The past 48 hours have seen much speculation about President Zelenskyy having decided to remove General Zaluzhnyi from his appointment as Commander in Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Of course, this is not a new story. But what might be the implications? 1/25 🧵
2/ The tensions in this relationship have been apparent for some time. During my first 2023 visit to #Ukraine early last year, I was informed that Zaluzhnyi had been forbidden from speaking to the press without Presidential approval.
3/ The lack of success in the 2023 counter-offensive, the interview by General Zaluzhnyi in @TheEconomist in late 2023, and perceptions about his presidential aspirations all appear to have built to a crescendo in the past few days.
4/ 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. But, in democracies, it is an unequal dialog. The civilian leader has primacy.
5/ If Zaluzhnyi is removed (again, not confirmed), there would be many examinations of the wreckage that got us to this point. That is not my intent here. My focus instead is on the key impacts of a possible Zaluzhnyi dismissal. I believe there are six.
6/ Impact 1. Command of UAF. Zaluzhnyi has been a charismatic & popular leader who prepared in the weeks before the Russian large-scale invasion. He is also an intellectual leader, having written two influential articles on the trajectory of the war and Ukraine’s strategy.
7/ He also cares deeply for the lives of his troops, and is not an overtly political general. This is not a common combination. It is what sets Zaluzhnyi apart from his peers. x.com
8/ This mix of professional competence, delegation, moral courage, intellectual humility and curiosity are vital strategic leadership traits and will be hard to replace.
9/ Impact 2. Successive changes down the chain. A Zaluzhnyi removal would assume that a suitable replacement is found. But in every high-level appointment there are successive moves of personnel well down the chain of command.
10/ This will be a little disruptive, but it is also what military organisations are designed for. Any change in the commander in chief will also change the fortunes of many other senior military leaders. Some will rise and some who were previously on the rise will stagnate.
11/ Impact 3. Advice to the President. A key role of the C-in-C is military advice to the President. This will obviously change with a new C-in-C. Given Zaluzhnyi’s experience as C-in-C in this war, & qualities described above, it will take time for the new C-in-C to settle in.
12/ Impact 4. Relationships with allies and security partners. While the Defence Minister is the primary interlocutor with foreign nations on military assistance, this is based on Zaluzhnyi’s priorities. The C-in-C maintains close links with US and NATO military chiefs.
13/ These would have to be re-established if a new C-in-C takes over. This would take time, but would be facilitated by the enormous good will towards #Ukraine among NATO military institutions and leaders.
14/ Impact 5. Perceptions of government instability. This is a danger area for Zelenskyy. There may be some, particularly in the US Congress, who could use a change in the C-in-C and the public fallout afterwards, as additional evidence for why they shouldn’t support #Ukraine.
15/ As such, the government narrative and information strategy in the wake of any removal of the C-in-C would be vital to get right.
16/ Impact 6. Russian info operations. The Russian president is acting as if he is on the road to victory. This is a deliberate strategy to influence US Congress members, & other politicians around the world, that Russian victory is inevitable & support for Ukraine is wasted.
17/ Any removal of Zaluzhnyi would play into this Russian strategic narrative. While the removal of the C-in-C is the prerogative of a civilian leader in any democracy, it will still come with political and strategic information costs.
18/ Impact 7. The Future of Zaluzhnyi. The current C-in-C won’t disappear if he is sacked by Zelenskyy. While it has been reported that he has been offered alternative national security appointments, finding the right appointment for Zaluzhnyi will be difficult.
19/ He has experience, stature, networks and leadership skills that will be difficult to reconcile with staff appointments. My sense however is that while Zaluzhnyi will not want to go, he is also first and foremost a soldier and servant of his country.
20/ It is very likely that he will not want to make the war effort more difficult for his nation by drawing out any removal.
21/ I won’t address presidential aspirations here. Projecting such aspirations on Zaluzhnyi without evidence is unfair to him.
22/ The civ-mil relationship between President and C-in-C is clearly at breaking point & in a place where only 1 of 2 things can happen: 1. A significant reconciliation; or, 2. Someone has to go. In democracies, that ‘someone’ is always the senior military person.
23/ There is an abundance of ambiguity about the next few hours and days in this civil-military crisis in #Ukraine. Like many, I am a huge admirer of General Zaluzhnyi and the stellar leadership he has provided to the Ukrainian military.
24/ But, unfortunately, if this speculation continues he may soon reach a point of no return in his relationship with the President. That is a tragedy for #Ukraine. However, such crises are also the nature of civil-military relationships in democracies during peace and war. End.
25/ Thank you to the following for the insights, images and links used in this thread: @IAPonomarenko @shashj @DefenceU @CinC_AFU @KyivIndependent @reuters @olliecarroll @ChristopherJM
Hopefully everyone noticed my (deliberate) mistake in this thread: there are 7 key impacts, not 6!!!
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