Unexplained fuel shortage in #Luhansk #LNR #LPR region including cities near the Russian border #Ukraine
Unexplained fuel shortage in #Luhansk #LNR #LPR region including cities near the Russian border #Ukraine
Lt. Gen. Alexei Dyumin, another presidential bodyguard doing well…
by Mark Galeotti
The former relationship of Lt. Gen. Alexei Dyumin to the GRU, mentioned in my last blog, is still unclear. As of 24 December 2015, he is a Deputy Defence Minister, although of still unclear portfolio. However, accounts of his promotion say that he was before then head of the Special Operations Forces (SSO: Sily spetsial'nykh operatsii) -- and the Spetsnaz are a GRU asset, so this might have been a position giving an equivalence to a deputy headship of the GRU -- and even before than, Ground Forces Chief of Staff. That's a pretty solid pedigree, but given that even back in May 2015 he was being name-checked as still being in the Presidential Security Service (SBP), that suggests a pretty meteoric rise.
Let's assume there aren't two Alexei Gennad'evich Dyumins within the Russian security elite. Let's further assume that these various accounts are correct. That means that in the space of at most seven months, Colonel Dyumin (as he was then), one of the deputy heads of the SBP, moved across to the Defence Ministry, took a senior operational role in the Ground Forces (despite not having been a career soldier), then a crucial command position in GRU special forces, and then a hop up to to deputy ministerial rank. In the process, he also went from colonel to major general to (two-star) lt. general. Pretty impressive.
But not wholly unprecedented -- let's not forget the infamous Viktor Zolotov, close Putin associate and judo sparring partner, who went at flank speed from head of the SBP to commander of the Interior Ministry's Interior Troops, to First Deputy Interior Minister and potential minister-in-waiting.
It's all conjecture, but the rapid promotion of close Putin clients from the SBP, people he knows, people he plays judo and ice hockey with, people who are his neighbours, may suggest a degree of insecurity. If he feels he cannot trust the elite as a whole (and I suspect he may be right), the temptation to colonise the key security structures with those you feel on whom you can rely, if push comes to shove, is logical. And interesting.
Ukraine intelligence reported to #OSCE they found 3 TOS-1 Buratino near the frontline
Russian Strategy Seeks to Defy Economic Decline With Military Bravado
http://www.jamestown.org/programs/ed...-W6Lfm.twitter …
Info on why even a temp shutdown would be catastrophic: A Ukr Factory That Can’t Close, and Workers Who Won’t Quit
http://nyti.ms/1Gk5yLn
Militants increase number of attacks: fired 23 times over last day, 14 of which after 6pm. Biggest attack was nr Mayorsk - ATO press center
Last edited by OUTLAW 09; 01-06-2016 at 05:36 PM.
Reference the shot down of MH17......
Lockerbie victims lawyer #JerrySkinner confirmed, he would move on suing #Putin #Russia to #ECHR for #MH17 tragedy https://twitter.com/24tvua/status/684764072202600448 …
Eliot Higgins @EliotHiggins
Putin's Next Potential Target: The Baltic States
http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs...WXMR-1.twitter …
Very interesting to see the role the Orthodox church has assumed in #Russia, #Serbia, #Montenegro regarding #NATO http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/arti...sPQ5Nk.twitter …
Following the Putin demands.....
Whenever Serbian clerics wax mystically about Russia+Orthodoxy, Apis smiles & the 10M dead of WW1 shake their heads.
https://twitter.com/20committee/stat...74402228109313 …
CIA eyes Kremlin hackers in electrical grid attack.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...ut-attack.html … pic.twitter.com/dVNxY66cEs
Last edited by OUTLAW 09; 01-06-2016 at 05:53 PM.
An insightful piece by @MSnegovaya on #Russia's #media war and on why the #Kremlin is losing it:
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/opinio...ed/531587.html …
21 violations of ceasefire today: small arms, snipers, RPGs.
+50% to 24hrs yday
http://liveuamap.com/en/2016/6-janua...l-arms-snipers …
pic.twitter.com/zRafMXVK1c
Maryinka
15:30 Shooting, towards the hospital & Kolkhoz
15:50 No change, smtms salvos can be heard
16:35 Battle continues
17:32 Calmed down
OSCE reports increased presence of armed men in occupied Debaltseve
http://www.unian.info/war/1230655-os...ebaltseve.html …
pic.twitter.com/0dXqobf0jA
There has been strong reporting out of the Baltics about a massive inflow of Russian money into the Russian focused NGOs and that these Russian NGOs have started a not so flattering info war towards the respective Baltic nation state they are based in---the initial precursors of non linear warfare.....the same standard procedure used in eastern Ukraine before actual fighting broke out..
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