Much has been written about how Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has isolated himself and may have not been kept informed on the status of the war effort and his invasion of Ukraine.
Missing elements of information could have included:
- Low morale of his troops.
- Poor combined arms integration on the battlefield. This would include infantry, armor, artillery, and air support.
- Logistics problems with fuel and food for the troops. An old quote is, “An army runs on its stomach.”
- The number of vehicles being lost in combat.
- Soldiers abandoning their vehicles due to fuel problems and surrendering to the Ukrainians.
- The number of dead and wounded Russian soldiers.
- The number of dead Russian general officers (7?).
- Soldiers attacking their commander (one report anyway).
- The poor progress being made on the ground.
All of the above is critical situational awareness. However, in a dictatorship, it might not be good to bring bad news to the boss.
Remember this in emergency management. We all need to “tune our reactions” to be receptive of all news, good and bad. Otherwise, especially at the higher levels of an organization, people might not be bringing you all the information you need to make informed decisions.
Eric Holdeman is a nationally known emergency manager. He has worked in emergency management at the federal, state and local government levels. Today he serves as the Director, Center for Regional Disaster Resilience (CRDR), which is part of the Pacific Northwest Economic Region (PNWER). The focus for his work there is engaging the public and private sectors to work collaboratively on issues of common interest, regionally and cross jurisdictionally.
