You write nation state but link to an article about a Russian. Outside of the United States[1], ‘nation state’ is not synonymous with ‘country’ (for example Russia and Iran, two commonly mentioned adversaries, are multiethnic states rather than nation states).

If you don’t want to write ‘country’ because it isn’t fancy enough, you can say ‘state level actor’ or ‘government actor’.

I realise this is a stupid nitpick but this is a hill I am willing to die on.

[1] lots of people in the national security sphere in the US like to use the term ‘nation state’ but they also use lots of stupid terms that don’t seem so much into everyday language. I do notice some media outlets or government sources outside of the US using alternative terms like the ones suggested above.