We don't need to create a Mossad, we have our own – Chief of Ukraine's Defence Intelligence
Kyrylo Budanov, Head of the Chief Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine, stated that the country does not need to create a Mossad in order to detect enemies abroad as such an agency "already exists [in Ukraine – ed.]".
Source: Budanov in an interview with the Reuters agency
Quote: "If you're asking about Mossad as being famous (for) ... eliminating enemies of their state, then we were doing it and we will be doing it. We don't need to create anything because it already exists."
Details: Western media calls Budanov "enigmatic and intense" and describes his office. There is a painting of an owl, the symbol of the Ukrainian Defence Intelligence, digging its claws into a bat, the emblem of the Intelligence of Russia.
In May, the Kremlin described Budanov's promise to "keep killing Russians anywhere on the face of this world until the complete victory of Ukraine" as "monstrous".
The Russians blame the Ukrainian special services for killings in the territory of Russia. In April, Budanov was even arrested in Moscow in absentia on terrorism charges.
The possibility of the Ukrainian intelligence sending killers to hunt the enemies of state abroad called for a comparison with the Israeli Mossad, and the Head of the Defence Intelligence did not mind the analogy.
Budanov came to the interview with a gun. Armament and military equipment are scattered all over the floor of his office.
He stressed once again that Ukraine has its own sources in the offices closest to Putin.
At the end of May, Russia launched an attack on Budanov’s headquarters in the Rybalskyi Peninsula in the city of Kyiv, which provoked the Russian media to report that Budanov was severely injured or even killed: "That wasn't their first attempt. But, as you can see, once again, we're here in the main quarters of this building. When you were outside, you could see people walking, and working. Everything is working as it should."
It was also remarked that 37-year-old Budanov had created an incredibly public image for an intelligence chief.
He explained that, in his opinion, an intelligence chief cannot remain in the shadows in the modern world: "It's not possible without this, not anymore. And all the next wars are going to look like this. In any country in the world. We can say that we're setting a trend here."
Budanov believes that since 2014, Ukraine had drawn conclusions about the necessity to make its messages clear: "We completely lost the information war in 2014. And the war, which began in (2022) - we started here in a completely different way. And now the Russians are losing the information battle."
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