Western Intelligence Warns Russia Is Targeting European Defense Executives for Assassination

Western intelligence agencies have warned executives at European defense companies that Russia is intensifying efforts to assassinate them as part of a broader expansion of sabotage and hybrid operations aimed at weakening support for Ukraine.

Officials from five different European intelligence agencies told the Financial Times that chief executives and other senior employees at defense firms are being targeted by Kremlin operatives. Executives at smaller companies, particularly those manufacturing drones or drone components, are also in the sights of the operations. The warnings have prompted companies to increase personal security around top executives. Some have relocated production sites in response to the assessed threats.

Germany’s domestic intelligence service, the BfV, has significantly increased its outreach to employees and management at German defense companies. A BfV official said the agency has recommended that some use privately contracted close-protection teams. BfV chief Sinan Selen told German lawmakers that Russia is deliberately planning acts of violence against individuals through state or state-controlled actors. He said the activities are evolving in targets, methods, and the actors involved, including greater use of organized crime structures.

The Financial Times reported that the Kremlin ordered the expansion of sabotage and hybrid operations in Europe amid a battlefield stalemate in Ukraine and pressure on the Russian economy. The goal, according to the intelligence officials, is to fatally weaken support for Kyiv in the coming months. Assassinations against European civilian targets, once considered taboo even by Russia’s spy agencies, have become a more prominent part of those plans. Russia’s military intelligence agency, the GRU, is described as largely responsible for the operations.

One senior European intelligence official told the FT that the threat level in Europe has risen, to property but also to people. Another intelligence official said the main goal from the Russian perspective remains psychological. “Just by making people feel they might be a target, they are having their effect,” the official said. “They want individuals to think twice before doing business with Ukraine.” Several defense industry executives told the newspaper they had stepped up personal security measures in recent months following specific recommendations from government security services.

European defense executives have been on heightened alert since 2024, when U.S. and German intelligence uncovered a Russian plot against Armin Papperger, the chief executive of Germany’s Rheinmetall and a prominent advocate of supplying weapons to Ukraine. German intelligence later prevented an attempt on Stefan Tumann, the founder of Donaustahl, a company that supplies drones to Ukraine’s forces. Russia has denied conducting hybrid warfare or sabotage operations in NATO territory and has not claimed involvement in the alleged plots against defense executives.

The warnings arrive as European governments have publicly attributed a series of other incidents to Russian-linked actors, including an explosives-laden drone found near a Ukrainian cargo plane at Leipzig/Halle Airport in August and subsequent investigations linking elements of that plot to GRU-connected individuals. Danish and Polish officials have separately assessed that Russia is likely to intensify hybrid activities in the coming months. Moscow has rejected those assessments.