[xetplan]

Even if you do this, a state backed intelligence agency is going to eventually find you if they keep trying.

The idea "the west" can protect any single person from a state backed intelligence agency set on eliminating that person is totally delusional.

I would question what is going on in a person's head to believe this is even possible. Maybe if we incarcerated the individual under a fake name then put that individual in solitary confinement for life, this would work!

[A_D_E_P_T]

Oh, I'm not so sure. Check out the Japanese guy at the link I posted. The Japanese equivalent of the FBI were searching for him like crazy -- his "Wanted" poster was seriously in every subway station across the nation -- and he managed to get away with it. Many such cases. There are lots of wanted men on the Interpol red list, and "state backed intelligence agencies" are actively searching for many of them. Some of them have been on the list for many years.

Intel agencies aren't magic, and they're not omniscient. If you're careful, the best tool they have is facial recognition, like Clearview, but that has yet to reach its full dystopian potential.

In OP, you've got a famous Russian defector who retired to a Russian resort town on the Spanish coast. A very boneheaded move, that; ofc he was going to get caught.

[mdhb]

Strong disagree on this one, despite their best efforts to seem otherwise the intel folks aren’t magic and they have very real limitations in terms of how many resources they can throw into something like this. Not everyone is going to get the bin laden treatment.

But they have lots of experience in managing defectors as well, it’s almost always a case of poor adherence to security procedures that exposes people because as the person in hiding you actually have the much stronger hand not the people looking for you.

There’s a long history of people successfully doing this with little to no help in groups such as the IRA for example but when you have a government who will actively support you with things like documents, money, housing and training… your chances are actually very good that you will die of natural causes.