Dictator Vladimir Putin's defense boss and the chief of his general staff were ousted shortly after the Kerch bridge blast as a group of top military officers were arrested by a furtive secret police unit, according to reports from Moscow.
Under fierce criticism from pro-war military bloggers, Putin and the man formerly known as his alter ego, Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu, had been reeling amid a political inferno, Moscow reports say.
Following the Kerch Bridge blast, several military bloggers, who support a paramilitary organization sometimes known as Putin's private army, said that the Kremlin had replaced Shoigu and the general staff's chief, Gen. Valery Gerasimov, with Tula Province Governor Alexey Dyumin and the deputy commander-in-chief of ground forces, Lt. Gen. Alexander Matovnikov. (The information on the military bloggers backing the Wagner Group paramilitaries comes from the Institute for the Study of War. No information on their posts was available via Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo search engines.)
The ousters were preceded by a swift move, shortly after the bridge blast Saturday, of the elite Dzerzhinsky Separate Operation Purpose Division, which entered Moscow and arrested a number of military officials, according to information cited by the institute. (Information on this action was again restricted by major search engines.)
But Putin Sunday deflected attention from the internal crisis, telling the public that the explosion was the work of Ukrainian "terrorists" bent on destroying Russian infrastructure. It was unclear whether the dictator was merely trying to maintain an appearance of Kremlin stability or whether he was scrambling to "pick the winner" among the security forces.
The arrest reports come in light of a Ukrainian belief that the bridge blast was a result of a conflict among Russian security forces.
Mykhailo Podoliak, adviser to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, called the bridge blast a sign of a struggle among Russian security forces. The Federal Security Service and the Wagner Group were at odds the the defense ministry and the powerful general staff, he said.
Podoliak said that the bomb-laden truck seems to have driven onto the bridge from the Russian side. He believes the logistics of the detonation, the fact that it happened just as a fuel train passed and the power of the explosion point to some Russian operation.
He believes that the Russian leadership is looking for people to blame for the defeats at the front, and that the FSB and Wagner Group owners wanted the defense minister and staff chief fired.
Podoliak said he suspects that the FSB was framed by other security forces, thus undermining its status for permitting such an event to occur. Similarly, the aide said, the FSB can be blamed for collapse of supply chains to the dazed Russian forces in east and south Ukraine.
But a top Kremlin official responsible for heading the bridge blast inquiry said the FSB is investigating the blast. Alexander Bastrykin conceded that the bomb-laden truck had come through Russia, traveling around, and possibly through, the Black Sea from Bulgaria. Other areas transited were Georgia, Armenia, North Ossetia and Krasnodar Territory, Bastrykin said. He did not mention Turkey as a transit country, though it may have been.
Bulgaria, though a NATO member, is completely dependent on Russia's Gazprom energy company for petrol and in June installed a pro-Russian government -- despite the population's highly negative view of Putin.
What sort of supplies might be originating in Bulgaria is not obvious but as the country's vigorous free market economy is a center of much international trade it seems probable that the Russian military relies on its operatives there to bypass Western embargoes on various high tech spare parts.
Meanwhile, Tass reported that Putin was to meet with Russian security council members Monday but asserted that the Kremlin had no information on whether the bridge blast would be discussed.
Officials have reported that car and truck traffic has resumed crossing on the one surviving roadway, but that trucks must be ferried across the Kerch Strait, indicating that the surviving roadway is in a weakened condition. Though there is no visible structural damage to the railway span, concussive effects may have weakened it, implying that the entire bridge could still be rendered unusable.
In another development, U.S. Gen. Wesley K. Clark, said he favored a measured advance by Ukrainian forces -- which is what they appear to be doing. It is unwise to outrun supply lines "pell mell" and potentially run into a big ambush, the former top NATO commander told CNN.
The retired general observed that Russian forces have been split or soon will be and that they face relentless battering, especially as their command and control positions are taken out (which occurs when HIMARS long-range rocketry is teamed with strong intelligence).
Clark said Putin has been nuclear saber-rattling in order to instill fear in the West so as to undercut military support for Ukraine. But, the general said, as NATO commander he had overseen numerous training exercises with simulated tactical nuclear weapons and had had "disappointing" results because forces were too mobile and the nukes could do little more than blow down a lot of trees. Russia must be made to see that use of such weapons -- which admittedly could devastate a city -- would have no impact on the progress of Ukrainian troops, he said.
The general reprimanded former President Donald Trump for speaking of a danger of World War III as playing into Putin's hands from a propaganda perspective.
Joe Biden however had a similar warning. “We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban missile crisis,” he said. “I don't think there's any such thing as the ability to easily (use) a tactical nuclear weapon and not end up with Armageddon.”
The White House quickly walked back the remarks, saying Biden meant that the stakes are very high.
