With a military helmet or beret, Chechen commander Apti Alaudinov is a familiar face to Russians on social media, where he reports news, always positive, about the Ukrainian invasion of the Kursk region.
„Let's calm down, get some popcorn and calmly watch our boys destroy the enemy,” he said on the first day of this surprise Ukrainian offensive in early August.
Unable to repel Ukrainian troops three weeks after the start of the operation, which caught them off guard, senior Russian army officers, however, prefer to remain silent.
Fifty-year-old Apti Alaudinov fills that gap by regularly posting videos that appear to have been shot near the front.
With around 275,000 followers on "Telegram", he is far from an internet star. However, his statements are replicated by the Russian media, especially television.
The commander heads the “Akhmat” special forces unit, made up of Chechen fighters, many of whom were sent to Ukraine by Ramzan Kadyrov – leader of this Russian republic in the Caucasus.
From the height of his post, Alaudinov tries to calm the Russians, claiming that “the enemy is (already) almost stopped” or that the situation is “stabilizing” while the Ukrainians continue to advance.
Recently, Alaudinov also stated that the war in Ukraine will end within two or three months.
For the journalist Tikhon Dzyadko from the independent Russian media "Dozhd" the new growth of Apti Alaudinov's popularity is an “incredible story”.
„Part of Russia is under the control of another country /.../, and the main commentator of what is happening in the Kursk region is this strange character Alaudinov,” he wrote in "Telegram".
He is approved
Such media presence cannot but happen with the support of the highest echelons of power in Russia, experts told AFP.
„I am convinced that this is being directed by the Kremlin,” says Sarah Oates, a specialist in Russian propaganda at the University of Maryland in the US state.
Georgy Bovt, a political analyst in Moscow, notes that “for now, this is apparently fine with the leaders”.
Like Ramzan Kadyrov, a loyal and outspoken aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin, Apti Alaudinov appears to enjoy an unusual freedom of speech.
Observers even peg him as a potential successor to the ruthless Chechen leader, whose health they say has deteriorated.
When parents express concerns about the mobilization of 18-year-old conscripts against the Ukrainian army – extremely sensitive issue in Russia – Apti Alaudinov does not show empathy.
If these young people “do not protect the motherland /.../, why would the country need you and your children?”, he answers in a video recording.
Speaker of "propaganda"
However, the Russian Ministry of Defense has an official spokesperson – Igor Konashenkov, whose purely factual and technical manner of expression is radically different from that of Apti Alaudinov.
The latter “presents the information in a more emotional way, which is probably easier for the public to perceive”, says Georgiy Bovt.
According to Sarah Oates, the frankly “scandalous“ Apti Alaudinov's statements are reminiscent of the style of the early Vladimir Putin, when he promised to “shit the terrorists right in the toilet”.
„I think he is an effective propaganda mouthpiece,”, she adds.
Apti Alaudinov grew up in the Stavropol Territory in southern Russia. His father and one of his brothers were killed fighting federal troops in Chechnya, where two wars were fought in the 1990s and the first decade of this year.
He later became Chechen police chief and deputy minister of internal affairs of Chechnya.
He has been sanctioned by several countries, including the US, over allegations of kidnapping and torture.
Apti Alaudinov, “powerful and dangerous”, has long been part of “Kadyrov”'s immediate security, writes the independent Russian newspaper “Novaya Gazeta” in 2016
In 2021, Vladimir Putin removed him from the Chechen government, which was seen as a sign of disputes with Ramzan Kadyrov.
In the first weeks of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, however, the Chechen leader announced that his “dear brother” will stand at the head of the fighters of his republic.
Although Apti Alaudinov was awarded the prestigious Russian order “Hero of Russia”, the unit he led “Akhmat“ it is sometimes called the "TikTok Army", criticized for prioritizing effectiveness on social networks over that on the battlefield.
The battalion "Ahmat" was helping to defend Kursk Oblast when Ukrainian troops invaded there.
In an unusually dark video, Apti Alaudinov admitted that Ukrainian soldiers had “done a good job”. “The only thing they didn't take into account was that God loves Russia,”, he added.
Translation from French: Alexey Margoevski, BTA