I return to the question of why the GRU is having a hard time of it at the moment (and is likely to continue to do so for a while) in my latest Moscow News column, Spooks Under Fire. They are suffering in part for being too obstreperous (and CoGS Makarov is looking to assert his authority) and also because Putin is becoming less tolerant of overlaps and turf wars within the intelligence community. Brian Whitmore makes some interesting additional observations in his latest Power Vertical blog post. We still await to hear whether military intelligence chief General Shlyakhturov will return to his post from his lengthy ‘medical leave’ – I suspect not.

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