In times of war, the removal of a country’s senior military commander and defence minister would normally not be considered a good omen for victory. In Ukraine, however, the departure of both within just a few days of each other is being seen as ultimately strengthening the position of the country’s wartime leader, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The president’s decision to dismiss Mykhailo Fedorov, 35, his popular defence minister, then Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi, a four-star general, was primarily the result of a deepening rift between the two men over how to best prosecute the war with Russia.
They come from different worlds. Fedorov’s forte is technology. He has championed the use of new weaponry including robotics and drones to achieve battlefield success, instead of relying on more traditional military strategies of Ukraine’s Soviet-era military establishment led by Syrskyi. It was Syrskyi’s traditional approach that defended Kyiv during the early days of the war, making him an overnight hero among Ukrainians.
Even so, Syrskyi found himself coming under increasing pressure from Ukraine’s younger generation of officers, who accused him of taking decisions that put their lives at risk for little reward on the battlefield. Fedorov’s appointment as defence minister exacerbated these tensions. The two men fell out to such an extent that they were reportedly unable to be in the same room as one another. Eventually, Zelenskyy sacrificed Fedorov.
A mood misjudged
He likely hoped that this would resolve tensions at the heart of Ukraine’s military hierarchy, but he soon realised that it would not, as thousands of Ukrainians took to the streets to demand the defence minister be reinstated. Fedorov had only been in post for six months, yet his tenure coincided with some of Ukraine’s most important military successes, they argued.
Popular displays of anti-government sentiment, even in the midst of Ukraine’s bitter conflict with Russia, are not uncommon. Last summer Zelenskyy had to sack his all-powerful chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, following a row over plans to remove the independence of Ukraine’s anti-corruption agencies.
