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Russia is taking hits in its war with Ukraine.
A kamikaze drone strike hit Russia’s Navy headquarters in Crimea and sparked a huge explosion on Saturday, in another suspected Ukrainian raid.
Smoke was seen billowing through the air following the attack, which came despite frantic attempts from Putin’s forces to shoot down the UAV, as seen in a video where repetitive gunfire is heard.
The naval HQ suffered a direct hit, said reports while terrified Russian tourists fled the popular summer peninsula.
Now, Alexander Dugin, a notorious fascist and Russian ultranationalist was the target of another attack this past Saturday.
While he has no formal role in government, Dugin, a far-Right occult writer who used to edit the staunchly pro-Putin Tsargrad TV network, is regarded as the Russian warmonger’s ‘guru advisor’ and reportedly exerts heavy influence over him.
He is credited with giving new life to the term Novorossiya (New Russia), which was adopted by Putin to justify his annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Dugin has long dreamed of an expansionist Russia, advocating for Russian rule ‘from Dublin to Vladisvostok’ in his 1997 book Foundations of Geopolitics.
He once said not taking back control of Ukraine would be ‘an enormous danger for all of Eurasia’ – before he was sanctioned by the US in 2015 after allegedly recruiting fighters for Russia-backed forces in the country.
He is the author of an extreme rightwing view of Russia’s role in the world which held an appeal to Putin.
Dugan has been known as Putin’s ‘Rasputin.’
On Saturday night, Dugan nearly missed being assassinated.
Dugan was travelling on a highway near the village of Bolshiye Vyazyomy just outside the capital — but avoided death only by chance.
Dugan and his daughter, Darya Dugina, had been together at a pro-Putin public event shortly before.
Ms. Dugina was returning at the same time from the cultural festival she had attended with her father.
Ms. Dugina was a political analyst and editor of pro-Putin journal United World International and a joint author of the book on Putin’s war in Ukraine.
But on Saturday night, Ms. Dugan has taken her father’s car rather than her own to return from the festival.
Her father – seen as the brains behind Putin’s interference in Ukraine from 2014 – was intended to be in the Toyota Land Cruiser Prado which was hit, but the former professor apparently switched cars at the last minute.
Witnesses saw the flaming wreckage of a car bomb meant for him that killed his daughter instead when the two switched vehicles last minute.
Alexander Dugin is in hospital after being at the scene of the explosion that killed his 35 year old daughter, Darya Dugina.
Darya was killed on the spot when the car exploded.
Ms. Dugina was described as ‘a young, smart, beautiful and incredibly talented and sympathetic woman’.
Along with her father, his daughter Darya was also sanctioned by the US Treasury after she became chief editor of the United World International (UWI) website – which was owned by Yevgeny Prigozhin, who is suspected of interfering in the 2016 election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.
Vladimir Putin’s closest supporters have demanded vengeance on Ukraine over the ‘assassination’ of Dugina, daughter of the Russian leader’s spiritual guru, who died in his stead.
There is no direct evidence Ukraine or its agents were involved in the Moscow attack, but senior pro-Putin war supporters were quick to demand an all out attack on Kyiv over the alleged assassination.
Margarita Simonyan, head of RT ‘propaganda’ network, posted on Telegram: ‘Decision-making centres! Decision-making centres!! Decision-making centres!!!’
Her call echoes a demand from hardliners loyal to Putin for him to wreak havoc with massive missile strikes on central Kyiv.
Propaganda journalist Maxim Kononenko messaged: ‘The address of the main building of the SBU [Ukrainian secret services]: Volodymyrska 33, Kyiv. I’m going to try to sleep now, and when I wake up, I hope to read on the news that it was f****** bombed along with its basements.’
There were also warnings that other pro-Putin propagandists could be in danger.
Denis Pushilin, the head of the Donetsk People’s Republic [DPR], a pro-Moscow puppet state in eastern Ukraine, posted: ‘The terrorists of the Ukrainian regime, trying to eliminate Alexander Dugin blew up his daughter…in a car. Blessed memory of Daria, she is a real Russian girl.’
He directly blamed ‘terrorists of the Ukrainian regime’.
Shocked and saddened by the deadly event, those close to the family spoke out.
Andrey Krasnov, the head of the Russian Horizon social movement and a close friend of the dead woman, said: ‘I knew Darya personally.
‘This was the father’s vehicle. Darya… took his car today, while Alexander went in a different way. He returned, and he was at the site of the tragedy.
‘As far as I understand, Alexander or probably both of them were the target.’
Source: The Republic Brief