The many lives of Andrei Portnov

Three decades of the Ukrainian deep state. 'Get fucked, prosecutor'

May 22. 9:15AM. The Madrid American School. A 51-year-old man drops off his two daughters. He returns back to his Mercedes.

Four bullets in the chest. One in the head. He lies face down in the concrete. A ‘professional hit’.

Andrey Portnov was born in 1973. His assassination is quite different from the other recent killings I’ve covered recently. He was no mere nationalist freak, to be manipulated, used, and disposed by the real political players. He was as much a political heavyweight as anyone.

Portnov knew many secrets – a highly valuable commodity, but also a dangerous one.

Along with his secrets, his life itself presents a range of highly illuminating paradoxes.

Paradoxes, because he managed to straddle a wide range of seemingly contradictory political positions. Hated as pro-Russian by Ukrainian liberals and nationalists, decried as a traitor by many actually pro-Russian Ukrainians currently living in Russia. A man whose killing has been celebrated on Ukraine’s state-controlled television and western-funded liberal media – yet also a seemingly all-powerful figure in Zelensky’s deep state. A man called a traitor by just about every political clan in Ukraine, yet one who managed to outlive all too many of his former bosses…

Until now.

The USAID-funded ‘anti-corruption’ publication Bihus.info celebrates Portnov’s death with a drink

Illuminating, because Ukrainian politics is defined by just such a paradoxical world of betrayals, divided loyalties, cynicism, and mysterious, random death.

There’s also another way to describe Portnov, one he favored - an advocate of Ukrainian sovereignty. He was one of the most articulate critics of the ‘foreign control’ of the country that had taken grip since 2014, but he also sharply condemned the Russian military intervention of 2022.

Hence, today’s article will be concerned with Portnov’s life not simply because it could explain his death – but because of his crucial role at the intersection between pro-western and sovereigntist vectors of Ukrainian politics, as well as between Ukrainian and Russian officialdom. Understanding the nature of the Zelensky elite is no easy task. Portnov was a crucial piece of the puzzle.

Perhaps most importantly, Portnov signaled the possibility of the ‘Georgian scenario’ - that Ukraine under Zelensky would drift towards ever-warming neutrality towards Russia. The Donbass could be reintegrated on the basis of a more democratic, tolerant polity. A scenario that was most possible in the 2019-21 period, when Portnov returned to the country.

However, western media worries that peace could still return to Ukraine. The same day Portnov was assassinated, JPMorgan put out the following prediction on what fate Ukraine might expect:

My Ukrainian friends reacted to this conception with laughter. After all, what it is really saying is that:

The best case scenario is one wherein the war never ends, and Ukraine is granted a murderous fascist dictatorship that kills hundreds of thousands of its own people

Still OK is Israel - need I elaborate?

Not great is a country free of war for almost ten years, one that tries to conduct diplomacy and trade with all countries of the world

The worst case is a country which hasn’t suffered from any wars since 1945, and where the quality of life for ordinary citizens is many times higher than that in either Georgia or Ukraine

Anyway, back to the complex hero of today’s article, a man dedicated to just such a ‘not great’ scenario.

Portnov’s death has provoked no shortage of obituaries narrating his illustrious life. All of them include various hypotheses on the causes of his death. Many contradict each other. To begin with, 7,666 words on the established facts.