Peskov Had To Answer The Question, "Where Is Gerasimov?"
- 17.09.2025, 14:06
The chief of the Russian General Staff was at the drills with Putin.
The head of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, Valery Gerasimov, was not present at the final stage of the Zapad-2025 exercise together with Vladimir Putin due to his busyness with the war in Ukraine, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitri Peskov said. "A special military operation is underway, and the overall coordination of the leadership of this operation is, of course, carried out by the chief of the General Staff," Peskov said (quoted by RIA Novosti). He added that Putin "on the whole" positively assessed "the course and results" of the exercises.
The Russian president visited the maneuvers held at the Mulino training range in the Nizhny Novgorod region the day before, on September 16. Putin was accompanied by Defense Ministry chief Andrey Belousov, his deputy Yunus-Bek Yevkurov and Secretary of the State Council Alexei Dyumin. Meanwhile, according to Kremlin pool journalist Andrey Kolesnikov, "everyone was searching with their eyes" for Gerasimov, but the General Staff was represented at the exercises by Army chief Gen. Andrey Mordvichev. After completing the maneuvers and touring the weapons exhibition, Putin, according to Kolesnikov, returned to talk "for about ten minutes" with Dyumin and "even longer" with Mordvichev. "What these two conversations were about, only these three people know. But maybe everyone else will find out soon," Kolesnikov concluded.
Gerasimov has attended all Zapad exercises before. In 2009, when they were held for the first time, he served as commander of troops of the Moscow Military District. In 2013, 2017 and 2021, Gerasimov as head of the General Staff was at the Zapad exercises alongside Putin and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.
Gerasimov has been head of the General Staff since 2012, the longest in the post-Soviet era. Under him, Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, engaged in a military campaign in Syria in 2015 and launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Since January 2023, Gerasimov has been in command of the United Group of Forces in Ukraine. He remained as head of the General Staff even after his boss Sergei Shoigu was replaced as defense minister by Andrei Belousov.