'Bars' replaced 'Volonter': New leadership of Ukrainian Armed Forces

Contents

• Oleksandr Syrskyi - New Commander-in-Chief
• Vadym Sukharevskyi and Andrii Lebedenko - Syrskyi's deputies
• Anatolii Barhylevych - Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine
• Volodymyr Horbatiuk, Oleksii Shevchenko, and Mykhailo Drapatyi - Barhylevych's deputies
• Oleksandr Pavliuk - Commander of the Ground Forces
• Yurii Sodol - Commander of the Joint Forces
• Ihor Plakhuta - Commander of the Territorial Defense Forces
• Ihor Skybiuk - Commander of the Airborne Assault Forces

Oleksandr Syrskyi - New Commander-in-Chief

Oleksandr Syrskyi was born on July 26, 1965, in the village of Novinki, Aleksandrovsky district of Vladimir region (Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, RSFSR). In 1986, he graduated from the Moscow Higher Combined Arms Command School. He began his service as the commander of a motorized rifle platoon in Lubny (Poltava region). Since 1993, he has commanded a motorized rifle battalion of the 6th National Guard Division in Chuhuiv (Kharkiv region), and later served as the commander of a division regiment.

In 1996, he graduated from the Academy of the Armed Forces of Ukraine with honors, and in 2005, from the National Defense Academy of Ukraine, defended his dissertation, and became a candidate of military sciences. In the 2000s, he commanded the 72nd mechanized brigade in Bila Tserkva (Kyiv region). From 2007 to 2011, he was the chief of staff - the first deputy commander of the Unified Operational Command of the Armed Forces. He was awarded the rank of Major General in 2009.

Photo: new Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Oleksandr Syrskyi (t.me/osirskiy)

From 2011 to 2013, he held the position of deputy chief of the General Command Center of the Armed Forces, responsible for cooperation with NATO and reforming the Ukrainian army according to Alliance standards. Since the beginning of the Russian invasion in 2014, Syrskyi has headed the Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) headquarters in Donbas. In this position, he actively participated in the Debaltseve operation. In 2016, he became the head of the Unified Operational Staff of the Armed Forces. Within a year, he became the commander of the ATO, in the spring of 2019 - again the commander of the Unified Operational Staff, and in the summer - the commander of the Ground Forces of the Armed Forces. In 2020, he was awarded the rank of Lieutenant General.

From the first days of the full-scale aggression in 2022, Syrskyi was responsible for the defense of Kyiv. He was awarded the Order of Bohdan Khmelnytsky II degree for its success and received the title of Hero of Ukraine. Subsequently, the Ground Forces commander became responsible for the eastern front in Kharkiv, Izyum, Lyman, Kupiansk, Bakhmut, and Avdiivka directions. He planned and implemented the Kharkiv offensive operation in the fall of 2022, during which Kupiansk, Balaklia, Izyum, Lyman, and Sviatohirsk were liberated.

In 2023, a particular challenge was posed in the Bakhmut direction. Despite the loss of Soledar and Bakhmut, the troops under Syrskyi's command managed to inflict colossal losses on the Russians, effectively liquidating the PMC Wagner. In the summer, the Defense Forces made some progress on the northern and southern flanks, but now, the initiative is with the opponent. The epicenters of the fighting remain Avdiivka, Kupiansk, and the Bakhmut direction.

By the February 8, 2024 decree, Syrskyi was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. He also outlined the priority tasks: clear and detailed planning, improvement of logistics, the balance between performing combat missions and preserving personnel, and implementing new technological solutions.

"Only change and constant improvement of means and methods of conducting combat operations will allow achieving success on this path," he succinctly formulated his vision of future victory.

Let's note that Oleksandr Syrskyi has a longstanding call sign "Bars" (Snow Leopard). His predecessor, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, has had the call sign "Volonter" (Volunteer) since the ATO.

Vadym Sukharevskyi and Andrii Lebedenko - Syrskyi's deputies

Vadym Sukharevskyi was born in Berehove (Zakarpattia region) and graduated from the Mukachevo Lyceum with enhanced military and physical training. In 2004, he participated in a peacekeeping mission in Iraq. In 2009, he graduated from the Lviv Institute of Ground Forces of the National University "Lviv Polytechnic".

In 2011, he became the commander of the airborne company of the 80th separate airborne regiment. He has been involved in repelling Russian aggression since 2014. Sukharevskyi, with the call sign "Borsuk" (Badger), is considered a legend of the Russia-Ukraine war, as it was he who gave the first order to open fire on April 13, 2014, when the 80th brigade covered the special forces in battle with militants near Sloviansk. In August, he was wounded in battles near Krasnyi (Luhansk region).

Photo: Vadym Sukharevskyi, Deputy Head of the Main Committee (t.me/osirskyi).

In 2016, he became the commander of a battalion, received the rank of Colonel in 2020, the following year became the chief of staff of the 35th Marine Brigade, and in February 2022, he took command of the 59th separate motorized infantry brigade named after Yakiv Hanzuk, which was engaged in combat from Oleshky (Kherson region). Until the liberation of Kherson, his brigade fought in the south, after which it was transferred to the Avdiivka direction.

As President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced, in the position of deputy head, Sukharevskyi will be responsible for unmanned systems and the development of drone applications. As a brigade commander, he deployed the production and repair of UAVs.

"Ammunition for FPV drones, for Mavic, for airplane-type drones - we produce all this ourselves," he said in an interview with Forbes, noting that his fighters supply drones to 8 more brigades.

Last week, information also appeared that Sukharevskyi could head the newly formed branch of the military - the Unmanned Systems Forces. As of today, there have been no official comments on this matter.

Another deputy of Syrskyi, Andrii Lebedenko, will be responsible for innovation, the technological component of the army, and combat systems. Before his appointment, he held the position of head of the main department of communication and cybersecurity of the General Staff of the Armed Forces. There is almost no information about Lebedenko; his name appears on the list of persons awarded the Order of Daniel of Galicia in 2022.

Anatolii Barhylevych - Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine

Anatolii Barhylevych was born on April 8, 1969, in the village of Omelyanivka (Korosten district, Zhytomyr region). He graduated from the Tashkent Higher Tank Command School and has been in military service since 1987. In one of the interviews, he mentioned that he was an operational management officer for most of his military career. According to him, these are closed individuals who develop and implement combat plans and know how to deploy any unit.

Photo: Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces Anatolii Barhylevych (t.me/osirskiy)

At the beginning of the war in Donbas in 2014, he held the Chief of Operational Training Management position at the General Operations Directorate of the General Staff. He later joined the Anti-Terrorist Operation headquarters. In 2016, he became the Chief of the Operations Directorate and Deputy Chief of Staff of the Ground Forces Command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. In 2017, he was promoted to the rank of Major General.

From 2020 to 2022, Barhylevych served as the Deputy Commander of the Ground Forces and the Commander of the Territorial Defense Command of Ukraine. Before the full-scale war, he opposed allocating Territorial Defense into a separate military branch. At that time, the Territorial Defense force numbered up to 600 personnel, but the general proposed to increase it to 10,000 in peacetime.

In 2022, he became the Chief of Staff of the operational-strategic group Khortytsia, and in October 2023, he was appointed as the Commander of the Territorial Defense Forces. By the February 9, 2024 decree, he was appointed the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

Volodymyr Horbatiuk, Oleksii Shevchenko, and Mykhailo Drapatyi - Barhylevych's deputies

The following candidates have been approved for the position of Deputy Chief of the General Staff:

Brigadier General Volodymyr Horbatiuk - operational work, staff work, planning, management

Brigadier General Oleksii Shevchenko - logistics

Brigadier General Mykhailo Drapatyi - training and preparation of military personnel

"All the real combat experience of combat commanders, combat brigades, our units, which have built a quality system of soldier training and assessment and analysis of combat actions, all this experience must be implemented for the success of the Defense Forces of Ukraine," said Volodymyr Zelenskyy recently.

Photo: Deputy Chief of the General Staff Volodymyr Horbatiuk (armyinform.com.ua)

Volodymyr Horbatiuk is originally from the Vinnytsia region. In 2014, as a major, he commanded a rotation of the Ukrainian contingent in Kosovo. From 2015 to 2017, he commanded the 54th Separate Mechanized Brigade stationed in Bakhmut. Later, he became the first deputy commander of the operational command West troops.

Photo: Deputy Chief of the General Staff Oleksii Shevchenko (Operational Command South)

Oleksii Shevchenko served in command positions in artillery units and was the deputy head of the National Academy of Ground Forces named after Hetman Petro Sahaidachnyi in Lviv. In the spring of 2022, he became the head of the Military Academy in Odesa.

Photo: Deputy Chief of the General Staff Mykhailo Drapatyi (t.me/militarymediacenter)

Mykhailo Drapatyi was a combat commander in the 72nd Separate Mechanized Brigade (Bila Tserkva) in 2014. He led the operation to liberate Mariupol and his battalion received orders to enter the city on armored vehicles and free hostages from the police headquarters. The situation was complicated by barricades, one of which blocked the path of a column of four vehicles. Drapatyi was in the first one, and his BMP crashed through the barricade, a scene broadcasted by channels worldwide.

In June, battalions of the 72nd separate mechanized brigade set out on a raid along the border with Russia, taking control of areas near Amvrosiivka, Zelenopillia, Marynivka, Dovzhansk, held Savur-Mohyla, and Chervonopartyzansk (Voznesenivka). Then, shelling of Ukrainian units with Grads and Uragans began from Russian territory in support of militants. Drapatyi led the units to Zelenopillia, and on the night of August 7, a decisive breakthrough was made from the so-called Izvaryne pocket. 260 soldiers and over 30 pieces of equipment broke out of the encirclement, but one soldier was killed during the three-day breakout.

After the reconstitution of Drapatyi's battalion, it was sent to Volnovakha, and he went to study at the Ivan Chernyakhovsky National Defense University of Ukraine. Later, he transferred to correspondence courses and returned to the ATO zone as the Chief of Staff and First Deputy Commander of the 30th Separate Mechanized Brigade until the end of the summer. In August 2016, he was appointed as the commander of the 58th Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade (Konotop).

He graduated from the university in 2017, and from July of the same year, he supervised the brigade's actions in the Bakhmut highway area. In 2019, he was prematurely awarded the rank of colonel, after which he transferred the brigade to another commander and returned to the defense university. Until January 2024, Mykhailo Drapatyi commanded the operational-strategic group Kherson.

Oleksandr Pavliuk - Commander of the Ground Forces

Oleksandr Pavliuk was born on August 20, 1970, in Novohrad-Volynskyi (now Zvyahel, Zhytomyr region). In 1991, he graduated from the Kharkiv Guards Higher Tank Command School, and in 2004 - from the National Defense University of Ukraine.

He commanded a tank platoon from 1991 to 1993 in Giebelstadt, Germany. Then he served in Novohrad-Volynskyi as a company commander, battalion commander, and deputy commander of the 30th Separate Mechanized Brigade. In 2006-2007, he commanded Ukrainian peacekeeping forces in Kosovo.

Until 2010, he served as the chief of staff of the 30th Brigade, and then for five years, he was the commander of the 24th Separate Mechanized Brigade in Yavoriv (Lviv region). He participated in repelling Russian aggression in 2014; his brigade liberated Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Severodonetsk, and Lysychansk, and also unblocked Luhansk Airport.

Photo: Ground Forces Commander Oleksandr Pavliuk (t.me/landforcesofukraine)

From 2015 to 2020, he served in the operational command West of the Ground Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, initially as chief of staff and then as commander. In 2018, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant general. In 2020-2021, he was responsible for training the command of the Ground Forces. In the summer of 2021, he became the Joint Forces Operation (JFO) commander. From March to May 2022, he was the chief of the Kyiv region Military Administration, after which he became the chief of staff of the Ground Forces and deputy commander, simultaneously responsible for Kyiv's defense forces and assets grouping. In February 2023, he became the Deputy Minister of Defense.

By decree dated February 11, 2024, Pavliuk was appointed Commander of the Ground Forces. The former commander and current Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Oleksandr Syrskyi, called his candidacy the only choice.

"When the President asked me who would command the Ground Forces, I had no other candidates," Syrskyi noted.

Pavliuk himself stated that he understands the full range of tasks.

"I will use my experience to develop the Ground Forces. Under the leadership of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and the General Staff, I will do everything possible to strengthen the Ground Forces and bring victory closer," he wrote on his Telegram.

Yurii Sodol - Commander of the Joint Forces

Yurii Sodol was born on December 26, 1970, in Chuguiv (Kharkiv region) into a military family. After completing secondary school in Mariupol, he graduated from the Sumy Higher Artillery Command School in 1992, and in 2002 - from the National Defense University of Ukraine with a specialization in "combat application and management of units (parts, formations) of the Ground Forces." He obtained the qualification of an officer of operational-tactical level military administration.

Photo: Joint Forces Commander Yurii Sodol (armyinform.com.ua)

He served in the airborne forces since 2003. During this time, he made 96 parachute jumps. In 2007, he was appointed commander of the 25th Airborne Brigade.

Since 2014, he participated in the Anti-Terrorist Operation, and his brigade spent five months in active combat in the Rubizhne and Yampil areas, defending Donetsk Airport, and covering the retreat of Ukrainian forces from Debaltseve. In 2015, Sodol qualified as an operational-strategic level military administration officer and became the first deputy commander of the Air Assault Forces. Then he changed his profile, and in 2018, he was appointed commander of the Marine Corps, receiving the rank of lieutenant general.

Before being appointed Commander of the Joint Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, he was the commander of the operational-tactical grouping Donetsk (Vuhledar direction).

Ihor Plakhuta - Commander of the Territorial Defense Forces

The public biography of Ihor Plakhuta begins in the mid-2000s when he served as the commander of the Separate Presidential Brigade. In 2009, he was the commander of the 169th Desna Training Center, and later - the chief of the Southern Territorial Command of the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine.

In this position, he supervised the dispersal of protesters on the Maidan. In particular, in December 2013, he explained to journalists that it took about 400 Internal Troops and Berkut fighters to clear the barricades on Bankova and Lutheran streets, and in February, his law enforcement officers launched a large-scale assault on the Maidan. On the other hand, some participants of those events indicate that Plakhuta was one of the few who negotiated with the protesters.

Photo: Commander of the Territorial Defense Forces Ihor Plakhuta (facebook.com/vadym.filashkin)

After the Revolution of Dignity (Maidan Revolution), he retired and became deputy rector of the Institute of State Security Management. In 2018-2019, he was the deputy head of the Institute of State Security Management at Taras Shevchenko National University.

From the early days of the full-scale war, he was on the front lines, serving as the deputy commander of the Special Operations Forces and for almost a year performing the duties of the deputy commander of the operational-strategic group Khortytsia.

He supervised the preparation of defense lines, fortification arrangements, the construction of operational defense lines, and the circular defense of Kupiansk. He organized the preparation of reserves for operations on the front line, and with tight deadlines, he created reserves of formations on the Lyman and Selydove directions. By decree dated February 11, 2024, he was appointed Commander of the Territorial Defense Forces.

Ihor Skybiuk - Commander of the Airborne Assault Forces

One of the least publicized military figures in Syrskyi's team. Ihor Skybiuk began his service in 1998 in the 80th Separate Airborne Assault Brigade as a platoon commander, after which he served in the 95th Polissya Brigade. He participated in peacekeeping missions, the Anti-Terrorist Operation, and the Joint Forces Operation.

Photo: Commander of the Airborne Assault Forces Ihor Skybiuk (dshv.mil.gov.ua)

The full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation was met in the south while serving as the commander of the 80th Separate Airborne Assault Galician Brigade. After a series of successful combat missions - defense of important areas, destruction of elite enemy units, liberation of occupied settlements - units of the Galician Brigade were redeployed to the Donbas.

Skybiuk was awarded the title of Hero of Ukraine for successful actions during the Kharkiv counteroffensive operation. From November 2022, he was chief of staff and deputy commander of the Airborne Assault Forces.