To fix its problems in Ukraine, Russia is turning to the architect of war

In rare public comments, mimicking Mr. Putin’s propaganda, General Gerasimov portrayed Russia as a victim of Western aggression, without explaining his strategy to neutralize the perceived threat.

Our country and its armed forces today are essentially opposed to the entire collective West, he said in an interview with the Russian newspaper Arguments and Facts published on January 24, adding that NATO is using Ukraine for a hybrid war against our nation.

As he sought to overhaul the Russian military, General Gerasimov upgraded the irregular warfare tactics he falsely believed the Americans were doing, rather than focusing on what the United States did well with a combination of weapons, combining various military capabilities to create overwhelming force, Seth G Jones, the national security expert, argues in his book Three Dangerous Men.

As a result, the Russian military has developed expertise in wiretapping and covert tactics, such as sending Russian Spetsnaz special forces units, without insignia, to Crimea before Russia illegally annexed the peninsula in 2014.

But the war in Ukraine required a different kind of maneuver: offensive campaigns by large numbers of ground forces operating in different regions with the goal of seizing land. There, General Gerasimov was ineffective.

The troops sent to occupy Kyiv in the early days of the war lacked even basic supplies and were soon halted outside the city. It did not improve the army’s ability to move large numbers of different kinds of troops, by land, air and sea, yet his invasion plan depended on it. Russian forces were swamped and then gutted in cities and towns in northern Ukraine.

General Gerasimov himself nearly fell victim to his military’s poor planning when, in late April, he narrowly escaped being killed in a Ukrainian strike while visiting troops. Dozens of Russians were killed, in an incident that prompted Moscow to limit visits by leaders to the front.