A top commander has been missing since a mutiny. Another was killed in an airstrike in Ukraine. Another accused his leadership of treason after being fired. And a fourth former commander was shot while jogging in what may have been an organized hit.
Russia’s military ranks have been roiled by instability in the days since a brief mutiny by Wagner mercenaries three weeks ago, as pressures from Moscow’s nearly 17-month war reverberate in entire armed forces.
On Wednesday, the mystery of what happened to Gen. Sergei Surovikin, the country’s former top commander in Ukraine, dubbed “General Armageddon” for his merciless tactics, has not been seen since Wagner’s rebellion.
One of the country’s top lawmakers said, when pressed by a reporter, that the general was “resting.”
“He is not available now,” the lawmaker, Andrei Kartapolov, the head of the defense committee of the Russian Duma, added in a video posted on the Telegram messaging app before rushing off the reporter.
General Surovikin was considered an ally of Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary company, whose forces launched a brief uprising in late June aimed at toppling the Russian military leadership, before rising to a deal with the Kremlin.
The New York Times reported that US officials believed that General Surovikin had advance knowledge of the uprising but did not know whether he participated. In the hours after the rebellion began, Russian authorities quickly released a video of the general calling on Wagner fighters to stand down.
The lawmaker’s cryptic comments about General Surovikin came two days after Russian authorities released the first footage of the country’s top military officer, Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov, since the insurrection.
In the video, General Gerasimov receives a report from the Russian Aerospace Forces, commanded by General Surovikin. But the person who gave the update on the footage was General Surovikin’s deputy, Col. Gen. Viktor Afzalov.
General Surovikin’s location is just one of many mysteries that have emerged since the uprising. Despite an agreement announced by the Kremlin, in which Mr. Prigozhin would leave Russia for Belarus and avoid prosecution, the mercenary tycoon appears to have remained in Russia.
The Kremlin revealed earlier this week that Mr. Prigozhin and his top commanders met with President Vladimir V. Putin five days after the uprising, raising many questions about what kind of treatment was given to the former insurgents. On Wednesday, the Ministry of Defense said that The Russian armed forces collected Wagner’s weapons, ammunition, and military equipment.
The matériel is expected to be returned for further use. So far, the mercenary group has provided thousands of small arms and heavy weapons, the ministry said, including rocket launch and mortar systems, anti-tank guns and multipurpose armored tractors.
Meanwhile, Russia received another blow to its top military ranks. Lt. Gen. Oleg Tsokov, the deputy commander of Russia’s Southern Military District, was killed in Ukraine in a missile strike on Monday night in the occupied city of Berdiansk, one of the highest casualties for Russia during the Ukrainian war. authorities announced.
A Russian lawmaker and retired general, Andrei Gurulyov, confirmed General Tsokov’s death in a state television broadcast on Wednesday, saying he “died heroically.” The death recalled the early days of the war, when Ukrainian officials said they had killed about 12 generals on the front lines.
Mr. Gurulyov also released a recording late Wednesday of the commander of Russia’s 58th Combined Arms Army, Maj. Gen. Ivan Popov, explaining to his troops why he was relieved of command of the unit, fighting on the Ukrainian front near Zaporizhzhia.
General Popov described a “difficult situation with the senior leadership,” which led to him being relieved after he brought up problems on the battlefield, including a lack of counter battery fire and artillery reconnaissance stations, as well as deaths and injuries sustained by the force. from enemy artillery fire.
General Popov appeared to target General Gerasimov without naming him, saying that while Ukrainian forces were unable to penetrate his army unit from the front, “our senior commander hit us from behind, treacherously and violently cut down of the head” the army unit “at the most difficult and tense moment.”
Russian authorities also arrested a Ukrainian man on Wednesday on suspicion of shooting a former Russian submarine commander, Capt. Second Rank Stanislav Rzhitsky, earlier this week in the southern city of Krasnodar, where he serves as deputy director of the city’s mobilization office. .
Russian news outlets reported that Captain Rzhitsky, who publicly posted his running routes on the exercise service Strava, was shot to death while jogging in a Krasnodar park.
On Tuesday, a day after the body was found, Ukrainian military intelligence said on its official Telegram account that Captain Rzhitsky commanded a submarine involved in a missile attack on Ukraine. Friends and relatives, however, told Russian news outlets that he had left active military duty before the February 2022 invasion.
State news agency RIA Novosti, citing an anonymous source in Russian law enforcement, reported that the man arrested on Wednesday admitted under questioning to being recruited by Ukrainian intelligence to carry out the murder.
Captain Rzhitsky’s name has been entered into the online database Myrotvorets, which posts photographs, social media accounts and phone numbers of people considered to have committed crimes against Ukraine.
A red stamp was added to his photo in the database that read, “Liquidated.”
July 12, 2023
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Due to an editing error, an earlier version of this article misstated the rank of a former Russian submarine commander, Stanislav Rzhitsky, who was killed this week. He was a captain second rank in the Russian navy, not a lieutenant general.
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