Zelenskyy Dismisses Zaluzhnyi

An Assessment of Reasons and Implications

Image: President Zelenskyy Twitter / x

Today I have decided to renew the leadership of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

President Zelenskyy, 8 February 2024

The decision that many expected has finally been made and delivered publicly.

President Zelenskky has dismissed his military commander-in-chief, General Zaluzhnyi.

As I wrote in a previous post here, this is not a new story. The tensions in this relationship have been apparent for at least the past year, and even further back. It should be stated up front that in peace and war, tensions are always present in civil-military relationships.

There is sufficient modern scholarship on this topic that demonstrates this working tension between national leaders and the most senior military commanders in countries. Works by people like Risa Brooks, Peter Feaver, Eliot Cohen and others, who have explored this topic through the lens of multiple conflicts in different nations, are well worth reviewing.

But a key principle in civil-military relations stands out. In democracies, civilian-military relationships is an unequal dialog. The civilian leader always has primacy.

The lack of success in the 2023 counter-offensive, and the interview of General Zaluzhnyi by The Economist in late 2023 as well as his most recent article published by CNN, have resulted in strains in the President / Commander-in-Chief relationship. Perceptions about Zaluzhnyi’s possible aspirations to be President of Ukraine (and these are speculation, so far) have combined with other challenges in the relationship, bringing everything to a head.  

President Zelenskyy released a video which outlines the dismissal of Zaluzhnyi. In it, he noted that he has appointed Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskyi as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. In his statement, Zelenskky also describes how:

Today, I made the decision to renew the leadership of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. I am grateful to General Zaluzhnyi for two years of defense. I appreciate every victory we have achieved together, thanks to all the Ukrainian warriors who are heroically carrying this war on their shoulders. We candidly discussed issues in the army that require change. Urgent change.