Muscovite musical chairs. On Wednesday, the Russian Defense Minister announced that he had once again replaced the commander-in-chief of its offensive in Ukraine by appointing General Valeri Guerassimov, chief of the Defense Staff, to this post.
Barely three months later, he thus took the place of Sergueï Surovikin, although reputedly implacable, who had been appointed to restore the situation of the Russian army that was suffering major setbacks, including the loss of Kherson. The one who was nicknamed “General Armageddon” was thus demoted as Guerassimov’s deputy.
“The increase in the command level 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,” the ministry justified. .
rich military career
The Western public knew Valéri Guerassimov from the first days of the invasion of Ukraine, in February 2022. With a placid face and military uniform covered with decorations, he faced Vladimir on February 27 with the Minister of the Armies Sergei Shoigu. Putin when the Russian president gave his war orders. Since then, the image has remained famous for the doubtful expression of the two interlocutors.
Now 67, the Kazan native is at the head of an impressive career and the fruit of a Soviet-style meritocracy. Coming from a modest background in Tatarstan, he graduated from the main military schools in the USSR, then Russia, including the military academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces in 1997.
Very quickly, Gerasimov finds himself on the front lines during the second Chechen war during which he leads the 58th army. During this conflict, he gained some notoriety outside of the “Budanov affair,” named after a Russian soldier guilty of brutalizing and murdering a young Chechen woman whom he had arrested and convicted.
In 2012, he was appointed Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and Deputy Minister of Defense of Russia by Vladimir Putin himself.
“The Balance of Power, The Real”
On the front, Guerassimov’s military career continued in Syria, but also in Crimea and Donbass in 2014, where he already participated in the seizure of these two Ukrainian territories. As such, the EU and the Ukrainian security service have issued an arrest warrant for him.
It was also during this period that the chief of the Russian General Staff gained notoriety on the international scene, particularly through his tough encounters with his counterparts.
On BFMTV, General Pierre de Villiers, himself Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces between 2014 and 2017, recounts his memories of meetings with Valéri Guerassimov, his counterpart at the time.
“What I noticed was that he only recognized one thing, the balance of power. Not the language element, not the burst of voice, the balance of power, the real one,” she recalls.
In the course of the meetings, General De Villiers was also able to notice a soldier slipping into fallacious arguments to justify his presence in the Ukraine. “He constantly spoke to me about NATO, about the threat of the West against Russia with an aggressiveness that I did not admit,” he adds.
The “Gerasimov Doctrine”
Although the authorship is disputed, Valery Gerasimov is also credited with being the father of what the Foundation for Strategic Research calls “new generation warfare”, or simply the “Gerasimov doctrine”.
In fact, this hybrid war consists of combining the military aspect with other methods, including disinformation, even in peacetime. This disinformation passed through official Kremlin channels, some of which, like RT or Sputnik, were broadcast in France and Europe before they were banned in light of the Ukrainian conflict. A strategy implemented, particularly in Africa through the Wagner group.
For the rest of the war, Guerassimov will also have to deal with the paramilitary group led by the sulphurous Evgeni Prigojine, which is gaining more and more importance in the Russian army and which even intends to trap eastern Ukraine on its behalf, including the Welding city.
Source: BFM TV
