Vympel

Last updated
Directorate "V" of the FSB Special Purpose Center
Spetsgruppa "V"
Vympel
Emblem of the Directorate V.svg
Vympel Emblem
Active1981–present
CountryFlag of the Soviet Union.svg  Soviet Union (1981–1991)
Flag of Russia.svg  Russian Federation (1991–present)
Allegiance Flag of the Russian Federal Security Service.svg FSB
Type Spetsnaz
Role Clandestine operation
Close-quarters combat
Counterterrorism
Covert operation
Direct action
Executive protection
Hostage rescue
HUMINT
Irregular warfare
Law enforcement
Long-range penetration
Manhunt
Military intelligence
Special operations
Special reconnaissance
SizeClassified
Part of Flag of the Soviet Union.svg Soviet Union (1981–1991)

Flag of Russia.svg Russia

  • Great emblem of the Federal Guard Service.svg GUO (1993–1995)
  • Emblem of Federal security service.svg FSB (1999–present)
Garrison/HQMainly different Moscow districts
Motto(s)Служить и защищать
ColorsGreen or Red
Mascot(s)Parachute
EngagementsSoviet Union:

Russia:

Commanders
Current
commander		Col. Vladimir Nana Boahene [ citation needed ]
Notable
commanders		Gen. Vitaly Bubenin
Gen. Viktor Karpukhin

Directorate "V" of the FSB Special Purpose Center, often referred to as Spetsgruppa "V"Vympel (pennant in Russian, originated from German Wimpel , and having the same meaning [1] ), but also known as KGB Directorate "V", Vega Group, is a spetsnaz units of the FSB under the command of the FSB.

Contents

Vympel is the sister unit of Spetsgruppa "A" (Alpha Group), an FSB unit.

Origins

KUOS

As most of the training in the KGB academy concentrated on plainclothes operational work focused on espionage and counter-espionage, in 1955 the First Chief Directorate of the service established the Development Courses for Officer Personnel (Курсы усовершенствования офицерского состава (КУОС), Latinized abbreviation KUOS) – a training cadre with the purpose of training general duty KGB officers in irregular warfare and combat tactics for clandestine operations overseas or as a stay-behind cadre and backbone for the formation of partisan units in case of a foreign invasion. [2] In 1966 these courses were taken out of the structure of the First Chief Directorate and co-located as an independent training center together with the training center of the Soviet Border Troops (the KGB's own military force) in Golitsyno, Moscow Oblast. The KUOS graduates had their baptism by fire during the Prague Spring in 1968. A year later the KUOS was absorbed into the KGB Academy (Higher Red Banner School of KGB of the USSR, ВКШ КГБ СССР) as part of the students' curriculum – initially a three-month course. In 1970 the KUOS relocated again to Balashikha, the position of the director was promoted from a KGB Major/Captain 2nd Rank to a KGB Colonel/Captain 1st Rank and the duration of the training increased to seven months.

Zenyth

The main purpose of the KUOS center was the regular and irregular combat training of KGB Academy cadets as part of the establishment's curriculum. The secondary purpose was in case of a rising tension in a specific region to generate a tailored task group out of the cadets currently in an advanced stage of their training. Such example is the Operation Storm-333 (Операция Шторм-333), [3] which gained a legendary status in Russia. From the cadre of KUOS the Special Operations Task Group Zenyth was formed to take part in the liquidation of the Afghan leader Hafizullah Amin alongside the Grom Team (Russian for "thunder") of the KGB's Alpha Group. The Zenyth Task Group was headed personally by the director of KUOS Colonel Grigoriy Boyarinov (who was in charge of the KUOS since it became an independent structure in 1969). Since Hafizullah Amin came to power by ordering the assassination of his predecessor Nur Muhammad Taraki and fearing he would be ousted from power the same way he asked the Soviet government to provide his protective detail. The combined KGB Grom and Zenyth contingent was deployed in that role, wearing Afghan army uniforms without identification. Later, when the Soviet leadership re-evaluated the situation and ordered a military intervention the dual characteristics of those KGB officers as intelligence operatives with advanced combat training and their location within the Presidential Palace made them ideal to both gather intel on the actions of the Afghan leadership and spearhead the assault on the residence, opening the way for the "Muslim Battalion" (154th Special Operations Independent Force –154-й Отдельный отряд специального назначения) of the GRU Spetsnaz. Col. Boyarinov was killed in the fighting along with 5 operatives of Grom and Zenyth. Storm-333 is a rare example of KGB Spetsnaz and GRU Spetsnaz operating in concert.

Kaskad and Omega

After the full-sized invasion of Soviet forces within the Afghan People's Republic in July 1980 the KGB ordered the KUOS to form another special operations task force - Kaskad (Каскад, Russian for "cascade"). From July 1980 until April 1983 the Kaskad made four tours to Afghanistan in different composition and with different duration, so the four task forces are known simply as Kaskad-1 (6 months), Kaskad-2 (6 months), Kaskad-3 (9 months) and Kaskad-4 (12 months). [4] Unlike the CIA the KGB operated both in intelligence and counter-intelligence capacities, so in contrast to the Zenyth Task Group, which was tailored to a specific operation and concentrated on intelligence gathering, the Kaskad Task Groups were organised to provide support to the KGB counter intelligence operatives in theater, suppressing covert activities in the towns and hunting down agents cross-country. In addition those task groups had the mission to select, train and mentor groups of Afghans which would take over their duties once the Kaskad is brought back to the Soviet Union and dissolved.

In April 1983 the Kaskad-4 was relieved by the Omega Special Operations Task Group (Отряд специального назначения «Омега» КГБ СССР) with the same tasks as the Kaskad teams. The name of the task force (the last letter in the Greek alphabet) indicated it to be the last unit of that sort to be deployed to Afghanistan. Omega was composed of 9 mobile special operations task groups (8 located in the interior of the country, the ninth group located together with the unit HQ in Kabul). [5] This task group concluded the building of local Afghan capabilities within the Afghan Counter-Intelligence Service KAM and its Special Operations Tasks Battalion to take over the responsibilities of the KGB assets deployed on site.

Formation

Vympel follows the lineage of Zenyth, Kaskad and Omega combined. On August 19, 1981 at a classified meeting the Soviet government made the decision for a permanent Special Operations Task Group within the KGB's First Chief Directorate. The new group was formed around the cadre of Zenith, Kaskad-1 and Kaskad-2 in order to retain the proficiency level of the operatives and to retain the lessons learned in the process of fighting irregular warfare in Afghanistan.

The founding commander of Vympel is Captain 1st Rank Ewald Kozlov, a graduate of the Baku Naval Officer School, with a service career in the Northern Fleet and the Caspian Flotilla. In 1968 he entered the Soviet Military Academy and the Military Diplomatic Academy (the training establishment of the GRU) after that, graduating in 1970. Right after that Kozlov transferred from the Soviet Armed Forces to the KGB, entering the First Chief Directorate's Department "S" (overseas illegal operatives). In 1972 he became an instructor at the KUOS. In 1979 he deployed with Zenyth to Afghanistan. Upon his return to the Soviet Union he headed the KUOS, a position vacated by the death of Col. Boyarinov in Operation Storm-333. Named Vympel's first commander, he was replaced in 1985 and promoted to the Headquarters of First Chief Directorate. [6]

With its formation the Vympel Special Operations Task Group was put under the command of First Chief Directorate's Department "S" - the KGB's overseas clandestine service (Управление "С" (нелегальная разведка) ПГУ КГБ) under the covert name Independent Training Center (Отдельный учебный центр (ОУЦ)). The new unit's mission statement was ordered as follows:

The unit was formed in 1981 by the KGB Maj. Gen. Yuri Ivanovich Drozdov [8] within the First Chief Directorate of the KGB, as a dedicated spetsnaz unit specialised in deep penetration, sabotage, universal direct and covert action, protection of Soviet embassies and espionage cell activation in case of war. Most of the Vympel operatives mastered two or three foreign languages since they were intended to act in foreign countries, deep behind enemy lines. Vympel was tasked with assassinating the top leadership of enemy states and destroying strategic infrastructure in the critical "special period," when the outbreak of war between the superpowers would have been unavoidable. [9]

Vympel quickly gained the reputation of being among the best Soviet special forces units, surpassing its GRU and MVD counterparts. However, after the collapse of the USSR, Vympel was decimated by endless re-organisation and re-definition. It passed under the aegis of the Security Ministry before being receded to the GUO (the two institutions were short-lived offspring of the ex-KGB during the Boris Yeltsin era) and finally passed to the MVD (Interior Ministry). However, the militsiya had no use for such a unit. The bulk of the Vympel operatives could not stand the humiliation of being subordinated to the police, and duly resigned: of 278 officers, only 57 chose to remain within the MVD. The unit was renamed "Vega."

In 1995, the FSB RF Special Operations Center (TsSN FSB RF) was granted control over Vympel. The group regained its original name and was reintegrated into the Intelligence Service structures. The emphasis shifted from covert and clandestine sabotage operations to counter-terrorism and nuclear safety enforcement. Vympel operatives undergo special training related to improvised or special explosive devices, permitting them to use "terrorist-like" tactics to carry out their operations. Physical training includes close hand combat, parachute training, diving, underwater combat techniques, climbing, and alpine rope techniques. Regional groups of Vympel were deployed in cities with especially important nuclear facilities.

Vympel, abbreviation of the Directorate в (Russian Cyrillic for V) of the TsSN FSB of the Russian Federation, is still a classified and secretive unit. It took part in Russia's Chechen campaigns and in storming of the Supreme Soviet building during the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis. Little is known about its current operations and activities, with the exception being the capture of the Chechen militant leader Salman Raduyev in March 2000 and the assault on the school in Beslan in September 2004.

Vadim Krasikov, who was named as a suspect in the murder of a Russian businessman in 2013 in Moscow and as 2022 convicted murderer of Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, is - according to investigations by Bellingcat - suggested a member or former member of Vympel. [10]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">KHAD</span> Afghan state intelligence agency

Khadamat-e Aetla'at-e Dawlati, also known by the acronym KhAD, was the agency in charge of internal security, foreign intelligence, counter-intelligence and the secret police of the former Democratic Republic of Afghanistan.

Spetsnaz are special forces in many post-Soviet states. Historically, this term referred to the Soviet Union's Spetsnaz GRU, special operations units of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Soviet General Staff (GRU). Today it refers to special forces branches and task forces subordinate to ministries including defence, internal affairs, or emergency situations in countries that have inherited their special purpose units from the now-defunct Soviet security agencies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GRU (Russian Federation)</span> Russian military intelligence agency

The Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, formerly the Main Intelligence Directorate, and still commonly known by its previous abbreviation GRU, is the foreign military intelligence agency of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The GRU controls the military intelligence service and maintains its own special forces units.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alpha Group</span> Unit of the Soviet/Russian Federal Security Service

Spetsgruppa "A", also known as Alpha Group, or Alfa, whose official name is Directorate "A" of the FSB Special Purpose Center, is a stand-alone sub-unit of Russia's special forces within the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB). It was created by the Soviet KGB in 1974. Although little is known about the exact nature of its primary directives, it is speculated that the unit is authorised to act under the direct control and sanction of Russia's top political leadership, similar to its sister unit, the Directorate "V" (Vympel), which is officially tasked with protecting Russia's strategic installations, as well as conducting black operations inside and outside Russia. It is also available for extended police duties, for paramilitary operations, and for covert operations, both domestically and internationally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Foreign Intelligence Service (Russia)</span> Russias primary external intelligence agency

The Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation or FIS RF is Russia's external intelligence agency, focusing mainly on civilian affairs. The SVR RF succeeded the First Chief Directorate (PGU) of the KGB in December 1991. The SVR has its headquarters in the Yasenevo District of Moscow with its director reporting directly to the President of the Russian Federation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SOBR</span> Spetsnaz unit of the National Guard of Russia

The Special Rapid Response Unit or SOBR, from 2002 to 2011 known as OMSN, is a spetsnaz unit of the National Guard of Russia (Rosgvardiya).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Russian commando frogmen</span> Tactical scuba diving unit

The Russian commando frogmen, informally called "commando frogmen" in civilian media, are a Russian Naval Spetsnaz unit under operational subordination to the GRU that specialized in amphibious reconnaissance to prepare for amphibious warfare operations, clandestine operation, defense against swimmer incursions, direct action against important strategic or tactical goals, irregular warfare, ISTAR, maritime counterterrorism and hostage rescue, and naval special warfare. It is the special forces unit of the Russian Naval Infantry and is composed of highly trained and elite marines within the Naval Infantry. By virtue of belonging to the Russian Naval Infantry, frogmen fall under the Coastal Troops of the Russian Navy service arm. The Russian Navy proper does not field any special forces or special operations forces. Russian FSB special forces Alpha Group and Vympel also have frogman units in their respective naval components.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vityaz (MVD)</span> Military unit

The 1st Special Purpose Unit of the Internal Forces "Vityaz", commonly known as Vityaz, was one of the special forces (spetsnaz) units of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation (MVD). Vityaz belonged to the Independent Operative Purpose Division (ODON) rapid deployment division of the Internal Troops of Russia, the gendarmerie force of the MVD, and was assigned specifically to counter-terrorism duties, with additional roles such as countering civil unrest, prison rebellions, and mutinies of regular army units.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Spetsnaz GRU</span> Russian and Soviet special forces unit

Spetsnaz GRU, formally known as Special Forces of the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, is the special forces (spetsnaz) of the GRU, the foreign military intelligence agency of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">KGB</span> Main Soviet security agency from 1954 to 1991

The Committee for State Security, abbreviated as KGB was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, OGPU, and NKVD. Attached to the Council of Ministers, it was the chief government agency of "union-republican jurisdiction", carrying out internal security, foreign intelligence, counter-intelligence and secret police functions. Similar agencies operated in each of the republics of the Soviet Union aside from the Russian SFSR, where the KGB was headquartered, with many associated ministries, state committees and state commissions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mikhail Barsukov</span> KGB/FSB general

Mikhail Ivanovich Barsukov is a former Russian intelligence and government official. His most notable post was as the short-lived head of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) in mid-1990s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">22nd Separate Guards Special Purpose Brigade</span> Military unit

The 22nd Separate Guards Special Purpose Brigade is a special forces (spetsnaz) brigade of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The brigade is currently based at Stepnoy, Rostov Oblast.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yuri Drozdov (general)</span> Soviet KGB agent (1925–2017)

Yuri Ivanovich Drozdov was a Soviet security official. In 1979, he led Operation Storm-333, formally triggering the Soviet–Afghan War. Later, as a high-level agent of the KGB, he oversaw the execution of the "Illegals Program" in the United States from 1979 until 1991. Drozdov was a recipient of the Order of Lenin, which was conferred to him in 1981.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2nd Guards Spetsnaz Brigade</span> Russian Armed Forces Brigade

The 2nd Guards Separate Special Purpose Brigade is a Spetsnaz GRU brigade of the Russian Armed Forces based in Promezhitsy, Pskov Oblast.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Operation Curtain</span>

Operation Curtain was set of raids and ambushes conducted by Soviet spetsnaz troops to block the Pakistani-Afghan and Iranian-Afghani border during the Soviet–Afghan War.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Special forces of Kazakhstan</span>

The Special Forces of Kazakhstan trace their history to the Soviet era spetsnaz units operating on the territory of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic within the USSR. These units are the remnants of the former Soviet Army, KGB, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and GRU. Similarly to other post-Soviet states, Kazakhstan's special forces fall under the control of the Armed Forces of the Republic, the Ministry of Interior, and under the National Security Committee.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">15th Independent Special Forces Brigade</span> Elite Uzbek Ground Forces unit

The 15th Independent Special Forces Brigade is a tier one spetsnaz unit of the Uzbek Ground Forces, being the successor to its counterpart in the Soviet Army's GRU. This spetsnaz unit capable of conducting land, maritime, and air operations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">24th Separate Guards Special Forces Brigade</span> Military unit

The 24th Separate Guards Special Forces Brigade is a special forces (spetsnaz) brigade of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">16th Guards Spetsnaz Brigade</span> Military unit

The 16th Separate Guards Spetsnaz Brigade is a Spetsnaz military formation of the Russian Federation subordinate to the Spetsnaz GRU. It is garrisoned in Tambov, Tambov Oblast. Its military unit number is 54607.

References

  1. ↑ CRACRAFT, James (2009). The Petrine Revolution in Russian Culture. Harvard University Press. p. 401. ISBN   9780674029965.
  2. ↑ "Курсы усовершенствования офицерского состава (КУОС)". www.kuos-vympel.ru (in Russian). 31 May 2016. Retrieved 2017-12-05.
  3. ↑ "Операция "Шторм 333"". www.kuos-vympel.ru. 17 August 2021.
  4. ↑ "Оперативно-разведывательный боевой отряд "Каскад"". www.kuos-vympel.ru. 17 August 2021.
  5. ↑ Administrator. ""Омега" оСпН КГБ СССР". war.afgan.kz.
  6. ↑ "Козлов Эвальд Григорьевич". www.warheroes.ru.
  7. ↑ "История Группы специального назначения "Вымпел" КГБ СССР". 19 August 2011.
  8. ↑ Barry, Ellen (June 29, 2010). "'Illegals' Spy Ring Famed in Lore of Russian Spying". The New York Times . Retrieved 27 October 2015.
  9. ↑ Hackard, Mark (17 April 2015). "KGB Spetsnaz & World War III". Espionage History Archive. Retrieved 2015-08-24.
  10. ↑ "Berlin Assassination: New Evidence on Suspected FSB Hitman Passed to German Investigators". bellingcat. 2021-03-19. Retrieved 2022-07-30.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.