PURGE RIPS THROUGH RUSSIAN LEADERSHIP

We have already seen Putin use the constitutional process of a new administration to his advantage as he begins his fifth term. It’s one of the few things that are similar in appearance to the US - all cabinet members must submit their resignations.
Putin used this to move Shoigu into the waiting room for old timers to prepare to slip away, by making him head of the Security Council, where he is boss of former president and drunken war monger Dmitry Medvedev. The former head of the SC and FSB, Petrushev, was sent off to manage Russian ship building, of which he knows nothing and cares less.
The Defence Ministry however is undergoing a shake up like it hasn’t seen since the days of Stalin. Every one of the deputy defence ministers - the equivalent of the Secretary’s of the Navy, Air Force, Army and Strategic Rocket Forces, all of their assistant secretary equivalent’s, have been picked off one at a time time.
These aren’t civilians, they are serving military officers who do administrative jobs.
These are the people who sign the contracts and make the decisions about who gets what and how much the state pays.
In the past these jobs were considered highly lucrative, a reward for good service (by which we mean unquestioned boot licking and loyalty), and if you managed to profit from them that was fine. That’s how the state worked and as long as you didn’t make it too obvious what you were doing it was perfectly acceptable to skim a percentage off the top.
Those who did so are now finding that loyalty, as it always is in a dictatorship, is a one way street; you give yours but you can’t expect a paranoid leader growing afraid of his own position to return the favour.
These generals aren’t just being dismissed. They’re being arrested for corruption and humiliated. The purpose of that is to send a clear message down the line that the way things have been done in the past will no longer be tolerated.
The scale of corruption has become so onerous in the military that estimates suggest as much as 30% of the defence budgets have been used to engorge personal fortunes. The state can no longer afford the luxury of such a system. The Special Military Operation is nearly two and a half years in, Ukraine was almost out of weapons and still, still even then it carried on and is still in the game. How is that even possible, given what Russia has spent?
The only way to make things change is to change the way things operate.
To make the ministry an honest and professional institution that does what it’s supposed to do, not finance the flashy lifestyles of wealthy generals.
Yet there is more to this.
Officers who had honest reputations but were sidelined from field commands by being too outspoken about the failures in the field caused by crap equipment and supplies, have also been charged.
Rather than letting them get in and make things right, only in such a rotten system are they too being punished and forced out. It’s not really corruption in their case, it’s about having had the gall to complain. They were disloyal. Shoigu protected them to a point, but he’s gone. To Putin they’re a threat and raising them up, even having them around is a potential source of a military coup.
Better they too, are gone.
And the purge continues down the line.
This could have been an opportunity to raise up quality commanders and reward competence. But this is Russia, competence and loyalty are rarely found together.
Competence means you know what’s wrong and how to correct it. Loyalty means you know what’s wrong but say nothing and learn quickly you say only what’s required to be heard.
Loyalty in Russia is far more valuable than competence ever has been or ever will be. Keeping Putin in power, unchallenged is all that matters. As he ages and his absolute power corrupts him absolutely, it’s only going to get worse.

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