Rise and Fall of a Russian Ultranationalist

The arrest and disappearance of dissidents and anti-war activists has become a common occurrence in Russia. But the detention in July of former Federal Security Service officer Igor Girkin has marked a turning point in how the government of President Vladimir Putin treats even those who support its military goals.

Known by the nickname Strelkov, meaning “shooter,” Girkin’s journey from key operative to political threat sheds light on the Kremlin’s complex history with ideological extremists.

Long before he became a wanted war criminal in the West, Girkin was a student at the Moscow State Institute for History and Archives, where he began his hobby of reenacting military history, especially that of the czarist White Army.

An avowed monarchist, Girkin fell in with far-right circles that were arising amid the Soviet collapse, writing for the newspaper Zavtra, which combined the idolization of Soviet militarism with antisemitic Russian nationalism and opposition to Western democracy.

However, his interest in war went beyond historical costume. He would fight in Russia’s brutal campaign against Chechen independence, as well as the 1992 intervention in Moldova that left the region of Transnistria as Russian-occupied territory.

Girkin also volunteered alongside ethnic Serb forces in the Bosnian War and was present at the massacre of thousands of Bosnian Muslim civilians in Visegrad. Afterward, he is believed to have served in the FSB, where he reportedly rose to the rank of colonel before retiring in 2013.

But this would not be the end of Girkin’s military career.

Following the 2014 Euromaidan protests that toppled Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, Girkin appeared in Crimea among the so-called Russian volunteers — later revealed to be active-duty soldiers — who brought the peninsula under Russian control.

Next, he would surface in Ukraine’s Donbas region as the head of militants who seized government offices in Sloviansk to establish the separatist Donetsk People’s Republic.

Despite claiming to be a local uprising with no Kremlin involvement, much of the militants’ leadership was composed of Russian citizens with close ties to the security services, such as Girkin’s old newspaper colleague Alexander Borodai. Girkin himself would later admit that the war in the Donbas would not have occurred without direct Russian support.

As defense minister of the small, breakaway state, Girkin imposed harsh discipline on enemies and allies alike, torturing and executing supporters of Ukraine, as well as petty criminals and even fellow separatist fighters, for infractions such as looting or abandoning their post.

His biggest war crime was yet to come.

On July 17, 2014, a Malaysia Airlines jet carrying 298 people was shot down over the Donetsk region, killing everyone on board. Evidence showed that the plane had been hit by a Russian-made BUK surface-to-air missile fired from rebel-controlled territory.

Deleted social media posts suggested Girkin had knowledge of the deliberate attack. He was found guilty in November 2022 by a Dutch court in absentia and sentenced to life imprisonment.

Publicly, Girkin denied any responsibility for the shooting and claimed it had been a false flag operation — a military action meant to blame an opponent or rival — mirroring Russian media’s own shifting explanations and conspiracy theories about the crash.

But this high-profile international attention made him a liability for Russia, which still denied involvement in the conflict. To make their denial more plausible, Girkin and other Russian citizens were removed from power and replaced with local separatist leaders.

Upon his return to Russia in late 2014, Girkin criticized Russian leadership. As a true believer, he viewed the Donbas as historic Russian land and had expected the Kremlin to fully commit to annexing the region, as they had with Crimea.

But for Putin, an ongoing stalemate in the Donbas provided a low-cost way to impede Ukraine’s integration into Western institutions while maintaining enough plausible deniability to avoid the full weight of international sanctions.

Dismayed by what he viewed as a betrayal of the cause, Girkin became an increasingly vocal critic of Putin. His media statements and interviews often undercut the official Kremlin line by revealing the extent of Russia’s involvement in the conflict.

With Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Girkin gained renewed prominence as one of the country’s top military bloggers.

While ordinary citizens and liberal activists were jailed for even referring to the “special military operation” as a war, Girkin and other far-right nationalists openly offered frank condemnation of the military strategy, as well as the top leadership, accusing them of incompetence and insufficient preparation.

The bloggers’ criticisms, which did not oppose the invasion but called for a more aggressive campaign, allowed for the venting of discontent without disrupting Kremlin narratives, while also positioning Putin as a relative moderate.

That calculus appears to have changed, however, with Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin’s aborted mutiny in late June. In the face of such a public challenge to his authority, experts believe Putin can no longer afford to tolerate criticism, even from so-called patriots.

Jailed liberal opposition figure Alexei Navalny has also weighed in, noting that despite his other crimes, Girkin should nevertheless be considered a political prisoner.

It remains to be seen what will become of other ultranationalist Putin critics, some of whom have already rushed to distance themselves from Girkin. His arrest, coming on the heels of the Wagner mutiny, underscores the Kremlin’s struggle to control the very forces it has unleashed.