Ex-US Army Green Beret charged with leaking military secrets, said he was a 'son of Russia'

• A 45-year-old former US Army Green Beret was arrested on Friday and charged with conspiring with Russia's military intelligence service, the GRU, for 15 years, according the Justice Department.
• Peter Rafael Dzibinski Debbins of Gainesville, Virginia, is accused of giving Russian spies secrets about his US Army commands and even the names of other special forces troops to try to recruit them.
• In 1997, he met with Russian officials on a military base and was given the code name "Ikar Lesnikov," according to his indictment.
• He made several statements and signed missives that mentioned he wanted to "serve Russia" and that he was a "son of Russia."

A 45-year-old former US Army Green Beret was arrested on Friday and charged with conspiring with Russia's military intelligence service, the GRU, for 15 years, according a Justice Department statement.

Peter Rafael Dzibinski Debbins of Gainesville, Virginia, is accused of conspiring with Russian agents between 1996 and 2011, according to the US Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Debbins rose to the rank of captain and was eventually honorably discharged from the military in 2008.

Debbins is accused of "giving Russian intelligence officers sensitive information about the units in which he once served and also providing the names of other service members so Russia could try to recruit them," FBI Assistant Director of the Counterintelligence Division Alan Kohler, Jr., said in a statement.

"The facts alleged in this case are a shocking betrayal by a former Army officer of his fellow soldiers and his country," Kohler said.

Debbins's indictment accused him of providing Russian agents with information on the units he served in, including his activities and the names of other Green Berets so that the Russian agents "could evaluate whether to approach the team members to see if they would cooperate with the Russian intelligence service."

In 1997, he met with Russian officials on a military base and was given the code name "Ikar Lesnikov," the indictment said. He made several statements and signed missives that mentioned he wanted to "serve Russia" and that he was a "son of Russia."

He faces a maximum penalty of life in prison if convicted on charges of conspiring to provide US defense information to a foreign government agent.

Debbins attended the Institute of World Politics (IWP), a non-profit graduate school that specializes in foreign relations, and obtained a master's degree in Strategic and International Studies. According to an interview he had with the IWP in 2018, Debbins is fluent in Russian and traveled to the country every summer.

Debbins also described NATO, a thorn to Russia's foreign policy, as "indispensable to US national security" and a "force for stability in Europe," but added that there were issues related to resources within the organization.

"Our NATO allies in Europe and North America are carrying out an enormous responsibility with a very small military force," Debbins told IWP. "Never in human history has such a vast amount of resources and people been defended with such a small allocation of resources."