.