Vladimir Putin also may be attempting to groom possible successors to his regime from the pool of his children and relatives and children of other senior officials, according to the Institute for the Study of War (ISW).

“Tsivileva's, Fradkov's, and Gornin’s appointments support Putin’s recent efforts to introduce his relatives and the children of other senior Russian officials to the Russian public and to install economic advisors to the MoD to improve the wartime economy,” the report posted on the Institute’s website reads.

The message says that Putin dismissed four deputy defense ministers and replaced them with a “close relative,” the son of a former Russian prime minister, and an economist.

It is reported that Putin dismissed deputy defense ministers Nikolai Pankov, Ruslan Tsalikov, Tatiana Shevtsova, and Army General Pavel Popov, replacing them with deputy defense ministers Anna Tsivileva and Pavel Fradkov and First Deputy Defense Minister Leonid Gornin.

Tsivileva is Putin’s first cousin once removed (“niece”), wife of the recently appointed Energy Minister Sergei Tsivilev, and the Chairperson of the Kremlin-initiated Defenders of the Fatherland Foundation. Tsivileva was also previously part of the Council on Issues of Trusteeship in the Social Sphere under the Russian Government in 2019.

Fradkov is the son of former Russian Prime Minister and longest serving Director of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Mikhail Fradkov. Pavel Fradkov served as the First Deputy Administrator of the Presidential Administration since 2021, Deputy Head of the Federal Agency for State Property Management (Rosimushchestvo) from 2012 to 2015, and at the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ (MFA) Department of Pan-European Cooperation from 2005 to 2012. Fradkov’s brother Pyotr Fradkov is the Chairperson of the Russian state-owned Promsvyazbank and recently met with Kremlin-affiliated governor of the pro-Russian Moldovan autonomous region of Gagauzia, Yevgenia Gutsul, on April 9, possibly as part of Kremlin’s efforts to destabilize Moldova.

Gornin served as the First Deputy Minister of Finance since May 2018, Deputy Minister of Finance from 2012 to 2018, and Minister of Finance and Tax Policy of Novosibirsk Oblast from 2010 to 2011.

The ISW reminds that both Tsivileva and Fradkov reportedly participated in the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) alongside Putin’s daughters and the children of other senior officials on June 6 and June 7.