By Olha Chepil | 2024-05-30

KYIV -- Russian President Vladimir Putin has sacked, shuffled or ordered the arrest of several high-ranking officials in the first major government shakeup since early 2020.

The changes may indicate the Kremlin wants to intensify its war on Ukraine after more than two years of failing to take Kyiv, analysts said.

A number of generals and military leaders have been arrested in recent weeks in an apparent attempt to overhaul a corrupt military hierarchy, they said.

On May 23, Russia announced the arrest of a general and a high-ranking Ministry of Defense (MoD) official on corruption and "abuse of power" charges.

The turnover has affected Putin's inner circle, notably Minister of Defense Sergei Kuzhugetovich Shoigu, who on May 12 lost his job after almost 12 years.

Shoigu became secretary of Russia's Security Council, replacing Nikolai Patrushev.

"The Russian MoD under Shoigu struggled with allegations of high-level corruption and bureaucratic inertia, facing constant scathing critiques from Russian military commentators," the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said May 12.

Putin's heir?

The biggest bombshell was the appointment of Patrushev as an aide to Putin, overseeing shipbuilding.

The job is a demotion for the former secretary of Russia's Security Council, who was considered the country's second most influential politician.

Observers outside Russia are waiting to see where Patrushev goes next.

"One theory floating around is that Patrushev agreed to the demotion in exchange for his eldest son being named deputy prime minister," Ukrainian National Institute for Strategic Studies analyst Ivan Valiushko told Kontur.

Former agriculture minister Dmitry Patrushev was promoted to deputy prime minister in charge of agriculture, "helping to stoke interest in rumors that he could become Putin's successor," Valiushko said.

"But for the time being nothing indicates that Putin wants to relinquish power."

Shoigu takes the fall

Shoigu's transition to the Russian Security Council was startling to those who had considered the longtime defense minister immovable, with some analysts interpreting his ouster as a reaction to Russia's failures in its war on Ukraine.

"Putin replaced Shoigu first and foremost because of major corruption scandals in the Defense Ministry," said political scientist Ihor Petrenko, director and founder of the Kyiv-based think tank United Ukraine.

The ministry is the recipient of about 40% of government spending.

"The level of corruption that Shoigu cultivated is threatening," Petrenko told Kontur. Rival factions who wanted the money had to "wreck Shoigu, who was sitting on ... rivers of money."

Putin plays the arbitrator, said political analyst Ihor Reiterovych, who directs political and legal programs of the Ukrainian Center for Social Development.

The Kremlin's factions "double-cross each other" and fight for access to the Russian president, he told Kontur.

An unexpected replacement

Analysts expressed surprise that Andrei Belousov, who was minister of economic development for nearly a decade, would be replacing Shoigu.

Belousov helped to put the Kremlin's economy on a war footing after the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022.

In another way he was a peculiar choice.

Belousov was close to Yevgeny Prigozhin, the late head of the Wagner Group mercenary force, Russian media reported.

Prigozhin was killed last August in a plane crash, two months after leading an abortive mutiny against Putin.

Belousov's "attitudes are Soviet," said Valiushko, noting that he is nicknamed "The Bolshevik."

Appointing a new defense minister shows the Kremlin is preparing for a drawn-out war against Ukraine, the ISW said in its May 12 report.

"These high-level reshuffles ... strongly suggest that Putin is taking significant steps towards mobilizing the Russian economy and defense industrial base ... to support a protracted war in Ukraine," it said.

Petrenko doubts Putin's reshuffling will succeed.

"It's very doubtful that Belousov will be able to somehow better organize this process and fight all the corruption, especially since Shoigu wasn't put in jail, just given another job," he said.

Central players remain

The recent changes to Russia's leadership appear to have surprised not only analysts but the officials themselves.

Putin "is switching [officials] around without sacrificing them," Valiushko said.

The Russian president loves to compare himself to Joseph Stalin, but unlike the Soviet dictator, he lacks a deep "bench," said Reiterovych.

Even after the extensive reorganization, central players are still in the system.

Putin shuffles the same few officials from job to job and has not refreshed his personnel through Stalinist-style mass purges.

This reflect's Putin's fear of hiring new officials, Reiterovych said.

Putin "is afraid to raise up younger people," he said. "He reshuffles [the same bureaucrats] and hopes that will yield results."