Ukraine’s military intelligence agency developed plans to conduct covert attacks on Russian forces in Syria using secret Kurdish help, according to a leaked top-secret U.S. intelligence document. The introduction of a new battlefield — thousands of miles from the war in Ukraine — appeared designed to impose costs and casualties on Russia and its Wagner paramilitary group, which is active in Syria, and possibly force Moscow to redeploy resources from Ukraine, writes Washington Post.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky directed a halt to the planning in December, but the leaked document, based on intelligence gathered as of Jan. 23, lays out in detail how the planning progressed and how such a campaign could proceed if Ukraine revived it.
The Washington Post obtained the document, which has not been previously reported, from a trove of intelligence material allegedly leaked to a Discord chatroom by Jack Teixeira, a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard. The Department of Defense declined to comment.
President Vladimir Putin’s 2015 intervention in Syria to help the embattled Assad regime retain power during the civil war has created a permanent presence of thousands of Russian troops there. The deployment, which includes advanced warplanes and air defense systems, has bolstered Moscow’s regional presence but exists in an environment Russia does not totally control. Moscow transferred some troops and hardware from Syria to the Ukraine battlefield last fall, which may have led Kyiv to assess that their departure created vulnerabilities.
Maj. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, the chief of Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence, declined to comment.
