Line #19 Main/RenegadeRussian


1	->'''Red Guardian:''' General Aleksander Lukin, under the authority of [[UsefulNotes/BorisYeltsin President Yeltsin]], you are hereby under arrest [...] for crimes of treason against Mother Russia.\
2	'''Lukin:''' Mother Russia? I'm sorry to tell you that I am all that is left of the true Mother Russia, boy.
3	-->-- ''ComicBook/CaptainAmericaWinterSoldier''
4
5	How to have a RedScare villain without insulting the [[UsefulNotes/SovietRussiaUkraineAndSoOn Soviet Union]] or the [[UsefulNotes/TheNewRussia Russian Federation]].
6
7	The Renegade Russian, formerly Renegade Soviet before end of the UsefulNotes/ColdWar, is or was a member of the Soviet/Russian military, government, or SecretPolice. They are involved in an evil scheme as either TheDragon or BigBad. However, there's one big caveat. Their actions are neither authorized nor condoned by the Kremlin. Indeed, the Kremlin may well be actively trying to stop them, at the time of the Détente in particular. If you're too bad for the Soviet Union, then you are ''really'' bad. While they'll likely be a GenericDoomsdayVillain in a Cold-War era story, they may well have Communist beliefs in a post-Cold War story, often trying to MakeTheBearAngryAgain. In any case, expect the renegade to be a former [[UsefulNotes/RedsWithRockets Red Army officer]] or [[UsefulNotes/MoscowCentre KGB agent]] in both eras. Also note that such characters may technically be from smaller republics of the former USSR, instead of Russia itself.
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9	See also TheMafiya, another popular Russian villain group that similarly includes a lot of FormerRegimePersonnel, and BalkanBastard, another Slavic villain archetype. More broadly, compare EvilReactionary, RenegadeSplinterFaction and RogueAgent; nowadays you're also likely to see renegades from RedChina and from the UsefulNotes/{{North Korea}}n [[UsefulNotes/NorthKoreansWithNodongs military]]. Some works have also used renegade TerroristsWithoutACause arising from real paramilitary conflicts like UsefulNotes/TheTroubles or UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror, taking advantage of an convenient source of villains without delving into actual politics. And of course, there's the tried-and-true technique of simply creating a FictionalCountry -- along the lines of {{Ruritania}}, {{Qurac}}, {{Bulungi}}, or a BananaRepublic -- to cash in on TheThemeParkVersion of a regional geopolitical situation while ensuring that NoCommunitiesWereHarmed.
10
11	Given the nature of this trope, it goes without saying that it doesn't really apply to actual Russian stories, where these would just be just generic villains.
12	----
13	!!Examples:
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15	[[foldercontrol]]
16
17	[[folder:Comic Books]]
18	* General Nikolai Alexandrovich Zakharov from ''ComicBook/ThePunisherMAX'' is a low-key example. Its unlikely he'd ever openly move against the Russian government, but he despises The New Russia and its government, considering them traitors who threw away the sacrifices made for the Soviet Union and whored out the country for profit.
19	* In an issue of ''ComicBook/TeenTitans'', a Renegade Russian, who blames the USA for the death of his family, infects a young woman with a virulent plague and sends her to the US to spread it. The Russian government sends their superhero Red Star to stop her, leading to the requisite misunderstanding ([[LetsYouAndHimFight and superhero fight]]) with the Teen Titans.
20	* ComicBook/{{Batman}} once fought the "[=NKVDemon=]", a Russian SuperSoldier, when he tried killing the new Soviet leadership, starting from the bottom and going right up to Gorbachev. A few years before that, the [=KGBeast=] went against his government orders to kill ten political targets, the last one being Ronald Reagan. He was also the [=NKVDemon=]'s mentor.
21	* "The Crossing Line", a ''ComicBook/TheAvengers'' storyline by Fabian Nicieza, features a group of Soviet soldiers who have decided that starting a global nuclear war would be, uh, good for the economy. Not unreasonably, the Soviet government disagrees, and the official Soviet supers team up with the Avengers and ComicBook/AlphaFlight to take them down.
22	* ''ComicBook/BlakeAndMortimer'': Dr. Voronov in ''The Voronov Plot'' is a Soviet scientist who attempts to [[spoiler: launch a series of bacteriological attacks targeting the Western Bloc and un-stalinist Soviets, by using an alien bacterium which has just been discovered.]]
23	* Aleksander Lukin of the ''ComicBook/CaptainAmericaWinterSoldier'' arc was a high-ranking Soviet general disgruntled by the fall of the USSR. He uses his megacorp Kronas International to fund his secret mercenaries to commit acts of terrorism, hoping to weaken the US and revive the Soviet Union. In his first scene, Red Guardian attempts to arrest him on Pres. Yeltsin's orders, but Lukin murders him, [[KnightTemplar denying any treason]].
24	* A Chinese variant in ''ComicBook/IronMan'' villain the Mandarin, at least in his earliest appearances. While he lived in and occasionally helped Red China, it was made clear from his debut that he thinks himself above both Beijing ''and'' Washington, and he routinely humiliates the PLA officials sent to negotiate with him.
25	** Played straight with Titanium Man, who went rogue several times prior to the Cold War's abrupt end; afterwards he briefly joined a group called the "Remont 4" dedicated to bringing back the USSR. That didn't pan out and after being killed (and later coming BackFromTheDead [[DeathIsCheap and then being alive with no explanation]]) he's since become a mercenary.
26	** Zigzagged with the numerous Crimson Dynamos -- at one point the armor was worn by GRU agent Valentin Shatalov, who was the leader of the aforementioned Remont 4. But he later lost the armor in the incident that killed the Titanium Man and the group dissolved after.
27	[[/folder]]
28
29	[[folder:Film]]
30	* The ''Film/JamesBond'' movie series loves this. The Soviet government itself, while always pursuing its own self-interests, [[EveryoneHasStandards is vehemently opposed to]] [[WorldWarIII open conflict with the West]], and [[EnemyMine its agents may even cooperate with Bond in stopping their rogue elements]].
31	** Colonel Rosa Klebb in ''Film/FromRussiaWithLove''. She is actually working for [[NebulousEvilOrganization SPECTRE]] and its mysterious leader Ernst Stavro Blofeld. This is a change from the original Ian Fleming novel, where Klebb has the backing of her government.
32	** Averted in ''Film/ForYourEyesOnly'', which is the only James Bond movie in which his enemy is a communist agent acting with the blessing of his government. Even then, the Russians are depicted as respectful competitors rather than bloodthirsty villains.
33	** General Orlov in ''Film/{{Octopussy}}''. A crooked and power-hungry GeneralRipper, he wants to do his country an ''unasked'' favour by blowing up a nuke in Western Germany so Russia can seize control of Europe, but ends up getting shot by GDR border guards before Gogol can arrest him for theft and embezzlement of Soviet state funds (to pay the terrorists).
34	** Creator/ChristopherWalken's character in ''Film/AViewToAKill'' is a French millionaire installed by the Soviets. When he goes rogue, the KGB itself attempts to get rid of him. [[spoiler:After Bond finally manages to kill him, he is offered the ''Order of Lenin'' from Gogol]].
35	** General Koskov from ''Film/TheLivingDaylights'', who tries to implicate his boss, General Pushkin, as one. [[spoiler:Pushkin then has him arrested and is implied to have been executed off-screen for his ChronicBackstabbingDisorder.]]
36	** General Ourumov and Xenia Onatopp from ''Film/GoldenEye'', who are working for Janus in UsefulNotes/TheNewRussia. Averted by Valentin Zukovsky (former KGB, now underground criminal syndicate) and Defense Minister Mishkin (who is an antagonist for Bond but that is due to him not knowing what is up with the [=GoldenEye=] attack on Servenaya).
37	** General Chang in ''Film/TomorrowNeverDies'' was to be conveniently delayed by traffic when Beijing was to be struck by a nuke previously stolen from a British warship, whereupon he would launch a coup and take command of the Chinese government. In the novelization, the Chinese government sends their agent to find Chang, since he stole a high-tech radar system. He is later arrested for the theft and treason.
38	** Valentin Zukovsky's nephew, the captain of a nuclear submarine, in ''Film/TheWorldIsNotEnough''. They had no clue about the real plan, though -- the crew thought they were just making money on the side.
39	** Colonel Moon, a renegade from UsefulNotes/NorthKorea, in ''Film/DieAnotherDay''. Though he does gain the loyalty of the North Korean generals after the coup. (Except, oddly enough, Moon's father, an officer with a great deal of common sense.)
40	* Captain Marko Ramius and his officers in ''Film/TheHuntForRedOctober'' -- according to their government. Ramius planned to [[DefectorFromCommieLand defect with his brand new hi-tech submarine]], so the Soviet Ambassador fed the US government the Renegade Russian line to get them to sink him. In [[Literature/TheHuntForRedOctober the novel]], the Americans know that Ramius is defecting and the Soviets say they are conducting a rescue mission; they argue that the Kremlin will not use the renegade story because it would indicate that the Soviet government has lost control of its own military.
41	* ''Film/{{Telefon}}'' (1977). A KGB clerk, motivated either by Stalinist sympathies or an insane need to write his name in history, steals a list of ManchurianAgent saboteurs in the United States and tries to start WorldWarIII. An interesting twist in that the protagonist (played by Creator/CharlesBronson) is a KGB agent trying to stop him. A further twist is that his KGB bosses neglected to inform the new Premier of these agents, so they can't just get him to [[TreacheryCoverUp inform]] the Americans as they'll be for the chop.
42	* In ''Film/CrimsonTide'', the nuclear threat is from a Siberian separatist who hijacked a missile emplacement on the Kamchatka Peninsula.
43	* In the third ''Film/TheLibrarian'' film, the main villains are these, hoping to revive Dracula and use him to create a vampire army to reconquer and restore the Soviet Union.
44	* ''Film/TheMummyTombOfTheDragonEmperor'': General Yang and his lieutenant Choi are working for the titular undead warlord in hopes of restoring China to its former glory. Rather uniquely for this trope, they are not Communists but rather Kuomintang members (the main antagonists to the Communists in the Chinese Civil War), though you'd only know that if you [[GeniusBonus recognize their outfits]]. Either way, they qualify since the Kuomintang wanted UsefulNotes/NoMoreEmperors, which makes Yang and his followers renegades all the same.
45	* ''Film/TheSoldier'' (1982). Renegade KGB steal nuclear material and, [[FalseFlagOperation posing as terrorists]], threaten to detonate an atomic bomb in the Saudi oilfields unless the US forces the Israelis off the West Bank. The HeroesRUs group led by the title character have to stop them, ironically [[RogueAgent going renegade themselves in the process]].
46	* [[YellowPeril General Chan Lu]] from the remarkably silly ''Battle Beneath The Earth'' is an example of the Renegade Chinese version.
47	* The villains in ''Film/{{Salt}}'' are a group of KGB Communist hardliners that somehow outlived the UsefulNotes/ColdWar.
48	* Terrorists led by Ivan Korshunov in ''Film/AirForceOne''.
49	* ''Franchise/StarTrek'':
50	** Commander Kruge from ''Film/StarTrekIIITheSearchForSpock'', who unilaterally decides to take his ship to the Genesis planet, attack Federation starships and murder Federation scientists in an attempt to learn its secrets.
51	** Given that the Klingons are Cold War analogs, the renegade Klingon commander on ''Film/StarTrekVTheFinalFrontier'' counts as a sci-fi version of this trope.
52	** General Chang from ''Film/StarTrekVITheUndiscoveredCountry'', who is [[spoiler:plotting with other renegades from the Federation to prevent peace between the two powers]].
53	** The entire House of Duras in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', whose non-stop scheming eventually escalates into a full blown civil war where they try to take over the Empire. Obedience to the ruling authority doesn't seem to be the Klingons' strong suit.
54	* Inverted in ''Film/DrStrangelove'', whose villain is an American renegade who launches a nuclear attack on the Soviets without authorization.
55	* In ''Film/WildWildWest'', Loveless seems to find quite a few influential British, French, and Mexican allies to go along with his plan of dividing the United States and granting its land to its previous owners. At first he seems to be trying to resurrect the Confederacy, but he's really only interested in his own aggrandizement.
56	* The bad guys in the first ''Film/{{xXx}}'' are former members of the Russian Army who deserted during the Chechen War of 1999 and started an organized crime ring, which is actually a front for their real objective: anarchist terrorism. [[spoiler:Yelena is actually a DoubleAgent who is spying on them for the FSB.]]
57	* ''Film/MissileXTheNeutronBombIncident'' has Dr. Nikolaeff, the nuclear scientist working for the Baron.
58	* Vladimir Radchenko in ''Film/CrimsonTide'' leads a mutiny and seizes control of a Russian base that has nuclear missiles, threatening to launch them at the United States.
59	* ''Film/DeathTrain'' (1993) features a renegade Russian general (Christopher Lee) hoping to revive the USSR by building a nuclear bomb with stolen weapons-grade plutonium, then handing it over to the Baath regime in Iraq so that the Russians will invade it to recover their weapon, with the inevitable American response forcing them to go back to their Soviet ways.
60	* While August Best from the MadeForTVMovie ''Film/PanicInTheCity'' may be employed by the Soviets, he is not above carrying out his own vicious agenda to nuke LA.
61	* The 1989 MadeForTVMovie ''Red King, White Knight'' has the KGB hiring a foreign terrorist to kill Premier Gorbachev to stop his policy of perestroika.
62	[[/folder]]
63
64	[[folder:Literature]]
65	* A couple of examples from the ''Literature/AlexRider'' series of books, since they draw a lot of inspiration from ''Film/JamesBond''. Most notable are General Alexei Sarov from the third book, ''Skeleton Key'', Yassen Gregorovich, who appears in ''Stormbreaker'' and ''Eagle Strike'', and Nikolai Drevin from the sixth book, ''Ark Angel''.
66	* While Creator/DaleBrown novels often use [[MakeTheBearAngryAgain a remilitarized Russia]], ''Act of War'' and ''Edge of Battle'' has explicitly ex-military Colonel Yegor Zakharov and his men.
67	* ''Literature/RainbowSix'' has Dmitriy Arkadeyevich Popov, a former KGB intelligence officer who instigates terrorist incidents on behalf of the BigBad. [[spoiler:At least until he learns the truth of the plan, decides that EvenEvilHasStandards, and turns informer.]]
68	* In the prologue to the ''Literature/{{Deathlands}}'' series about an AfterTheEnd United States, a hardline communist faction called ''vseesozhzenie'' (terrible fire) tries to take out the US military and political command system by exploding three nuclear bombs in Washington D.C. during the Presidential inauguration, as a prelude to a nuclear attack. It [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt doesn't go well]].
69	* The BigBad in ''Literature/JamesBond'' novel ''Literature/DeathIsForever'' (which is set ten months after the dissolution of Soviet Union) seeks to restore international communism, and the book repeatedly posits the threat of people who won't give up on its ideology, and will continue to fight the west until the bitter end.
70	* Vladimir, an Estonian patriot and former Russian general, in ''Literature/SmileysPeople''; he defected to the British after discovery. [[/folder]]
71
72	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
73	* A few ''Series/MacGyver1985'' bad guys.
74	* ''Series/Jake20'' uses this.
75	* ''Series/TwentyFour'' uses this from time to time, particularly when [[PresidentEvil Charles Logan]] shows up, [[spoiler:before subverting it in the final season]].
76	* ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' has these ''everywhere'', as does its parent series ''Series/{{JAG}}''. The most notable example is submarine captain Mikhail Yerastov, hired by Al-Qaeda in season 7 of ''JAG'', who wants to avenge his dead [[UsefulNotes/MoscowCentre KGB]] wife who was killed by the UsefulNotes/{{CIA}}.
77	* ''Series/{{Spooks}}'' has a very interesting variant in its tenth and final season. In this case, the renegades' endgame is [[spoiler:to trick Britain into attacking a Russian jetliner bound for London, [[MakeTheBearAngryAgain thus stopping a proposed partnership and driving the two nations into war]] while simultaneously opening the way for the Ultranationalist Party to seize power in the Kremlin]].
78	* ''Series/TheLastShip'': The BigBad of the first season is [[InsaneAdmiral Admiral]] Konstantin Ruskov, who took his ship rogue and refused to return it to dock when the [[ThePlague Red Flu]] pandemic reached Russia, and is now seeking the cure as a means of creating a new world order. Though, since the Russian government and military have been wiped out, how "renegade" they are is debatable.
79	* ''Series/TheNewAvengers'': In the "K is for Kill" two-parter, Colonel Stanislav is a hardliner who is not happy with the thawing Cold War, and puts in a motion a scheme set up after UsefulNotes/WorldWarII in an attempt to trigger World War III.
80	* ''Series/TheEnemyWithin'' focuses on FBI's efforts to stop a Russian terrorist named Vassily Tal, who is very good at subverting their efforts by turning people or using blackmail. [[spoiler:It's eventually revealed that Tal was a case of CreateYourOwnVillain. After he left Russian intelligence to strike out on his own, he was contacted by Americans and offered to work for them in exchange for a safe passage for him and his two brothers to the US. Instead, he was betrayed and his brothers were killed in an airstrike.]]
81	[[/folder]]
82
83	[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
84	* The ''TabletopGame/GURPSTechnomancer'' setting has Russia in a civil war between the [[UsefulNotes/TheNewRussia Federal forces]] and rebels led by UsefulNotes/JosephStalin, who was [[NotQuiteDead never quite dead]], just [[KingInTheMountain sleeping and waiting]]. Dangerous antagonists can emerge from that mess.
85	* In ''TabletopGame/TheMadnessDossier'', the old Soviet psy-war program acquired a working grasp of mental manipulation techniques and a very partial understanding of [[CosmicHorrorStory true nature of reality]]. Elements of that program appear to have gone rogue, and may make dangerous human opponents for the heroic Project SANDMAN.
86	* The default setting for the third edition of ''TabletopGame/{{Champions}}'', as developed in the 1980s, featured a relatively straightforward pair of Soviet/Warsaw Pact super-teams ("The Supreme Soviets" and the "Cominterm"), who were largely loyal to the Soviet Union, if only because that suited their ambitious leader, Colonel Vasalov, putting the members in the range from {{Worthy Opponent}}s to DirtyCommunists, with some potential to act as ChummyCommies. However, the switch to 4th edition came around the time of Soviet collapse, and by the time the characters were updated in ''Classic Enemies'' (1991), they needed major changes, and one group, "Red Doom", had gone distinctly Renegade, with Colonel Vasalov aiming to depose President Gorbachev and take over Russia. (The other group, the largely independent and heroic "New Guard", considered Red Doom their greatest enemies.)
87	[[/folder]]
88
89	[[folder:Video Games]]
90	* Zakharov in the video game ''VideoGame/ActOfWar''.
91	* ''VideoGame/CallOfDuty'' has used this type of villain [[TropeCodifier repeatedly.]]
92	** The similarly-named Imran Zakhaev in ''[[VideoGame/CallofDuty4ModernWarfare Call of Duty 4 :]]'' ''VideoGame/ModernWarfare'' is the leader of an ultranationalist Russian faction currently involved in a civil war with the ruling government. He commits a huge amount of war crimes, supports MiddleEasternTerrorists in {{Qurac}} to spite the West, and attempts to nuke the United States near the end of the game. Despite all their setbacks in ''Modern Warfare'', including Zakahev himself and his bodyguard unit all getting killed by the SAS, [[TheBadGuyWins the faction he founded ends up victorious and ruling Russia by the sequel]]. Oddly enough, despite being termed an ultranationalist, Zakhaev is not an ethnic Russian, going by his name.
93	*** As Imran Zakhaev sounds very much like a Chechen name, this might actually be a case of [[ShownTheirWork having done the research]] on Infinity Ward's part, coupled with NoCelebritiesWereHarmed, as a fictional counterpart to Ramzan Kadyrov, the Chechen dictator and former rebel having turned Russian loyalist. It may also be a reference to Vladislav Surkov, allegedly born Aslambek Dudaev, a half-Chechen, half-Russian close confidant of Putin and long-serving key member of the administration who is, in the West, often seen as a sort of [[TheManBehindTheMan grey eminence]] in the Kremlin, responsible for much of the (not "ultra", but fairly nationalist) ideology of the RealLife United Russia party. (It should be noted here that while there certainly are ethnic nationalists and white supremacists in Russia, due to it's nature as a multiethnic state, there is also a peculiar brand of "civic" patriotism/nationalism focused on being a Russian citizen, whatever the ethnicity, so it's not all that surprising.) Then again, it may just be a coincidence.
94	** In [[VideoGame/CallOfDutyModernWarfare2 the second]] and [[VideoGame/CallOfDutyModernWarfare3 the third]] games, we have Vladimir Makarov, one of Zakhaev's proteges. Interestingly, he is a renegade to the very government that Zakhaev fought to instate because they couldn't handle his radical ideals (which, ironically, is what their martyr fought for). He starts out as a small time terrorist with a few hundred goons who provokes a U.S.-Russian war by massacring hundreds of Russians at an air port and framing the CIA for it. By the third game he's somehow in de facto control of much of the Russian military after pulling off a coup against the president and massacring his cabinet.
95	** ''VideoGame/CallofDutyBlackOps'' has Nikita Dragovich planning to disperse lethal biological agents in major U.S. cities in a plot that is hinted to be running without anyone in the Kremlin either approving or knowing the full details. Much like Volgin's case below, this is an example that takes place when the Soviet Union is still around.
96	** In ''VideoGame/CallOfDutyBlackOpsII'', one of Raúl Menendez's key allies is Tian Zhao, head of the Strategic Defense Coalition's armed forces (who, coincidentally, turns out to have fought in Afghanistan alongside Alex Mason against Dragovich's erstwhile lackey, Lev Kravchenko). He's also in charge of China's military, but the Chinese government has zero control over him, to the point that they send an assassination request to the U.S. Carry it out, and the Chinese premier will thank the American president personally.
97	** ''VideoGame/CallOfDutyModernWarfare2019'' has General Barkov, who the developers describe as "a rogue general that has the correct intentions but has gone off the rails in his effort to get what he wants."
98	* And again, the [[RuleOfThree also-similarly-named]] Zaitsev in ''VideoGame/{{Vanquish}}'', who initiated a coup in Russia with his [[MechaMooks robot army]].
99	* General Alexei Vasilievich Guba from the ''VideoGame/OperationFlashpoint'' series, particularly the first installment, ''Cold War Crisis''. The year is 1985, and Guba and his loyalist troops have launched an unauthorized invasion on a certain backwoods island chain sandwiched between NATO and Warsav Pact territory. They have 2 stolen nuclear SCUD launchers and intend to provoke WorldWarIII between the East and West Bloc (because Guba is deeply disgusted by Gorbachov's perestroika and the decline of the economic and military might of the USSR).
100	* ''VideoGame/MetalGear'':
101	** Sergei and his daughter in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid2SonsOfLiberty'' seek to make Russia a superpower once again, while Ocelot just [[ChronicBackstabbingDisorder pretends to be affiliated with them]]. Though he does seem pretty disgusted with the state of post-Soviet Russia.
102	--->'''Ocelot:''' 20th century Russia had its share of problems, but at least they had an ideology. Russia today has ''nothing''!\
103	'''Snake:''' They're struggling between freedom and order, and a new spirit of nationalism has been born.
104	** Colonel Volgin in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3SnakeEater'', an interesting example as the Soviet Union is still around during ''[=MGS3=]''.
105	** Subverted with the Soviet personnel in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolidPortableOps'': They were doing exactly what the Soviet government told them to do on the San Hieronymo Peninsula (build a missile base), and carried on with the top-secret mission while suffering all the while specifically because they thought doing the mission under the Soviet government would greatly benefit Russia. However, when Detente came, and the Soviet Union experienced a policy shift, the Soviet government screwed them over, cancelling all shipments and cutting all communications with them, not even allowing them to come home specifically because they wanted to make it seem as though the Soviet soldiers were of this trope in case the missile base was ever discovered. Suffice to say, the soldiers weren't pleased at this development.
106	* In ''VideoGame/SplinterCell1'', [[spoiler:General Kong Feirong]] and his faction of the [[spoiler:[[UsefulNotes/ChineseWithChopperSupport PLA]]]] provide another [[spoiler:Chinese]] example. ''VideoGame/SplinterCellChaosTheory'' gives us [[spoiler:a ''Japanese'' example in the form of Admiral Otomo and his ISDF faction]].
107	* ''VideoGame/GoldenEyeWii'' upgraded its Renegade Russians to [[PragmaticAdaptation accommodate advancing the story to 2010.]] General Ourumov became an under-the-table arms dealer out of jealousy toward rich, post-Soviet era oligarchs, while Xenia Onatopp is a veteran of the 2008 South Ossetia War who left the Russian army and went mercenary.
108	* OlderThanTheyThink trope as far as video game plots go, actually, particularly for Mil Sims. "Red" Russian forces bent on restoring the old Soviet system by taking control of nuclear arms and facilities in Murmansk and the Kola Peninsula have served as the plots for the original ''VideoGame/GhostRecon'' game and the study combat flight sim Jane's F/A-18. Both games predate ''VideoGame/ModernWarfare'' by seven years.
109	* [[AcePilot Colonel Markov]], General Stanisgeslov, and [[spoiler:Major Illich]] from ''VideoGame/AceCombatAssaultHorizon'', whose coup forces against the Russian government of 2016 are called the New Russian Federation (NRF).
110	* Red Ivan from ''Videogame/EvilGenius'' is an ex-Soviet commando who was exiled to a gulag for having a sadistic streak that [[EvenEvilHasStandards even his old Soviet taskmasters found distasteful]]. Being betrayed left him disillusioned with Communism, but he also retains his hatred of western politics, making him the perfect tool for an Evil Genius out to cause global chaos. In [[Videogame/EvilGenius2 the sequel]], Ivan has now moved on to be a supervillain in his own right of TheGeneralissimo variety and now seeks to conquer the world for himself.
111	* Modern military shooter spoof and ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' mod ''VideoGame/CallOfDooty'' parodies this. The player is clearly just fighting the same zombies, imps and demons from the core game, but the map designer just slapped a few hammer-and-sickles on the maps, while every character swears up and down that they're actually fighting Russians (on Phobos.)
112	* ''VideoGame/Metro2033'': being set in a post-apocalyptic Moscow Metro, this was kind of inevitable. In the first game, you fight both the communist Red Line and the Russian Neo-Nazis of the Fourth Reich in order to reach your destination, and unaligned bandits on other occasions. In the second game, the Red Line are the main antagonists. To be fair, though, it's not like the Red Line have a monopoly on the ex-Soviet angle--it's heavily implied that Miller, the commanding officer of the much more heroic Rangers of the Order, formerly served in the ''real'' Red Army before the atomic hellfires forced the citizens of Moscow underground and wishes to recolonize the irradiated surface and restore Russia's glory, but knows that the dictatorships sought by the Red Line and the Fourth Reich aren't the way to achieve that.
113	* ''VideoGame/IronMan3TheOfficialGame'': The Crimson Dynamo is a former Russian soldier who resented how his country eventually became corrupted by the capitalist ideals of the West. After stealing a prototype armoured suit from the government, the Crimson Dynamo joined forces with A.I.M. in the hopes of using their resources to help take over Russia and restore its former glory.
114	[[/folder]]
115
116	[[folder:Web Original]]
117	* ''Literature/{{Sapphire}}'': Boris Rubanenko. Officially, he pledges allegiance to the Soviet Union. [[spoiler:However, in Episode I, he plans to nuke the West AND East indiscriminately, so that both sides will be weak enough for a Psychic takeover.]]
118	** [[spoiler:Not to mention trying to start ''another'' war between North Korea and Japan in Episode II, plus whatever he has up his sleeve for Episode III...]]
119	[[/folder]]
120
121	[[folder:Western Animation]]
122	* Crimson Dynamo in season 2 of ''WesternAnimation/IronManTheAnimatedSeries'' is this, wanting to crush Iron Man and Tony Stark while also bringing back the USSR. He gets hired at one point by a group of these guys to help them [[spoiler:and ends up causing a nuke to go off, killing himself and poisoning the entire area with radiation, which Iron Man gets blamed for. [[FromBadToWorse Then Tony discovers his technology inside the Dynamo's fried armor]]...]]
123	[[/folder]]
124
125	[[folder:Real Life]]
126	* The group of military officers and KGB leaders who tried to depose Gorbachev in 1991.
127	* The second-latest addition to Russia's terror blacklist (February 2015) is a "People's militia named after Minin and Pozharskiy". Naming itself after the founders of an actual mass rebellion against foreign intervention in the early 1610s, it intended to combat the "Western invasion" and "corrupt and traitorous elites", including UsefulNotes/VladimirPutin himself, apparently. Based on the court charges filed against individual members in 2011-2012, a group spearheaded by GRU and paratroop veterans planned to stage an armed insurrection in Yekaterinburg and Kovrov, sabotaging most of the civic infrastructure with the small strike groups they'd formed, while also gunning down any rabbi they could get in range of.
128	* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yevgeny_Prigozhin Yevgeny Prigozhin]], the head of the infamous Wagner PrivateMilitaryCompany briefly became this when he lanched an abortive coup attempt against the Russian Ministry of Defence in June 2023. Prior to then, Prigozhin was known for having furthered the Kremlin's interests across Africa, in Syria and in eastern Ukraine. When the Russo-Ukrainian war broke out, Prigozhin's forces were at the forefront and became the only pro-Russian forces in the country operating with any semblance of effectiveness after the rest of the Russian military got bogged down. This led Prigozhin to brand nearly the entire Russian military brass as [[GeneralFailure General Failures]], launching a months-long, drawn-out and very public spat with them. Accusing Defence Minister Shoigu and Chief of Staff Gerasimov of driving Russia to a total military defeat in Ukraine (and suggesting that this, in turn, would lead to wholesale collapse of Russia), Prigozhin mobilised his forces to Moscow in a bid to remove them. However, his forces stood down shortly afterwards, and [[ShaggyDogStory Prigozhin himself was killed]] in a suspected assassination two months later. Obituaries posted after his death highlight the difficulty Russians had in canonising him, praising his "patriotic" actions while contending with the fact that he brought Russia closer to a civil war than any other figure in recent history.
129	[[/folder]]

Context Main / RenegadeRussian