Russian President Vladimir Putin has appointed Gen. Sergey Surovikin to lead the country's war efforts in Ukraine amid growing discontent over the invasion of Ukraine.
The Saturday announcement comes after authorities sacked two Russian senior military commanders as Kyiv continued to regain lost territory in the northeast and south of Ukraine. Furthermore, the appointment comes as Moscow has suffered a huge blow after the partial destruction of the Kerch Bridge, which is viewed as a crucial link between Russia and Crimea.
Russia's New War Commanded
Surovikin was born in 1966 in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk and was previously appointed as the head of Russia's southern military grouping in its war on Ukraine in June. He also received the title of Hero of Russia and was awarded a medal for his exceptional service in Syria in 2017.
At the time, he led the Russian military expedition as commander of the Aerospace Forces of the country. Surovikin is known as a "ruthless" official in the Russian military, based on a report by the Jamestown Foundation, a United States defense policy think-tank, as per Aljazeera.
The report noted that the Russian general made a stellar career in the top echelons of the General Staff and defense ministry after the radical military reform in 2008. It added that Surovikin's "readiness to vigorously execute any orders" trounced any potential questions about his experiences.
However, the general has already been jailed two times, the first was for six months after soldiers under his command killed three demonstrators in Moscow during a coup in August 1991. Surovikin was later released without a trial and four years later, he received a sentence, which was overturned, for alleged illegal arms trade.
According to CNBC, Surovikin's new role will involve galvanizing Russian military troops after a series of setbacks, including heavy losses of both troops and equipment and the forfeiture of square miles of occupied territory in Ukraine.
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'Ruthless' Sergey Surovikin
Furthermore, the appointment of the general follows Putin's plans to conscript hundreds of thousands of Russian men to fight in the war. The Russian president's order for approximately 300,000 citizens is the first time since World War II that Moscow has drafted civilians into the military.
The Kremlin's decision to impose a partial draft was made in part due to the series of surprising Ukrainian advances in recent weeks. President Putin declared last week that four Ukrainian regions now belonged to Russia, citing referendums, widely viewed as rigged and illegal by Western governments, held in Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine.
On Sept. 30, Putin said that the results were well known, adding that Russia had four new regions, Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson. Following the annexations, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that he will submit an "accelerated" application for Ukraine to join the NATO military alliance.
Prior to Surovikin being announced as the leader of Russian troops in the war, Gen. Aleksandr Dvornikov was appointed overall commander of Russian forces in Ukraine in April, based on Western officials and other sources. However, the latest announcement and change of roles did not mention Dvornikov, Radio Free Europe reported.
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