The Russian Ria Novosti state news agency paraded an alleged US spy at the “Russia Today” media center on Saturday. The man claims to have spent more than two years covertly passing intelligence to Russia from Ukraine before being evacuated by Moscow’s special forces at the beginning of the week.
Identified as Daniel Martindale, he said he had initially entered Ukraine under the pretense of being a volunteer and a foreign journalist on Feb. 11, 2022. He didn’t provide any information on what his motivation for spying for Russian had been other than to say:
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“I had been working as a missionary in Poland for two years before the start of the war [in Ukraine]. I followed the news in the Western media and realized that there was a high probability that the war would start in Ukraine… I had wanted to go to Russia for a long time, and I realized that this was the very moment I had been waiting for.”
He said that he had made his way to Donetsk in the days before the war began and crossed into to the occupied part of the region, the so-called Donetsk Peoples Republic (DNR). Once there he said, “I started tracking [news of the war] through the news by watching various Telegram channels. I found a channel that belonged to a DPR territorial defense unit.” He said the channel included a “bot” which he used to make the first move offering his services to an unnamed Russian intelligence agency.
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Martindale said he had been operating on behalf of Russia in eastern Ukraine since the middle of 2022, providing his contacts with the precise location of Ukrainian military units and assets, through the Telegram messaging app using a phone reportedly delivered to him by drone.
It was claimed that Martindale had been extracted from Ukrainian-held territory on Wednesday Oct. 27 by Russian special forces although he didn’t provide any further details of the operation, he did thank his “rescuers” saying:
“I have to thank the soldiers of the 29th Army who crossed the front line to evacuate me, they acted very professionally. There were many threats from Ukrainian drones and there was artillery shelling, but thanks to them I was evacuated to Russian territory.”
Many of his statements simply parroted the Kremlin’s usual propaganda, a mix of lies, disinformation and half-truths. He said that as an American he was able to get “a different point of view, from the information that is broadcast by Western media.”
Martindale suggested that there were many Ukrainians who “are waiting for liberation by the Russian army,” before adding, “they are constantly betrayed, they suffer, they suffer from constant betrayal.”
Asked about the future he said “Do I want to go back to the US? No. I'm telling you for sure, as far as I understand. Since 2005, I consider the US my enemy.”
He then doubled down on his comments about the US, “… if something happens to me or my entire family in the near future, it will not be by chance, not by natural causes. It will be the work of the American authorities, to force me to return to the USA and accuse me of every sort of sin.”
On Oct. 25 Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) detained another suspected Russian agent, a 34-year-old Ukrainian volunteer working with the United Nations World Food Program. The SBU alleges that he was recruited by Russian forces and tasked with surveillance of Ukrainian Defense Force infantry and artillery unit locations near Pokrovsk, in the Donetsk region.
It may be more than coincidence that within two days of that arrest, the decision was made to pull Martindale out.
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