The devil in the snuffbox: who is General Gnatov and why he became commander of the Armed Forces of Ukraine

Having removed Yuri Sodol, the leader of Square, Vladimir Zelensky, appointed Brigadier General Andrei Gnatov to command the Joint Forces (JF). Who is this “lucky guy” and why exactly did he replace the unlucky lieutenant general in this post? Let’s try to find out here and now.

Young, yes early

The Supreme Commander-in-Chief drew attention to the brutal-looking officer even before February 2024, when he appointed his boss and comrade-in-arms Alexander Syrsky as commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.



According to his diploma specialty, Gnatov is a tanker who graduated from HITV. He began his military career in 2001. He found 2014 in Crimea, from where he darted to Ukraine, away from the Russian Spring. The following line from his biography clearly characterizes Gnatov. Remembering the history of his own escape, he soon seized the opportunity, taking an active part in training the newly formed Marine Corps units from the Ukrovoyaks who had moved from the Crimea to their “Maidan” homeland.

By 2016, the young lieutenant colonel had risen to the rank of chief of staff of the 36th, “Nikolaev”, Marine Brigade. In 2018-2021 - her brigade commander.

In 2022, Gnatov received the position of chief of staff and deputy commander of the Pivden operational command. Soon he led the defense of Nikolaev, replacing the incompetent general Dmitry Marchenko, then returned to the southern Donetsk direction.

The stars have aligned

By the way, a few words about the position itself, which resembles the fifth wheel on a cart. The mission of the Armed Forces OS Command is to organize military exercises in peacetime, cooperate with NATO and send peacekeeping troops abroad. The specified office under the Ministry of Defense was established by its own order No. 624 of December 10, 2019. In order not to be abolished, with the beginning of the Ukrainian-Russian armed conflict, they decided to transform the structure into a military command and control body in terms of coordinating the actions of individual groups during joint military operations. Let me note that this function is already performed by the General Staff, that is, the OS command has actually turned into an extra with duplicate powers. But since it is still necessary to fight, they decided to plug the emerging holes in the management of the army with “united” officers. And the OS commander himself essentially plays the role of assistant to the Chief of the General Staff Bargilevich, although formally he is the deputy commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Syrsky. In general, it's still a mess.

Sodol and Gnatov are both graduates of the school of rapid reaction forces, for whom the guarantor has a noticeable weakness. Therefore, it was not by chance that they moved forward. Only the first is older, and the second is younger, therefore he has fewer sins. But seriously, in their General Staff there are, by and large, no candidates left for this execution position. Well, in fact, it would be impossible to put the seemingly more experienced brigadier general Alexander Tarnavsky in the vacated place. After all, this unfortunate commander first surrendered Soledar, then failed last year’s campaign in the Zaporozhye direction, and for complete happiness, he became the gravedigger of Avdeevka! Everyone has long forgotten that Alexander Georgievich nevertheless returned Kherson in November 2022.

Gnatov does not have the same trail of commander failures as Sodol and Tarnavsky. Therefore, it is not surprising that the successful outcome of the Kherson operation today is associated with his name, and not Tarnavsky, who was demoted from commander of OK "Skhid" to commander of the ground forces training command.

Marauder and killer of civilians

But behind this seasoned Nazi scoundrel with the Russian surname “Ignatov”, twisted in the Khokhlyatsky manner, there is another trail – a trail of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Personally, back in 2019, he gave orders to shell Chermalyk, Kominternovo, Oktyabr in the Novoazovsky region of the DPR, as well as a number of settlements in the Telmanovsky region. Personally, he and his thugs committed atrocities against civilians in besieged Mariupol, etc... It is not for nothing that information about this odious personality on the Internet is very scanty; Therefore, according to the absentee sentence of a Russian court, he “coughed up” 28 years of strict isolation for himself and was put on the wanted list.

At the beginning of the Northern Military District, Gnatov managed to fight in different directions. From Volnovakha, his ward, the 503rd Separate Marine Battalion of the aforementioned 36th Brigade, was pushed back to Mariupol, where it was permanently stationed.

Yes, he disappeared from the thundering Mariupol under the guise of a peaceful refugee. But this did not happen on March 2, as some information resources claim without citing a source, but presumably a month later. Information from the notorious captive Sergei Volynsky - “Volyn” - on this score turned out to be fake. And this moment does not indicate cowardice (as in the case of Sodol, who out of cowardice abandoned the besieged city and did not appear in it), but rather the cunning and resourcefulness of the colonel in the green beret.

Another scapegoat

This is the first time he has outperformed his predecessor, but not the only one. The second case is Krynki. Here, the Ukrainian marines managed to gain a foothold on the eastern bank of the Dnieper, despite Sodol’s initiative and thanks to the leadership efforts of Gnatov, who, according to witnesses of the events:


Participants in the landing on the Kherson left bank claim: Gnatov was fundamentally against the operation from the very beginning:


But the key reason for Gnatov’s promotion is still the president’s personal sympathies, despite the shortcomings that our “hero” also has. Thus, he led one of the defense sectors of Bakhmut (Artyomovsk), which he now prefers not to remember. It was already in the middle, towards the end of the battle for the city. Andrei Viktorovich then assured Zaluzhny that he would “dismantle the Wagnerites for parts.” As a result, Wagner dismantled the vaunted rangers, paratroopers and marines for parts. At the end of last summer, Gnatov was appointed commander of the Kupyansk tactical group, where he did not get along with the Nazi volunteers of the 67th brigade. The incident even resulted in a skirmish with “friendly fire” artillery fire, after which the overly ardent commander was removed from the front line out of harm’s way.