Nicolas Tonev with AFP
modified to
06:56, January 12, 2023
The Russia on Wednesday again replaced the commander of its offensive in Ukraine by appointing this time General Valéri Guerassimov, the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, announced the Ministry of Defense. In a statement, the ministry said that Valery Gerasimov would become “commander of the combined group of troops” deployed in Ukraine, replacing Sergei Surovikin who will have directed the operations for barely three months.
A heavyweight for bigger missions
“The increase in the level of command of the special operation (in Ukraine) is linked to an expansion of the scope of the missions to be performed, the need to conduct closer interaction between the components of the armed forces”, explained the ministry. He specifies that Valéri Guerassimov will have Generals Sergei Surovikin, Oleg Salioukov and Alexei Kim as assistants.
With his rough face and massive physique, his diplomas from some of the most renowned armored and staff schools in Russia, Valeri Guerassimov, 67, has the reputation of being a soldier through and through. . He is renowned for his successes in using the brute force of artillery to win in Chechnya or Syria, but also for his enforcement of orders.
By his appointment, he could be in charge of a new massive offensive on kyiv, which is much talked about, or of managing the arrival in the conflict of joint Russian-Belarusian units. In any case, this heavyweight of the military system in the field indirectly involves more Vladimir Poutinewho is now in danger of missing a military fuse in the event of failure in the conflict.
Sergei Surovikin ousted since the setback suffered in Kherson
His predecessor, Sergey Surovikin, was appointed in October as commander of troops in Ukraine to redress the situation of the Russian army which was suffering setbacks in the face of Ukrainian offensives in the regions of Kharkiv (northeast) and Kherson (south) . It was Sergei Surovikin in particular who proposed and organized the withdrawal of Russian forces from the city of Kherson in early November, a major setback for the Kremlin.
Since then, the front has generally stabilized, except in the Bakhmout area, in the Donetsk region (east), a city that the Russian army and the paramilitary group Wagner have been trying to conquer for months. Faced with these difficulties on the ground, Vladimir Putin ordered the mobilization of 300,000 reservists and a campaign to bomb Ukrainian energy infrastructure.