Zelenskyy Sets Air Defense and Mobilization Priorities for Ukraine’s New Defense Leadership

Ukraine’s new Commander-in-Chief Mykhailo Drapatyi and acting Defense Minister Yevhen Khmara must work together to strengthen the country’s air defenses and overhaul its mobilization system, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on July 23.

Ukrainska Pravda reported the remarks on the same day, citing Zelenskyy’s press conference in Kyiv with Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin.

Zelenskyy said Drapatyi and Khmara would be responsible for addressing the central challenges facing Ukraine’s defense leadership after years of full-scale war.

“Both Drapatyi and Khmara will have to fulfill the main task after this long, exhausting war for everyone. The issues of closing the skies, the TCCs, and giving mobilization a normal face—if I can put it that way—all of this will have to be done together, in alliance, until the war ends. Unfortunately, such an alliance did not exist before,” Zelenskyy said.

TCCs are Ukraine’s territorial recruitment and social support centers, which administer military registration, recruitment, and mobilization.

Zelenskyy said the same tasks had previously been assigned to former Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov and General Oleksandr Syrskyi, the former Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

He emphasized that the responsibilities of the military command and civilian defense leadership could not be separated, with one side blamed for failures while the other was absolved.

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Both officials took up their duties during a reshuffle of Ukraine's wartime leadership. Mykhailo Fedorov left the Defense Ministry on July 15 as the government was reorganized, and Serhii Koretskyi was approved as prime minister the following day.

Yevhen Khmara, then acting head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), was named acting defense minister on July 17.

At the same time, protests demanding Fedorov's return and the dismissal of General Oleksandr Syrskyi, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, took place for seven consecutive evenings across Kyiv, Lviv, Kharkiv, Odesa, Dnipro, and other cities.

Zelenskyy dismissed General Oleksandr Syrskyi as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on July 21 and appointed Drapatyi as his replacement.

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