Classic Psyops: How Recruits From the Online Gig Economy Are Being Used to Set Europe on Fire

Moscow intelligence services have launched a new wave of attacks on the west that are violent, but piecemeal and difficult to prove

- Shaun Walker

Serhiy was just about to board a coach bound for Germany when Polish security services detained him at the bus station in the city of Wrocław. In his backpack, the officers found firelighter cubes, a juice bottle filled with paraffin, a lighter, two pocket knives, a mini handsaw and a face mask.

Later, when they searched the mobile phone of the 49-year-old Ukrainian refugee, they found a pdf of a Russian-language book called Modern Pyrotechnics. It contained detailed instructions on how to start fires and detonate explosives.

Serhiy S - as he is identified in accordance with Polish law on naming criminal suspects - is one of dozens of people across Europe over the past two years who have been accused of being foot soldiers in a new front of Russia's war against the west.

European intelligence agencies say Moscow has launched a campaign of sabotage and disinformation. Sometimes, it is focused on specific targets related to support for the Ukrainian war effort, but more often it is simply aimed at causing chaos and unease.

In Lithuania, an Ikea shop was set on fire; in Britain, six people were arrested for an arson attack on a business with links to Ukraine; in France, five coffins inscribed with the words "French soldiers in Ukraine" were left under the Eiffel Tower; in Estonia, the car windows of the interior minister and a local journalist were smashed. There have been numerous suspicious fires in Poland, including one that destroyed a huge shopping centre in Warsaw. Taken together, the incidents point to how Russia has moved towards a new kind of attack on the west, one that is violent but also piecemeal and hard to prove.

On the ground, the acts are carried out by people who are recruited online and often paid in cryptocurrency. Some know exactly what they are doing and why, others do not realise they are ultimately working for Moscow.