Russia’s ‘General Armageddon’ quietly replaced with deputy responsible for strikes on Ukraine

Sergei Surovikin, the former commander of the Russian aerospace forces, has been sacked from the post and replaced with his first deputy Viktor Afzalov, Russian media close to the Kremlin confirmed on Wednesday.

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The day before, Mr Surovikin was reported to have been dismissed from his post "due to his transfer to another job" and was allegedly on "short-term leave".

Mr Afzalov, a lieutenant general who now allegedly heads the Russian aerospace forces, was directly involved in the planning and organisation of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last February.

In particular, he was responsible for planning air strikes on civilian and energy infrastructure in Ukraine as commander of Russia’s 11th air force and air defence army.

Mr Surovikin has been the commander of the Russian aerospace forces since October 2017.

Before that, he commanded Russia’s invasion of Syria and was nicknamed ‘General Armageddon’ for his alleged ferocity.

From October 2022, Mr Surovikin was also the commander of Russia’s war against Ukraine, but in January, Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu demoted him to the deputy commander, replacing him with chief of the Russian general staff Valery Gerasimov.