#Spetsnaz - ManGod #EBM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=af_44Au4hMQ

@fergabell @OldSquida2 Abstract

A Hybrid Threat: The #NightWolves Motorcycle Club

Kira Harris
July 2020

"Hybrid threat actors are dynamic and often intentionally disguise their intentions. While the Russian motorcycle club Night Wolves dress comparably to outlaw motorcycle gangs, open source materials describe the club as posing a distinctly different national security threat. The Night Wolves’ ambiguity and covert activities make the club hard to analyze; however, this case study uses open source materials to provide insight into their activities and characteristics across an array of security domains. International incidents indicate members and associates have the capability and resources to engage in crime, corruption and politically-motivated violence both for personal interests, as well as the furtherance of Russian goals."

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1057610X.2020.1862752

@fergabell @OldSquida2

From 2018: The #NightWolves: Russian Motorcycle Club or Kremlin Militia?

"The Night Wolves, Nochnye Volki in Russian, are a Russian motorcycle club that over the last two decades has morphed into a pan-European corporation and a mini-conglomerate of about 60 different businesses. Their activities include consumer organizations, entertainment, security services and a variety of manufacturing businesses ranging from motorcycle accessories to clothing.

"They have also been implicated in several Kremlin-sponsored covert operations in eastern Ukraine and in the Russian takeover of Crimea. And they were suspected of being involved in the assassination of Milo Djukanovic, the president of Montenegro. The assassination is now seen as an attempt to derail the country's entry into NATO.

"Nicknamed Putin's Angels, they are widely seen as a sort of militia that operates in a variety of roles at the Kremlin's behest while, at the same time, affording the Russian government the luxury of denying any responsibility for their actions.

The group, many of its leaders and several of its affiliated companies, has been placed on sanctions lists by the U.S., Canada and several European countries."

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2018/09/04/night-wolves-russian-motorcycle-club-or-kremlin-militia.html

@fergabell @OldSquida2 Seems #Spetsnaz / #Nightwolves have been active in Bosnia...

https://www.newsweek.com/putin-night-wolves-biker-gang-spotted-bosnia-1772408

More about what Putin's Night Wolves are all about. Sounds a lot like the other Fascist / NeoNazi movements that have crawled out from under a rock in recent years...

Russia Is Co-opting Angry Young Men

Fight clubs, neo-Nazi soccer hooligans, and motorcycle gangs serve as conduits for the Kremlin’s influence operations in Western countries.

By Michael Carpenter
August 29, 2018

"Deep in the forests of Slovakia, former Russian #Spetsnaz commandos trained young men from a right-wing paramilitary group called the Slovak Conscripts. Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2014, some of these freshly-minted paramilitaries went to fight with Russian forces in eastern Ukraine while others stayed at home to agitate against NATO as a 'terrorist organization.'

"On the streets of the French city Marseille, Russian soccer hooligans sporting tattoos with the initials of Russia’s military intelligence service, #GRU, brutally attacked English soccer fans in June 2016, sending dozens of bloodied fans to the hospital. Alexander Shprygin, an #ultranationalist agitator and the head of the All-Russian Union of Supporters (a soccer fan club that he claims was established at the behest of the Russian Federal Security Service, or #FSB), was arrested during the melee and deported from #France.

"In Budapest’s Fiumei Road Cemetery in May 2017, a Russian motorcycle gang carrying giant red flags displaying the Soviet hammer and sickle rode up to a World War II memorial. Somewhat incongruously, the tattooed bikers, accompanied by pinstriped Russian Embassy diplomats, disembarked from their motorcycles to lay red carnations in front of the memorial and then posted a video clip of it online.
It seems almost too strange to be true: fight clubs, #NeoNazi soccer hooligans, and motorcycle gangs serving as conduits for the Kremlin’s influence operations in Western countries. It sounds more like an episode of The Americans with a dash of Mad Max and Fight Club mixed in. Yet this is exactly what is happening across #Europe and #NorthAmerica as Russia’s intelligence services co-opt fringe radicals and angry young men to try to undermine Western democracies from within. And not just in the virtual world, but in real life."

Archive:
https://archive.ph/zOwww

#NightWolves

@OldSquida2

#SpetsnazMC is very much still active.

"The first, the one, and the only Russian-speaking Law Enforcement Motorcycle Club in the United States — SPETSNAZ LE MC is proud to announce the change of our main patch from the old Russian two-headed eagle to a star covered by a thin blue line."

https://www.facebook.com/groups/231301067260723/

#ACAB #RussianSpecialForces #Spetsnaz #NightWolves
@OldSquida2

#Russian official linked to #SouthFlorida biker club spent millions on #Trump condos

Lily Dobrovolskaya and Nicholas Nehamas
July 15, 2017

"#Mangushev is a former officer in Russia’s security service, the #FSB, the successor agency to the #KGB. He first appeared in Miami around 2010.

"In Russia, he ran a group of companies called #AlphaAnticriminal that provided security for some of Russia’s biggest state-owned companies and government agencies. The Alpha-Anticriminal companies were listed under the name of a relative until 2014, according to Russian corporate records.

"#AlphaTeam is an elite #Spetsnaz counter-terrorism unit that operates within Russia’s security service. Mangushev told Russian media that he is a former Alpha Team officer and that many of his employees are veterans of Russia’s security service."

https://www.news-journalonline.com/story/news/state/2017/07/15/russian-official-linked-to-south-florida-biker-club-spent-millions-on-trump-condos/20254596007/

#SpetsnazMC #NightWolves

@OldSquida2

Where to begin... Well, let's start with this "oldie but goodie" from 2017:

[#Trump's] #Russia Scandal Was Desperately Missing a #BikerGang Subplot. Well, Here It Is.

Paging Hunter S. Thompson.

By Charles P. Pierce
Published: Jun 26, 2017

"[#Mangushev] helped found a biker club called #SpetsnazMC. #Spetsnaz is a group of motorcycle-loving #SouthFlorida expatriates who named themselves after the Russian equivalent of Delta Force or Seal Team Six.

"Spetsnaz members once asked for official recognition from Russia's biggest biker gang, the #NightWolves, an infamous group that has strong ties to Russia's security services. The Night Wolves played a role in the Ukrainian uprising, once had their flag flown in outer space by Russian cosmonauts and are under U.S. sanctions.

"So this Mangushev character starts a motorcycle gang among his fellow Russian expats that he names after the Russian equivalent of the special forces. This gang, named after the Russian special forces, seeks the imprimatur of an actual Russian biker gang that, unlike their American brethren, doesn't settle for tearing up small towns along the California coast. This bunch helps overthrow governments. This is not a guy I'd do business with but, then again, I'm not #IgorZorin, with his millions buried in coffee cans in his backyard.

"Zorin and Mangushev have ties in both Russia and the United States: In Russia, security firms that have been linked to Mangushev have won $2.4 million worth of contracts from Zorin's agency since 2015. In Miami, Mangushev once transferred a Florida company that owned a $1.5 million condo out of his name and into Zorin's. No deed of sale was recorded, meaning the price paid — if any — is unknown. The condo is one of three units Zorin owned at Trump Palace, a ritzy tower in Sunny Isles Beach built by a local developer and branded by the Trump Organization. Their total value? $5.4 million. Zorin still owns two condos there, plus a $3.3 million home in Bal Harbour… Zorin was not an original buyer at #TrumpPalace, meaning his funds would not have gone to the #TrumpOrganization, which signed lucrative deals to brand several condo towers in South Florida in the early 2000s. The Trump name is attractive to Russian buyers and helped turn Sunny Isles Beach into a high-rise condo haven sometimes called 'Little Moscow.'"

Read more: https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a55879/russian-bikers-trump/

@OldSquida2