Russia Tried To Kill A Defector in America #usa #russia In 2020, Putin ordered his intelligence services to cross a red line - Killing a Russian informant for the CIA in Miami. Aleksandr Poteyev was a high ranking Russian intelligence officer who flipped in 1999 and began working with the CIA. In 2001, he signed a contract with the CIA that was reportedly worth somewhere between two to five million dollars. While being a CIA informant, he helped the US arrest 11 Russian spies who were living under deep cover in suburbs and cities on the East Coast. The spies had assumed false names and lived regular lives. They were sleeper agents. The spy bust was the inspiration for the TV Show “The Americans”. He fled to the US before he could be arrested for the betrayal and upon arrival he joined the CIA’s version of the Witness Protection Program. This made him disappear, he took on a different name for a period of time and lived a regular life. Russia had sent intelligence operators to America to find him and presumably kill him with one Kremlin official suggesting they would send a hitman after him, and they couldn’t find him. That is until he registered as a Republican so he could vote and took out a fishing license in his real name in 2016. That’s when Russia forced a Mexican scientist to help them. Hector Fuentes was a Mexican citizen who studied in Russia and who also had two wives. One who was Russian and lived in Germany and one who lived in Mexico. When Fuente's Russian wife and kids visited Russia in 2019, the authorities refused to allow her to go back to Germany. Fuentes then went to Russia to visit them and hopefully get them back to Germany. Upon arrival, he was told a Russian official wanted to see him in Moscow who told him “we can help each other”. Fuentes was then told to get a condo in Miami beach where Poteyev lived and he was ordered to find his car, obtain its license plate number, note its physical location, and to not take any pictures. So what did he do? He took pictures of course. He botched the operation by trying to tailgate a vehicle into the apartment complex, this alerted security who told him to leave – but not before his wife could take a photo of Poteyev’s license plate. Two days later, he tried to fly to Mexico but customs and border patrol stopped him and searched his phone where they found the picture of the license plate. Upon being arrested, he told investigators everything. It turns out that Fuentes didn’t even know who he was targeting or their significance but rather he was just following orders from Russia’s S.V.R. in exchange for letting his wife and kids go home. Fuentes was sentenced to prison for 4 years and one day. The revelation of the plot to kill Poteyev elicited a harsh response from the US who imposed sanctions and expelled 10 Russian diplomats including the Chief of the SVR station and in response, Russia kicked out 10 American diplomats and the head of the CIA’s Moscow office. - @philipdefranco