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Two Russian officers reported killed in two days
Summary
A retrospective on reports from 10 and 11 July 2023 of the deaths of a Russian lieutenant general near Berdiansk and a mobilisation official in Krasnodar.
What did two reported deaths on consecutive days say about the reach of the war? On 11 July 2023, Russian Lieutenant General Oleg Tsokov was reportedly killed by a missile strike near Berdiansk, in Zaporizhzhia Oblast. The report was set within the 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive.
The day before, on 10 July 2023, a different kind of incident was reported far from the front. Stanislav Rzhitsky, deputy chief in charge of military mobilisation in the Russian city of Krasnodar, was shot dead near the city's sports complex. He was also the commander of the Russian Navy submarine B-265 Krasnodar.
Two settings, one pattern of loss
The two cases differ in method and place. One was a missile strike near Berdiansk, in an area of active fighting. The other was a shooting in a Russian city, listed among attacks on Russian military commissariats.
Both involved senior Russian military figures, and both were reported within 24 hours of each other. Beyond that, the reports give no basis for linking the two events, and none is claimed here.
