On April 3, 2026, the newspapers La Nación and El País simultaneously published internal documents from a network called "La Compañía," the successor to the Wagner Group under the control of the Russian SVR, which financed over 250 articles in Argentine media during 2024 with the aim of destabilizing President Javier Milei and reorienting Argentine foreign policy towards Moscow. The total budget for the operation amounts to $626,100. This report summarizes the documented operations of Russian and Cuban intelligence in Argentina, the active judicial files, the identified actors, and the strategic context that turns the country into a permanent theater of operations.
The "Illegals" of the SVR: Argentine Identities at the Service of Moscow
Between 2012 and 2022, the couple Artem and Anna Dultsev operated in Buenos Aires under the false names Ludwig Gisch and María Rosa Mayer Muños, with Argentine documents obtained through a falsified Austrian death certificate. Their two children were born at the Hospital Italiano and voted in Argentine elections. Their objectives were concrete: surveillance of the energy sector in Vaca Muerta —the fourth-largest unconventional gas reserves in the world—, establishing contacts in the Triple Frontier, and building a local logistical support network (Alconada Mon, La Nación, July 13, 2025).
In December 2022, Slovenian intelligence services detected encrypted communication channels and unaccounted cash in the apartment the Dultsevs occupied in Ljubljana. Convicted in July 2024 to one year and seven months —time already served—, they were deported with a five-year re-entry ban. On August 1, 2024, in Ankara, they were part of the largest prisoner exchange since the Cold War: 26 people from 7 countries. Putin personally received them in Moscow and greeted them in Spanish: "Good evening." Their children, holding valid Argentine passports, found out who their parents were only during the flight (Buenos Aires Herald, August 2, 2024).
Judicial File — Dultsev Case / SVR Network.
The case is being handled by the Federal Criminal and Correctional Court No. 9 of the Capital Federal, presided over by judge Sebastián Ramos, with federal prosecutor Eduardo Taiano and prosecutor Santiago Marquevich from the UFECO. The applicable legal framework is Law 13,985 on acts of espionage, sabotage, and treason (Argentina, 1950). Among those charged in the local logistical network are Fabián Horacio Gutiérrez —an employee of the Civil Registry of Viedma—, Olga Alexandrivska, and Ali Kherchi. Additionally, those with links to the GRU identified include Alexander Verner, Olga Koloba, Denis Sergeev, Vladimir Ochatov, Irina Bain, and Andrei Zuev. At the time of this edition, the file remains active, with no formal charges yet, and a request for lifting banking secrecy is underway. Source: La Nación, July 13, 2025.
"La Compañía": $626,100 to Buy the Journalistic Narrative
The 76 leaked documents describe a structure internally referred to as "La Compañía," activated for Argentina in December 2023 —the exact day Milei invited Zelensky to his inauguration—, with an identified chain of command: regional coordinator Alexey Evgenievich Shilov, a former contractor of the Wagner Group, and operators in Buenos Aires Lev Konstantinovich Andriashvili and Irina Yakovenko (Torres Cabreros, El País, April 3, 2026).
The internal sheets note more than 250 articles published between June and October 2024 in at least 23 Argentine media outlets, with fees ranging from $350 to $3,100 per piece. The budget allocated to media was $283,100; intelligence expenses and field operations totaled $343,000, for a grand total of $626,100. The most active ghostwriter —responsible for 20 articles— signed as "Gabriel di Taranto," with a profile photo generated by Nvidia's artificial intelligence (Alconada Mon, La Nación, April 3, 2026). Among all the fabricated pieces, the most illustrative was "Argentine Tourists": a false story accusing Argentine citizens of sabotaging a Chilean gas pipeline, conceived to contaminate the information cycle and instill doubt, not to uphold a permanent lie (LatAm Journalism Review, April 7, 2026).
"Argentina was the largest expenditure destination for La Compañía in Latin America during August 2024, even surpassing Brazil and Mexico." — University of Navarra, Global Affairs, November 2025
About the Author
William L. Acosta is a graduate of PWU and the University of Alliance. He is a retired police officer from the New York Police Department, a former member of the United States Army, and the founder and CEO of Equalizer Private Investigations & Security Services Inc., an agency licensed in New York and Florida, with international outreach. Since 1999, he has led investigations in cases of narcotics, homicides, and missing persons, as well as participating in criminal defense at both state and federal levels. A specialist in international and multi-jurisdictional cases, he has coordinated operations in North America, Europe, and Latin America.
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