Free Republic

Last year I was working on an article about foreign fighters and volunteers in Ukraine... Among the people I interviewed: Ryan Wesley Routh, the 58-year-old man whom the F.B.I. is investigating in what it is calling an assassination attempt... Mr. Routh, who had spent some time in Ukraine trying to raise support for the war, was seeking recruits from among Afghan soldiers who fled the Taliban... There were a few complications. Mr. Routh, a former construction worker from Greensboro, N. C., said he never fought in Ukraine himself — he was too old and had no military experience. *** When...

Analysts have used other evidence to conclude that the transfers were most likely part of an effort to offer payments to Taliban-linked militants to kill American and coalition troops in Afghanistan. American officials intercepted electronic data showing large financial transfers from a bank account controlled by Russia’s military intelligence agency to a Taliban-linked account, evidence that supported their conclusion that Russia covertly offered bounties for killing U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan, according to three officials familiar with the intelligence. Though the United States has accused Russia of providing general support to the Taliban before, analysts concluded from other intelligence...