His name is Alexander Dvornikov and according to the BBC he is Russia’s new military commander in Ukraine. He commands the “special operation” launched by Vladimir Putin on February 24. A Western official confirmed to British media that Russia has reorganized command of the operation, handing it over to General Dvornikov, who has extensive experience in Syria. And that’s because coordination between commands was poor and Russian forces weren’t trained for what they found on the ground. A thesis confirmed by Serghey Markov, a former advisor to the tsar, who stated in an interview with Repubblica that Russia expects a different reception than the Ukrainians and believes that Kiev’s military will soon desert.
A general who was in Syria
General Dvornikov has extensive experience with Russian military operations in Syria. And he’s also been put in charge of special operations in anticipation of May 9, or the day that’s a national holiday in Russia, which may be the right day to announce victory. “There is a delta between the military logic preparing a massive offensive in Donbass and the politics asking whether operations should continue or not,” the BBC official explained. Russia currently has nearly a hundred operational battalion combat groups. This is the sizable force that Russia is stationing in Ukraine. Which, according to the United States, is 85% of the force due to the huge casualties on the ground.
Meanwhile, British military intelligence claims that Russian military operations in Ukraine “remain focused on the Donbass region, Mariupol and Mykolaiv, backed by continuous launches of cruise missiles by naval forces”; and “Russian air activity is expected to increase in the south and east of the country in support of this activity.” The intelligence services also say that the Russian military continues to target Ukrainian civilians. While Ukrainian forces prevented the Russians from creating a corridor between Mariupol and Crimea.
