Daryl Fladung wore an Akubra-style hat, a banana-patterned shirt and a broad grin in a picture posted in April at a Moscow airport.
The 38-year-old security guard had left Queensland to join the Russian army in its invasion of Ukraine, despite having no military experience or known family ties to eastern Europe.
He entered into a contract with Russia before undergoing basic combat training with other foreign mercenaries.
But within days of posting about being sent to the front line, unconfirmed reports started spreading online that Daryl “Dundee” Fladung had been killed by a drone strike.
His mother has not heard from her son since late June.
“I think he’s an idiot for doing it. But there’s nothing I can do about it,” she told ABC Investigations.
“I just want to know if my son’s alive.”
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) would not confirm if it had any information about Mr Fladung’s disappearance.
He is the first Australian known to have joined the Russian army since the full-scale invasion in 2022.
ABC Investigations has uncovered details of how the Queenslander got involved with a recruitment network luring mercenaries from the UK, US, and Europe on ideological grounds.
This is how a security guard playing video games in his mother’s outback home ended up on the battlefield.
From the outback to the Russian armed forces
The night before Daryl Fladung left Australia for the final time, his mother says she talked with her only child for three hours about his “stupid” decision to join the Russian army.
“To be honest, I didn’t think he would go through with it,” she said.
“I said, anything is better than that. He didn’t listen.”
Daryl’s mother agreed to speak to the ABC on condition of anonymity.
“Part of me is scared. I mean they’re going to call him a traitor and all this stuff, so what do they do to a family who has a traitor?”
Mr Fladung worked for 10 years as a security officer in shopping centres, bars and clubs, and on night-time mobile patrols.
His mother says he was diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder and could become “fixated on certain things”. He’d been living with her rent-free in a rural town west of Brisbane because he was depressed, withdrawn and “in debt up to his eyeballs”.
She believes he met a man online playing “live-action war games”, who convinced him to fight for Russia as a solution to his problems.
“He was just a desperate guy trying to get some money,” she said.
“They got him at the right time when he was weak and vulnerable. They said everything magical, and it worked.”
She doesn’t know who her son was speaking to, but ABC Investigations can reveal that in April Mr Fladung took a one-way ticket to Moscow.
He was met at the airport by two Putin-supporting British nationals, Ben Stimson and Bradley Townsend.
Daryl Fladung (right) with Ben Stimson (left) and Bradley Townsend (centre) on his arrival in Moscow. (Telegram: Ben Stimson)
Mr Townsend, 33, was reportedly killed by a drone in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region only 10 days before Mr Fladung disappeared.
A photo of the trio taken at the airport was posted to more than 1,170 subscribers on Stimson’s Telegram channel.
“Meet Daryl our latest volunteer from Australia. Thats [sic] a proper Aussie hat there bro. Stay safe guys,” Stimson’s post read.
Ukrainian authorities allege Stimson plays a key role in an English-speaking recruitment network that lures and trains foreign fighters for Russia.
He has been involved in the war since 2015, when he joined pro-Russian rebels. After serving a prison sentence in the UK for terror offences, he reportedly received Russian citizenship this year and is a member of Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party.
In late April, Ben Stimson posted this photo of Daryl Fladung (bottom right) and Bradley Townsend (top left) with a group of “other international volunteers from Latin America and Europe”. (Telegram: Ben Stimson)
Stimson told ABC Investigations he spoke online with Mr Fladung for months.
“Daryl used to follow my [YouTube and Telegram] channels,” Stimson said.
“Then he said he was coming over, and a lot of the times when Westerners say they’re coming over, it’s bravado.
“I said, ‘Well this is what you can expect, you don’t know where you’re going to end up, it’s where your commander sends you. And if you’re coming over, can you bring me some Vegemite because I’m running low on Marmite.'”
Despite previous media reports that Stimson acknowledged helping at least 10 foreign fighters join the war, he denies luring Mr Fladung to Russia.
He told the ABC the reason he greeted the Australian at the airport was to pick up two jars of Vegemite, before then introducing him to a recruiter.
Ben Stimson said he asked Daryl Fladung to bring him Vegemite as he was running low on Marmite. (Telegram: Ben Stimson)
“People contact me and I tell them exactly what to expect. If they still come, that’s up to them,” he said.
“I introduced him [Fladung] to the recruiter at the airport who worked for a Moscow recruitment, a military recruitment thing.
“That was it. I’m not a recruiter.”
He says Mr Fladung signed a contract along with Mr Townsend. But Stimson says he takes no responsibility for what happened next.
Injured and unprepared, Australian was sent into ‘drone-infested’ battlefield
More than 3,500 foreign fighters from more than 40 countries have died fighting for Russia in the Ukraine war, a BBC investigation found this year.
Daryl Fladung’s recruitment appears to mirror that of several other foreigners who shared their journeys online.
After arriving in Moscow, the Queenslander started a public Telegram account under the username “Daryl Fladung (Dundee)” and uploaded what appeared to be a photo of himself wearing camouflage and holding an assault rifle at a training camp.
Daryl Fladung posted this photo to his Telegram channel in April. (Telegram: Daryl Fladung)
He also shared a link to a podcast interview he’d done with a former British soldier turned Russian marine, Mike Jones, who actively promotes a pro-Russia website offering monthly salaries, signing bonuses and citizenship to foreign recruits.
In the video titled “Fed Up with the West!”, Mr Fladung complains of Australia’s youth crime, homelessness and “out of control” tent cities.
“I feel that I have more in common value-wise with Russia than I do with anywhere in the West,” he said.
Daryl Fladung was interviewed for a pro-Russia podcast within days of arriving in Moscow in April. (Telegram: ForeignAgentIntel)
Mr Jones told the ABC Mr Fladung gave him the contact details of his Russian girlfriend, called Marina, “just in case”.
When ABC Investigations spoke to Marina, she claimed they matched on an international marriage dating site six months ago but never ended up meeting in person.
“Daryl called me his future wife. But he disappointed me with his actions,” she said.
His mother says Mr Fladung thought he could leave the Russian army at any point if he changed his mind.
“I did notice in some of the pictures he sent that there was always an armed guard with him, so he wasn’t free once he got there,” she said.
“I don’t think he really realised what he was doing or what he got himself into.”
A Russian army document seen by the ABC shows Mr Fladung signed up on April 29.
Daryl Fladung’s military contract with the Russian Federation. (Supplied)
A month later, he posted to his Telegram account about injuring his left knee and heel during combat training.
After spending 10 days in the medical bunkhouse, he revealed he was being sent into combat without any more training.
“I have been told im [sic] going to frontline storm tomorrow night or the day after,” he said on June 10.
“What total bullshit.
“Still unable to run and unable to full [sic] recover and only at 70% at best.”
A week later came an update from what appeared to be a battlefield.
“My knees need a MRI and CT scan but I will still been [sic] sent out of [sic] foot anyway, still can’t run or sprint and that makes crossing fields a game of chance and luck,” he wrote.
“Tomorrow is another 5km hike through rough terrain and Drone infested open spaces, I pray get though [sic] it safely.”
His final public post appeared the following day on June 20.
“My physical condition has dropped alot [sic] due to no sleep and no medical, lack of food and now I can only do a snail pace…
“I will be lucky if I dont [sic] collapse within the 1st few kms of walking.
“The pain though [sic] the roof, my moral [sic] dropping faster then [sic] any bomb.
“I can only hope and pray I survive long enough to get sent to a hospital.”
His account has been inactive ever since.
Daryl Fladung has not posted to his public Telegram account since June 20. (Telegram: Daryl Fladung)
For five months now, his mother has been scouring social media for any information about her only child.
“Is there any proof Daryl (Dundee) from Australia being dead,” she posted on his account last month.
“Or is he MIA.”
A user who responded, “he is dead”, previously posted that a “friend” in the same unit had claimed Mr Fladung was struck and killed by a First-Person View (FPV) drone.
The ABC has been unable to independently verify this claim.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry and its embassy in Australia, and Ukraine’s ministry of defence, did not respond to questions about Mr Fladung’s disappearance.
A DFAT spokesperson said the government advised Australians not to travel to Ukraine or Russia because of the war.
Recently, Mr Fladung’s mother left a public comment under a video posted the day before he vanished.
It reads, “I love you my son.”
Source: www.abc.net.au
