The tragic story of a down-on-his-luck Texan who turns himself into a renegade war hero in one fake Russian republic took an unexpected turn this week when he was allegedly kidnapped by the Russian military—after apparently being accused of being a CIA spy.
Russell Bentley, also known as “Texas,” was perhaps the last person one would expect to have mastered cunning espionage techniques during his nearly 10 years living among Russian fighters in Ukraineoccupied area of Donetsk. A Dallas native convicted of drug crimes in his hometown, Bentley quickly attracted international attention in 2014 when he was spotted wearing a cowboy hat with Russian militants and brought Kremlin propaganda about “Nazi Germany” in Ukraine. He obtained Russian citizenship in 2020 after transitioning to work as a combat vet “journalist” for Kremlin-controlled media.
News of his disappearance earlier this month went largely unnoticed until his wife, Lyudmila Bentley, went public Tuesday with claims that he had been kidnapped and held hostage by the Russian military.
“Russell was brutally detained on April 8,” Lyudmila Bentley wrote in a post. declare on Telegram. “I Urge EVERYONE to do EVERYTHING POSSIBLE to save my husband, our 'Texas,'” she said, describing him as “a friend of Donbass and Russia.”
“Perhaps, there is not much time left,” she said.
Russian propagandists claimed Bentley disappeared after approaching the site of recent shelling or mortar attacks, and an independent Russian news site said he had taken photos of damaged buildings. damage. That detail has led to a series of conspiracy theories about Bentley possibly being a mole.
On Wednesday, Bentley's friends sought to quash those rumors, with his self-proclaimed “brother in arms,” identified only as Vasily, releasing a video to refute claims that Bentley had “filmed something on his phone”.
After discovering Bentley's phone was smashed, Vasily wrote that he checked it later and said, “I didn't find ANY PHOTOS or VIDEOS.”
Graham PhillipsAnother Westerner who is linked to Russian forces in eastern Ukraine and knows Bentley, issued his own statement Wednesday noting that “a small but active segment of the Russian community has written letters against back in Texas, such as that he was an 'American spy,' etc.”
Strangely, after writing that such claims were “meaningless” and unfair because Bentley was not present to defend himself, Phillips himself went on to subtly criticize the Texas native's filming military operations, calling such practices “illegal and suspicious”.
Still, he said, “I hope for the best that our Texas survives well.”
