Russia adopted a punishment strategy, not a population-centric strategy characterized by winning local hearts and minds.81 Russian and allied military forces inflicted civilian harm on opposition-controlled areas by using artillery and indiscriminate weapons, such as thermobaric, incendiary, and cluster munitions.82 As the Russians demonstrated in Grozny during Gerasimov’s time in Chechnya, a punishment strategy is designed to raise the societal costs of continued resistance and coerce rebels to give up.83
