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Protesters nationwide got what they wanted yesterday when Volodymyr Zelensky dismissed General Oleksandr Syrskyi as commander-in-chief of the armed forces following days of mass demonstrations.
Yet this short-term gratification also serves as a bleak reminder that Kyiv’s true object of desire—acceptance by the U.S. and Europe as a reliable democratic partner—is unlikely to materialize any time soon.
Ukraine’s people have never had a problem making their voices heard. From the “Orange Revolution” of 2004 that charted a path westwards and the Euromaidan protests of 2014 to last year’s outrage at crackdowns on anti-corruption watchdogs, the public “acts as a check of last resort” on their political and military leaders, head of the Ukraine Forum at the Chatham House think tank, Orysia Lutsevych, told Newsweek.
But that a week of intense public demonstrations was required to force the president to correct an obvious blunder that called into question Kyiv’s control over its military shows how far the machinery of government lags behind the liberal society it serves.
This is not good news for a country that has its heart set on European Union membership and the full trust of Western allies as a reliable democratic partner.
How Did We Get Here?
President Zelensky was bullied into his U-turn days after he sacked former Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov; a youthful, tech-minded reformer credited with pioneering Ukraine’s stunning drone-and-data-based battlefield transformation; after just six months in office.
He did so after repeated clashes between Fedorov and Gen. Syrskyi—the grizzled commander-in-chief who led the valiant defense of Kyiv in the days following Russia’s full-scale invasion, but had come under increasing criticism for resisting reform in the armed forces and employing costly Soviet-era tactics.
Protests exploded shortly after, first in Kyiv and later across the country, as an enraged public impressed upon Zelensky in no uncertain terms that perhaps he’d sacked the wrong person.
Zelensky, who last year also bowed to public pressure when he halted wildly unpopular crackdowns on anti-corruption watchdogs, finally dismissed the 60-year-old Syrskyi on Tuesday, appointing 43-year-old General Mykhailo Drapatyi—seen as an ally of Fedorov—as his replacement. The president has said he’ll find another prominent position for Fedorov in government, without specifying exactly where.
“Zelensky has corrected course. The appointment of Drapatyi as the new commander-in-chief is very good news, the people will accept this,” said Lutsevych.
“But this whole case shows Zelensky is struggling to manage competing visions for war strategy. This one clearly damaged trust in how he governs.”
Who Commands the Commander?
The episode offers no verdict that Ukraine is corrupt, authoritarian or unfit for the democratic West.
The country is nearly four-and-a-half years into Russia’s full-scale invasion, operating under martial law and general mobilization: elections have been postponed, and political power has necessarily concentrated around the presidency. It is unreasonable to expect a state facing such a predicament to function like a peacetime democracy.
It does, however, reveal a critical weakness in Ukraine’s institutions in an area that is vital to the functioning of any democracy.
The dispute between former Defense Minister Fedorov and former commander-in-chief Syrskyi was complex. Beyond a mere disagreement over battlefield strategy, it centered around a much deeper point: civilian control over the military.
Fedorov entered his post as Defense Minister with parliamentary support to overhaul the armed forces.
The minister, who previously oversaw a highly successful digital transformation of Ukraine’s public services and led the scale-up of drone production for the war, performed an extensive audit of the armed forces’ 120 brigades. He outlined a raft of reforms designed to break up underperforming units, improve unit rotations, pool key resources and facilitate procurement networks to ensure front-line forces get the right equipment at the right time.
What he encountered was a commander-in-chief who had no interest in listening. Syrskyi resisted large parts of the ministry’s plan, in some cases directly defying Fedorov’s directions in favor of preserving his rigid, top-down command, according to Jack Watling, Senior Research Fellow for Applied Military Sciences at the RUSI think tank.
For his part, Syrskyi argued he was trying to get on with the business of fighting Russia rather than squabbling with the Defense Ministry and suggested Fedorov was overstepping his mark as a minister by becoming a war strategist, in an op-ed published by Ukraine’s militarnyi.com.
When their conflict came to a head, Zelensky took the executive decision to dismiss Fedorov and his parliamentary mandate and retain Syrskyi, raising serious questions about whether civilian institutions could enforce policy over the military command.
Can the New Commander Help?
Mykhailo Drapatyi has only been in post as Ukraine’s new commander-in-chief a few hours, but his inbox will be overflowing already.
In a speech announcing Drapatyi’s accession, Zelensky laid out his orders for the new commander: to produce a revamped defense strategy, complete vital reforms of army corps, accelerate weapons and drone deliveries, strengthen air defense, and re-engineer Ukraine’s mobilization methods, which are currently the object of major public disdain.
That is to say, exactly what Fedorov was trying to do before Zelensky dismissed him.
Therein lies one of the most disconcerting aspects of this whole affair. Why did Zelensky give Fedorov the boot in the first place if he approved of his reforms, only to then pull an about-face and dismiss Syrskyi days later?
The answer to that question is anyone’s guess, and we will see in the coming weeks whether the Ukrainian public decides it needs an explanation from the man himself.
In the meantime, the power rests with Drapatyi to turn this confusing and embarrassing own goal by the president into a meaningful correction. If he manages to press ahead with the reforms outlined by Fedorov, Ukraine could emerge with a more effective military and a clearer system of civilian oversight.
Timing Could Have Been Better
Whether Drapatyi can effectively implement his ally Fedorov’s reforms remains to be seen, but it is safe to say the debacle of the past few days couldn’t have come at a much worse moment.
Not only has it nibbled at morale and distracted from Ukraine’s recent successes in the campaign against its imperial neighbor, it also serves as a clear signal to the nation’s European benefactors that Kyiv still has lots of work to do before it can be accepted into the fold for real.
Just last month, the EU opened negotiations with Ukraine on the “fundamentals” cluster—Brussels jargon for the basic legal, political and economic standards a state must meet if it is to advance down the path to accession to the bloc. It is basically the EU’s trust test for aspirants, used to determine how quickly the whole membership bid can advance by asking: can this country be trusted to govern fairly, competently and predictably?
Ukraine can align its trade rules, improve infrastructure and adopt thousands of pages of European law, but accession will stall if Europe concludes that civilian authorities cannot control the armed forces. Or that power rests primarily with Zelensky as a lone decision-maker, and not the wider political establishment.
“Distrust of Zelensky among the public might linger, but the deeper question is: can Ukraine’s institutions effectively deliver defense inside Ukraine and be a reliable partner for Europe?” Lutsevych concluded.
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