He gained a reputation for brutality in Ukraine, where Milchakov photographed himself next to dead Ukrainian soldiers. When he left Ukraine, some members of the unit appeared in Syria with Wagner’s team, a private military contractor run by an ally of Vladimir Putin and used by Russia to wage non-book wars in the Middle East and Africa. Rusich has been described by some researchers as a subset of Wagner, whose commander, Dmitry Utkin, has SS tattoos. The group has been investigated for war crimes by the International Criminal Court in The Hague, and Mikhalkov and Petrovsky have both been charged with terrorism in Ukraine.
