Brittany Griner was released from Russian custody on December 8th, 2022. US diplomats came to an agreement with Russian officials in an even one-for-one prisoner exchange. Griner was swapped for a man named Viktor Bout.
Background on Brittany Griner:
Griner, in order to make extra money during her off-season, played in out-of-country basketball league. In the time before she was arrested, she played in a Russian basketball league for the UMMC Ekaterinburg.
It appears that she was detained on February 17th on drug smuggling and possession charges at an airport north of Moscow. She was accused of possessing vape cartridges containing hashish [here is a good link for learning more about the differences between “traditional marijuana” or “weed”, and “hashish”] while traveling through the Sheremetyevo Airport.
Culturally, it is important to note that Russia is notorious for having severe drug laws. This is most likely why she was sentenced to nine years in prison. It is not clear whether Griner was warned of the severity of drug laws in Russia prior to residing in the country. However, it absolutely should have been made clear to her that the possession of drugs in Russia can and have been charged harshly in the past [drug conviction rates reaching around 99%].
It is also important to note that Griner has maintained that she is innocent of the charges and said that she does not know how the hashish made its way into her luggage.
Either she is lying and she knowingly brought illegal substances into Russia.
Or Griner possessed a vape contained in her luggage, and the Russia government arrested her unlawfully in order to frame her for a crime she never committed.
Both are plausible.
Very likely, the answer is a combination of both. Two things can be true at once. Griner either possessed some sort of drugs that she was using recreationally/medicinally or she possessed something that could be construed as “drug paraphernalia” in her luggage.
Honestly, it doesn’t matter.
The timing matters.
Griner was arrested shortly after the invasion of Ukraine and not long after the US [as well as many European allies] sent billions of dollars of aid to Ukraine to aid in its defense [mostly in weapons and ammunition - more work of the US Congress needs to be done in order to properly track these funds to understand exactly where they are going and who it is going to].
Background on Viktor Bout:
Without making this post a biography of Viktor Bout, here is a quick background on the man that the US just set free and handed over to the Russian government:
Bout is a Soviet era military intelligence officer who went into the aviation transportation business in South Africa after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. His company eventually conducted business all over the globe, which is when it is believed that his transportation of arms began. He has sold weapons supporting civil wars in which mass rape and murder of women and children, as well as the implementation of child soldiers occurred. If you want to get an idea of exactly what Viktor Bout was contributing too, read the book, “A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier”. He aided major civil wars in multiple African countries [DR Congo, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Sudan] as well as the Taliban up until 9/11/2001. For the visually inclined, the movie “Lord of War” is believed to be at least partially based on Viktor Bout’s arms dealings.
Viktor Bout is known colloquially as “the merchant of death” - a nickname created by the US intelligence community. In 2008, Bout was arrested in Bangkok in a sting operation based on the sale of weapons to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia [FARC] in order to target US troops operating in Columbia at the time. In 2012, Bout was sentenced to 25 years in prison for the sale of weapons, conspiring to kill Americans, and money laundering.
My suggestion is, do more research on this guy.
It is important to point out that this man, a well known arms dealer supplying conflicts all over the globe, was released during a time where Europe is on the brink of war with Russia, China is encroaching into the South China Sea and close to invading Taiwan, and Iran is destabilizing once again.
It needs to be clear that releasing a man with the background of Viktor Bout is likely to put Americans in danger, escalate and increase the deadliness of conflicts, not just in Ukraine, but conflicts that have yet to emerge.
The things that Viktor Bout has done and been convicted of does not mean that Brittany Griner should not have been released from custody. An American is still an American and the US government is responsible for doing everything they can in order to ensure the safety of US citizens being held in other countries.
It also does not mean that Viktor Bout is going to dive right back into arms dealing in the same way that he did in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. But, Viktor Bout is back in Russia. Russia is in desperate need of weapons to change the tide of their war in Ukraine, an area of expertise that Viktor Bout knows very well.
What you need to know is that this prisoner transfer has the potential to put American citizens in danger and to provide the violent means for conflicts happening in the world today. It is not for me to decide, but for individuals to judge whether or not it was a good or bad idea to exchange Griner for Bout.
What to look out for this week:
Southeast Asia: China
Chinese riots against “Zero Covid policies”
The lifting of some “Zero Covid Policies”
Eastern Europe: Ukraine
Diplomatic activity between US, France, Turkey, Iran, and Russia
Russia “leveraging civilian harm as a tactic of war”
Western Asia: Iran
Government holds first hanging for protestors involved in recent mass demonstrations