As fighting rages in eastern Ukraine, in Bakhmout and Soledar, where “the bloodiest scenario of this war” is unfolding according to the Ukrainian presidency, Moscow reorganizes the high command of its troops . On Wednesday January 11, the Russian Ministry of Defense thus announced, in a press release, the appointment of General Valéri Guerassimov, current Chief of Staff of the Russian armies, in charge of the “special military operation” in Ukraine. He replaces Sergueï Sourovikine, who will have directed the operations for barely three months.
“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 carried out, to the need for closer interaction between the components of the armed forces”, specified the ministry. He also specifies that Valéri Guerassimov will have Generals Sergei Surovikin, Oleg Salioukov and Alexei Kim as assistants.
In Russia, Valéri Guerasimov, 67, is a very well-known figure. “He is a pure soldier, notes General Jérôme Pellistrandi contacted by The Express. His whole career was spent in the army. He is rooted in the Soviet-Russian tradition”. As Chief of the Defense Staff, he is also the highest military officer in the country. “He is the one who implements Russia’s military strategy for years”, also underlines General Dominique Trinquand, military expert and former head of the French mission to the UN. “He is a faithful of Vladimir Putin and of his Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu”. Nicknamed “the iron man”, he took over from General Sourovikine, baptized “General Armageddon”.
“In Russia, we even talk about Gerasimov Doctrinethat is to say if he is important”, adds General Dominique Trinquand. He also had many diplomatic relations with Westerners. “He is a man of action and reflection, which is not often the case with the Russian military”, observes General Jérôme Pellistrandi. He is also known for having led the victorious operations in Syria, Chechnya and Crimea. It was he who was in particular at the operational head of the “little green men “, these masked soldiers dressed in green who appeared during the war in 2014.
According to several Russian analysts, this appointment is not a promotion for Valéri Guerassimov, it would on the contrary be a poisoned gift. “He already had the highest position in the Russian army, his appointment shows that there are major difficulties in the direction of this operation”, notes Dominique Trinquand. While Jérôme Pellistrandi, for his part, believes that he is now on the front line. “From now on, he will have to get directly involved in the design and conduct of operations”.
Appointed in September, Sergueï Sourovikine has been the architect of Ukraine’s shelling strategy since the beginning of winter, and in particular energy infrastructure. “This strategy is reaching its limits,” said General Dominique Trinquand. “Today, the Russians launch 2 or 3 missiles a day. It seems like a lot because they send them in salvos, but in reality it is not. It shows above all that their stocks are decreasing”. An observation shared by General Pellistrandi. “The Russians, even with Surovikin’s harsh strategy, have not yet managed to find the right tactic to regain the upper hand. They chain failures and are overwhelmed by the agility of the Ukrainians”.
Moreover, according to the pro-Russian military news channel Rybar, Sergei Surovikin has a “questionable” record: the withdrawal from Kherson, bombardments on the Ukrainian energy sector “which did not lead to its collapse”, but also “the tragedy” of the strike on Makiïvka which caused the death of at least 89 Russian soldiers as well as many problems related to the mobilization of Russian reservists.
Dominique Trinquand and Jérôme Pellistrandi also agree that Sergueï Sourovikine surely pays for his close ties with Evgueni Prigojine, boss of the Russian Wagner militia, which for several weeks has been competing with the Russian army on the ground. “In eastern Ukraine, when Wagner announces that he has taken the town of Soledar, the Kremlin is displeased because the militia is showing that it is doing better than the Russian army, explains Dominique Trinquand. However, Surovikin has given credit to Wagner’s fights in Bakhmout and Soledar from the start, which tends to annoy the highest authorities in Moscow.”
Several Experts viewed by The New York Times recall that Surovikin was “a respected commander within the Russian army”, while Guerassimov is an “apparatchik”, considered “one of the architects of the invasion, and in particular of the failure of the plan to make fall kyiv from the first days of the war”.
Since February 2022, Vladimir Putin has often changed commanders for operations in Ukraine. And for many observers, including General Jérôme Pellistrandi, “this umpteenth waltz of appointments reflects a bankruptcy of the Russian command”. Political analyst Dimitri Trenin, interviewed by Al Jazeera, believes for its part that the Kremlin wanted to “streamline the chain of command of the operation in Ukraine”, while the conflict is entering another phase. “War is getting more intense, it’s getting more dangerous, and I think that’s beyond the level of a field general,” he adds.
Faced with a dispersion of the command of operations on the ground, this appointment of Valéri Guerassimov as “commander of the combined group of troops” therefore suggests that there is only one principal. “The fact that Guerasimov, close to Putin and to his Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu, is appointed to this post is a resumption in hand of the organization of the troops around a single authority, whereas until now we had a form of dispersal of responsibilities, synonymous with fragility”, says Jérôme Pellistrandi. With each failure cashed by the Russian troops, the Kremlin changes its command. “As soon as things don’t go well, we reorganize the generals thinking that it will go better, which is not necessarily true”, points out Dominique Trinquand. “But ultimately, it shows that it’s still Putin who makes the decisions. Which confirms, once again, that it’s a very autocratic logic,” he concludes.
In a publication on Wednesday, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a US-based body, believes that “Guerasimov’s appointment is likely to support a decisive Russian military effort in 2023, likely under the form of a resumption of Russian offensive operations”.
