The Kremlin and Vladimir Putin’s top military brass have created a “complicated” and “ineffective” structure for Russia’s response to the Ukrainian offensive in Kursk, military analysts have said.
Russian defence minister Andrei Belousov yesterday announced the creation of a “coordination council” for military and security issues in affected regions bordering Ukraine.
He said the council was aimed at improving support for Russian troops and will oversee the provision of military aid, while also assisting with evacuations and measures to protect residents.
Mr Belousov did not say how it would interact with an existing command structure established by the Kremlin when it called on the Russian security service (FSB) to conduct a counterterrorism operation in Belgorod, Bryansk, and Kursk.
Analysts at the Institute for the Study of War say the two operations “will likely generate continued confusion” about who is responseible for what aspect of the response to the Kursk invasion and could “lead to friction between the FSB and the Russian military”.
It added that the delayed establishment of a “complicated” structure “continues to highlight the fact that the Kremlin failed to plan for the possibility of a significant Ukrainian incursion into Russia”.
“The Ukrainian incursion into Kursk will likely expand the Kremlin’s consideration for what type of Ukrainian operations are possible along the border and highlight that Putin and the Kremlin have suffered from a strategic failure of imagination,” the think tank said.
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