During a visit to Russia’s Vladivostok, Russian President Vladimir Putin was shown around an “interactive zone” dedicated to the 155th Naval Infantry Brigade, during which he viewed a video narrated by Maj. Gen. Mikhail Gudkov, who previously commanded the brigade.
Putin was told by his hosts that who better to tell the story of the unit than the man for which Putin had renamed in honor of its former commander.
Gudkov was promoted personally by Putin to the post of Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Navy. While serving in that position, he was killed during a July 2 Ukrainian missile attack, believed to have been conducted using a US-supplied HIMARS system, on the command post of the 155th Brigade in Korenovo, Kursk region.
That attack also killed several other senior Russian military officers, including Gudkov’s successor as commander of the brigade, Col. Sergei Ilyin and his deputy, Col. Leonid Bashkardin.
Ukrainian authorities accused troops from the 155th Brigade of involvement in war crimes, including the torture, rape and killings of civilians during the short-lived 2022 occupation of the Kyiv region towns of Bucha, Irpin, and Hostomel, along with reports that during operations in eastern Ukraine, Gudkov’s soldiers posted videos on social networks of them beheading several captured Ukrainian service members.
For this and other operations by his brigade within Russia’s “special military operation,” Gudkov was awarded the Hero of the Russian Federation Medal by Putin, having previously been presented with the “Gold Star” medal along with a plethora of awards for his displays of “courage and military valor.”
According to numerous reports, the 155th Brigade, along with several other major Russian units – the 336th, 40th, 61st, 155th brigades, the 177th regiment, the 39th brigade, parts of the 70th division – are forming up to conduct a new offensive focused on Pokrovsk, Konstantinovka and Druzhkovka in Ukraine’s Donetsk region.
Ukrainian social media has portrayed this as another desperate attempt by the Kremlin to achieve a “propaganda triumph” earned at the cost of thousands of lives in fresh “meat assaults.” No doubt the current commanders of the 155th and the other involved formations are hoping to earn the medals and awards given to Gudkov and others.