The tattoo connected the slain mercenary with an elite US Army unit
A member of a Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance group killed in Russia’s Bryansk Region had a prominent tattoo associated with the US Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment, according to a video released by Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB).
The fighter was among four killed in a cross-border raid on Bryansk on Sunday, the FSB said. When searched afterwards, they were found to be equipped with foreign weapons and gear, as well as personal items indicating that they belonged to “third countries,” such as a Canadian flag, a Polish prayer book, and a notepad with notes on tactics in English, the FSB added.
One of the dead men had a tattoo of an angel holding a rifle, with a banner reading ‘Ranger’ and ‘2d Bn’, apparently a reference to the 2nd Battalion of the US Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment. The tattoo, and the man’s American-made combat fatigues, were displayed in a video published by the FSB on Monday.
“According to law enforcement agencies, among the mercenaries neutralized in Bryansk Region are nationals of the US, Poland, and Canada,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters on Monday. “This is preliminary information that will be updated.”
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Rangers are elite special forces troops trained in airborne assault operations, reconnaissance and sabotage behind enemy lines, search and rescue, airfield seizure, and the capture or assassination of high-value targets. Numerous Army units have borne the ‘Ranger’ designation throughout history, but only the three battalions of the 75th Ranger Regiment and a handful of National Guard units have done so since the end of the Vietnam War.
It is unclear whether the man killed in Bryansk was ever a member of the regiment. However, displaying the insignia or tattoos of a unit in which one never served is considered highly offensive in American military culture, and those who do so are accused of “stolen valor” by veterans.
The winged angel is not an official symbol of the 2nd Ranger Battalion or the 75th Ranger Regiment, but similar iconography is common in tattoos across all branches of the US military.
The US maintains that its military presence in Ukraine is limited to a small contingent of troops monitoring the delivery of Western military aid to the country. American special forces personnel also reportedly trained Ukraine’s neo-Nazi Azov Brigade in Poland last year, in defiance of a US State Department ban on aid to the unit.
Numerous American military veterans have died fighting in the Ukrainian military, including former special forces operatives. One of the most high-profile deaths was that of former US Army Green Beret Nicholas Maimer, who was killed in a Russian artillery barrage in Artyomovsk (formerly Bakhmut) last summer. Maimer’s body was displayed in a video released by the late founder of the Wagner private military company, Evgeny Prigozhin, who offered to “hand him over to the United States of America” for burial.
As of March, 1,113 American mercenaries had taken up arms for Ukraine, according to a tally released by the Russian Defense Ministry. At least 491 of these had been killed, the ministry stated.
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