Chief of the Russian General Staff Gerasimov to Head Military Ops in Ukraine

Chief of the Russian General Staff Valery Gerasimov will lead a joint group of troops in the Special Military Operation zone in Ukraine, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Wednesday.

New appointments of the leadership of the Northern Military District were made on January 11 by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

Army General Valery Gerasimov’s deputies are Commander-in-Chief of the Aerospace Forces General of the Army Sergei Surovikin, Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces General of the Army Oleg Salyukov, and Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Colonel-General Alexei Kim.

"The increase in the level of leadership of a special military operation is associated with the expansion of the scale of tasks solved in the course of its implementation, the need to organize closer interaction between the branches and branches of the Armed Forces, as well as improving the quality of all types of support and the effectiveness of command and control of groupings of troops (forces)," a Russian MoD statement said.

Prior to this, the grouping of Russian troops in the NVO zone was commanded by Surovikin. Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov, announced his appointment in October last year.