Finding Krasnov
Please watch this video before you read everything that follows.
The Press Who Cried Russia—Now Too Scared to Prove Themselves Right
Where the hell are CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and every other self-important media outlet that swears up and down it’s in the business of protecting democracy? Where are the emergency panels of so-called experts? Where are the somber-voiced news anchors, furrowing their brows and warning us that our republic is in danger? Where are the “BOMBSHELL” graphics?
WHEN A FORMER KGB CHIEF SHARES YOUR ARTICLE—AND THE AMERICAN MEDIA IS STILL ASLEEP
Something bizarre just happened. Something that proves independent journalism is doing what the corporate press refuses to do.
The Red “X” of Arrogance: How Snopes and France 24 Got Lazy and Let a Pro-Russian Hack Rewrite History
I didn’t start out pissed — I started out curious.
In the end, we went to Austria because something in our bones told us we had to.
We attempted to write a book about everything that transpired when we stepped off the plane in Vienna. Many of the following chapters read like a twisted travelogue.
If you don’t have the patience for that kind of thing, feel free to skip ahead to the last chapter. The missing chapters are merely placeholders at this point in case we ever want to include anything else. Right now, they don’t exist.
CHAPTER 2: The Ruby Sofie
We arrived in Vienna already confused. Not by customs, or signage, or even the language. Just by how smooth everything was. The train from the airport ran like it had something to prove. It glided. It whispered. It felt less like transit and more like being delivered.
CHAPTER 3: Who Is Alnur Mussayev?
Alnur Mussayev is not a conspiracy theorist. He’s a former spy chief who once ran Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee—the KNB. He wasn’t some mid-level desk jockey pushing paperclips across a Cold War relic. No. Mussayev was the head of the KNB, meaning he had keys to the whole paranoid kingdom: secret prisons, encrypted lines, burn phones, and the…
CHAPTER 4: Bones and Bells
We did what any pair of impulsive, under-caffeinated investigators would do when facing the weight of a possible international conspiracy.
CHAPTER 6: Krasnov Visits the Habsburgs
There was no shade left in Vienna. The sun beat down like it had been hired by the Kremlin. We’d been walking for ten minutes when it became clear: Schönbrunn Palace wasn’t just “a nice place to visit.” It was an ordeal. A sprawling imperial fever dream that stretched so far into the distance, we weren’t sure if the end was real or just a mirage shimmering in the heat haze. The kind of place where royalty once roamed and peasants once pissed themselves if they got too close.
CHAPTER 10: All Thumbs
There are things they don’t tell you about a trip that feels dangerously close to espionage.
CHAPTER 13: The Black Mamba
You can trace every major mistake in my life back to one of three things: poor impulse control, peer pressure disguised as curiosity, or the Austrian amusement park known as Prater.
CHAPTER 16: Welcome to the Fairytale
Against the odds, we landed the last available parking spot in the P1 lot. Lukas muttered something about divine intervention. I said nothing because I was still trying to reverse into it without gouging a Hungarian license plate or scraping the bumper of a French family’s Renault that looked like it had never lost a fight.
CHAPTER 17: Salt in the Wound
Our AirBNB, tucked under a canopy of mountain and mist, stood like the final frame of a postcard. Caffeine was clawing at our veins, and the air was humming with tourist energy. The main drag through Hallstatt was alive, too alive, almost comically photogenic. Cobblestones underfoot, cameras clicking in every direction, and wedding couples from a dozen countries posing in front of swan-shaped paddle boats. Every building looked like it had been painted yesterday, designed by elves with a deep commitment to pastel.
CHAPTER 18: Echoes of the Stomach
We had emerged from the salt mine with our sense of direction scrambled and our asses still tingling from the world’s oldest wooden slide. Lukas was bleeding from his lip. He wiggled one of his front teeth. It was loose. He pulled it from his mouth and placed it in a folded napkin.
CHAPTER 27: Cake and Conversation
Vienna’s was gray and dry, the sky low and metallic—like a lid waiting to slam shut. I stood outside Café Gerstner, just across from the State Opera, trying to stay calm. I was supposed to meet Mussayev out front. I wanted to be in a place where I could see him coming.
WHAT PUTIN HAS ON TRUMP
On August 12th, 2025, Alnur Mussayev, the former head of Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee, alleged that Russian President Vladimir Putin possesses a comprehensive kompromat file on Donald J. Trump. He didn’t suggest it. He stated it. The file, he said, is extensive, meticulously documented, and designed not to destroy Trump—but to control him.