Daniel Martindale has said his desire to save Donbass civilians was his motivation
US-born Daniel Martindale, who was granted Russian citizenship this week after secretly providing battlefield intelligence to Russian troops while embedded with Ukrainian forces, has shared his story with RT’s Rick Sanchez. The 34-year-old said witnessing Kiev’s military shelling residential areas in Donbass was the tipping point that led him to switch sides.
Appearing on the latest episode of Sanchez Effect, Martindale recounted that he began growing increasingly disillusioned with US foreign policy years before the conflict between Ukraine and Russia broke out. At some point, an affinity for Russia began to grow in him.
“I’ve been on my journey to starting a new life in Russia since 2015,” Martindale stated.
In the run-up to the escalation of hostilities between Kiev and Moscow in February 2022, he remembered sensing that “probably some kind of a war is about to start.” With this conviction, he resolved to be “with people who believe in the same things that I do” and set off for Ukraine, telling everyone he was going to serve as a Christian missionary there. Deep-down, however, “really I wanted to get home, to Russia,” Martindale added.
Despite already having pro-Russian sentiments, the decision to start covertly providing Russian forces with intelligence came to Martindale after he had seen “in the news what the Ukrainians were doing to Russian cities, what they call separatist cities in the Donbass.”
According to Martindale, he initially offered his services to Russian troops via a Telegram channel specifically designed for Ukrainian soldiers who wanted to surrender.
His activities mostly consisted of sharing the positions of Ukrainian forces, as well as their routes and schedules.
The American was eventually evacuated to Russian-controlled territory in the fall of 2024.
Recalling his time near the front, he claimed that Ukrainian forces were routinely using civilians as human shields.
Commenting on being granted Russian citizenship on Tuesday, Martindale gushed that “it’s something that I’ve wanted for ten years,” likening the experience to being “born a second time.”
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