The new commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, has earned a fearsome reputation as a military commander in the war with Russia, but he faces some major challenges, including how to mobilize new forces and combat corruption in Ukraine . the categories.
Over the past week, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy fired most of his top generals in an attempt to “reset” management of the country's depleted, under-trooped and under-supplied armed forces.
The list of 15 dismissed generals includes the popular commander-in-chief, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, who has been replaced by Syrskyi, described by some as a “butcher” who cares little about the loss of human life. Some commanders of combined forces, military reserve, and ground and airborne forces, along with some of their deputies and advisors, have survived the carnage.
“The first thought is that this is an absolutely unprecedented action,” said Nikolay Mitrokhin of the University of Bremen in Germany, who has been writing detailed analyzes of the war between Russia and Ukraine since the conflict began in 2022.
“Apparently, it was coordinated with the new commander-in-chief, Syrskyi, who named the people he would like to work with as a team,” Mitrokhin told Al Jazeera.
The wave of layoffs follows the failure of last year's counteroffensive to recapture Russian-occupied areas in southern and eastern Ukraine, corruption scandals, dire delays in Western military aid and chaotic management of the armed forces. .
However, the scale of the layoffs reflects the way Zelenskyy has been managing Ukraine since coming to power in 2019.
“It's very much in Zelenskyy's style with his decision to 'fire them all,' not just those who failed at their jobs, but even those who belong to the wrong generation or team,” Mitrokhin said.
The only senior officers who have retained their positions are those who led successful operations against the Russian fleet in the Black Sea, along with some air force and air defense force chiefs who “demonstrate success or stability in repelling Russian attacks.” “, he claimed. saying.
Challenges ahead
The new top brass faces a number of challenges, and mobilization is number one.
kyiv does not disclose its battlefield casualties, but Washington believes Ukraine has lost at least 70,000 military personnel.
The now-ousted Zaluzhnyi had wanted to mobilize 500,000 men, but Zelenskyy rejected the idea for fear of popular protests and citing limitations in training, housing and weapons.
Thousands of Ukrainian men of fighting age are believed to have bribed their way out of the country or illegally crossed Ukraine's borders, either by land or even by swimming through the icy waters of the Prut River near Moldova.
Some recruiting officers have been arrested after receiving bribes of thousands or tens of thousands of dollars to “release” someone from military service and have now amassed huge assets in Ukraine and abroad.
Zelenskyy fired all regional recruiting officers and replaced them with battle-tested veterans vetted by intelligence services.
But the new appointees failed to mobilize enough men for the 1,000-kilometre-long front line amid devastating manpower losses.
'This man sent me to die as meat'
Meanwhile, some in the military are dismissive of the restructuring of Ukraine's top leadership.
A seasoned veteran who enlisted in 2014, after pro-Russian separatists took up arms against kyiv in the southeastern Donbas region, and had just returned from the front line, was especially disdainful of the new top general Syrskyi.
“This man sent me to die as if I were meat,” he told Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity, saying that soldiers who complain about their superiors or corruption end up sent to the most dangerous places on the front to be killed.
He stated that doctors are instructed to ignore life-threatening wounds and injuries.
“One man lost two legs and was still deemed fit for duty,” he said.
Other military personnel have allegedly complained about Syrskyi's “butchery” tactics of ignoring human losses.
Syrskyi addressed these concerns in his first public speech about his new role.
“The life and health of servicemen have always been and are the main value of the Ukrainian army,” Syrskyi said on February 9.
The former deputy chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said that Syrskyi is indeed “tougher” than his predecessor.
“Judging by his previous actions, he has a more severe approach to preparing and organizing actions and holding his subordinates accountable,” Lieutenant General Ihor Romanenko told Al Jazeera.
However, Syrskyi “is very scrupulous in preparing for hostilities, goes into details, thoroughly studies supply issues, etc.,” Romanenko said.
Greatest hits under Syrskyi
While leading the ground forces, Syrskyi is credited with two major successes. One was the defense of kyiv in February and March 2022, when tens of thousands of Russian soldiers attempted to surround the capital from the north.
Under Syrskyi's command, small, highly autonomous groups of military and irregular forces attacked Russian troops and armored vehicles, cutting their supply lines and using drones for reconnaissance and surprise attacks.
One such soldier was Bohdan Yavorsky, whose group of two dozen men ambushed a column of armored vehicles in the northern Kiev suburb of Bucha.
They immobilized the column by bombing the first and last vehicle and showering the rest with grenades and Molotov cocktails before speeding away and calling in an airstrike to destroy the rest of the vehicles.
“This garbage was stinking in the center of Bucha for a month until it was removed,” Yavorsky told Al Jazeera in August 2022.
Syrskyi's second major success also came in 2022, when he clandestinely amassed light infantry in the eastern Kharkiv region to break through Russian defenses and liberate the entire region despite Russian superiority in artillery.
Address delays in Western aid
Another major challenge for Ukraine's new top brass is delays in Western aid.
The European Union's 27 member states agreed earlier this month to unlock 50 billion euros (about $54 billion) in aid, but Republicans in the U.S. Congress, aligned with Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, still oppose a $60 billion package from the United States.
“It's obvious [the EU] It won't solve everything without the Americans. That is why the American conundrum lasts too long, which is definitely not positive for us,” Romanenko said.
The delay is not ruining Ukraine's economy but is absolutely crucial for the military.
“The economy is not going to collapse until the end of the year,” kyiv-based analyst Aleksey Kushch told Al Jazeera.
“The main problem is the supply of weapons and ammunition. Without American aid there is not enough money for that.”
