Vladlen Tatarsky was a man who had many enemies.
He was hated by millions of Ukrainians for saying they should all be killed and robbed in videos that earned him a reputation as a hardliner even among the world of radical Russian military bloggers.
Then there were the Russian government and prominent generals who publicly blamed the failed war effort and called for their expulsion and prosecution.
More enemies hid in the shadows: perhaps from his days as a bank robber in Ukraine, when he was called Maxim Fomin; possibly pro-Ukrainian dissidents within Russia; Or perhaps the enemies of Wagner’s chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was one of Tatarsky’s few allies.
Whatever they are, they found their mark on Sunday.
A bomb hidden inside a golden bust of the 40-year-old publicity stunt went off at one of his speech events in St. Petersburg, leaving 30 injured and one big unanswered question: Whodunnit?
Vladlen Tatarsky (pictured) was a man who had many enemies. He was hated by millions in Ukraine, he blamed the Russian government and generals for the failures of Putin’s invasion, lived his former life as a bank robber, and counted a mercenary leader among his allies. On Sunday, he was killed by a bomb hidden inside a gold bust of himself
Officially, 26-year-old Daria Trepova – a well-known dissident who was photographed handing the statue to Tatarsky moments before it exploded – was blamed.
She confessed on camera after her arrest, though she did not specifically admit to knowing the bust was a bombshell and said nothing about who gave it to her.
Those who knew Trepova say she was unable to kill and even Russian investigators suspect she was the mastermind.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, immediate suspicion fell on Ukraine.
The attack on Tatarsky has similarities to the bomb that killed Daria Dugin, the daughter of preacher Alexander Dugin, on the outskirts of Moscow last year.
Either way, the intended target was an outspoken supporter of Putin’s invasion — even if the blast intended for Dugin ended up killing his daughter instead.
In both cases, the attack was carried out by an assassin who planted explosives — in Dugena’s case, hidden inside a car her father was supposed to be driving.
And in the Dugin case, a CIA official said unofficially that they believed the Ukrainian intelligence services were behind it.
It makes sense, then, that Ukraine would also be a suspect in Tatarsky’s murder.
Kiev, predictably, has denied any involvement — but Ukrainians aren’t the only ones to issue such denials.
Prigozhin himself wrote a post on Telegram doubting the “Kiev regime” was behind the killing and instead blaming it on “a group of extremists… who are unlikely to have anything to do with the government”.
Honestly, he did not say what government he was talking about: the government in Kiev, or the government in Moscow.
Many believe the Russian state itself may have been responsible for the blast, and are looking to silence a voice that has become increasingly critical of its mistakes on the battlefield.
Tatarsky has criticized nearly all top leaders, including Putin, for the way the war is being fought — and it’s no secret that critics of the Russian leader don’t stay around for long.
But any number of military stalwarts, with easy access to explosives, could be responsible: from Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu to General Valery Gerasimov.
The US think tank the Institute for the Study of War believes the attack may have had a dual purpose, either to silence Tatarsky or to send a message to Prigozhin’s ally.
Officially, 26-year-old Daria Trepova (pictured) – a well-known dissident who was photographed handing the statue to Tatarsky moments before it exploded – was blamed.
The American think tank The Institute for the Study of War believes the attack may have had a dual purpose, either to silence Tatarsky or to send a message to ally Yevgeny Prigozhin (pictured)
Chief Wagner led broadsides of the regular Russian army—at one point calling Gerasimov a “fa****”—and became emboldened with each victory his mercenaries won.
But he seems to have fallen out of favor lately, and the murder of Tatarsky may have been intended as the stark warning that he is yet to recede.
It is certainly worth noting that St. Petersburg is Prigozhin’s birthplace, and that the café where Tatarsky died was owned by Prigozhin—a fact that seems like a coincidence, except that he had held a similar event in a different café earlier the same day and walked away. away unharmed.
Another possibility is that dissidents inside Russia could have planned the killing, either out of hatred for Putin or out of solidarity with Ukraine — or both.
Ilya Ponomarev, a former Russian deputy who now lives in exile in Ukraine, has alleged that a group he had contacts within his home country carried out the bombing.
He told The Daily Beast that he “knows about the preparations for the attack in advance” and provides the organizers with “financial and political” support.
Ponomarev did not name those responsible, but has previously claimed links to the National Republican Army — a group of anti-Putin artisans he blamed for Duzhina’s murder last August.
US and German officials also accused a pro-Ukrainian group not affiliated with the government but with possible links to Russia of blowing up the Nord Stream pipelines.
Meanwhile, Ukraine has blamed a cross-border attack in Russia’s Bryansk region – in which two civilians were attacked and bombs planted – on dissidents within Putin’s ranks.
If such groups really exist, they seem to be able to stage a bombing in a big city.
There are also plenty of skeletons in Tatarsky’s closet from his colorful past, and one may have taken advantage of his newfound fame to target him.
Before he became a pro-Russian blogger, he was a Ukrainian criminal from Donbass named Maksim Fomin, who was jailed for bank robbery shortly before Putin’s first invasion in 2014.
When pro-Russian groups stirred up by Igor Girkin start a proxy war in the Donbass, Tatarsky claims he escaped from prison and joined their ranks to fight against his homeland.
After that war reached a stalemate, he traveled to Moscow where he reinvented himself as a blogger and writer, then back to eastern Ukraine in early 2022 before invading Putin a second time.
In addition to documenting the war and pushing pro-Kremlin narratives, Tatarsky claims to have been actively involved in the fighting including in the city of Mariupol.
But he reportedly made a mistake on Girkin, other war bloggers mocked him for overstating his military service, and anyone could have decided to avenge his perceived ‘stolen courage’.
Russia has even tried to pin the blame on imprisoned Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, accusing his political party of involvement.
Immediate suspicion of who was behind the bombing fell on Ukraine. Pictured: Ukrainian special forces seen during exercises in 2019
Pictured: Russian investigators search the cafe where Tatarsky was killed and 32 others wounded in a bomb attack on Sunday.
This theory has been largely dismissed, not least by Navalny’s movement itself, but will likely be used as a pretext by an increasingly paranoid Kremlin to crack down on opponents.
It will almost certainly be used by Putin and his allies to portray Russia as a country threatened — whether by enemies without or enemies within.
It is a sign of how deeply Putin and Russia are involved in this conflict that a bomb could have been conceived in her second city by several people.
The war that Putin hoped would end in days with a bloodless victory is getting closer and closer to home.
