Ivan Tkachev, Head of FSB Directorate K, Appointed Chief of Military Counterintelligence

Ivan Tkachev, head of the FSB’s Directorate K, has been appointed chief of the Department of Military Counterintelligence (DVKR). Two former intelligence service officers not connected to each other told IStories about the appointment.

According to them, the decree on the appointment has already been signed, but it will be officially announced at the next FSB collegium.

IStories’ sources say that formally, this is a career promotion (a move from a lieutenant general’s to a colonel general’s post), but informally, Tkachev is losing influence. The Directorate K he led has always been considered one of the most “coveted” posts in the service hierarchy, as it oversees all banks, tax authorities, customs, the presidential administration, and the government.

The DVKR, in turn, supervises the Ministry of Defense, and in wartime this position within the FSB is considered doomed. The previous head of the DVKR, Nikolai Yuryev, left his post in December 2024 at his own request.

Tkachev’s transfer to the DVKR had been in preparation since at least 2020. At that time, documents regarding his appointment to the new post were submitted for approval to the presidential administration, wrote RBC and the Telegram channel VChK-OGPU, citing sources.

General Tkachev is now 55 years old. He is one of the most influential FSB officers with over 30 years of service. Until 2016, Tkachev headed the Sixth Service of the FSB’s Internal Security Directorate. This service is called the “Sechin special forces”: it was created at the initiative of Igor Sechin during the attack on Yukos and Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Since then, the Sixth Service has repeatedly participated in criminal cases in the interests of both Sechin himself and Rosneft.

As head of the Sixth Service, Tkachev oversaw criminal cases against leaders of Russian regions, including former Komi governor Vyacheslav Gaizer, as well as the high-profile corruption case against former chief of the Main Directorate for Economic Security and Anti-Corruption of the Interior Ministry, Denis Sugrobov, in 2014. At that time, Sugrobov’s deputy Boris Kolesnikov during the investigation died under strange circumstances: he allegedly “smashed his head” against a wall and then fell from the sixth floor of the Investigative Committee building after an interrogation.

In 2016, Ivan Tkachev headed Directorate K and was involved in criminal cases against Economic Development Minister Alexei Ulyukayev, Serpukhov District head Alexander Shestun, billionaire Ziyavudin Magomedov, former minister Mikhail Abyzov, senator Rauf Arashukov, and investor Michael Calvey.