How Google Translate Exposed Russia's Secret Army

Overview

An investigative report by Christo Grozev (with The Insider and Der Spiegel) argues that a newly formed Russian intelligence unit—created to replace the highly exposed GRU unit 29155—was ultimately uncovered and crippled because of a critical operational mistake involving Google Translate.

Background: Why a new unit was created

• Between 2018–2022, Russia’s GRU covert unit 29155 (linked to the 2018 nerve agent attack in Salisbury, among other operations) collapsed under its own carelessness and exposure.
• Investigators traced 29155 officers after noticing GRU passports issued in sequential batches, allowing identification through travel records and customs/biometric databases.
• The report alleges internal Russian documents described the unit as a “liability”, and its leadership was not removed—many were instead repromoted or redirected to avoid losing experienced people during Russia’s expanding war.

Replacement: Unit 75127 / Center 795

• In December 2022, the Russian General Staff established a replacement structure called military Unit 75127, also referred to as Center 795.
• The unit was designed with a “full cycle” mandate: one organization handling intelligence collection, recruitment, surveillance, sabotage, and—when needed—assassinations without relying on external structures.
• A central claim is that Center 795 was built outside the usual GRU chain and reported directly to Valery Gerasimov.

Concealment strategy: Corporate camouflage

• To hide hundreds of operatives, the report claims Center 795 was embedded inside the well-known arms brand Kalashnikov Concern.
• Operatives allegedly appeared as civilian employees, trained and logged through ordinary “test shooting” activity at Patriot Park (a Moscow-area military-industrial site Kalashnikov already occupied).
• The report claims the funding/financial wiring resembled the model used by Yevgeny Prigozhin/Wagner, where state payments and overpricing could be routed through private mechanisms while maintaining deniability.

Key people named as part of the architecture

• Alleged principal backer/connector: Andrei Bokarev
  • Described as having arms/rail conglomerate ties, including controlling stake purchase and later divestment.
• Linked senior patron: Sergei Chemezov
  • Rostec chief with longstanding proximity to Putin.
• Personnel/leadership:
  • Denis Fisenko — chosen to lead the unit (described as an FSB Alpha veteran with Kalashnikov leadership and drone experience).
  • Dmitry Drozdov and Sergei Radkevich — described as leadership figures with trajectories from KGB/Belarus through Kalashnikov to Center 795.
  • Nikolay Zriachev — described as a senior deputy link bridging GRU/FSB channels.
  • Anatoly Kovalev — described as leading a key human-intelligence function (the 12th Department), with deputies also claimed to be GRU-linked.

How Western services allegedly got the blueprint

• The report claims Ukrainian hackers found or triggered discovery when Kalashnikov-related materials unexpectedly included a PowerPoint “board deck” detailing Center 795’s structure, staffing, and ambitions.
• It also argues that Western intelligence services and journalists received much of this plan before operations matured.

Inside the unit: Structure and roles

The report claims Center 795 had:

• Just over 500 officers organized into three directorates:
  • intelligence
  • assault
  • combat support
• A selective recruitment pipeline involving questionnaires, psych tests, polygraphs, and interviews, drawing from elite services such as:
  • FSB Alpha/Vympel
  • GRU Spetsnaz
  • FSO
• Intelligence directorate departments allegedly covering:
  • open-source monitoring and satellite imagery,
  • human-agent networks (including abroad),
  • signals intelligence,
  • optical reconnaissance drones,
  • multiple parallel ground surveillance teams,
  • a sniper department treated as an “intelligence function,” implying assassination capability.
• Assault directorate compartmentalization:
  • strike teams arranged so one cell’s compromise could not “burn” the others.
• Combat support included assets like armor, artillery, and air-defense, framing the unit as capable of broader conventional activity—not only assassinations.

The “Google Translate” failure (core claim)

• The report presents the decisive operational flaw as follows:
  • A field operative named Darko Durovic allegedly wrote field reports in Serbian.
  • Those reports were run through Google Translate into Russian for his handler (Denis Alimov).
  • The report argues this “airgapped” approach assumed communications were safe because messengers were encrypted and identities were compartmentalized—yet Google queries still traveled through U.S.-based infrastructure and could be exposed via court orders.
• Result:
  • The FBI allegedly obtained already-translated and transcribed murder-for-hire instructions and surveillance reporting, making the evidence effectively more useful than a standard wiretap.

The assassination ring and arrests

• Alimov (an operative arrested in Bogotá under a cover identity) allegedly coordinated assassination targeting Chechen dissident figures in Europe, including:
  • Akhmed Zakayev — allegedly priced at $1.5 million dead or delivered,
  • another unnamed Chechen dissident in Europe — also priced at $1.5 million,
  • a third high-priority target allegedly tied to a $10 million bounty (as described in the report/indictment discussion).
• Durovic allegedly traveled to Russia under the guise of holidays in Turkey, met Alimov near Lubyanka, and received an initial cash payment ($60,000 down payment), then later was questioned by the FBI.
• The FBI arrested Durovic, then spent roughly 11 months building the case to reach Alimov.

Alimov’s capture via a “passport known to the FBI”

The report says that by early 2026, Alimov made a fatal travel decision:

• On Feb. 23 (Defender of the Fatherland Day), he allegedly flew via Istanbul to Colombia using an identity/cover known to the FBI.
• The FBI obtained an Interpol arrest warrant.
• Upon arrival in Bogotá, he was detained/handcuffed by Colombian authorities.
• Charges listed include:
  • conspiracy to commit murder and kidnapping,
  • material support for a designated terrorist organization,
  • conspiracy to finance terrorism.
• The report states each main count can carry potential life sentence exposure.
• It also claims Russia is trying to prevent extradition.

Broader consequences: unit likely to be shut down

• The report argues that the exposure now documented in Western court filings has pushed Russian authorities to consider closing or rebuilding intelligence structures.
• It frames the irony as follows: a unit designed to prevent leaks and exposure was undone by two people needing to communicate and using the most convenient translation tool.
• The report further claims Russia has repeatedly replaced “burned” units (“whack-a-mole”), but that convenience-seeking, corner-cutting, and corruption remain recurring vulnerabilities.

Presenters / Contributors

• Christo Grozev — investigative journalist (lead narrator)
• Investigation partners referenced: The Insider and Der Spiegel
• Individuals and entities mentioned in the report’s described investigation include: Denis Klimenkov / Denis Alimov, Denis Fisenko, Dmitry Drozdov, Sergei Radkevich, Anatoly Kovalev, Nikolay Zriachev, Andrei Bokarev, Sergei Chemezov, Valery Gerasimov, Darko Durovic, Akhmed Zakayev, Alexei Iliushin, Vadim Krasikov, plus entities such as GRU 29155 and Center 795.