Blackwater’s pawns were too close to Russia.But the Ukrainians had serious doubts about working with Prince. The choice of Prince’s allies in Kiev – two men with ties to Russia – was particularly alarming. His Ukrainian business partner is Andriy Artemenko, who made headlines in 2017 for proposing to the Trump administration a “peace plan” for the war in Ukraine that included the lifting of sanctions on Russia by the United States.

Another prince ally in Kiev was Andriy Derkach, a Ukrainian MP whom the US accused of being an “active Russian agent”. Both Artemenko and Derkach worked in 2020 to boost Prince’s business in Ukraine.

Prince’s interests went far beyond the military. He has traded oil and minerals in Africa. He assembled a private army for his friend, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi. He prepared a force in Somalia to fight pirates in the Gulf of Aden. He helped train a team of assassins for the CIA. When Trump took office in 2017, Prince called on the new administration to privatise the war effort in Afghanistan, publicly outlining a plan that would allow contractors to run many US military functions.

Trump’s priority in Ukraine was not to make peace; it was to promote his own political fortunes. In the midst of his re-election campaign, Trump asked Ukraine to investigate his opponent, Joe Biden, and withheld military aid to Ukraine as leverage. The campaign of coercion caused a rupture in US-Ukrainian relations.

The Blackwater mercenary company tried to take over the Ukrainian military industry. – El colectivo de Uno / The Collective of One