Ukrainian hacktivists of the Cyber Resistance team, together with InformNapalm international intelligence community volunteers, continue to collect information about officers of the 610th Center for Combat Training and Retraining of Military Pilots (military unit 41520), Ivanovo city, Severny airfield. The A-50U airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft are based at this airfield. This Russian equivalent of AWACS is used by the Russian Federation to direct missile attacks on Ukraine.
This time, the target of the study is the commander of the Combat Training Section (preparation of combat control crews), Lieutenant Colonel Vladimir Kasatkin.
LIEUTENANT COLONEL KASATKIN
The retrieved information allows us to validate the personal data of this officer and transfer it to the relevant competent authorities involved in identifying war criminals for the future tribunal.
Kasatkin Vladimir Vyacheslavovich (Rus.: Касаткин Владимир Вячеславович), born on 8/21/1977. Passport: 45 97 115347. Personal number: У-968986. Registered at: Ivanovo, post office 14th, house # 313. However, another address also appears in the mail: Ivanovo, Voykova st., 13, apt. 57.
He has a wife, Irina (entered in the phone book as “Irishka”), born in 1971 (passport) and son Maxim, born in 2004 (passport).
We are also publishing his phone book, since its data has already been processed. The list of contacts includes Kasatkin’s colleagues, for example, Colonel Leonid Rusin who featured in one of our previous CYBINT investigations. And for our active readership interested in doing their own bit of OSINT we suggest going through the phone book (*PDF) to find the contacts of the operational duty command posts of the Savasleyka air base, as well as air bases in Krymsk, Lipetsk, and Rostov. These airfields are used by MiG-31K fighters carrying the Kinzhal missiles to hit Ukraine. We will be thankful to all those who will be able to get through or overload the lines of the duty posts. Please make sure to write back to us.
Lieutenant Colonel Kasatkin managed to get in a spotlight in Syria, where he received a positive character reference and a nomination for an award (electronic copy of the reference document *PDF).
However, in the same month, also in Syria, our defendant was detained by the military police. Intoxicated, Lieutenant Colonel Kasatkin managed to invite another lieutenant colonel “to go f… himself” because the latter “hated aviation and despised pilots”. Kasatkin’s explanatory report to the commander of the Russian military transport aviation forces Lieutenant General Benediktov (*PDF) is a shining example of the lofty writing style practiced by the so-called “Russian officers”.
Also, the mail dump contained an interesting order to develop measures to prevent offenses among military personnel in the temporarily occupied Donetsk in cooperation with the so-called “Traffic Police of the DPR” (*PDF). Kasatkin’s connection with the occupied Donbas is not yet fully clear from his correspondence. However, this message once again demonstrates that it was Russia that waged a hybrid war in the east of Ukraine from 2014 to 2022, whereas Russian officers of different levels and units were very closely woven into the management of the military and terrorist formations in the occupied parts of the Donbas.
TRAINING AND EDUCATION OF SPECIALISTS ON A-50 and IL-22 AIRPLANES
However, the greatest value of our investigation target is not in his drunken antics in Syria. Lieutenant Colonel Kasatkin and his father, Honored Military Specialist of the Russian Federation, Colonel of the Reserve Vyacheslav Kasatkin (Rus.: Касаткин Вячеслав Анатольевич), are involved in the process of reforming Russian radar surveillance and targeting aviation systems.
We are making public the retrieved documents on proposals for staff changes and reassignment of the 610th Center, information on the commissioning preparations of the A-100 systems, which should replace the aging A-50 aircraft developed back in the Soviet times.
The data also contains information on various communication, monitoring and recording systems used on A-50 aircraft, as well as about the simulators used to train the specialists for A-50 and Il-22 airplanes.
Experts may be interested in the Russian Combat Training Courses, the information on the number of rating flight hours required to qualify for different categories.
We were especially interested in manuals on interfacing of the Russian systems for performing target acquisition and tracking tasks:
- Tracking controller operations (for Ivanovo) (PDF)
- Targeting controller operations (in Ivanovo) (PDF)
The retrieved data helped us improve our understanding of the problems that the Russians faced while operating A-50 aircraft. For example, Kasatkin filed a report based on the results of a snap check of the air defense troops of the Central Military District of the Russian Federation. A detailed operational report – from the moment the order was received to the moment the A-50 aircraft took off – gives an idea of the enemy’s response speed.
We also learned about issues with the training of the flight crews and fuel provisioning for the aircraft of the Center (screenshot).
P.S.
So far, we cannot make public all the information. However, we can offer some careful hints and clues to those sitting up and taking notice.
Lieutenant Colonel Kasatkin also kept in his e-mail a number of messages compromising a whole group of Russian officers. Experts will most probably guess with whom and about what Kasatkin corresponded, and why the Machulishchi airfield appears on the last screen shot. Unfortunately, Comrade Lieutenant Colonel did not get in touch again.
Read more publications based on the data from Cyber Resistance hacktivists
- Hacking a Russian war criminal, deputy commander of the OMON of the Krasnoyarsk Krai
- Hacking a Russian war criminal, commander of 960th Assault Aviation Regiment
- Hacking Russian Z-volunteer Mikhail Luchin who ordered sex toys for $25,000 instead of drones for the Russian army.
- BagdasarovLeaks: hacking ex-member of the Russian State Duma Semyon Bagdasarov. Iranian gambit
- Hacked: Russian GRU officer wanted by the FBI, leader of the hacker group APT 28
- Hacking “James Bond”: medical service commander of 960th Assault Aviation Regiment doxed key personnel of his own unit
- Hacking Andrey Lugovoy, member of the Russian State Duma, First Deputy Head of the Security Committee
- Ukrainian hacktivists acquired first-ever photo of the GRU hacker unit commander wanted by the FBI for meddling in the U.S. election
- New evidence of collaboration of former Slovak Justice Minister Štefan Harabin with the Russian Federation
- Hacking Colonel Leonid Rusin, ex-commander of Russian AWACS unit
- Ukrainian hackers posted lists and documents of the Russian 72nd Motorized Rifle Brigade (TOP-10 files)
- Economic summit Russia–Africa 2023 databases hacked by Ukrainian hacktivists
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