SCALP Missile Strike Reportedly Wounds Top Russian General

A long-range strike by French SCALP cruise missiles on Monday struck and devastated an office building used by Russian army leadership in the eastern Ukrainian city of Luhansk. According to unconfirmed reports, the top commander of all Kremlin forces on the Russo-Ukrainian War’s southern front was wounded in the attack.

The missile strike hit an administrative and academic building complex operated by the Kremlin’s occupation government in Yuvileine, just outside of Luhansk City.

At least two SCALP missiles struck an office building, according to most reports, as Russian army leadership was holding a meeting inside.

The pro-Ukraine Telegram channel Dosye Shpiona, an information platform often publishing information similar to Ukrainian military intelligence, reported 13 Russian service members were killed in the strike, and another 26 were wounded.

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The industrial city, which had an estimated pre-war population of more than 700,000 people, lies around 35 kilometres from the nearest Russian positions.

One of the wounded was Col. Gen. Gennadiy Anashkin, the recently appointed commander of Russia’s southern military district and effectively the top officer of all Kremlin forces deployed to Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Donetsk and Luhansk regions, the report said, citing “two independent sources.”

There was wide confirmation in independent Ukrainian media, and Kremlin-controlled Luhansk media, of the SCALP attack and substantial damage to buildings and injuries. Isolated reports repeated the news that Anashkin was among the wounded.

The strikes in the mid-morning hours were widely recorded by Luhansk residents and video posted on social media – in violation of a local law forbidding it – showed at least three and possibly five substantial explosions raising massive gray smoke.

Many reports said the missile strike appeared to target a single building within the premises of the Luhansk Academy of Internal Affairs Named for E.A. Didorenko, in the center of the city.

A statement published by Leonid Pasechnik, an official in the Luhansk occupation authority, said falling missile debris hit civilian structures in the suburban village of Yuvileine, some eight kilometers to the west.

He mentioned no damage to Russian troops or buildings used by them and stated the SCALP missile set one house on fire and damaged “dozens” of other structures. Five civilians were injured, Pasechnik claimed.

Artem Lysohor, a Luhansk region official associated with Kyiv, said that the missile strike hit a building taken over by Russian troops in 2014, during the Kremlin’s first invasion of Ukraine, and used by them as a command headquarters since then. The US-funded news platform Radio Liberty on Tuesday published satellite imagery seeming to show a damaged hi-rise building complex in the center of Yuvileine village.

Imagery reviewed by Kyiv Post confirmed at least one missile hit an office building in the center of Yuvileine village at the 48.5582, 39.18548 grid point. The structure appears to be the main building in a recently built limited-access complex. Apartment buildings surround it.

A high-flying career paratroop officer, Anashkin per his official biography rose to prominence in 2008 as a colonel leading Russian paratrooper assault units invading Georgia. During 35 years of army service, he held command jobs from platoon leader to division commander, and saw combat in the First and Second Chechen Wars, and commanded Russian “peacekeeper” troops in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Nagorno-Karabakh, as well as Soviet troops stationed in East Germany.

In 2014 Anashkin was appointed vice commander of Russia’s 58th Army, an area command responsible for operations in the Caucasus and the Black Sea region. He was named the 58th Army’s commander and promoted to Colonel General, the top possible uniformed rank in the Russian army, in 2023. On May 15 a Kremlin order named Anashkin acting commander of Russia’s Southern Military District, the Russian Federation’s area command responsible for operations in south Ukraine and the Caucasus region.

Fact Check:

On May 20, SCALP missiles hit the Luhansk city area, and a local official named Gennadiy Pasechnik said the Ukrainians used the missiles to attack civilian targets, that dozens of buildings were damaged, and at least five civilians were injured. Checks of other sources and satellite imagery showed that, in reality, the Ukrainians targeted a former MVD complex that was being used by the Russian army as a headquarters.