The Daily Beast [Shannon Vavra]
Russia has now lost at least 100 senior officers since it invaded Ukraine earlier this year, according to some tallies. It’s a devastating milestone for Moscow—and just the latest indication that Vladimir Putin’s war effort in Ukraine is wavering.
In the past two days alone, three senior Russian officers were reported dead: Lt. Colonel Nikolay Gorban, a commander from the Foreign Security Service (FSB) special forces; army aviation commander Colonel Vasily Kleshchenko; and Colonel Vitaly Tsikul of Russia’s 90th Tank Division—reportedly the 100th Russian senior officer to die in the war.
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But it’s not just deaths rankling Russia’s forces. Russia has been chipping away at its leadership ranks just by firing them outright, too. General-Colonel Aleksandr Chayko, the former commander of the Eastern Military District, was dismissed in May, according to British intelligence. Russia has likely replaced General-Colonel Aleksandr Zhuravlev with General-Lieutenant Vladimir Kochetkov to head up the Western Military District. General Aleksandr Dvornikov, who was heading up the operation in Ukraine, has also reportedly been dismissed.
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