Aleksandr Dvornikov, the Russian general appointed by Vladimir Putin to lead the military strategy against Ukraine, played a prominent role in the Syrian war, where forces under his command were responsible for widespread abuses against civilians and were frequently accused of of committing crimes against humanity.
Dvornikov, 60, has been described as an "old school" general and a "blood and soil nationalist," trained in Soviet military doctrines that see the destruction of civilian targets as a means of gaining momentum in the field. of battle.
Speaking to CNN on Sunday, Mark Hertling, a retired Army general and former US commanding general in Europe, spoke about Dvornikov's past in the Russian military and explained why he seems to fit into Putin's Ukraine strategy.
Hertling says that Dvornikov is well versed in campaigns that involve targeting civilians and sowing chaos.
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"The way he's executed combat operations in the past has made him... [perceived as] the kind of executioner who runs these kinds of campaigns where there's a lot of civilian attacks, destruction of populations civilians, [and] chaos in the populations, both in Syria and in Grozny," the retired general said.
"So this is the guy who is going to be asked to achieve military success before the [May 9] celebrations in Moscow."
a career general
He is a career military officer who has risen steadily through the ranks since starting out as a platoon commander in 1982.
He fought during the second war in Chechnya and held several important posts before leading Russian troops in Syria.
In September 2015, Dvornikov was sent by Putin on an urgent mission to stabilize the position of Syrian regime forces, which Tehran and Moscow believed were on the verge of falling to the opposition.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and General Alexander Dvornikov during a ceremony in the Kremlin on March 17, 2016.Alexei Nikolsky / AP
The decision to establish new leadership on the battlefield in Ukraine comes as Russia prepares for what is expected to be a major push to expand Russian control in the Donbas region, and follows a failed attempt to conquer kyiv. , the Ukrainian capital.
In Syria, Dvornikov quickly established an air base near the northwest coast, from which bombers destroyed towns and cities in Idlib province.
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The fall of Syria's second largest city, Aleppo, was largely due to Russian airstrikes that flew from the Hmeimim base and routinely targeted hospitals, schools, places where people lined up to buy bread and other civilian places.
The anti-aircraft batteries he installed gave Russian and Syrian planes air supremacy over Idlib, and destructive bombing has been carried out with impunity for the past five years.
Several of the fighter pilots who participated in the Syrian war have been shot down over Ukraine.
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Dvornikov was also responsible for the Russian campaign against the Islamic State in eastern Syria.
Russian propaganda efforts attempted to conflate the two conflicts, claiming that they were fighting the same enemy on both sides of the country.
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Putin's intervention in Syria was done under the pretext of fighting the terrorists besieging the country.
However, Russia's first airstrikes did not target Islamic State or a second jihadist group, Jabhat al-Nusra, which was active in Idlib at the time.
Rather, they targeted opposition groups whose attacks on Syrian armored columns had seriously weakened Bashar al-Assad's hold on the Alawites' heartland and, by extension, on Damascus.
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The Russian offensive turned the tide of the war in favor of Assad.
The narrative also skewed partially towards the Syrian leader, with much less scrutiny given to Russian denials that he was targeting civilian infrastructure as a means of terrorizing populations into submission, and generating sympathy in many quarters for the claims by the two leaders that the fight against Assad was led by jihadis rather than insurgents.
Putin believes the Syrian campaign was a success, and he awarded Dvornikov the Hero of Russia medal, one of the country's highest accolades.
Russia lost very few troops or aircraft in the conflict and was able to maintain air supremacy throughout.
Dvornikov's challenges in Ukraine
Dvornikov, who has served as commander of the southern military district since 2016, faces a different set of challenges in Ukraine, where the Russian air force does not control the skies and its ground forces have been severely depleted by regular supplies of advanced weaponry. that were not available to the Syrian rebels.
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Just as formidable will be countering the massive amount of data coming from the war zone that refutes Russia's claims of success on the battlefield.
While Syria was hailed as the best covered conflict in modern times, that effort is dwarfed by the way smartphones and digital technology have brought the Ukraine conflict to the world.
Gwythian Prins, a military strategy expert who has advised NATO, spoke to the BBC about Dvornikov's appointment, saying his background indicates a continued focus on the strategy of terrorizing the Ukrainian people, after his initial plans failed to secure a decisive victory.
However, Hertling added that it is unclear whether Dvornikov will be able to meet Putin's goals, despite his background and experience, due to the lack of Russian army forces in eastern Ukraine.
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CNN reported that forces are regrouping in the east, with plans to advance towards the city of Kharkiv, which is the country's second largest city.
Hertling disputed those reports, noting that it would be difficult for Russian forces to move into the eastern regions and carry out further attacks given the heavy loss of soldiers and equipment they have experienced so far.
"This is not like Stratego or a video game," the retired general explained.
"Those forces have been maimed and are in very bad shape. You just can't regenerate and say we're going to send them into battle one more time. It will take a long time, if they can ever get the fighting forces operational again. So I think Ukraine is in very good shape."
With information from
The Guardian
, BBC, AP and
CNN