Analyzing Kadyrov’s Claim Of Paying Kiev’s Spies To Steal Back His Horse From Czechia

While it’s possible that he’s telling the full truth and just randomly decided to reveal what happened at this particular point in time, there are credible reasons to suspect that there’s much more going on than appears at first glance.

Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov shocked everyone when he casually admitted on Telegram to paying Kiev’s spies $18k to steal back one of his favorite horses from Czechia. Zazu had been stuck at a stable there since 2014 after being sanctioned by the West, but Kadyrov claimed that Ukrainian intermediaries approached him earlier this year with an offer to buy back his horse, who was then reported stolen shortly after. According to Kadyrov, Kiev’s spies just paid the local police off to cover up this deal.  

While it’s possible that he’s telling the full truth and just randomly decided to reveal what happened at this particular point in time, there are credible reasons to suspect that there’s much more going on than appears at first glance. For starters, Kadyrov is a veteran of the special operation and still leads his autonomous republic’s forces that continue to participate in this campaign. It’s therefore unlikely that he of all people would be approached by intermediaries from Ukrainian intelligence.

The next point is that he claims to have paid them $18k to secure Zazu’s release, which isn’t anywhere near the $10 million that he’s previously claimed the horse is worth, but still amounts to the leader of a Russian region literally giving money to his country’s enemies during ongoing hostilities. Considering his patriotic credentials, the case can be made that there’s a lot more to this story, especially since he would have already presumably been detained on charges of treason by the security services if there wasn’t.

Finally, Kadyrov is very sensitive to the West’s accusations that he’s corrupt, yet he just suddenly admitted in the most casual way possible that he allegedly engaged in an act of transnational corruption at the potential expense of his country’s national security just to get back one of his favorite horses. This is completely out of character and should thus prompt suspicions from all observers who know better than to think that he’d give the West infinite narrative ammunition with which to attack him forever.

The abovementioned reasons explain why his claim deserves to be analyzed instead of taken at face value, ergo the purpose of this piece. If it’s true that he was contacted by intermediaries of Ukrainian intelligence, which can’t be known for certain, then they must have been corrupt and rogue elements operating outside of official authority. After all, it’s against Kiev’s soft power interests to have any dealings with Kadyrov, let alone those that involve stealing back his horse from a NATO country.

That said, it’s still possible that corrupt and rogue elements from Ukrainian intelligence did indeed approach him with such an offer, in which case it’s unlikely that he’d have agreed to pay his enemies without approval from the security services. Failure to run this by them ahead of time could later lead to charges of treason, not to mention Kiev exploiting their deal to blackmail him, but the security services might have approved this scandalous payment if they thought it served Russia’s interests.

To explain, the Kremlin has a stake in exposing Ukrainian corruption, especially in this scenario which involves colluding with their country’s hated enemy Kadyrov to carry out crimes in a NATO country. Instead of Kiev blackmailing him, he could thus have blackmailed them, with the potential soft power consequences being considered by the Russian security services to be well worth the comparatively paltry $18k investment.

The other scenario about what might have happened is less detailed than the one explained in the last three paragraphs and simply posits that Kadyrov made the whole thing up for the aforesaid soft power reasons. In this version of events, some Russian-linked actors would have been behind Zazu’s rescue, but that doesn’t account for why he decided to pin it all on Kiev at this particular time. The timing is very important too since it immediately follows another scandal connected to alleged collusion with Kiev.

The Washington Post (WaPo) published a piece on Sunday about what it presented as previously unreported documents from the latest Pentagon leak alleging that Wagner Group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin has been in secret talks with Ukrainian intelligence. According to that outlet, he offered to give them information about Russian troops in exchange for Kiev withdrawing from Artyomovsk. Prigozhin also purportedly urged his country’s enemies to attack Crimea, all of which he denies.

These claims came amidst the intensification of Wagner’s rivalry with the Defense Ministry (DM), thus leading many to predict that the latter might try to exploit this scandalous narrative development to gain an edge of some sort over him. It’s within the context of Prigozhin being suspected of crimes against the state for reportedly having a back channel with Ukrainian intelligence, which could have been approved by the security services for disinformation purposes if it exists, that Kadyrov’s claims should be analyzed.

Keeping in mind that he made his post about Zazu on early Monday evening after WaPo’s scandal had already swept through Russian social media, the timing of his claims about paying Kiev’s spies to steal back his horse from Czechia can be seen as indirect support of Prigozhin irrespective of their veracity. These two have previously expressed very harsh criticism of the DM so it’s in Kadyrov’s interests to support his fellow traveler in their joint efforts to encourage reform of that institution.

If this scandalous incident is exploited by the DM to gain an edge of some sort over him, then Kadyrov’s influence would also decrease. Moreover, if there’s any truth to his story – such as in the scenario that the security services approved this arrangement for future soft power purposes just like they’d have also approved Prigozhin’s back channel with Ukrainian intelligence for disinformation purposes if it exists – then details about it could leak out at a later date and be exploited by the DM against him too.

Kadyrov might thus have sought to preemptively avert that from happening by spilling the beans himself, with the timing of his claims also having the additional impact of supporting his pal Prigozhin. No honest observer would ever seriously suspect the Chechen chief of treason after all he and his forces have done throughout the course of the special operation, to say nothing of the West’s fierce hatred of him personally, so they might then be less inclined to think that back channels with Kiev are something bad.

In turn, the targeted domestic audience might not fall for whatever efforts could soon be made to take Prigozhin down on WaPo’s alleged pretext that he committed treason by having back channels with Ukrainian intelligence. If Kadyrov just admitted to having something similar but nobody doubts his patriotism, then they might think that there’s no reason to doubt Prigozhin’s either, especially since Kadyrov hasn’t been detained so it should be assumed that the security services approved of this.

All told, the timing of Kadyrov’s claims is much more important than their speculative veracity. His disclosure came right after his fellow DM critic Prigozhin was accused by WaPo of having back channels with Ukrainian intelligence, so it looks like he’s signaling to the domestic audience that there’s nothing automatically wrong with this in principle, thus implying the security services’ approval of both. In other words, this unexpected narrative development is arguably tied to the escalating DM-Wagner rivalry.