The Russian invasion of Ukraine has been celebrated with one month of hostilities. Now, the Russophiles have to question if it is going according to plan. However, even if you ignore the propagandism, maps show that the war is real. Two weeks ago, the frontlines remained stable with minor modifications. This can either be due to the Russian operation reaching its culmination point (Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine Reaches Its Culmination Point and Zelensky Plays Hardball in the Peace Negotiations) or because Russia had decided it doesn’t want to move any further and is happy to hold ground and reduce Ukrainian cities to rubble.
It doesn’t matter what your opinion is about the current state of affairs in the military campaign. But it is hard to ignore the fact that there is ferment at the Kremlin. In the past couple of weeks, we’ve had solid but unconfirmed reports that Putin has relieved at least eight general officers of their commands; two senior FSB officers have been arrested, allegedly over the intelligence that supported the operational plan for the Ukraine invasion (see Trouble in Paradise: Putin Arrests Senior FSB Officers Over Ukraine Fiasco); and the deputy director of Rosgvardiya, or Putin’s personal military force, has been arrested (see Top General in Putin’s Personal Army Is Arrested by FSB). These events were reported in Russian media.
We now have additional information. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu is a Putin crony and has not been seen since March 11.
Agentstvo posted a long post to the messaging app reporting that Channel One had aired a story about Shoigu at that awards ceremony on March 18. However, the photo used to illustrate the story allegedly came from a video posted on Russia’s Ministry of Defense website on March 11.
Shoigu was mentioned on the Kremlin’s website on March 18 in a passage about Putin meeting with members of his Security Council to discuss the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. Although Shoigu was believed to have been present, there were no photos or videos of him.
Shoigu, aged 66, has not been reported to be seen with Putin after he met with Valery Gerasimov (Russian president and chief-of-the-general staff) in Moscow on February 27, only days after the Ukraine invasion.
Shoigu’s profile on the Ministry of Defense website has also not been updated since March 11.
Perhaps they were connected, or not. Shoigu, who was accused of massive corruption before the war became bulletproof due to his close relationship with Putin. It is rumored that Shoigu has a “heart condition.”
The Chief for General Staff Valery Georasimov is another face that’s still waiting to get its milk carton. Gerasimov, like Shoigu hasn’t been in the public eye since his meeting with his Turkish counterpart on March 11. Ukrainian media hyped a story that Gerasimov was fired as early as February 25, but that doesn’t seem to be true as images of him in proximity to Putin appeared after those stories.
Shoigu’s and Gerasimov’s disappearances are only data points for the moment. With reasonable explanations, they could reappear at some point in the future. If they were removed, however, this is a completely different story. What we can’t know is the reason for the spate of dismissals, if they are all true. It is clear that someone is making a scapegoat. However, Putin has made it easy to eject the Defense Minister that he had appointed 10 years ago. This is a time when the country is in a war of increasing wastefulness. I believe we need to see beyond incompetence.
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