The Zhukov Affair (2019-2022)
The Kraken Special Unit (Part IV)
On 17 April 2022, Kostiantyn Nemichev posted a video that showed men in battle dress using heavy equipment to topple a bust of Georgy Zhukov, remove it from the park where it had been on display, and dump it in a salvage yard. Below the video he wrote “Special Unit KRAKEN dismantled the monument to Putin's idol, Marshal Zhukov the butcher. Zhukov is a monster who is responsible for the deaths of 400,000 Ukrainians, repression, looting, and mass shootings.”
This was the second time that people associated with Mr. Nemichev had torn down this bust of Marshal Zhukov. On 2 June 2019, a group of men, some of whom wore T-shirts proclaiming their membership in Mr. Nemichev’s political party, had thrown a rope over the sculpture and pulled it off of its pedestal. However, it was not long before the major of Kharkiv arranged for the repair of the bust and its return to its place of honor.
While the video bore the Kraken logo, it did not appear on the official Telegram channel of the Kraken organization. Rather, it was posted on the personal Telegram channel of Mr. Nemichev. Launched in January of 2017, that channel had been used to promote various initiatives of Nemichev’s political party (the National Corps), Mr. Nemichev’s community center (the First Nationalist Hub), and Mr. Nemichev’s two bids for public office.1 In 2019, it had also been used to publicize a campaign to prevent the city government of Kharkiv from naming an avenue in honor of Marshal Zhukov.
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In 2019, Nemichev stood for, but failed to win, a seat in the National Parliament. In 2021, he ran for, but did not win, the office of mayor of Kharkiv.