Russian Defense Minister retains post despite defeat in Ukraine thanks to Putin

LONDON, Feb 20 (Reuters) – Its army has staged three humiliating withdrawals from Ukraine in the past year and nearly 200,000 of its men have been killed or injured, U.S. officials say, but Russia’s defense minister Defense remains in place thanks to President Vladimir Putin.

The Russian leader has several reasons for keeping Sergei Shoigu, 67, in his post, according to senior Western officials, veteran Kremlin watchers and former Western military commanders: he is ultra-loyal, helped Putin become president and decision-maker on Ukraine is not his only concern.

“Loyalty always trumps competition in Putin’s inner circle,” said Andrew Weiss, a Putin scholar at the Carnegie Endowment think tank, who has held various political posts on the U.S. National Security Council. and wrote a book about Putin.

Putin has publicly admitted that he finds it difficult to fire people and that he often deals with such issues personally, Weiss said.

“Many people in positions of responsibility, whose work performance leaves much to be desired, including Shoigu, benefit from this underrated sentimental side of (Putin’s) personality,” he said.

The Russian Defense Ministry did not respond to a request for comment on Shoigu or its own performance in Ukraine.

A fiery character who trained as a civil engineer, Shoigu has held leadership positions in Russian power structures continuously since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, and served as Minister of Emergencies under the late President Boris Yeltsin.

Appointed defense minister in 2012, he is part of Putin’s inner circle and has spent hunting and fishing holidays with him in his native Siberia.

Tatiana Stanovaya, founder of the analysis firm R.Politik and a Kremlin watcher, said Putin prefers to work with people he knows well, despite their flaws.

A senior NATO diplomat and a senior EU official said they still see Putin and his generals as Ukraine’s main decision-makers, not Shoigu.

The Kremlin says it will achieve its goals in Ukraine in what it calls its “special military operation” and has dismissed Western casualty estimates as exaggerated. Russian forces still control about a fifth of Ukraine and kyiv suspects they are preparing for another major offensive.

However, the Russian invasion is considered to have cast a grim light on the Moscow army, which was repelled by Kiev, defeated in northeastern Ukraine, and forced into the southern city of Kherson.

(Additional reporting by Phil Stewart in Washington, Mark Trevelyan in London and John Irish in Paris, Spanish editing by José Muñoz in the Gdańsk newsroom; editing by Mark Heinrich)