Washington – “Al Quds” dot com – Saeed Erekat – Investigative journalist Jack Murphy reported, citing unnamed former US intelligence and military officials, that the CIA has been using the intelligence services of a European country in NATO to carry out subversive attacks inside Russia since Invasion of Ukraine in February.

The report, which was posted on Murphy's own website, said there were no US personnel on the ground in Russia, but the operations were being directed by the CIA. According to the report, the United States is using allied intelligence services to add an additional layer of plausible deniability, and a former US Special Operations official told Murphy that this layer was a major factor in US President Joe Biden's approval of the attacks.

Murphy says he did not name the NATO country whose intelligence services are used in the report because "doing so could jeopardize the operational security of cells still operating inside Russia."

In a note at the end of the article, Murphy explained why he did not publish this article in a well-known media outlet, choosing instead to publish the article on his own site, saying, "While working with editors at major publications, I have been asked to do things that are illegal and immoral in one instance, and in Another case I felt was that a senior CIA official was able to edit my article by making off-the-record statements, before leaking the report to the New York Times to undermine this (journalistic) piece.

According to the report, the covert campaign inside Russia was years in the making, with two former military officials saying that the (unnamed) NATO country's spy services hid a cache of explosives and equipment in Russia more than a decade ago, and some of the equipment was used recently.

As a former U.S. Special Operations official and an American person familiar with the campaign said, the CIA did not become involved in NATO country operations inside Russia until 2014, the first time sleeper cells entered Russia at the direction of the CIA while a NATO ally was engaged in espionage service (in Russia) in 2016, and more entered the country in the following years," according to Murphy's article.

Murphy explains, "The NATO ally provided the undercover agents with stories and alibis to explain their presence in Russia and documents to support these claims." And they were ready to give orders as to which targets to hit."

It is not clear how many attacks the sleeper cells were responsible for, but there have been a series of mysterious explosions at Russian military facilities, power plants and railways since the invasion. The report indicated that saboteurs may have been behind a fire last April at the Research Institute of the Russian Air Defense Forces, which killed more than 20 people.

The report indicates that "disruptive" operations supervised by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) require presidential approval, and that former US President Barack Obama signed a conclusion before leaving office that allowed covert action against Russia due to allegations that Moscow interfered in the 2016 elections, a claim. It has never been proven.

According to the Washington Post, Obama's "conclusion" allows "the implantation of electronic weapons in Russia's infrastructure, (the digital equivalent of bombs) that can be detonated if the United States finds itself in an escalating exchange with Moscow." Murphy cited a former CIA official who said the finding also allows for disruptive operations against Russia, though other former officials he spoke with said existing operations would have required a modification or an entirely new outcome.

According to the report, a CIA spokesperson denied the allegations in the report, but Murphy noted that the spy agency could legally deny the existence of its covert operations.

Experts warn that directing the CIA's subversion inside Russia risks a major escalation between NATO and Russia and could lead to a nuclear escalation.

Ukraine has recently escalated its attacks inside Russian territory, and according to The Times, the Pentagon tacitly supported the recent drone strikes that hit air bases deep in Russian territory, raising the risk of escalation.

It is noteworthy that Murphy said in his report that he published this story to inform the public, as he believes that, in fact, the Russian government knows very well who is sponsoring these sabotage strikes, as well as the American intelligence services know that, "and that the only party left in the dark is the public in general, who He was left unaware of the shadow war going on behind the scenes."

Murphy said the article "underwent a rigorous fact-checking process, and was deemed newsworthy as strategic bombings in Laos and Cambodia (during the Vietnam War) or the CIA's covert drone campaign in Pakistan."