Strelkov sounds like a very interesting man by all accounts, but I suspect his replacement really had more to do with the rebels needing to gain traction among the Ukrainian populace in the area, and ethnic Russians were not getting it done.
The ‘Orthodox Whites’ bear some resemblance to the 30s Romanian reactionary movement, ‘The Legion of the Archangel Michael’, without the time-specific antisemitic focus that existed back then and led to a series of pogroms.
I would not necessarily associate these ‘monarchist’ individuals with Russian nationalism at large however, as there is also within that a National Socialist element. Strelkov’s word and deed indicate he is a little more than your average Russian nationalist.
This article is problematic in that if STRELKOV is indeed GRU, as the Ukrainians have tried to document (from Russia sources and photos), then he is not an independent actor but a puppet for Putin.
Strelkov doesn’t fart without permission from PUTIN and the FSB. If he did, he’d be dead and buried in a wheat field in Ukraine.
You don’t disobey the KGB/FSB and live. You don’t challenge the boss and live. Accidents happen. People disappear.
That’s the Moscow Way and Putin is definitely “Old School”.
The Pro-Russian forces in Ukraine have a Red communist side and a White fascist side. Putin's aim is to unite them together in a Red-White (really Red-Brown) alliance. That is why Putin recently lifted restrictions against the Red-Brown National Bolshevik Party, because it supports Russia's invasion of Ukraine.