Spetsnaz GRU was an elite military formation under the control of the military intelligence service GRU. It was the first Soviet/Russian spetsnaz (special forces) force, more than two decades older than its KGB/FSB and MVD counterparts. The full acronym is GRU GSh (Russian: ="ru" xml:lang="ru" >ГРУ ГШ) or Glavnoye Razvedyvatel'noye Upravleniye Generalnovo Shtaba (Russian: ="ru" xml:lang="ru" >Главное Разведывательное Управление Генерального Штаба) meaning Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff (of the Russian Federation). The acronym, however, is usually shortened to just GRU (Russian: ="ru" xml:lang="ru" >ГРУ) which stands for Glavnoye Razvedyvatel'noye Upravleniye (Russian: ="ru" xml:lang="ru" >Главное Разведывательное Управление) (). The word "Spetsnaz" is often written in a