Ukraine's new military chief says that his immediate goals are to improve the rotation of troops at the front lines and harness the power of new technology, at a time when Kyiv's forces are largely on the defensive in the war with Russia.
Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, who previously was the commander of Ukraine’s ground forces, spoke a day after President Volodymyr Zelenskiy put him in charge of the battlefield campaign with the war poised to enter its third year. He replaced the broadly popular General Valerii Zaluzhnyi.
“New tasks are on the agenda,” Syrskyi said on his Telegram channel on Friday.
Though he provided little detail, his remarks appeared to align with Zelenskyy’s stated aim of bringing “renewal” to the armed forces with Thursday’s shake-up and adopting a fresh approach to the fight.
But the changes at the top won’t solve some of Ukraine’s biggest problems: a shortage of manpower that has helped sap morale and may require a mass mobilisation, and the inadequate supply of Western weapons to take on Russia’s might.
Kyiv officials are “rethinking” their war strategy “with a new emphasis on improved technology and updated command and control," said James Nixey, an analyst at London’s Chatham House think tank.
One sign of that may be the claimed recent sinking of a Russian warship in the Black Sea by a new generation of Ukrainian naval drones.
“It’s not going to be easy" for Syrskyi, said Marina Miron, a researcher at the War Studies Department of King’s College London.
“There are a lot of problems" for Ukraine at the moment.
She cited a lack of ammunition, uncertainty about new weapons from Ukraine's Western allies, a manpower shortage, people's reluctance to be drafted, the tiredness of troops getting no respite from the front lines, and the question of how Zaluzhnyi's departure might affect morale.
Whereas Zaluzhnyi was a proponent at this stage of the war of active defence — securing defensive lines while also searching for Russia’s weak points and hitting rear areas with long-range strikes — Syrskyi “will try to push the Ukrainian forces. ... He will try to increase counterattacks possibly,” Miron said.
That would align with Zelenskiy's desire to take a more aggressive approach.
With the fighting about to enter its third year, Kyiv is largely dependent on support from Western countries where signs of war fatigue have emerged.
That has left Ukraine on the back foot while Russia has placed its economy on a war footing and is building up its weapon stockpiles.
Analysts detected no sign of a deeper malaise in Zelenskiy's move, which had been rumoured for weeks.
Asked about Zaluzhnyi’s exit and Syrskyi’s appointment, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Friday downplayed the moves.
“We don’t think that these are the factors that could change the course of the special (military) operation,” he said, using the Russian government’s euphemism for the war.
Russian President Vladimir Putin used an interview broadcast late Thursday with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson to urge Washington to recognise Moscow’s interests and persuade Ukraine to sit down for talks.
Syrskyi, who was born in the Soviet Union and attended Moscow Higher Military Command School as well as serving in the Soviet Artillery Corps, is described as an obsessive planner, and his comments Friday said his first job was to ensure “clear and detailed planning.”
He also placed emphasis on ensuring the wellbeing of troops.
“The life and health of servicemen have always been and are the main value of the Ukrainian Army,” he said.
Syrskyi is viewed as the architect of the counteroffensive in the Kharkiv region in September 2022. That was the most significant Ukrainian victory of the war, allowing Kyiv to push the Kremlin’s forces out of the cities of Kupiansk and Izium.
