A new spy unit is leading Russia's shadow war against the West

The department has been particularly focused on Germany because Russia sees it as a weak link in NATO

- Bojan Pancevski

Russia's spy services have a shadowy new unit taking aim at the West with covert attacks across Europe and elsewhere, Western intelligence officials say.

Known as the Department of Special Tasks, it is based in the Russian military-intelligence headquarters, a sprawling glass-and-steel complex on the outskirts of Moscow known as the aquarium. Its operations, which haven't been previously reported, have included attempted killings, sabotage and a plot to put incendiary devices on planes.

The department's creation reflects Moscow's wartime footing against the West, the officials said. It was set up in 2023 in response to Western support for Ukraine and includes veterans of some of Russia's most daring clandestine operations in recent years, according to two European intelligence chiefs and other U.S., European and Russian security officials.

The Kremlin sees the West as complicit in Ukraine's attacks on Russia such as the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, the killings of senior officials in Moscow, and Ukrainian strikes using long-range Western missiles, according to these officials. Ukraine has denied it was behind the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines.

"Russia believes it is in conflict with what it calls 'the collective West,' and is acting accordingly, up to and including threatening us with nuclear attack and building up its military," said James Appathurai, deputy assistant secretary-general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in charge of hybrid warfare.

"These are, as usual, completely unsubstantiated accusations," said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

The new department, which is known to Western intelligence officials by its Russian acronym SSD, is believed to be behind a host of recent attacks against the West, including the attempted killing of the chief executive of a German arms maker and a plot to put incendiary devices on planes used by shipping giant DHL.