Russia’s Ultra-Nationalist Oligarch Pushes for Nuclear War

On 23 Feb­ru­ary 2025, Busi­ness Insid­er report­ed that Kon­stan­tin Mal­ofeev, a wealthy Russ­ian media mogul who advo­cates for impe­r­i­al revival and tra­di­tion­al Ortho­dox val­ues, is push­ing Putin’s gov­ern­ment toward a more aggres­sive stance on Ukraine, includ­ing nuclear strikes. The arti­cle begins:

Kon­stan­tin Mal­ofeyev is on a roll. It’s the day after Don­ald Trump’s vic­to­ry in the 2024 elec­tion, and the Russ­ian oli­garch’s 900,000 fol­low­ers on Telegram expect a rol­lick­ing post. Mal­ofeyev, after all, is one of the Russ­ian right’s most adept media mag­nates, men­tored by a for­mer pro­duc­er from Fox News on how to nour­ish and cap­ti­vate a con­ser­v­a­tive audi­ence in Rus­sia. Mal­ofeyev illus­trates his post­elec­tion post with a provoca­tive image of Trump rais­ing a clenched fist. Trump “is our ene­my,” he declares. “He wants a great Amer­i­ca.” Even so, he sug­gests, Trump might be able to get togeth­er with Vladimir Putin and agree on a com­mon goal: how to divide the world between the two great super­pow­ers. He fin­ish­es with a Trumpian flour­ish: “LET’S MAKE RUSSIA GREAT AGAIN.”…

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Key Points:

• Mal­ofeev com­bines media influ­ence with finan­cial pow­er, lead­ing a nation­al­ist fac­tion that includes mil­i­tary and secu­ri­ty ser­vice elements.
• He helped orga­nize and finance the 2014 sep­a­ratist rebel­lion in Ukraine’s Don­bas region that pre­ced­ed Putin’s full-scale invasion.
• The oli­garch explic­it­ly advo­cates using nuclear weapons against Ukraine, stat­ing “We are able to deliv­er a tru­ly potent retal­i­a­tion strike.”
• Mal­ofeev’s Tsar­grad media plat­form pro­motes impe­r­i­al revival and tra­di­tion­al val­ues while crit­i­ciz­ing the Krem­lin’s per­ceived weakness.

Kon­stan­tin Mal­ofeev is a Russ­ian oli­garch, media mogul, and ultra-con­ser­v­a­tive ide­o­logue known for financ­ing pro-Krem­lin Ortho­dox and nation­al­ist projects. Born on July 3, 1974, in Pushchi­no, he grad­u­at­ed from Moscow State Uni­ver­si­ty with a law degree before found­ing the invest­ment fund Mar­shall Cap­i­tal Part­ners in 2005. Mal­ofeev gained noto­ri­ety for alleged­ly bankrolling sep­a­ratist move­ments in east­ern Ukraine in 2014, lead­ing to U.S. and EU sanc­tions. He chairs Tsar­grad TV, a plat­form pro­mot­ing Russ­ian Ortho­dox nation­al­ism and host­ing far-right fig­ures like Alek­san­dr Dug­in, and leads the monar­chist group “Dou­ble-Head­ed Eagle.” His St. Basil the Great Foun­da­tion has been accused of fund­ing mer­ce­nar­ies in Ukraine. Despite finan­cial strug­gles in his busi­ness­es, Mal­ofeev remains influ­en­tial through his media empire and ties to glob­al far-right net­works. In 2022, the U.S. indict­ed him for sanc­tions eva­sion, seiz­ing his assets.

For a detailed look at Mal­ofeev and his net­work, go here.

Dis­claimer: This post was gen­er­at­ed using AI, with added con­text where pos­si­ble. Please ver­i­fy all infor­ma­tion before using. Images are also AI-gen­er­at­ed and are for illus­tra­tive pur­pos­es only—they do not depict real events.