Russian major general says he was dismissed after reporting on army problems

Russian Major General Ivan Popov, who goes by the alias of Spartak, has told his subordinate soldiers that he had been fired after releasing a report on the current problems in Russia's Armed Forces.

Source: The Insider

Details: The Insider has reported that the Telegram channel of Andrey Gurulev, a member of the State Duma (the lower chamber of the Russian parliament – ed.) Defence Committee, has posted a voice message supposedly from Major General Ivan Popov, the commander of the 58th Combined Arms Army of the Southern Military District of the Russian Armed Forces.

The voice on the audio, which addresses the soldiers as "my beloved gladiators", says that he was "traitorously and despicably" dismissed after he spoke out about problems in the army "at the very top level".

Quote supposedly from Popov: "I was taken out of staff and dismissed from my post. Lieutenant General Lyamin arrived and took command of the army. And I'm waiting for my further fate, the military one, to change, to receive some kind of offer for further service...

To be honest with you, there was a difficult situation with my superiors, when I had to either keep silent and be weak-minded... or call a spade a spade. I... outlined all the problematic issues that exist in the army today regarding combat work and supply. I called it like it is."

Details: The voice on the audio named the most pressing problems of the occupying army: 

• lack of counter-battery combat,
• lack of artillery reconnaissance stations,
• mass deaths and injuries of soldiers from enemy artillery.

According to Popov, he spoke about all the problems at "the highest level – frankly and extremely harshly".

And then, one day, they "came up with an order from the Minister of Defence", took him out of the military unit and "got rid" of him.

"As many regimental commanders of the division said today, our army was not pushed away from the front by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, but was attacked from the rear by our senior commander, who traitorously and despicably beheaded the army at the most difficult and tense moment," the Russian major general supposedly said.

Background:

• On 11 July, a Storm Shadow missile allegedly hit the Duna Hotel in temporarily occupied Berdiansk, which was supposedly the command headquarters of the Russian 58th Army, killing occupation Lieutenant General Oleg Tsokov.
• Russian Telegram channels stated that Tsokov's death was an accident, saying that the real target was Major General Ivan Popov.

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